For this concealment he is peculiarly fitted, as he belongs to that class of beings, who, from their spirituality, are invisible. He is the head of those high and apostate spirits "who kept not their first estate.' With the exception of those instances in which, to answer some wise purpose of a righteous providence, he assumes a material form, he is as invisible to men as those angels who never fell, and all of whom are "ministering spirits to them that shall be heirs of salvation." It is not the open assault of a manly foe that men encounter when they enter the conflict with this "angel of the bottomless pit;" but the stealthy assassin whose step is in the dark, and whose presence is indicated only by the blow he strikes. The best, as well as the worst of men, are not always aware of the subtlety with which he is lurking about their path. There is no bosom so pure, but in an evil hour, he may insensibly invade its tranquillity; no sanctuary so holy, but he may pollute it with sacrilegious, though unseen hands. And what is true of himself, as the head and chief of all evil spirits, is true of the "legion," who act in concert with him. They are all perpetually employed, but with impervious silence and secrecy. We live on the verge of the world of spirits; good and evil angels are always hovering about us, though unperceived. It is the treachery of this arch deceiver, that he should persuade multitudes who

are themselves the victims of his treachery, that his agency is visionary and unreal; so that, although his influence is so extensively felt, it should not be suspected. Amid the noise and bustle of the world, and amid the retirement and silence of the closet; at home and abroad, on the land and on the ocean, by day and by night, he is exerting his power; yet no touch feels, no ear hears, no eye sees him. Behind every scene of iniquity, he is the dark mover. His stratagems are often discovered; we find the gin, but we cannot detect the fowler. Millions writhe under the wounds they receive from his hand, but the hand that inflicts them is undetected. The pit itself may sometimes be left uncovered, but never the foe that digs it.

Nor is it his agency only that is concealed; he conceals his object. What this is, his deep malignity leaves us at no loss to determine. When he fell from his primeval integrity, from a pure spirit in the heavenly court he became a reprobate in the world of darkness; from an angel, he became an incorrigible, irrecoverable fiend. Every development of his character has been indicative of his fell malice and revenge. We have become acquainted with his object, not from himself. From the beginning to the present hour, he has kept his own secret; nor has so much as one note of alarm escaped his venomous tongue. Yet has his aim

been steady and single. It were a dark chapter in the history of our race, that should recite even a few of the more prominent instances in which men have been beguiled by him to their undoing, and in which to have dealt honestly and have avowed his purpose, would have been to have defeated it. It matters not on whom he practises this deception, nor upon what scale; his object is alike concealed. It was concealed from Adam and Eve; it was concealed from Cain, when he made him the abhorred of his race, and brought upon him a punishment greater than he could bear. It was concealed from the antediluvian world and from Sodom, when their blind credulity in his promises was answered in the rushing waters of the Deluge, and in fire from the Lord out of heaven. It was concealed from Judas, when he "put it into his heart" to betray the Son of Man with a kiss. All the world over, those who yield to his temptations, find, when it is too late, that they were a lure, and that while he flattered them with the expectation of good, his object was evil. "The tree was good for food, and pleasant to the eye, and a tree to be desired to make one wise”. this is the whole story of his stratagems. It is an artful appeal to the three vulnerable points of humanity" the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life." And in making it, the devil excels all other deceivers never unfolding

the flower without concealing the thorn; never aiming to injure, without promising to benefit. The poisoned cup is held to the lips, and while it sparkles and exhilarates, shows no signs of the death that lurks within. Who of all the victims of his treachery are premonished of their overthrow? Not one. It is the voice of the Deceiver which they hear. It is the fascination of the lap of indulgence, where the head of the victim is laid to be shorn of its strength, and then blinded and delivered over to the tormentors. is the syren song that invites to pleasure, and introduces to death. It is the serpent's breath, carrying its notes to the ear, and instilling its poison into the soul, till the unwary and deluded awake to the struggle only to be bound faster in his coils.

It

The same artifice is also discoverable in the means by which his malignant ends are attained. Of his influence in the physical world we are not able to speak with definiteness or certainty. From the fact that he is represented in the Scriptures as the "Prince of the power of the air,' learned and sensible men have believed and taught, that it is not beyond his province to "produce winds and storms, and other natural evils to afflict mankind, and carry on his malignant opposition to Christ and his kingdom." Some instances of this sort occur in the Scriptures. The magicians of Egypt seem to have a limited power over

the material creation, when they "withstood Moses," in the presence of Pharaoh. This great Enemy is also distinctly represented as obtaining permission from God to visit Job with various and sore physical calamities. The notion of his power in the material creation was certainly extensively prevalent among the Jews, as well as not a few even of the learned Gentiles. Demons and evil genii were supposed by them to have the seat of their empire in the air, there exerting their influence, and watching their opportunities to harass and destroy. And it is a fact worthy, in this connection, to be mentioned, that in those portions of the world that are unvisited by the light of the gospel, and where the inhabitants are most under the power of the Prince of Darkness, his physical power is most dreaded.

Be this as it may, he has another sphere of action, which, if it be not his own selected sphere, is the one in which he has the divine permission most extensively to employ his subtlety. That sphere is the human mind, with all its faculties of perception, thought, imagination and memory. Nor do I know that we are warranted in saying that he has no power over the heart. It has been supposed, that if his power extended to the hearts of men, the havoc would be so fearful that there would be no hope for the race. The reasoning would be conclusive, if his power were not watched