The traveler who stops at a hotel close to a large I railway station finds little rest the first night. The constant noise in the station, rumbling of omnibus and wagon in the street disturb his rest. The second night he sleeps better, and soon, becoming accustomed to the noise, sleeps soundly until the porter knocks at his door. He awakes. His room is full of light. It is morning.

Let us leave the traveler in the hotel and look at another-a traveler to eternity. Turning the search light of the word of God on him we discover some very indistinct features of a child of God. When a child of wrath and disobedience, he was delivered from this present evil world and the wrath to come to wait for His Son from heaven. (Gal. 1:4; i Thess. 1:9.) With garments gathered up under that girdle of truth-the "blessed hope" of the coming of the Son of God-he started on the heavenly road and pressed on, through the night, looking for "the bright and morning star " that will usher in the eternal morning without a cloud. (Rev. 22:16, 17, 20.) But, alas! his eye gradually becoming dim to the glory of the coming One, and his ear dull to the words of his Guide, the Spirit of God, he touched "the unclean thing" (2 Cor. 6:17). He considered the thing touched "harmless in itself," but it defiled him, and interrupted his fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, (i John 1:3.) Again he touched, more defilement and a duller ear to the words of his heavenly Guide were the sad results. No longer a robust traveler, he dropped out of the ranks of those that are "strangers and pilgrims" who look for a city whose builder and maker is God, sat down to rest, and went to sleep in Sodom saying in his heart:"My Lord delayeth His coming" (Matt. 24:28). Like the traveler who became accustomed to the noise, his conscience gradually became insensible to defiling influences and associations, and under the power of these spiritual anesthetics, he laid his head on Delilah's knees, and went to sleep. (Judges 15:19.)

Reader, is this an imperfect portrayal of your condition? If it is, hear what the Spirit of God says to you:"Awake thou that sleepest, arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine on thee" (Eph. 5:14). Thank God, you are not dead in your sins, for you have been quickened together with Christ, but you are asleep among the dead in a world that "lies in the wicked one " (i John. 5:19). During the great plague in London, a load of plague smitten dead was emptied, one night, into a pit for burial. Before shoveling the earth into the pit a laborer turned a light on the dead, and saw an arm slowly lifted up by one in the pit. A feeble indication of life was there. Yes, a living man, unconscious of where he was until the light was turned on him, lay among the dead, and was pulled out from among them. Awake thou that sleepest, arise from the plague smitten heap of this world's dead, and Christ shall shine on thee. Sleep no longer. Awake now. The Lord Jesus may come before you put this paper out of your hand, and drag you out of Sodom-from the plague smitten heap of this world. What an eternal loser you will be if He comes and finds you asleep. Can you afford it? Think of the joy it would give His heart to-day to have your head again pillowing on His bosom of eternal love, love that led Him to give Himself for you. W. B.—– n.