spectator often cannot understand, the Christian is prepared to act with the high powers of a spiritual nature. In the appointed time, the new creature emerges from its prison; the captive sees the light of heaven; he lives in other regious; he feeds on other food: he is already in desire become an inhabitant of heaven-on the wings of faith he soars towards God.

COAL.

Do you know the substance I have laid upon the table? Have you often seen it? Why have I brought it before you?

Tell me what you know about it.

What kind of substance is it? Is it hard? cold? heavy? opaque?

Does it belong to the animal kingdom? To the vegetable? To the mineral?

Where are minerals found?

Who forms them in the earth?

Must the Creator have foreseen our wants, when He formed coal?

When is coal particularly a comfort?

And what ought we to feel for the comfort?

Now let us consider this piece of coal. Were I to put a living creature on the table, what would you observe in it, which you cannot observe in the coal? Will the coal ever move? Has it animal life?

Were a plant to remain long upon the table, what change would take place in it?-Would a similar change ever take place in the coal? Why not?

We spoke of the coal as hard: is it as hard

as a stone?

If you rub the coal in your hands, what will you perceive? Why?

Would a dark stone produce the same effect? Why not?

* Has every piece of coal a shape? Has every piece of coal the same shape?

Is shape an essential, or an accidental quality?

Is particular shape ever essential?

Is the particular shape of the coal essential or accidental?

Of what properties can you think as essential to coal?

What is the peculiar use of coal?

Would stone or clay answer the same purpose? Why not?

Stone and clay cannot be kindled, but we see that coal can:-what is coal with respect to the fire? Does it create fire? Is it not the food of fire?

Will a piece of coal burn always ?—When the coal burns, does all the fire you see proceed from that which was first applied to it?

In what respects does the coal become changed by the action of fire?.

What takes place when the coal begins to burn?

We said that its colour is black; does it continue black?

What becomes of the blackness?

What proceeds from the co in its burning state? [Smoke].

And what more? [Light and heat]. And what is then the whole appearance of the coal?

How may we describe the action of the fire? [It unlocks the dark hard matter, and unites with the latent fire in the coal; it decomposes the coal, and changes a part of it into its own substance.]

What becomes of the fire when the coal is consumed?

And where is the heat dispersed?

What becomes of the grosser part of the coal?

Does the cinder contain as much latent fire as the coal? Why not?

What has the coal lost by burning? Is its weight the same? Its size? Its colour? Its hardness? Its power of combustion?

With what element do the ashes at last mingle?

After the different particles of the coal are separated by burning, can you trace whither they go?

Who knows whither every single particle is gone, and makes every particle serve its proper end?

Now let us collect into one view, some of the particulars we have noticed in our conversation.

In what different states may you think of the coal? [First, of its state in the mine, where probably this piece of coal formed part of a large mass.

Secondly, we may consider it in the state in which we now see it, when it has been dug out of the mine, and separated from the mass of which it was a part.

Thirdly, we may think of it in a burning state; as emitting smoke, flame, light, and heat. Fourthly, we may think of it when it has undergone the operation of fire, either partially or wholly.]

• Let us consider how the qualities of the coal differ in its different states.

You have already told me some of the qualities of the coal in its present state-tell me how it differs in its burning state.

*

And what can you tell me of it, when it has become a cinder?

Let us try whether, from any part of our considerations, we can draw spiritual improve

ment.

What is the present state of the coal? Is it not cold, gross, dark, hard, heavy and inert?All these qualities exist in the unrenewed heart.

If you had never seen burning coal, would you have supposed the piece you now see, capable of being brought into a state so different from the former?

And if we could, with our spiritual eyes, behold the heart of man as it really is, entirely opposed to the divine grace and love-if we could be fully aware of its blackness, coldness,