but as it was not in either case, therefore it only gave their conduct the appearance of reasonableness. No man is willing to see his conduct to be contrary to sound reason; yet very few are careful to avoid having it so. There was likewise the influence of fear in the case. They were unwilling to make an utter breach with the distinguished maker of the feast.

These are precisely the influences which induce men to make excuses for not accepting God's invitation; and they are just as delusive. Let us compare them together.

These invited persons hoped not to make an utter breach with the lord of the house by their refusal. But they did. Their excuses passed for idle breath with him, as they should have done. The refusal remained a naked fact, stripped of these veils; an entire insult to his friendly and generous feelings and intentions. He was angry, Christ says. And we know whom he meant to describe in that. So that it teaches

us this bald truth; that God is indignant at every refusal of his offered grace; and that no excuses diminish in his eye the naked offensiveness of the insult. Let us now select a few specimens.

"I cannot give myself up to the invitations of the Gospel, because the whole subject appears to me unintelligible." Now can you on sober reflection conceive of any thing more insulting than this? Your Maker has made a costly provision for your welfare, and invites you to partake of it. Your simple reply is: "I cannot understand the invitation. Either then God is not sincere; or, he is not able to make himself understood.

But it is false. God does not believe you. You

can understand that you are perishing through guilt and depravity; that a full provision is made in both these respects; that, if you relish the provision, and prefer the host and company, you may and will come; that the act of coming is totally a heart-preference or choice. The feast is spiritual, spread before the spirit; and the willing heart partakes of it. All the difficulties you yourself make. They are not in the Gospel nor in its offers.

Are you going is unreasonable

"I am unreconciled to several points in the Gospel, for I regard them as very unreasonable." Here is another insult to the infinitely wise God. And it does not satisfy him. The penalty, you say, is excessive. But that is not the Gospel. If the penalty is not what the Gospel says it is, then the Gospel is false. If it is, and is eternal, so is the salvation offered you. to refuse eternal salvation, even if it that you should be punished for ever; or rather, on the ground that you can show it is so? The conditions are reasonable, surely; for, more is gained than is sacrificed; that only is required, which becomes every rational being to do. We pity poor souls sent to toil and to count their prayers; to call on saints and angels for salvation; who never do get peace or hope. We pity those who hang any part of their salvation on endless genealogies. But two simple conditions are made by the Master of the feast. Have an appetite for the feast, and a love of the company. Come and eat, and be in fellowship with Christ and his saints.

"I have not time." That is both insulting and false. It means—something more important claims my time. Some duty more imperative binds my conscience. It puts God upon waiting your convenience.

It says: "Wait until I abuse thy mercy longer; then come to me with it again. I hope to become a Christian." When? When your Maker is ready? "No; when I am ready!" It is false; because it does not require as much time as you give to infinitely inferior things. It is false, because you have got the present hour in which you may come to the feast.

"I have not feeling enough." That does not exclude you from the invitation, nor prevent your coming. The will can act; and in every case of self-conquest, must act against the feelings, or without them.

"The invitation is not personal; it does not mean me." There is not a limitation or qualification to be found in the apostolical commission; not one in Christ's offers; in the apostles' offers; in our commissions; in your Bible. See this parable. Who more unlikely to be welcome than the poor, the maimed, the halt and blind? The invitation is as broad as the law, as its requirements, as its curse. Insert your name in the card, and then let it sound forth in hearing of the universe. No matter what your character or condition; say what you will of yourself, it does not exclude you from the invitation; nor will any thing but unwillingness shut you out from the feast. If you think sin a trifling evil, avow it, and offer that as your reason. If you have no desire to possess the forgiveness and favor of God, then that is the real reason. The real state of the case is this: you think, in the depth of your heart, that you will have a comfortable berth in the next world, by one means or another, however you treat this invitation. And on that falsehood believed is founded your indifference.

Then each act of refusal is a sentence of self-con

demnation. It is a personal act. God does not do it. The preacher does not do it for you. Your neighbor cannot refuse for you. Parents cannot refuse for their children. It is one of the most distinctly individual and personal of your actions.

It is voluntary. No kind of outward constraint can cause it, or prevent it, unless you choose. If you were under Mohammedan control, that should prohibit your confessing Christ, it could not prevent you from accepting the invitation to his feast; for the acceptance is purely spiritual and voluntary. So is the refusal.

It is intelligently done. You can plead no want of clearness in this feature of the Gospel.

It rejects salvation, and presents reasons as satisfactory and sufficient for such rejection. But sufficient or insufficient, you shut the door of heaven with your own hand. You dash the cup of salvation to the earth; you tear the proclamation of your pardon in pieces.

It is a deliberate and contemptuous rejection of God's love as expressed in the Gospel.

We see the value of a present moment under the invitations of the Gospel. It is a moment when God waits to be gracious. The feast is ready; the Master waits. Can any part of the universe present such a spectacle; God inviting; some accepting; some refusing!

The decision is final at some such moment as this. "The doors were shut." "There remaineth no more sacrifice for sin." This refusal establishes an eternal relation between God and the soul; and what a relation!

See that soul turning away from God's banquetinghouse, satisfied with the wisdom of its preference!

LECTURE XIX.

THE SEED IN GOOD GROUND; OR, RIGHT RECEPTION OF THE GOSPEL

MATT. XIII. 23.

"But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty."

In all the former stages of this parable we have seen the expectations of the Sower disappointed. Now we come to see them gratified and realized. The seed is not here rejected by a rude, ungenial soil, that has no affinities for its precious life; nor is it received by a partial sympathy that gives it a temporary entertainment; nor has it a rival growth of thorns, that finally choke and destroy it.

Here is a reception of Christ's Gospel into a heart which bids it a full welcome, and incorporates it into its very life; so that now the direct glorious results at which infinite mercy aimed in creating the facts of the Gospel, and sending to men the message and offers of salvation, are realized.

Our attention is here called to the right reception of the Gospel, and to the consequences of it.

1. WHAT IS THE RIGHT RECEPTION OF THE GOSPEL?

The answer may be given in a word. It is the re