could God have done more that He hath not done for His vineyard'? Promises, exhortations, strivings, assistance, His Word, His Sacraments all are given. And do we think that promises, exhortations, strivings, assistance, His Word, His Sacraments, will be given in vain, and no vengeance follow? Vain thought! Be not deceived, God is not mocked! A day will come when a merciful God will shew that He is a just God: a day when we shall find no place for repentance, though, like Esau, we seek for it with tears. 6 Then it will be too late to knock when the door is shut; too late to call for mercy, when it is the time for justice', too late indeed when we have passed to that state where hope never comes, where repentance is useless, and amendment impossible.

Let not this be our case, my brethren. God has endowed us either by nature or by grace, with faculties which enable us to discern and appreciate the beauty of holiness. He has set before us a sufficient rule, and a perfect pattern of all that is lovely and pure. Yet more, he has given us the means of walking by the rule, and imitating the pattern, of raising ourselves in the scale of moral beings, day by day, and year by year, till however deep or deadly the taint of our original nature, and however frail and weak our hearts may yet be, we may by patient continuance in welldoing emancipate ourselves from the foul thraldom of sin, rise into the glorious liberty of the children of God, and in our measure and degree be holy as He is holy, and perfect as He is perfect. Shall we close our eyes to the glorious vision, neglect the rule, des

pise the pattern, reject the proffered aid, live in a low, base, and odious servitude, to corruption and sin, and never look, hope, soar heavenward? Shall we be content to resign the heavenly for the earthly, the spiritual for the animal, and all the glorious privileges of holiness and hopes of Heaven for the sordid and melancholy concernments of a passing and corrupted world? What must be the guilt and shame of rational and moral beings who have the means of improvement in their hands, and refuse or neglect to use them, who might go on in perpetual succession from one stage of improvement to another, and who yet remain through their whole lives unadvanced and unimproved, contented to creep where they might soar, and, yet worse, contented to revel with lost spirits in the foulness of sin, when they might rise with heavenly spirits, to the perfection of holiness.

These words, my younger brethren, spoken in this place, may possess little interest for you. They present no question for the understanding to discuss, no difficulty for it to solve. But if I were to think only of the progress of your understanding, I would yet say, despise not these plain and practical exhortations. Be assured that the plain and practical exhortations which point out to you the one only road to the improvement of your moral nature, point out to you also the only road to the elevation of your intellectual being. For whatever may be the acuteness, or the penetration of the understanding while the heart is yet unconverted, there is no clear discernment, no full comprehension, no firm and permanent grasp of any

great and abiding truths for any but the moral and spiritual man. Mysteries are revealed unto the meek', says the Son of Sirach. The Spirit of the Lord will not enter into a polluted soul, but he that keepeth the law, getteth the understanding thereof and the perfection of the fear of the Lord is wisdom'.

But it is of something better and higher than the triumphs of intellect, it is of the progress of the moral being which I now speak. And I beseech you to remember what you may become even in this low world of care, and what gracious offers of help are made you by One who is equally able and desirous to confer the aid He offers. If His grace then is sufficient for us, sufficient to make us creatures worthy to know and love, and worship such a Creator, again I beseech you not to let it be offered in vain. For if For if year after year it is offered in vain, if year after year this culture is wasted on a barren tree and an unkindly soil, if year after year we bring forth no fruit, how long will the eternal Lord of the Vineyard endure with us? when will He issue the dread command, 'Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground'? Oh! spare us, Lord, a little while, shut not thy merciful ears to our prayer, still for a little while send forth thy light to lead, thy grace to guide us, deliver us not yet, Oh! Lord, into the bitter pains of eternal Death!

21

SERMON II.

MAN'S NEED OF A SANCTIFYING PURPOSE.

1 CORINTH. X. 31.

Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.

In the verses immediately preceding that in which the text is written, the great Apostle has given the resolution of one of those cases of conscience about which he had obviously been consulted by his Corinthian converts. Living, as they did, in the heart of a heathen city, and surrounded by friends and neighbours still sitting in the darkness of heathenism, they must have been often exposed to much that was painful to their feelings, and might be perilous to their own peace, as well as a source of temptation and distress of mind to their Christian brethren. they renounced all commerce with those whose heathen practices shocked them, they must needs have gone out of the world. Yet in remaining in it, they must often have been witnesses, and, to outward appearance, not disapproving witnesses of practices op

Had

posed to the truth. That they who were of the contrary part and were ashamed, not having any thing to say against the godly lives of the Christians, would often seek to entrap them into practices at variance with their principles and profession, we cannot doubt; nor that, when they succeeded, the weaker brethren would be offended, and their faith perhaps shaken.

The question which gave rise to the Apostle's precept in the text affords an apt instance, and must have been one of constant recurrence. Might the Christian, with a safe conscience, purchase, or partake of any portion of the victims which had been offered up in the temple of an heathen God? The Apostle's answer was fraught at once with wisdom and love. The enlightened Christian, he said, would well know that the victim offered to an imaginary being could in no way be consecrated, nor its nature changed. To him therefore its having been used in a vain and idle form was a matter of indifference. It was still God's creature, given for man's use, and to that use it might be lawfully applied. But as recent converts of weak faith or weak minds might still have some confused notion of a virtue in the idol which they had so long worshipped, their case was to be considered; and if they were shaken or affected by the sight of practices which might appear to them, though erroneously, to imply some halting between two opinions, those practices, however innocent and harmless, were to be avoided or forsaken. The inconveniences which might arise from giving them up, would be perhaps serious, and serious offence might be given to the heathen friends of the