very enviable one, I know. Yet is it God's will in our regard, and we must try to bear our own part of the sad burthen of our own generation. These French and Germans are our brothers, I say, and we must try to give them a brother's sympathy and a brother's help. Even here, in this house of God, we cannot shut out from ourselves the terrible war sounds that are borne to us on every wind. Nor ought we endeavour to shut them out, especially on Christmas Day. Still, in this place, we have only one course in respect of them which it is right to follow. And that course is very clear. This pulpit, at all events, has no purely political end. It has no purely political sympathy. It has nothing to say to the purely political aspects of this fearful war. To it, France and the Fatherland are equal, for, to it, France and the Fatherland are only two portions of that grander nation which alone it owns. Outside the pulpit a preacher has a right to hold whatever political opinion his reason and his conscience ratify: inside the pulpit he has no policy at all. At all events, while teaching God's religion, he will make very small account of man's political divisions. Looking from the pulpit his eyes can discern no boundaries that separate the nations: he forgets that there are such things as various nationalities at all. But he never forgets that nation of which Christ is King, nor the men that form it who are his brothers. Wherever men honour the name of Jesus; wherever they have been baptized into His body; wherever

their hopes rest upon His mercies; wherever they weep over the blood-shedding of Calvary, and weep still more that it has been so much in vain; wherever this twenty-fifth of December is with them a sacred day as being the birth-day of a Messenger of Perpetual Peace, there must a Christian's sympathies for ever go, for there is the Christian's Fatherland! And therefore do we, on this blessed day, putting aside, as not concerning us, all disputes about the French and German claims to our political approval, pray up to God for that common Christendom to which both nations claim to belong. And we beg of Christ to come down as a little Babe and a Prince of Peace upon our earth once more; to calm the hot French heart, and unbend the haughty German brain; to instil a little of His own gentleness into the souls of warriors, a little of His own simplicity into the souls of statesmen; to scatter these horrid war-clouds that vex men's eyes, and to still these horrid warshouts that vex men's ears; till all, Frenchman and German, unite once more in singing the angels' song, "Glory be to God on high; on earth, peace; good will to men."

IX.

AT THE PROFESSION OF A NUN.*

"Then shall the kingdom of heaven be like to ten virgins who taking their lamps went out to meet the bridegroom and the bride. Now, five of them were foolish, and five were wise, * * * And at midnight there was a cry made: Behold the bridegroom cometh, go ye forth to meet him. And the foolish said to the wise: Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out. The wise answered saying: Lest there be not enough for us and for you, go you rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves. Now while they went to buy, the bridegroom came and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage and the door was shut."-MATTHEW, xxv. 1, 2, 6, 8, 9, 10.

THERE is for any child of man, my Brethren, no inquiry of such surpassing moment as the inquiry after the precise path on which he will walk to the Lord.

* This short sermon was never actually preached. It was to have been preached on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, 1869. The assembly to which it proposed to address itself would have been such an assembly as is ordinarily found in Ireland at the Profession of a nun, viz.: priests, nuns, and the lay friends of the young religious. These remarks will explain some of the sermon's allusions.

For many reasons the determining of one's vocation, as we call it, is the most important of important matters. As a consequence, it always requires the most caution and conscientious attention. That a person should pause long and ponder deeply before he commits himself to any permanent line of life viewed merely as leading to a temporal end, is a maxim universally received. That there should be thought at least equally long and equally solemn when there is question of selecting a line of life viewed as leading to an eternal end, is what no sane man will be found to deny. The choice of a road to get to God, is, at least, of as great moment as the choice of a road to get to riches. The selection between the world and religion is, therefore, a very solemn matter, to be preceded by very solemn self-examination. But that self-examination once over, the chosen path should be entered upon generously and earnestly, with a whole heart and a whole will to walk along it bravely to the end. When God's finger has pointed, and God's mouth has spoken, no foot should slacken, and no heart should fail.

Now, the paths upon which it is possible to walk to heaven are, in a rough way, reducible to two :— the path of the pious who live in the world, and the path of the pious who live outside it. Each of these has its recommendations real or apparent; each has its drawbacks real or apparent too. Of the path of the pious who live in the world, it must, in the first place, be said, that it is seemingly a very pleasant

one betimes. Father and mother, sisters and brothers, dear relatives and dear friends, are fellow-travellers thereon. Much to delight the eye, and ear, and palate, meet one on the journey. There are of course delays and disappointments in abundance. But, as a rule, most of what the heart desires is supplied on the way. And at all events there is ever present that sense of liberty, that unconsciousness of outer restraint, which is certainly a pleasant thing, and which by many is held the most pleasant thing of all. The man of the world is for the most part his own master. His own will may be his own rule. He has not entered where the doors are shut. There is no flower about him that he may not pluck or have a chance of plucking. There is no sight around him that he may not either see or have a chance of seeing. There is no fruit above him that he may not either taste or have a chance of tasting. For, though God has kept the heaven of heavens to Himself, yet the earth He has given to the sons of men!

Yet of this world-path, my Brethren, must it be said in the second place that it is a dangerous one withal. There is no doubt about the fact, though we may be puzzled enough to see how it comes to pass, that the most agreeable things in the world are just those things which are employed most frequently and most successfully in the devil's service. Since the fall of Adam the whole world (and especially the pleasantness thereof) is become one great temptation. There are serpents hidden under every