Page:Female Piety.djvu/13

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INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
9

doing, to seek for glory, honor, and immortality," and to obtain eternal life. I look beyond the painted and gandy scene of earth's fading vanities, to the everlasting ages, through which you must exist in torment or in bless; and, God helping me, it shall not be my fault if you do not live in comfort, die in peace, and inherit eternal life.

Give me your most serious attention—what is more, give me your prayers—and especially pray for yourselves, that in listening to these discourses you may not be "hearers of the word only, but doers of it also." Come to each sermon in devout seriousness of mind. Lay aside all frivolity and levity, You are not invited to an entertainment, but to listen to matters of infinite moment, of everlasting importance. The Hightness of the concert, the ball-room, and the theater, would be quite out of place when called to listen to words whereby you may be saved.

I could think of no subject with which more appropriately to commence these sermons, than that which you are now prepared to hear—The Influence of Christianity on the Condition of Woman.

Our first attention must be directed, of course, to the condition of the sex beyond the boundaries of Christendom.

it would seem, from the words of the original denouncement upon Eve for her transgression in eating the forbidden fruit, as if, while yet the first pair were innocent, there was a more entire equality