salvation of a race treading on each other's steps in crowds to the death that never dies?-or is it that you may use your accumulations for the displays and luxuries of life, and for the advancement of yourselves and families in worldly rank? We see no such earnestness for the advancement of religion, as we see for worldly success, no such intensity in prayer as in enterprises of business, -no such zeal to save a soul as would indicate that soul to be worth more than all the treasures of the world.-We cannot abide the scrutiny of a truthful examination. It is written, that when the great apostle stood on the confines of life, looking back on the period of his service, and forward to the reckoning of the_great day, he could say with a peaceful and approving heart, "I have finished my course," accomplished my mission,-done that which God gave me to do, and now with the fruit of my toil, gathered and to be gathered, I go confidingly to my rest; ❝ henceforth there is a crown laid up for me, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me in that day." But is there one of us that anticipates the privilege of uttering a dying testimonial like this? And yet such is the service which we owe to Christ. This is the zeal which should be the mark and the honor of the church. By how much we fall short of this measure, by so much are we guilty, and by so much may a perishing world confront and rebuke us in the judgment day. And we must see our delinquencies before we shall arouse from our apathy. The whole church must become conscious of her supineness, and the guilt of it, before she will start into her primitive earnestness, and find her primitive strength. We have backslidden, and the path of return to God lies through the valley of repentance. Oh, that God would open our eyes, and teach us how deeply we have sinned, while giving to ourselves and to worldly ends, the energies of a life which belongs to Him, and to the regeneration of the race which His Son came to redeem !

2. In the second place, in order to the earnestness which properly characterizes the disciples of Christ, it is indispensable that we have a due sense of the mission to which we are called. No man becomes aroused to the highest earnestness of his nature who does not see and comprehend his work. It is the inspiration of high purposes which sets the soul on fire, and strengthens the arm for mighty deeds. And what has our Master given us to do? Behold, the field is the world. Over its broad surface are multitudes which no man can number, each individual of whom has a soul, a soul stained by sin, under the condemnation of God's law, doomed and waiting execution, yet capable of being saved through the merits of an infinite redemption; and our mission is to spread through the world the healing cry, "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters ;" to purify and exalt individual and social life till crime shall cease, and happiness become universal; till truth shall spring from earth like summer flowers, and righteous

ness look down from heaven on scenes of peace and love; till Christ shall reign the Universal King, and the world redeemed become the vestibule of heaven. Such is our work. O Thou great Author of the world's salvation, may our minds comprehend and our hearts warm to this mission! May its high aims and blessed results inspire us, and make us like Him, who himself the Leader of the work, when He saw that the baptism of the Cross lay in the path to its achievement, was nevertheless impatient, straitened, till even that baptism was accomplished!

Finally, I remark, that if we would attain the true earnestness of Christian devotion, we must find it in the individual consecration to Christ which springs from a personal sense of the preciousness of his cross. We cannot manufacture an effective earnestness by any outward assiduities to which we may apply ourselves. True earnestness is an inward impulse awakened at the cross of Jesus Christ. "The love of Christ constraineth us," said the apostle to the Gentiles, when those who, measuring by more meagre views the value of the cross, accounted his intense energy as uncalled for and fanatical. If we are Christians, there have been times when a sense of personal unworthiness has weighed down our hearts with inexpressible anguish-when our sins have seemed too numerous and aggravated for even Divine Mercy to heal-and we have obtained no solace for our woe, till turning to the cross, and estimating the love of the infinite Victim, we have found there the sufficient ransom, and have heard from his lips the precious voice of pardon and peace. Oh, how have our souls been ravished with a sense of His love, and with what sincerity and unreserve we have at such moments said,

"Here, Lord, I give myself away,

'Tis all that I can do!"

And at such moments, what service were we not ready to perform for our Master? Whither were we not ready to go at his bidding? What would we not do to bring even one soul to his feet? And when, under the influence of such a personal consecration, we have passed our thoughts over the world, reflecting on its condition and necessities, and its possible and promised destiny, how have our hearts burned within us at the magnitude and blessedness of the mission of the church, and our feet hastened to the work which, in this wide scheme of beneficence, has been alloted to us! This was the true impulse of Christian earnestnes. This was a type of that earnestness which alone can qualify the church of Christ for the conquest of the world. This is the toil which the Spirit's presence shall bless, and under whose warm devotion the solitary place shall blossom as the rose. There is no hope of revived earnestness which does not find its origin and its support in

a sense of the Saviour's unspeakable love. The cross is the hope of the world, not only as the atonement for sin, but as the awakening impulse and sustaining power of that energy in the church of Christ, which shall bear its messages of mercy to every creature. Oh, that its power may rest upon us, that we may find in it the shelter of our own souls, and the motives to an earnestness in the service of Christ which shall never flag till he shall call us home, and pronounce our work well done. Come thus, O Saviour, to all thy church-rouse her to new endeavors, and may thy cross be the power of God to the world's speedy regeneration!

SERMON CCCCXCII.

BY REV. J. MANNING SHERWOOD.

THE WARNING VOICE.

"And what I say unto you, I say unto you all, Watch."-MARK 13: 37

CHRIST is no vain alarmist. When He bids us, beware-watch-there is always occasion for the warning, and we slight it at our peril. Dangers throng our path; enemies lie in wait to surprise; temptations assail at all points; and evil influences, within and without, are continually operating to seduce and ruin the soul. And we must watch.

1. Watch against evil thoughts. We are creatures of thought. The mind is always thinking; it is the occupation of every rational being; every day is filled up with thoughts; not even the "night watches" are free from them. To how many thoughts does a man give being and immortality, even during this short life! And thoughts are not the vain and powerless things that men take them to be they are the "seeds" of all things: they are immensely prolific of good or evil: there is life or death in them. For, thoughts make the man! They are the parent of feeling and of action. They constitute, mainly, a man's being-exercise and control it-and rule his life and destiny. The character of one's habitual thinking, determines all his mental habits and moral exercises and attributes, and gives tone and complexion to his daily conduct. If his habitual thoughts are thoughts of levity, his mental being and visible life will quickly come to bear the marks of emptiness, vanity, contemptibleness, folly. If his thoughts are habitually impure, his inner life will be corrupt, and his inward corruption will flow out into his language and conduct, in spite of every restraint or barrier. If his ruling thoughts are worldly, selfish, or irreligious, they will make his spirit and life such in their prevailing purposes and habits. No man can think wrong habitually, and do right;

cherish evil thoughts daily, and be pure in spirit or virtuous in life. He who sows to the wind, in this respect, is sure to reap the whirlwind.

A man never sins in deed, until he has first sinned in thought. No matter how sudden or great is the temptation, he never yields and falls till the mind acts, thinks, wills. It is evil thoughts that invite temptations, and prepare the moral feelings to look with favor upon them, or at least to make but a feeble resistance. If the real history of men's apostacies could be written, it would be seen that the way is previously prepared, and all the safeguards and barriers to virtue and piety broken down and swept away, by evil thinking. Let a man keep out from his mind evil thoughts, and he is in no danger; his life will take care of itself, or rather, God will keep his feet from falling, his eyes from tears, and his soul from death. But let him once open the door of his mind to evil thoughts-it matters not what their object is; let them prowl at large and revel undisturbed in the chamber of the soul-and he is no longer master of his own house, and can no more rule his spirit or control his life, than he can chain the winds or calm the tempest : 66 a strong man armed" has taken possession: so many devils are let loose upon him, and if he do not "cast them out" by the power of prayer and repentance, they will as certainly defile and rule and ruin him, as that they are evil.

Let us beware, then, of evil thoughts. To harbor them is to harbor a mer ciless tyrant, who will fetter every attribute of the godlike soul, and kill the very life of virtue; to harbor them is to harbor moral defilement, and guilt, and death itself; nay, to harbor evil thoughts is to harbor so many devils, who will riot on all that is fair and good within, and drive the possessed mortal on and down to eternal perdition! Beware of evil thoughts! Watch against

them-pray and strive against them! The mastery over these is everythingvirtue, obedience, life everlasting; but defeat here is the loss of all things self-command, the grace of God, the hope of heaven, the soul itself, with its power of endless thinking and endless happiness!

2. Watch against an evil Spirit. This is one of the most insidious forms that sin ever takes. Its workings constitute a fearful illustration of the heart's deceitfulness. There is a degree of blindness and moral obliquity in relation to it, that is hard to account for. It is more difficult to make a man see and own that his spirit is bad, than to convince him of any other wrong. There is no sin that we are more prone to indulge in; none that it is so easy to cover up; none that men are more ready to excuse in themselves. And yet, in the whole catalogue of sins, not one can be found fuller of meanness, malignity, and all manner of evil. A bad spirit! Why, what good thing does it nour ish, or speak well of, or spare? It sours a man's disposition, and renders him habitually peevish, fretful, censorious, fault-finding, unmerciful. Such a man breeds a moral pestilence in the community in which he lives; stirs up all the wrathful elements with which he happens to come in contact.

A bad spirit is sure to wither every generous thought and pure feeling; it will load the tongue with the poison of asps; it will see much evil and but little good in others; and it will, in the end, vitiate and pervert a man's entire influence. And yet how common is this sin. With what ease and facility do men fall into it! We have only to indulge our natural feelings-let the bitter waters of the heart flow; nay, we have only to neglect to cultivate the spirit of charity, meekness, love, and forgiveness, and straitway the spirit of evil rules the temper, and speaks out in every act.

Here, then, we are to build a watch-tower, and plant a sentinel, and charge him, on peril of his life, to keep the city. Failing to do it, how many are injured in character and usefulness, if not personally ruined. O, with what jealousy should we watch and try our hearts, to know what manner of spirit we are of! One may be actuated by a very bad spirit, when he little suspects it. His denunciations of sin may be but the expressions of his unholy selfish passions. The opinions which he declares respecting his fellow-sinners, may

be but his cherished and uttered wishes. ambition.

His zeal for God, may be but low

3. Watch against spiritual declension. How frequent and how sad are the instances of religious declension! How many who run well for a season, come to slacken their pace, and then to halt, and it may be, finally to turn back. How many who espouse Christ and his cause with zealous hearts and an earnest profession, at length lose their first love, and sadly decline in their religious interest, and deteriorate in their Christian character. Why is this? Is it not mainly because we are not half alive to the danger of such a declension, and do not watch against it with sufficient carefulness and prayerfulness?

Piety will not live of itself, in beings but partially sanctified; the graces of the Spirit, in such natures as ours, will not grow and bring forth fruit unto life if we withhold the hand of diligent culture. Let a man neglect his piety-do nothing to foster, invigorate, and keep it alive, and it will die out in a very little while; let him cease to watch and pray, strive and cultivate, and all his spiritual interests will quickly decay, and his soul become a barren waste. Piety, here on earth, is an exotic plant, and great care and pains are needed to make it grow, in so unfriendly a soil, and to protect it from the chilling winds and blighting frosts of so ungenial a clime. Keep it away from the sunshine, and moisture, and pure air of Divine grace, or neglect to care for it, and leave it to take its chance; and what can make it fruitful, or even keep it alive? Let a Christian, for example, leave his faith to stand alone to shift for itself, or to live by its inherent vitality and power, and how long will it be a living faith? It must be strengthened by constant exercise-nourished by prayer and the study of the Scriptures; pinions must be given to it, and it must be helped to mount and fly, or it will die a natural death, or at least become a lifeless principle and just so of every other Christian grace.

All the tendencies of human nature are towards declension, deterioration, in moral and spiritual things, and it possesses, in itself, no compensative or reclaiming power. These tendencies are numerous, strong, decided, and are ever operative; they draw with the strength of a Leviathan, and make the declivity to apostasy, and on to perdition, steep and slippery. All the influences of this world also, as well as the temptations of Satan, tend the same way. And what is to counteract such a world of depletive, wayward, corrupting influences, and preserve the "life of God in the soul?" There is nothing in religion itself, in such circumstances, to perpetuate its own life, secure its proper growth and development, defeat these fatal tendencies, and hold one near to God, independently of his own exertions. If he will not use the appropriate means, there is nothing in God, nothing in the nature of religion, to keep the soul from sliding back with a perpetual backsliding. If he will not nourish and culture the grace of God in the soul, and thereby keep it fruitful, He will not hinder its return to its natural state of barrenness. If he will not hold on to the promises with the power of faith and prayer, He will not put forth his hand to arrest the natural process of decay, and stay the otherwise inevitable tendency of human corruption.

And here is where all declensions in religion begin, not from without, but from within; not in overt transgressions, but in a personal falling away from God in the habits and experience of the soul. The inward fire is suffered to go down-the heart's first love to decline-the graces of the spirit to languish—— then corruption regains its power, and the world comes in with the power of a flood, and the Devil prevails. O, how sad, and yet instructive is the history of men's experience in this thing! How imminent is our danger! What arm less than Omnipotence, continually invoked, can save us from declension-from a fatal apostasy? Let us heed the warning and watch-watch against any decline of interest in spiritual things-watch against any falling off in the heart's love to God and to his cause-watch against any inroads upon our spiritual temper and habits; any going back to the weak and beggarly elements of the world.