TO SERVE HIM. 353 so reluctant, so heartless, as to bear no sort of comparison. In the former case, every thing is a gratification ; in the latter, every thing is a sacrifice. We think much of the smallest instance of self-denial if it be for God ; if it be an act of acknowledgment to the most gracious of all Fathers ; if it be a tribute of homage to the King of kings, however large or lasting the promised recom- pence. But we think little of any pre- sent privation of our own, if it insure to us a longer subsequent enjoyment, though but for a short season. " God," says a pious writer, " is more easily imitated by his children, in the perfections in which he appears to us as a father, than in those in which he appears a God." Andyet it is in his inimitable perfections that we seek most to imitate him. We bad rather resemble him in his independ- ence and his power than in his benefi- cence and his love and his forgiveness, yet it is in these last that we are com- manded to copy him..
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