the thought, that multitudes of fair professors are now in hell: although they, like ourselves, once wore a goodly name, and hoped as others said of them, that they were ripening for glory; whereas they were fattening for the slaughter, and were drugged for execution with the cup of delusion, dreaming all the while that they were drinking the wines on the lees, well refined. Surely, among the damned, there are none more horribly tormented in the flame than those who looked to walk the golden streets, but found themselves cast into outer darkness, where there is weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth. The higher the pinnacle from which we slip, the more fearful will be our fall; crownless kings, beggared princes, and starving nobles; are the more pitiable because of their former condition of affluence and grandeur: so also will fallen professors have a sad pre-eminence of damnation, from the very fact that they were once esteemed rich and increased in goods. When we consider the vast amount of unsound profession which prevails in this age, and which, like a smooth but shallow sea, doth scarcely conceal the rocks of hypocrisy-when we review the many lamentable falls which have lately occurred among the most eminent in the Church, we would lift up our voice like a trumpet, and with all our might entreat all men to be sure of their grounds of trust, lest it should come to pass that sandy foundations

should be discovered when total destruction has rendered it too late for anything but despair.

O age of profession, put thyself in the crucible! O nation of formalists, take heed lest ye receive the form and reject the Spirit! O reader, let us each commence a thorough trial of our own spirits!

"Oh! what am I? My soul awake,

And an impartial survey take:
Does no dark sign, no ground of fear,
In practice or in heart appear?

"What image does my spirit bear?
Is Jesus form'd and living there?
Say, do his lineaments divine

In thought, and word, and action, shine?

"Searcher of hearts! oh search me still,

The secrets of my soul reveal;
My fears remove, let me appear

To God and my own conscience clear.

"May I at that bless'd world arrive,

Where Christ through all my soul shall live,
And give full proof that he is there,

Without one gloomy doubt or fear."

III. We close our chapter by the third remark -the wounds of our Jesus were faithful. Here proof will be entirely an unnecessary excess, but we think meditation will be a profitable engageAh! brethren, when we were groaning under the chastening hand of Jesus, we thought

ment.

him cruel; do we think so ill of him now? We conceived that he was wroth with us, and would be implacable; how have our surmises proved to be utterly confounded! The abundant benefit which we now reap from the deep ploughing of our heart is enough of itself to reconcile us to the severity of the process. Precious is that wine which is pressed in the winefat of conviction; pure is that gold which is dug from the mines of repentance; and bright are those pearls which are found in the caverns of deep distress. We might never have known such deep humility if He had not humbled us. We had never been so separated from fleshly trusting had He not by his rod revealed the corruption and disease of our heart. We had never learned to comfort the feeble-minded, and confirm the weak, had he not made us ready to halt, and caused our sinew to shrink. If we have any power to console the weary, it is the result of our remembrance of what we once suffered-for here lies our power to sympathise. If we can now look down with scorn upon the boastings of vain, self-conceited man, it is because our own vaunted strength has utterly failed us, and made us contemptible in our own eyes. If we can now plead with ardent desire for the souls of our fellow-men, and especially if we feel a more than common passion for the salvation of sinners, we must attribute it in no small degree to the fact that we have been smitten

for sin, and therefore knowing the terrors of the Lord are constrained to persuade men. The laborious pastor, the fervent minister, the ardent evangelist, the faithful teacher, the powerful intercessor, can all trace the birth of their zeal to the sufferings they endured for sin, and the knowledge they thereby attained of its evil nature. We have ever drawn the sharpest arrows from the quiver of our own experience. We find no sword-blades so true in metal as those which have been forged in the furnace of soul-trouble. Aaron's rod, that budded, bore not one half so much fruit as the rod of the covenant, which is laid upon the back of every chosen child of God; this alone may render us eternally grateful to the Saviour for his rebukes of love.

We may pause for a moment over another thought, if we call to mind our deep depravity. We find within us a strong and deep-seated attachment to the world and its sinful pleasures; our heart is still prone to wander, and our affections yet cleave to things below. Can we wonder then that it required a sharp knife to sever us at first from our lusts, which were then as dear to us as the members of our body? so foul a disease could only be healed by frequent draughts of bitter medicine. Let us detest the sin which rendered such rough dealing necessary, but let us adore the Saviour who spared not the child for his crying.

If our sin had been like the hyssop on the wall, our own hand might have gently snapped the roots; but having become lofty as a cedar of Lebanon, and firmly settled in its place, only the omnipotent voice of Jehovah could avail to break it: we will not therefore complain of the loudness of the thunder, but rejoice at the overturning of our sin. Will the man who is asleep in a burning house murmur at his deliverer for shaking him too roughly in his bed? Would the traveller, tottering on the brink of a precipice, upbraid the friend who startled him from his reverie, and saved him from destruction? Would not the harshest words and the roughest usage be acknowledged most heartily as blows of love and warnings of affection? Best of all, when we view these matters in the light of eternity, how little are these slight and momentary afflictions compared with the doom thereby escaped, or the bliss afterwards attained! Standing where our ears can be filled with the wailings of the lost, where our eyes are grieved by sights of the hideous torments of the damned-contemplating for an instant the fathomless depth of eternal misery, with all its deprivation, desperation, and aggravation-considering that we at this hour might have been in our own persons enduring the doom we deprecate, surely it is easy work to overlook the pain of our conviction, and bless with all sincerity "the hand which rescued us." O