tice, cruelty, and oppression; and the friend of all that is just, kind, and courteous. The rough, the brutal, and the ferocious, are alien from its spirit; while the tender, the gentle, and the courteous, are entirely homogeneous with its nature. Tyranny, whether in the palace or the parlor, it frowns upon with indignant countenance, while it is the friend of liberty, and the patron of all rights. The man who understands its genius, and lives under its inspiration, whether he be a monarch, a master, a husband, or a father, must be a man of equity and love. Christianity inspires the purest chivalry--a chivalry shorn of vanity, purified from passion, elevated above frivolity-a chivalry of which the animating principle is love to God; and the scene of its operation the domestic circle, rather than the tournament. He who is unjust or unkind to any one, especially to the weaker sex, betrays a total ignorance of, or a manifest repugnance to, the practical influence of the gospel of Christ. It is a mistake to suppose that the faith of Jesus is intended only to throw its dim religious light over the gloom of the cloister, or to form the character of the devotee; on the contrary, it is pre-eminently a social thing, and is designed as well as adapted to form a character which shall go out into the world in a spirit of universal benevolence: to such a character the oppressor or degrader of woman can make no pretensions.

2. The incarnation of Christ tended to exalt the dignity of the female sex. His assuming humanity

He

has given a dignity to our nature which it had never received before, and could not have received in any other way. Christ is "the Pattern Man" of our race, in whom all the lines of humanity converge and unite, so far as the existence of our race goes. "When he took man's nature, he vouchsafed to ally himself to all the members of this extended series, by the actual adoption of that transmitted being, which related him to the rest. not only became like men and dwelt among them, but he became man himself-an actual descendant from their first progenitor." He was made man. This is why the existence of human nature is a thing so precious. By the very manner of his birth, he seemed to associate himself with our nature. This appears to be the meaning of the apostle in his quotation of the eighth Psalm, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, to show the dignity conferred upon humanity by its being assumed by so glorious a person as our Lord Jesus Christ in his divine nature was. If, then, manhood is honored by Christ assuming it, how much more is woman exalted, who, in addition to this, was made the instrument of giving birth to the humanity of Christ!

It is emphatically said by the apostle, "When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, MADE OF A WOMAN, made under the law.". Gal. iv. 4. In the person of the Virgin Mary, and by her giving birth to that holy Being that was born of her, the sex was elevated. True, it was a personal distinction, that she should be the mother

of our Lord's humanity; and though she has been by the apostate Church of Rome wickedly exalted into an object of idolatrous homage, all generations justly call her blessed. Yet the honor is not limited to herself, but passes over to the sex which she represented; and it is this to which the apostle alludes. He does not even mention the honored individual, says nothing of the Virgin Mary, but dwells upon the abstract, general term, “made of a woman." Every female on earth, from that day to this, has had a relative elevation, by and in that wonderful transaction. Woman is not the mother of God, as the Papists absurdly, and, as I think, almost blasphemously, say; but the mother of that humanity only which was mysteriously united with Divinity. Does not this great fact say, "Let the sex which alone was concerned in giving birth to the Son of God, and Saviour of the world, be ever held in high estimation."

3. The personal conduct of our Lord during his sojourn upon earth, tended to exalt the female sex to a consideration before unknown.

Follow Him through the whole of his earthly career, and mark the attention he most condescendingly paid to, and as condescendingly received from, the female sex. He admitted them to his presence, conversed familiarly with them, and accepted the tokens of their gratitude, affection, and devotedSee him accompanying his mother to the marriage-feast of Cana in Galilee. See him conversing with the woman of Samaria, "instructing

ness.

her ignorance, enduring her petulance, correcting her mistakes, awakening her conscience, converting her soul, and afterward employing her as a messenger of mercy and salvation to her neighbors. See him rebuking his disciples for discouraging the approach of mothers and their infants. See him compassionating the widow of Nain, and restoring her son to life. See him in the little family of Bethany, blending his sympathies with the bereaved sisters; and on another occasion entering into familiar conversation with this same Martha and Mary, faithfully rebuking one, and kindly commending the other. See him receiving the offerings of those women who ministered to him of their substance. Witness the attendance of pious women upon him in the last scenes of his life. It was on Mary Magdalene that the honor of the first manifestation of the risen Saviour was made; and thus a woman was preferred to apostles, and made the messenger of the blissful news to them. "The frequent mention," says Doddridge, "which is made in the evangelists of the generous courage and zeal of some pious women in the service of Christ, and especially of the faithful and resolute constancy with which they attended him in those last scenes of his suffering, might be very possibly intended to obviate that haughty and senseless contempt which the pride of men, often irritated by those vexations to which their own irregular passions have exposed them, has in all ages affected to throw on that sex, which probably, in the sight of God,

constituted by far the better half of mankind, and to whose care and tenderness the wisest and best of men generally owe, and ascribe much of the daily comfort and enjoyment of their lives."

Compare this behavior toward the sex, the chaste, holy, dignified conduct of our Lord, with the polygamy licentiousness, and impurities of Mohammed; not merely as evidence of their claims, but as regards their influence upon the condition of woman; while the one does every thing by example and by precept to corrupt, to debase, and to degrade, the other does every thing to purify, to elevate, and to bless. The conduct of the Arabian enthusiast and impostor, and not less the boast of his followers and admirers, are too revolting for description-almost for allusion. But, on the contrary, what one syllable of the Saviour's utterance, or what one scene of his life was there which tainted the immaculate purity of his language, or left the slightest stain upon the more than snow-like sanctity of his character? What part of his conduct might not be unvailed and described before a company of the most modest, and most delicate, and even most prudish-minded females in existence? His treatment of woman raised her from her degradation without exalting her above her level. He rescued her from oppression without exciting her vanity, and invested her with dignity without giving her occasion for pride. He allowed her not only to come into his presence, but to minister to his comfort, and inspired her with awe, while he conciliated