them." We may see this sad truth confirmed within our daily experience. Where does the unrighteous man seek enjoyment? Not "where true joys are to be found," but in those pleasures only where continued excitement is elicited; where reflection is absorbed in the activities of sensual pursuit; where the affections are depraved by the seductions of art, of luxury, of flattery, of that visionary bliss, which has the body only for its object, or, at least, in which the soul can find no lasting participation. There is nothing in all this to promote happiness, because, such pleasures quickly pass, and, if succeeded by others, we know that these also cannot continue, but that they must soon fail us altogether. Besides which, when past, they too frequently leave the stings of remorse behind them. The unrighteous man suffers more than he enjoys, because, whilst the desires of the body only are gratified, the soul has no peace; and in the soul it is that we suffer the most acutely. Beyond what the desires of the flesh may dictate, the ungodly man seeks for no motive of action; he listens to no monitor but self-love, and, therefore, cannot command those comforts which exclusively attach to such as secure them by the very opposite course. Indeed, the senses are the only repositories of his hopes to gratify them, is the main object of his life; and when they fail him, what must be the prospects before him, to which they can contribute not a single ray of enjoyment: but, on the

contrary, over which dreary presentiments and conscious guilt must combine to cast that gloom which shall arise from the alarms of an apprehended exclusion from the felicities of Heaven, and a dreaded abandonment to the miseries of Hell?

Now, whilst the enjoyments of the unrighteous man are confined to this world, they must be insufficient and nugatory, because they can only last as long as he has the capacity of indulging in them, and this must ever be to him a source of unquiet reflection. He has no security in these enjoyments. Disease, adversity, and a thousand other ills, which are comprised within the narrow circle of existence, may speedily place them beyond the grasp of his possession. He may see them before him, and not be able to participate in them, having the will, but not the capacity; and often, too, like the fabled fruit of the wilderness, which, to the eye of the thirsty traveller, was an object of alluring invitation, but when applied to the parched and eager lips, yielded only ashes and bitterness : so, to the unrighteous man shall eventually be the fruits of his iniquity, plucked from the polluted stem of sensual pleasure; he shall taste them till they too only send forth bitterness. He may, indeed, go on for a while successfully, and with little visible suffering, but, in the end, "his travail shall come upon his own head, and his wickedness shall fall upon his own pate." The considerations, the fears, the experience of the fugitiveness, together

also with the uncertainty of all earthly objects, which he cannot but have perceived, must naturally tend to render him unfixed in mind, dissatisfied with the present, doubtful as to the future, and, where he thinks at all, wretched. It is only the prospect of a bright reversion beyond the skies, that can quiet an agitated and unsettled heart.

A man must be under continual distrust, and, therefore, continually miserable, where he bounds his hopes to a scene of things which is perpetually shifting; which, under the most favourable circumstances, cannot be otherwise than short, and whose continuance is not secure to him a single moment. He may enjoy, that is, his mere sensations may be gratified; his body may be satiated with those turbulent delights to which alone it clings, but the sober, thinking, immaterial soul, can find nothing to repose in amid the questionable pursuits of sense. There can be no peace to it, because it will look beyond this life, and will look with apprehension and alarm. Conscious of that principle of immortality of which the reasoning faculty, however perversely directed, cannot divest it, the view of eternity will occasionally rise before it and how, then, can it be otherwise than wretched, where it must feel sensible, that, unprepared, corrupt, and seared, it can have no portion in that splendid inheritance which has been purchased for the righteous by the precious blood of the crucified Son of God? The seat of happiness

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is in the soul. Where this can look forward to no perpetuity of bliss, it can feel no lasting repose: all our pleasure is then but pain, our joy but sorrow, our fruition but misery. There can be no happiness to the persisting sinner, however the draught of life may be mingled with those cloying sweets which, to his distempered affections, are at all times the most desirable objects, whilst his conscience whispers to him the awful words of inspiration" the righteous only shall be had in everlasting remembrance, and his righteousness remaineth for ever. The ungodly shall see it, and it shall grieve him; he shall gnash with his teeth, and consume away: the desire of the ungodly shall perish."

Secondly, unrighteousness robs us of our selfesteem. We can be happy even in this world no longer than whilst we esteem ourselves, because, where we cannot esteem ourselves, we must be sensible, that we can have no claim to the esteem of others; and the good opinion of their fellowcreatures even the ungodly look upon to be an object of desire. Besides, where a man loses that respect which he ought to entertain for himself and by a respect for ourselves, I do not mean an overweening assumption of moral superiority over others, but that dignified feeling which naturally arises from a firm, though humble, assurance, that we are "going the way of all peace," whilst we are seeking earnestly to do the will of

God-I repeat, where a man loses this self-respect, he is the more likely to yield to those temptations which promise so much, but realize so little. The guard over his passions is weakened. His acquaintance with himself becomes less intimate. From having relinquished that restraint which self-esteem always imposes, more or less, upon our unruly wills and affections, he becomes unreflecting, obstinate, reckless, rash; and when he has no longer any secret approbation to direct his impulses, they will naturally bear him headlong into folly, into error, into guilt. Then it is that infidelity makes such inroads upon the soul. Then it is that we abandon all our hopes in Christ, forfeit our interest in his most merciful atonement, and rush again from the blessed "liberty, wherewith he has made us free,” into the deplorable bondage of sin and death. Then it is that we seek for happiness through ourselves, and not through Him who died so ignominiously to procure it for us. Thus it is that, when we have lost our self-esteem, we sink into degradation and sin.

Let it not be imagined, that whilst we maintain self-esteem, under its due limitations, to be worthy of our Christian profession, we would thereby exclude humility, which, though it may seem to be inconsistent with it, really is not so; because this self-esteem, when properly directed, is only that preventing quality of our nature which keeps us above the lowest degradations of sin, and actuates