resisted the drowsiness in which his faculties for the time were lost. The ship is on the point of being engulphed in the raging waves, but Jonah is fast asleep. The building may be in flames, or the thief may have broken through the house, but the owner sleeps on in total ignorance of his danger, or his loss, until it is too late to escape the one, or to prevent the other. Thus is it with the man who lives only for the things of time and sense. The judgments of God are far above out of his sight;2 and all the realities of the unseen world have no hold whatever on his mind; no evidence, or substance,3 in his judgment. The business, or pleasures, of life, in which he is wholly occupied, and which he takes for realities, are as the merest dreams and shadows, compared with all those mighty truths of which he is wholly unconscious, although as deeply concerned in them as any others. Great things are going on around him; but his eyes are shut, and he cannot see them. Angels are rejoicing over penitents; souls are being quickened from the death of sin; the Spirit of God is changing many a desert into a garden of the Lord; the Church is coming up out of the wilderness, while the poor foolish sinner is buried in a deep sleep, following with eager desire the merest vanities and shadows, and knowing nothing of the danger which is ever hanging over him, or of the bright inheritance which he is forfeiting, for want of taking the necessary pains to gain it. Such is the state of every soul by nature; and it is of God's great mercy that we are roused from this stupid sleep, and spiritual insensibility. He sends His ministers to say to each of us, as the mariners said to Jonah, "What meanest thou, O sleeper? 1 Jonah i. 5. 2 Ps. x. 5. • Heb. xi. 1. arise, and call upon thy God:" or, "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." How loath are we for the most part to be disturbed, and to rouse ourselves! how fond are we of our vain dreams! how slow to believe in their vanity, and to open our eyes to what is true and real! When the word comes to us, "How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?" how often do we plead, "Yet a little more sleep, a little more slumber, a little more folding of the hands to sleep!" And thus it is that poverty (the poverty of a soul destitute of true riches) comes upon us as one that travelleth, and want as an armed man. It is not only spiritual death, however (or sin), which is compared to "sleep." The common natural death of the body is likened to it likewise. The dead are said to "sleep in the dust;"2 and more especially all those who have departed this life in the faith and fear of God, are said to "sleep in Jesus."3 The state of an impenitent sinner is compared to sleep, to show his supineness, indolence, and darkness; but the state of departed saints is compared to sleep, because "they rest from their labours," and because, also, they will have a glorious and blessed awakening from their sleep in the morning of the resurrection. How blessed is the thought, which is thus suggested to us, of the perfect rest which remaineth for the people of God, after all the troubles and temptations of life; and also of that bright morrow, when they shall "awake up in the likeness of God, and be for ever satisfied with it!" 4 When I lie down to take rest in sleep,5 let me 1 Prov. vi. 9. 2 Dan. xii, 2. 81 Thess. iv. 14. John xi. 13. think both of that sleep of the soul which is sin, that I may pray to be awakened from it, and also of that last sleep of which our sleep every night is an image and similitude, that I may pray to be prepared for it. As I know not any night that I may ever again open my eyes on this world, let me so close them, as I would wish to close them, if I were sure that I had taken leave of the world for ever, with a humble hope that the sins of which I repent may be pardoned through Jesus Christ, and in perfect charity with all men. My soul longmy heart and "How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! eth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord: my flesh crieth out for the living God. Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King, and my God."-Ps. lxxxiv. 1-3.-See also Ps. xxvii. 4. THE Psalmist is generally supposed, says Bishop Horne, in this passage, to lament his unhappiness in being deprived of all access to the tabernacle or temple; a privilege enjoyed even by the birds, who were allowed to build their nests in the neighbourhood of the sanctuary. It is evidently the design of this passage to intimate to us, that in the house, and at the altar of God, a faithrul soul finds freedom from care and sorrow, quiet of mind and gladness of spirit, like a bird that has secured a little mansion for the reception and education of its young. We read, that "as a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place." And the proverb may be applied to those who restlessly leave the place which Providence has assigned them, and thereby so greatly lessen their opportunities of usefulness. But as the Psalmist considers "the swallow," or "the sparrow," especially favoured, which have found a place where they may lay their young near the sanctuary of God, so, in the figure of a bird that wandereth from her nest, we may chiefly see the similitude of some unhappy wanderer from the ways and worship of God, who must utterly perish, unless he be enabled to return to the happy home from which he has erred and strayed. When I see such a wanderer along this world's broad highway, let me earnestly and affectionately endeavour to lead him back to the "place" of peace and safety; and may the sight of any bird flying eagerly to its home remind me of the blessedness of living near to God! Still may my feet be found in the way to His earthly courts at every due season of Divine worship; still may I find strength and refreshment under the burden and heat of the day, in the thought of that 1 Prov. xxvii. 8. blessed communion which is there chiefly enjoyed; and may I at length dwell all the days of my life in the house of the Lord, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple! "I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus; Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke: turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the Lord my God."-Jer. xxxi. 18.-See also Lam. iii. 27; Hos. x. 11; Matt. xi. 29, 30. AN untamed heifer, that has never yet been put to the yoke, rebels against its master's will. It will not submit its neck to the restraint which he wishes to lay upon it, nor put forth its strength in drawing the burden which its companions at once undertake. Though fed and kindly treated by its owner, it struggles for a long time against his endeavours to bend its stubborn will; and if it be chastised, it becomes only the more furious in kicking against |