we know, see corruption, we may sow to the Spirit; that is, make our chief endeavours tend to the improvement of the soul, that of the Spirit we may reap life everlasting.

Now the branch of this subject to which, as taught us by the text, I would direct your attention, is the progress in spiritual improvement which we must make in this world, to prepare us for participation in the joys of the next. "He that soweth to the Spirit," says the apostle, "shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting; but he that sows to the flesh, shall of the flesh

reap corruption." Now in this typical manner of speaking, let us first distinctly understand what it is the apostle means to enforce. It is not sufficient to have a mere general idea of what he means, and to assent to the truth of it: if such only is the use we make of the Scripture as our guide, if it does not reach and instruct the heart, we may as profitably amuse ourselves with any other volume which comes to our hands. To be what it pro

fesses to be, a guide through the perplexities of this world to a better, every truth,

every passage must be well weighed and considered, and the full meaning be extracted, by careful and diligent perusal. Consider then what the apostle here urges: "He that soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption." He considers that all our actions have some object in view. We labour that we may procure the means of subsistence; we eat, that we may support life; the most rational among us so live as they think most conduces to their happiness however mistaken these views of happiness may be, each in his actions, however foolish, proposes to himself some good, be that fancied good pleasure, ambition, riches, or a more solid and real good in the enjoyment, not of time, but of eternity. Now this preparation for enjoyment, this proposal in our views and actions of some good, is what the apostle means by sowing to the flesh and to the Spirit. By sowing to the flesh he further means, proposing to ourselves, as the

object of our actions, the good of the flesh, or of the body; that is, the acquisition of such things as conduce to our comfort, our enjoyment, our happiness, during our sojourn in the flesh: among these may be classed pleasure, riches, worldly power, and worldly wisdom. Now thus sowing to the flesh, he tells us, we shall reap corruption; and what can be more evident? I will not lengthen out the subject by reasoning on this. It must be admitted by all, that there is not one of the advantages which, in sowing to the flesh, we propose to ourselves, of which, in the grave, we do not reap corruption; that is, there is not any advantage, there is not any good that will not perish with us in the grave, nor will any of those things we have been so anxious for in this life survive it. Then do we not truly reap corruption? That body we have so tenderly cared for lies in corruption in the grave; the pleasure or the power we have so anxiously thirsted after has passed away; our riches are in the hands and the enjoy

ment of others who little think, in the riot and abuse with which they are squandered, of those by whose toils and labours, by whose neglect of those things that should have been for their peace, they have been so hardly earned.

From this degrading picture of weakness and corruption, let us turn to that spiritual harvest the apostle proposes to us: "He that soweth to the Spirit, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." It is evident that he here contrasts our spiritual with our temporal improvement; that as he has before spoken of our sowing to the flesh as ending in the corruption of the grave, he here speaks of our sowing to the Spirit, that is, attending to our spiritual improvement, as carrying us beyond the grave, and preparing for a state of spiritual enjoyment. There is nothing, perhaps, so little understood, or so seldom considered as the nature of the state we are preparing for. That we must undergo a change is admitted by all; that we are to prepare in this life for the consequences

of this change, is the very first principle of religion, and yet are there few who seriously consider whether they are making such a preparation as is requisite for it. It is the spirit, that is, the soul, which is to survive the grave; it is evident, therefore, that all preparation must be spiritual. We know not, perhaps, distinctly, what are the enjoyments that God has prepared for those who love him; but so far we may safely and with certainty conclude, that they are of a spiritual nature; and in speaking of this spiritual state, our blessed Saviour says, that they who enter it shall be divested of all worldly feelings, and be like the angels of God. Now, of this state the apostle speaks, when he exhorts us to sow to the Spirit; that is, tend the advancement and improvement of the soul in that knowledge which shall enable it to participate in the spiritual enjoyments of life everlasting. I have already said we know not distinctly what that state is; but the apostle tells us, that as we now know in part, so shall