name." It is as if he would say, "Whatever may be my natural and my spiritual endowments, 'all that is within me' shall love, and laud, and magnify the Author of my being, the Finisher of my salvation, and the Sanctifier of my nature. Not a thought, nor a feeling, not an affection, nor a sentiment within me, shall draw back from this blessed occupation. Every faculty of my nature, every emotion of my soul, shall be consecrated unto God."

Who is there among us that would refuse to follow this example of the Psalmist? Who does not feel his constant need to imitate it? Our hearts within us are dull and selfish by nature. They require to be continually roused to activity and zeal in the Lord's service, and to be effectually stirred up to grateful celebrations of the Divine goodness.

Alas! how prone are we to forget the mercies of our God. Day unto day uttereth speech of the liberality of the Lord: night unto night showeth forth knowledge of His long-suffering: year after year proclaims aloud the vastness, the freeness, and the excellency, of His love toward us. Oh! that day unto day uttered speech also of our devotedness : that night unto night showed forth knowledge of our gratitude; and that one year after another proclaimed aloud the sincerity, the intensity, and the continual increase, of our love to our Redeemer. Surely the burden of every renewed heart is this, that its praises are so cold and lifeless, and its gratitude so grievously inadequate.

Intelligent thank-offering is the honorable employment, and the peculiar prerogative, of angels and of the Lord's redeemed. All creation, indeed, should celebrate the praises

of the Great Creator. In either world, the animate and the inanimate, all things, all beings, should show forth His praise. The lower animals in their measure, equally with men, are recipients of the blessings of the Most High, and are, like them, dependents upon His bounty. They partake of His universal provision, and they lie sleeping under His almighty protection. But, so far as we can tell, they know not the God that made them, neither do their instincts raise them to their unseen Benefactor. They possess, however, earthly benefactors whom they see and know, and the gratitude of these dumb creatures towards their masters, not unfrequently presents a striking contrast to the ingratitude of men towards their God. In His own unerring word, He thus puts His people to shame by the comparison: "Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the Lord hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider." Isa. i. 2, 3.

Ingratitude is no light sin. Its guilt increases in a four fold proportion, for it must be estimated by the greatness of the Giver, by the unworthiness of the receiver, and by the number, and by the excellency, of the benefits bestowed. Ingratitude from man to man is odious. Ingratitude from man to God is base and horrible in the extreme. To accept a benefit and to return no acknowledgment, is altogether without the shadow of an excuse. In the sight of God and men, the ingrate is most justly despicable.

Who shall describe the Egyptian blackness of ingratitude?

It is "

a darkness that may be felt." It is the "midnight" of the soul. It is the death-stroke on every "first-born" hope, every noble aspiration, of the human breast. Ingratitude is satanic. The first foul spirit that rebelled, was the first ingrate in creation. The type, the personification of ingratitude, is the "Dragon, that old Serpent." Rev. xx. 2. Nursed in his first estate of happiness and glory, he kept it not, but turned against the gracious Lord that had created him. No bosom is proof against the entrance of ingratitude; and when once admitted, no created being can of himself resist its transforming, and demoralizing, power. The angel who first entertained it in his breast, became thereby the first fiend. Pride has been called the father, and ingratitude may be denominated the monster-mother, of iniquity. The whole brood of our transgressions display the lineaments of their descent. So "exceeding sinful" is this sin, that there is not a single thought, or word, or deed, against the Universal Benefactor, but bears the impress of their ingratitude upon its front. Every sin is not envious, nor false, nor malicious, but every sin against our God is certainly ungrateful. Anger is an ingrate. Envy is an ingrate. Falsehood is an ingrate. Examine every form and species of transgression against the Most High,-idolatry, disobedience, selfrighteousness, blasphemy, pride, malice, self-will, and every other sin that can be named-these, all these, not only render us guilty in express terms of law, but also prove us to generation of vipers," who sting the very bosom in which they have been nursed.

be a

Ingratitude is the arid desert in the region of the human

heart, warmed by the sun and watered by the rains, yet continuing as bare and unproductive as before. It exhibits the sluggard's garden in our soul, bearing disgraceful testimony both against its owner and itself. tree in our profession, which after

It is like the barren figyears of watching and The dark mine yields

of cultivation, brings forth no fruit. ore, and the hard rock gives gold; from the worthless shell we gain a pearl, and from a poor mean worm we are supplied with silk; but from ingratitude we get no return. It is darker than the mine, and harder than the rock; it is more worthless than the shell, more mean and ungenerous than the worm. Some sins have a specious appearance in the eyes of the world, whereby men's minds are oft beguiled to call them virtues; but ingratitude possesses not a single redeeming quality. It has no specious appearance, no fair oolor, no bright side whatsoever. It is unmixed evil-essential evil-“ only evil, and that continually." Historians have not recorded it in any single instance with approbation. Moralists have made no exceptional case in its favor to admit it amongst the virtues. Poets have not been heard to sing its praises in any nation or language under heaven. Philosophers may have pandered to almost every vice, but none have pandered to ingratitude. Merchants have made gains of innumerable sins, but no man has turned ingratitude to account. It is an unstamped coin of the kingdom of darkness. None acknowledge it in earth or hell. It is a vice so base, that even the vilest of men will turn with indignation when denominated ingrates. Ingratitude is robbery, for it deprives the benefactor of the acknowledgment

that is his due. Ingratitude is rebellion, for the King of Heaven has commanded us in everything to give thanks. Ingratitude is cruel, how many a heart has it not broken? Ingratitude is a monster which, wherever it appears, obtains universal execration, standing unrivalled in its own peculiar turpitude, alike unexcused and inexcusable.

How revolting, therefore, how "exceeding sinful" is ingratitude towards God. It deepens the guilt of all our other sins against Him, and imparts to each of them its own hateful character.

But oh, how good, how pleasant, how comely, is gratitude! How just is it, how reasonable! Next in blessedness to giving gifts, is the consciousness of giving thanks. Gratitude is a noble return. It is the highest which man can render either to his God or to his fellows. It is the response of the heart-that very response which God requires, and in which His soul delights. Why has the Lord made this world of ours so fair-adorned the earth with flowers-and crowned the year with goodness? To draw forth our gratitude! Why did he preserve our infancy, guard our youth, and sustain our manhood? To draw forth our gratitude! And why, in addition to all these temporal mercies, has the Lord loaded us with spiritual benefits, so great, so suitable, and so precious, that neither heart can Why, we ask, has

conceive, nor tongue can express them?

the Lord poured forth upon us all the blessings of redemption? Surely, amid other gracious reasons, this is not the least, that He might draw forth from our hearts a full and everlasting gratitude.