But sometimes the professing Christian comes to regard the place of secret intercourse with God with very different feelings.  He loses, perhaps by a process so gradual that he is scarcely conscious of it for a time, the tenderness of heart, and the elevation and fervor of devout affection that he had been used to feel in meeting God.  There is less and less of spirit and more and more of form in his religious exercises.  He retires at the accustomed time rather from force of habit than because inclination draws him.  He is enclined to curtail his seasons of retirement or to neglect it altogether if a plausible pretext can be found.  He reproaches himself, perhaps, but hopes that the evil will cure itself at length.  And so he goes on from day to day, and week to week.  Prayer—­if his heartless service deserves the name—­affords him no pleasure and adds nothing to his strength.  Where such a state of things exists it is evident that the pulses of spiritual life are ebbing fast.  If the case is yours, dear reader, it ought to fill you with alarm.  Satan is gaining an advantage of you and seducing you from God.

A second sign of spiritual declension is indifference to the usual means of grace.  The spiritual life, not less than the natural life, requires appropriate and continual nourishment.  For this want God has made ample provision in his Word.  To the faithful-disciple the Scriptures are rich in interest and profit.  “O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day.”  To such a soul the preaching of the gospel is a joyful sound; and the place where kindred spirits mingle in social praise and worship is far more attractive than the scenes of worldly pleasure.  But, alas! from time to time it happens that some who bear the Christian name and who have rejoiced in Christian hopes, insensibly lose their relish for the Scriptures.  If they continue to read them daily, it is no longer with such appreciation of their power and beauty as makes them the bread of life, refreshing and invigorating the soul.  Their minds are occupied no small portion of the time with thoughts of earthly things.  They find it easy to excuse themselves from frequenting the place of social prayer, and even content themselves, perhaps, with an occasional half-day attendance on the more public service of the sanctuary.  And when they are in the place of worship they feel listless, destitute of spiritual affection, disposed to notice others or to attend to only mere words and forms.  They want, in a great measure, that preparation of the heart, without which the means of grace are powerless and lacking in pleasure or profit to the soul.  Such indifference is conclusive proof that the soul has departed from God; has grieved the Holy Spirit and lost the vital power of godliness.  If you, reader, are conscious of this indifference, see in it an infallible sign of your backsliding.  It declares you have departed from the fountain of living waters and are a wanderer from your God.