promised his Spirit to teach them to pray, and to help their infirmities. The sacrifice of Christ has rendered it just for him to forgive sin; and whenever we are led to repent of, and to forsake it, even the righteousness of God is declared in the pardon of it. Dear brethren, consolation pours itself in on every side, whilst we contemplate the gospel, and refreshes our inmost souls. It gives us the prospect of our sins being pardoned-our prayers accepted our very afflictions turned into blessings and our existence prolonged to an endless duration. We see christianity indeed, as yet, but in its infancy. It has not already reached the great ends it is intended to answer, and to which it is constantly advancing. At present it is but as a grain of mustard-seed, and seems to bring forth a tender and weakly crop; but, be assured, it is of God's own right-hand planting, and he will never suffer it to perish. It will soon stretch its branches to the river, and its shade to the ends of the earth. The weary will repose themselves under it; the hungry will partake of its fruits; and its leaves will be for the healing of the nations.

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You, dear brethren, who profess the name of Jesus, will delight in contemplating the increase and grandeur of his kingdom, and your expectations will not deceive you. He must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The religion of Jesus is not the religion of one age, or of one nation. It is a train of light first put in motion by God, and which will continue to move and

to spread, till it has filled the whole earth with its glory. Its blessings will descend, and its influence will be felt, to the latest generations. Uninterrupted in its course, and boundless in its extent, it will not be limited by time or space. The earth is too narrow for the display of its effects, and the accomplishment of its purposes. It points forward to an eternity. The great Redeemer will again appear upon the earth as the Judge and Ruler of it; will send forth his angels, and gather his elect from the four winds; will abolish sin, and death, and hell, and will place the righteous for ever in the presence of his God and their God, of his Father and their Father. If such be our religion, what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness? You are conscious that a mere belief of the christian revelation will not purify the heart, or regulate the conduct. We may calmly assent to the most interesting and solemn truths of christianity, and afterwards suffer them to slide out of our minds, without leaving any impression behind them. If we look back upon the usual course of our feelings, we shall find that we are more influenced by the frequent recurrence of objects than by their weight and importance; and that habit has more force in forming our characters than our opinions have. The mind naturally takes its tone and complexion from what it habitually contemplates. Hence it is that the world, by continually pressing upon our senses, and being

ever open to our view, takes so wide a sway in the heart. How think you, dear brethren, must we correct this influence, and by faith overcome the world, unless we habitually turn our attention to religion and eternity? Let us beseech you then, to make them familiar with your minds, and mingle them with the ordinary stream of your thoughts: retiring often from the world, and conversing with God and your own souls. In these solemn moments, nature, and the shifting scenes of it, will retire from your view, and you will feel yourselves left alone with God; you will walk as in his sight; you will stand, as it were, at his tribunal. Illusions will then vanish apace, and every thing will appear in its true proportion and proper colour. You will estimate human life, and the worth of it, not by fleeting and momentary sensations, but by the light of serious reflection and steady faith. You will see little in the past to please, or in the future to flatter; its feverish dreams will subside, and its enchantment be dissolved. It is much, however, if faith do not, upon such occasions, draw aside the veil which rests on futurity, and cut short the interval of expectation. How often has she borne aloft the spirits of good men, and given them a vision of better days and brighter hopes! They have entered already the rest which remained for them; they have come to an innumerable company of angels, to the spirits of the just made perfect, and to God, the Judge of all. From these seasons of retirement and religious

meditation, you will return to the active scenes of life with greater advantage. From the presence of God you will come forth with your passions more composed, your thoughts better regulated, and your heart more steady and pure. Do not imagine that the benefit of such exercises is confined to the moments which are spent in them; for as the air retains the smell, and is filled with the fragrance of leaves which have been long shed, so will these meditations leave a sweet and refreshing influence behind them.

If your religion be genuine, it will be often the source of the warmest and most interesting feelings. It will be a spring of consolation within, which will often be full and pour itself forth. If the gospel has not taken a share in the feelings of our hearts, if it has not moved the great springs of our hopes and fears, we may be assured we have never experienced its force. It is filled with such views as cannot fail to interest and transport us. Besides, if we do not feel the gospel as well as believe it, how can it support against the overwhelming influence of what we do feel? The world steals upon us, and engages our affections on all sides. Its prospects enrapture, and its pleasures are seducing us. Will a religion which rests only upon opinion, and a conviction, at times extorted from us, keep us firm against those assaults, and stem the force of a torrent which never ceases to flow? This can be done only by opposing hope to hope, feeling to feeling, and pleasure to pleasure.

Perhaps one of the chief reasons why christianity does not more purify our hearts is, that we are apt to confine it to seasons of worship, and to shut it out from the ordinary concerns of life. It is a great and fatal mistake to imagine them so separate that we can innocently and usefully engage in the one, without any regard had to the other. Our temporal affairs should never, indeed, be suffered to mingle with the exercises of religion; but religion should always regulate the conduct of our temporal affairs. The reason of this is obvious. The world and the fashion of it is passing away, and our union with it will soon be dissolved; whilst the relation which we bear to God, and to eternity, is ever the same, and extends to all times, and to all places. The character which, as christians, we sustain, is our high character; and the hopes which, as such, we indulge, are our high hopes. It is but reasonable, it is but just, therefore, that a desire of discharging the one, and attaining the other, should sway the whole of our conduct. Perhaps you will be ready to think that this advice is impracticable. You will urge the necessity of attending to your worldly callings, which, you will say, cannot be carried on, unless you give them the greater part of your time and attention. So. Remember, we do not advise you to spend more of your time in religion than in your ordinary concerns. This would extinguish all human industry. But, if you be sincere in your profession of religion, you will regulate your pursuits by it,

Be it