one too; and when we sketch the Dissenters, let us lay the finger of love upon their scar; and let us preserve and set forth the beauty of each-let us merge and forget the deformity that cleaves, more or less, to us all.

Let me suppose that from this stand-point you are looking down upon this world, and all that is transpiring in the midst of it in connection with the people of God, and the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. You would discover in that pure light and from that lofty observatory, that there is no such monstrous thing in the world as chance. A hair does not fall from the head without God's permission, and cognizance, and regard. A tear drops not from an orphan's eye that God does not watch and take notice of. In the magnificent record of facts by Colonel Edwardes in relation to India, he shows that in that dread scene through which we passed, and out of which we have emerged, and of which I hope we shall never have any recurrence, the very facts which the world called lucky chances were responses to the finger of God; and whilst the world was thinking only of chance, and accident, and contingency, and a thousand things, God is proved to have been in all that was microscopically minute, in all that was magnificently great. If any one incident in that marvellous history had dropped from the chain that binds India to England, India had been lost, and our Queen had parted with the brightest gem in her imperial crown. But we need not Colonel Edwardes to teach us that there is no chance. Grant to me that there is chance in the turning of a straw, and I will demonstrate to you, with irresistible logic, that there is chance in the upsetting of a throne or the government of an empire. Prove to me that a sparrow can fall wingwearied to the earth without God's arranging it, and I will prove to you that thrones can be upset, dynasties upheaved, a continent convulsed, souls lost, and God ignorant and unconcerned in the issue of any event. If it is not too trivial for God to make little things, it cannot be unworthy of God to govern little things. Whatever

it is worthy of Him to make it is worthy of Him to control; whatever it was not beyond God to redeem, it never can be beyond God to regulate and preserve: we need this truth to quiet the oscillations of the heart. He whose biography is the most bare, whose experience is the most limited, whose sphere is the most humble, never can look back upon that biography, and turn over the leaves of memory, and re-read them, without seeing that it was upon the tiniest turning of the tiniest straw that all he is, and has, and hopes for, depended, and does depend at this moment. Can I suppose there was chance in minute things, upon which such magnificent issues depend? Can I suppose that there is any chance in the conversion of a soul, which determines whether that soul is to be in everlasting joy or in everlasting woe? No! No! If we look down from that high stand-point, we shall hear only the beat of everlasting harmony where the world hears clashes of discord; we shall see perfect proportion, and beautiful procession, where the world sees disorder and disorganization; and we shall learn that lesson which an apostle taught, and which it needs God's grace to enable us to feel, that "all things," not some things, "work," not are still, but operative; "work together," are co-operative, "for good," are beneficent, "to them that love God, and are the called according to his purpose." If I could believe for one moment that there was accident in the world, I should really fear to turn a corner; I should never venture into a steam-boat; I never should think of going into a railway carriage: but there is no accident. I believe, just as truly as I believe that there is a God in heaven, that the day of every man's departure for heaven is literally fixed; and that each of us is immortal till we have finished the mission that God has given us to do. I know what you will argue, just as worldly men argue about other subjects; they say, Very well, if you believe that, of course you will drink prussic acid, or swallow arsenic, perfectly satisfied that as your time is fixed you cannot be

poisoned till it arrive. That seems a very logical, but it is a most unscriptural view. If the end be fixed, the means are fixed also. If I believed that I was fated to die in seven years, or in twenty years, it would not alter in the least degree my common sense in my intercourse with the world, and in regard to myself. I would eat as if all depended upon eating; I would avoid poison as if all depended upon that; I would call in a physician if I was ill. But the world would say, Why, you have one theory in your mind, but you have another practice in your life. I answer, The theory in my mind is in God's word, and the practice in my life is also consistent with that word. So in the same manner, if I believed, what I cannot prove, that this economy is to close seven years hence, that would not in the least affect my intercourse with the world. I am to act always as if all depended upon the means that God has put in my power. I believe that all that are saved are chosen to eternal life. Well, the argu ment of the world would be, then, if we are elect we shall be saved, if not, we shall be lost. I answer, That is not the reasoning of the word of God. We have nothing to do with the secret things, or the decrees, or the everlasting purposes of heaven; it is ours to run the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. There is no chance, or accident, or incident beyond the range or below the impulse of God. And yet I am not a fatalist; but on the contrary. My Bible says: "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling." Why? Because all depends on your doing? No, no; "because it is God that worketh in you to will and to do of his good pleasure." And again He tells us : "Chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world; " but how? "Through sanctification of the Spirit and by belief of the truth." In every instance God fixes the issue; but in every case He devolves upon man the duty, the responsibility, and the means.

Looking from that lofty stand-point, we should

see all things in the loveliness of God, and all working for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose. From that heavenly observatory how magnificent would the cross of Christ appear! how truly should we acquiesce in the judgment of Paul, "God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of Christ!" how we should feel the force of his sentiment, "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ!" How grand, how noble, how precious a book would the Bible look from that heavenly altitude! the inspiration of God, the lamp from off the everlasting throne; the word upon our right hand and upon our left evermore, saying, "This is the way, walk ye in it."

LECTURE XXVII.

SYMPATHY IN SUFFERING.

We are not alone in our sorrows. One who trod the wine-press alone feels with us, and fills the heart which sorrow has broken with glorious hopes.

"If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him."-ROMANS viii. 17.

It is

"If it be possible let this cup pass from me." important to distinguish here. In Christ's sufferings there was a mysterious virtue, which never can exist in the sufferings of any human being. His sufferings were expiatory—ours are not; his sorrow was atoning -ours never can be. He suffered because the sins of others needed thus to be forgiven. No tears that a penitent can shed, no sufferings that a martyr can undergo, can in their united force expiate a single sin of his own, much less the sins of mankind. In Christ's cup there was an element we cannot drink, and are not doomed to drink; and in Christ's cross there was a suffering that we cannot undergo, and are not designed to undergo. But there is a sense in which we are told if we suffer with Him, we shall also be glorified with Him. Let us see what this is. All suffering is unnatural; we were never meant nor made to suffer; and every pang that rends the heart, every tear that moistens the eye, belongs to the dynasty of the thorn, and the thistle, and the curse; not to the dynasty of innocence in Eden, before sin entered, and by sin death, with all our woe. And hence, wherever I see