he next six months to get over it. Nay, he never recovers. At the
season when the fields are most full of leafage and life let us not be
lethargic and stupid.

Let us remember that iniquity does not cease in summer-time. She never
takes a vacation. The devil never leaves town. The child of want, living up
that dark alley, has not so much fresh air nor sees as many flowers as in
winter-time. In cold weather the frost blossoms on her window pane, and the
snow falls in wreaths in the alley. God pity the wretchedness that pants
and sweats and festers and dies on the hot pavements and in the suffocating
cellars of the town!

Let us remember that our exit from this world will more probably be in the
summer than in any other season, and we cannot afford to die at a time when
we are least alert and worshipful. At mid-summer the average of departures
is larger than in cool weather. The sun-strokes, the dysenteries, the
fevers, the choleras, have affinity for July and August. On the edge of
summer Death stands whetting his scythe for a great harvest. We are most
careful to have our doors locked, and our windows fastened, and our
"burglar alarm" set at times when thieves are most busy, and at a season of
the year when diseases are most active in their burglaries of life we need
to be ready.

Our charge, therefore, is, make no adjournment of your religion till cool
weather. Whether you stay in town, or seek the farm house, or the
sea-shore, or the mountains, be faithful in prayer, in Bible reading and in
attendance upon Christian ordinances. He who throws away two months of life
wastes that for which many a dying sinner would have been willing to give
all his possessions when he found that the harvest was past and the summer
was ended.

The thermometer to-day has stood at a high mark. The heat has been fierce.
As far as possible people have kept within doors or walked on the shady
side of the street. But we can have but a faint idea of what the people
suffer crossing a desert or in a tropical clime. The head faints, the
tongue swells and deathly sickness comes upon the whole body when long
exposed to the summer sun. I see a whole caravan pressing on through the
hot sands. "Oh," say the camel-drivers, "for water and shade!" At last they
see an elevation against the sky. They revive at the eight and push on.
That which they saw proves to be a great rock, and camels and drivers throw
themselves down under the long shadow. Isaiah, w