from bad books. They devour without suspicion every thing which promises to gratify curiosity, or furnish entertainment; and swallow poison when they should be taking nourishment.

The present is a reading age; the world is flooded with books; and individuals of every class, but particularly the young, need the admonition of the text. "Cease, my son, from the instruction that causeth to err from the words of knowledge." Permit me then, in accordance with the spirit of the text, to direct your attention to

I. The Books which are sources of corruption.

II. The Evils which flow from them.

I. The Books which are sources of corruption.

The first class are those which wage open and direct warfare against religion. The leading popular works of this class were written by men of acute minds, distinguished for their knowledge of the world, and impelled to their task by a fiend-like hatred of the object of their assault. Were there not a congenial spirit in the sinful heart, the sophistries of Hume with all their ingenuity, the wit and sprightliness of Voltaire, the eloquence of Rousseau, and the obscenities and ribaldries of Paine and his vulgar herd of imitators, would scarcely awaken sufficient interest to induce the mind to wander through their pages. But unhappily this affinity exists, and with a power of attraction sufficient to give them a cordial welcome, and secure to them a wide circulation. They are found in almost every community, and are read with avidity by age and youth, but particularly the latter.

As the aim of these writers is to rend asunder every tie which binds man to the throne of God; to destroy all sense of moral obligation to induce man to renounce his allegiance to the government of Jehovah, despise his authority, trample upon his laws, and be a god to himself; they dispute the Divine existence; or if it be admitted that there is a God, they deny that he takes cognizance of the affairs of men; death is pronounced an eternal sleep; the Bible is treated with contempt and scorn, as an imposition upon the credulity of the world, a fabrication of designing priests, a tissue of absurdity and falsehood; virtue and vice, truth and falsehood, are reprobated as distinctions made to rob men of their natural liberty; Jesus Christ is held up to derision as a deceiver and vile impostor; prophecies are denounced as lies; miracles as cheats; the judgment, heaven, and hell, are scouted and scoffed at, as the dreams of enthusiasm, bugbears to frighten children; human accountability is made a subject of ridicule; and man is taught to lie, defraud, commit adultery or suicide, according to his pleasure.

The great object they have in view is to establish the reign of licentiousness, in which passion and appetite, and lust may walk

abroad without shame, and be indulged without control. In this manner and for such purposes, genius, learning, eloquence and wit, which might have adorned and blessed the world, have prostituted themselves.

It tells but little in favor of the moral condition of our race, when men so employ exalted powers of mind, and interest prompts to the publication of such works, and multitudes are found to read them with avidity and imbibe their principles. But they release from the restraints of the gospel, and vindicate the ways of iniquity; the sinful heart therefore will take pleasure in them.

Let the young be warned against them. They are subtle, yet sophistical, full of bold assertion, misrepresentation, and falsehood; they substitute sneers and ridicule for fact and argument; and though they have been triumphantly refuted a thousand times, still their circulation is encouraged to the ruin of many.

2. Another class of destructive books are the licentious and impure. These, though not written with the same professed design, take the surest method of accomplishing it.

For

"Errors in the life, breed errors in the brain,

And these reciprocally those again."

Others, like the

Some of these are the grossest vehicles of impurity. sheet let down before the scrupulous apostle, are full of all manner of beasts, both of the clean and the unclean. And while the dress of the former shares the coarseness and vulgarity of their sentiments, the latter have summoned to their aid all the eloquence of prose and all the attractions of poetry. Their authors with a brow of brass, and a heart that is the sink of pollution, devote themselves to the business of corrupting the imagination, inflaming the passions and exciting lust; and through their instrumentality passions and lusts are stirred up, which subvert the order of society, and waste the happiness of individuals and families, and which, but for the influence of such books, might have slept forever in the bosom.

On their pages genius appears sadly perverted from its proper office, ministering to the corrupt taste of vice and profligacy. It may be regarded as treason against the cause of literature to name in this connection some of the authors now alluded to. Fielding, Smollet, Sterne, Moore, and Byron, are proud names on the literary annals of the world. But shall the savage spirit of the lion and the leopard be concealed from the public mind, and they have privilege to hurt and destroy at pleasure, because of the nobleness of their natures or the beauty of their appearance?

The wide-spread pestilence, beneath whose arm the strong men faint at the tops of the streets, and the mighty sink in helplessness on their beds and in their graves, is far less to be dreaded, than these

poisonous fountains, whose waters cause the soul to stagnate and perish in its own corruptions. They cannot be read in company but at the expense of decency, nor in the closet without opening the heart to every foul spirit. The foundations of society are convulsed and overthrown by them, and man in all his pride and glory degraded beneath the level of the brutes that perish.

3. A third class of pernicious writings are works of imagination and fiction.

In this we include novels, romances, and plays. They exceed in number both of the others, and are generally far less exceptionable in their character. Their avowed object is to enlarge our acquaintance with human nature, and cherish a love of virtue, and a hatred of vice. Did they fulfil the promises of which their authors are lavish, the civilized world would present a very different picture from that which now every where meets the eye. Instead of vice enthroned as a queen, idolized and worshipped as the source of honor, office, influence, and wealth, virtue would be in the ascendant, and reign and triumph among men. But while they profess to make the world wiser and better, the result of their labors is to furnish amusement, and enlarge and perpetuate the empire of sin. Truth and justice demand that exceptions should be made from this general sentence of denunciation, particularly in favor of some works of this class, which are of modern date. Their materials are drawn from the living world, and though worked up by fancy, to impart to them the interest of a tale, they fulfil to some extent the office of history, and inculcate important lessons of truth. But while these and some other peculiarities exempt them from unqualified condemnation, and entitle them to a preference among works of this class, still, like the miserable fictions which preceded them, they often "cause to err from the words of knowledge."

Could nothing more be said of these works but that they merely furnish amusement, we should scarcely have given them a notice from the pulpit. But while as a body they are useless for any higher purpose, they have a bearing upon the moral and religious interests of the community, which demands the note of warning. Combining in themselves eloquence, humor, wit, all the powers of language and all the graces of style, they possess an attractiveness scarcely to be resisted. Hence they are read with avidity, at an age when their influence is most to be deprecated. To these sources may be traced many errors both in principle and practice which war against the soul.

Were these various classes of pernicious books brought together into one vast pile, and, like those of the converts at Ephesus, "burned before all men," the world would experience no real loss, but infinite

gain. The first and second classes breathe the unmingled atmosphere of pollution and death. And the last, with few exceptions, tend to corrupt the youthful heart and divert it from the proper objects of pursuit, and especially from the great interests of eternity.

II. The manner in which this is done, or the evil tendency of such works, is the second point of consideration.

1. They waste precious time. "What is our life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away!" This is its character viewed in its greatest extent, from the cradle to three score years and ten, the allotted period of human life. Subtract from this period the hours devoted to refreshment and rest, the time spent in business, employed in the discharge of ordinary domestic duties, or given to needful exercise, and what remains? A third part of human life is passed in the unconsciousness of sleep. Add to this what is appropriated to eating and drinking, or to worldly engagements, and the remainder dwindles to a span.

But man is not born to a mere worldly existence. His intellectual and moral powers point him out the heir of a higher and nobler destiny; a destiny beyond the grave, in the presence of God, in the company of angels, among the spirits of the just made perfect. While wedded to his sinfulness this inheritance is in forfeiture. But through the reign of grace, it is still held forth to his acceptance, and he is enjoined and urged, by timely repentance-by striving against and forsaking every evil way, appropriating Jesus Christ in his merits and offices, living in obedience to the Divine commands, cultivating holiness, and being active in every good work-to press forward to the heavenly possession.

Failing in the attainment of this, the soul sinks under accumulated guilt, into everlasting wo! Such is the character of human existencc. Threatened on one side with overwhelming ruin, wooed on the other by immortal bliss. To flee the one and lay hold on the other, are the great purposes for which life is continued; and were every moment of it appropriated to the grand object, it would not be too much. But a great proportion is necessarily diverted, and a fragment only can be made available. Reading, prayer, self communion, active benevolence, all the means employed and efforts made, are to a great extent circumscribed within the narrow limits of this unappropriated period. Whether this period be longer or shorter than has been intimated, what is it in comparison with the work to be performed?

Shall a part. even of this be spent in vain and unprofitable reading? Shall we give to mere amusement, the precious and invaluable hours on which hang the immortal interests of immortal man? Is it not a lavish expenditure and sinful waste of an invaluable gift?

Where such reading is indulged, until it grows into a habit, we can scarcely calculate the waste of time. There is a fascination in well written works of fiction, (and to these I now allude,) which gives them a magic power over the soul, by means of which they insensibly steal away months and years. If the time thus spent makes a serious inroad upon life, contemplated as a whole, how much more serious the inroad made upon the golden period of youth! With you, my young friends, it is emphatically a wasting of the seed time on which hang the hopes of the future harvest. And if you, under such circumstances, perish in your sins, how utterly without excuse will you be, in the presence of the great Judge! He has admonished you with frequency and tenderness,-"Redeem the time." "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness." But, in direct contempt of all, you throw away the hours big with the promise of the year, in pursuit of worthless gratification. Dare you, in this manner, pervert the talents entrusted to your charge? Dare you so challenge the character of the wasteful steward, before the bar of God, and bring upon yourself the fearful sentence,-" Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness?" Such is your presumption when you spend time in unprofitable reading.

Add to what has been said, the further consideration that these works, while they amuse, corrupt the mind; those of the first classes infusing a most deadly poison; those of the last, a poison less virulent and active, but scarcely less fatal; and the waste of time grows in criminality a thousand fold. The period granted, in mercy, to heal the disorders of the soul, you devote to spreading and deepening the infection; and thus work death with what was intended to be the means of endless life!

2. They create a disrelish for serious reading. "Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me." In such language the great Prophet of mankind indicates one of the chief sources of religious instruction and influence. A preached gospel is the grand means which God has instituted for the conversion and training of the soul. But next to this, and inferior only to it in importance, is the reading of the Scriptures and other religious works. Faith and all those associate virtues which form the christian character, and qualify the soul for the service and enjoyment of God, originate in a knowledge of that truth which is embodied in the word of God, and can only be acquired through the medium of hearing and reading.

Whatever tends to unfit the mind for employing this means must prejudice the best interests of man. Will any dispute that this is the effect of the works under consideration? Infidelity wars against