X.

THE KINGDOM OF GOD WITHIN US.

PART II.

MATTHEW Iv. 17.

FROM THAT TIME JESUS BEGAN TO PREACH, AND TO SAY, REPENT; FOR THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN IS AT HAND.

THAT the reformation and improvement of individual character proceeds from within, not from without; that it usually dates, not from any change in the condition and circumstances of life, but from the birth of some indigenous idea or affection in the mind, is the doctrine which I endeavoured to establish in the preceding discourse. However natural may be our reliance on external influences and marked transitions in our lot, as facilities for a change of mind, that reliance was shown to be delusive, and even to originate in a state of feeling, which itself forbids the change. A new and regenerative affection, wherever it finds root, springs up (like a kingdom of God

within us), 'not with observation,' but silently and unconsciously; from suggestions seemingly slight or even untraceable; with power often sudden and triumphant; in a seat within the soul profound and central; whence a transforming force radiates over the whole character to its very form and visible expression.

From the case of an individual man, we will now pass to that of multitudes. In societies, the order of reformation will be found to be the same;-from the centre to the circumference; from a solitary point deep-buried and unnoticed, first to the circumjacent region, and then over the whole surface; from the native force and inspired insight of some individual mind, that kindles, first itself, and then, by its irresistible intensity, a wider and wider sphere of souls; spirit being born of spirit, life of life, thought of thought. A higher civilization, by which I understand neither superior clothes, nor better houses, nor richer wines, nor even more destructive gunpowder, but a nobler system of ideas and aspirations possessing a community, must commence, where alone ideas and aspirations can have a beginning, in somebody's mind. Hence, of all the more remarkable social revolutions, the seminal principle, the primitive type, may be traced to some one man, whose spiritual greatness had force enough to convert

generations and constitute an era in the world's life; who preached with power some mighty repentance or transition of sentiment within the hearts of men, and thus rendered more near at hand that kingdom of Heaven,' for which all men sigh and good men toil. Private 'repentance,' individual moral energy, deep personal faith in some great conception of duty or religion, are the prerequisites and causes of all social amelioration.

It might appear a waste of breath to make assertion of so plain a truth as this, were it not for the disposition of men to invert this order, to plan new systems of society in order to perfect the individual, instead of seeking in the individual conscience the germ of a nobler form of society. Every vice and grievance, every evil physical and moral which may afflict any class of a community, is apt to be charged exclusively upon faulty institutional arrangements; upon laws or the want of laws; on forms of government; on economical necessity; on some external causes which lift off the weight of responsibility from the individual will, and make men passive and querulous under wrong, instead of active and penitent. Their aspirations are turned without, rather than within ; become complaints instead of efforts; and spoil their tempers instead of ennobling their energies.

The

They must have the world mended, before they can be expected to be better than they are: they reverse the solemn exhortation of my text; and propose to make a stir to get the kingdom of Heaven' established first; and then repentance and moral renovation will follow of course. machinery of human motives being, we are sometimes assured, altogether out of order, the manufacture of characters is unavoidably far from satisfactory. And not unfrequently a truly surprising amount of faith is manifested in the skill of certain moral mechanists, who promise to rectify the disorder, and form for us only the true specimens of men. Self-interest is the one force, by which all speculators of this class propose to animate their new frame-work of society; its application being ingeniously distributed so as to maintain an unerring equilibrium, and smoothly execute the work of duty. A hard-worked power is this Self-interest; by which vulgar minds, in schools of philosophy or in councils of state, have from an early age thought to subdue and manage men; but from which, time after time, they have broken loose in startling and remarkable ways. Against this reliance for human improvement on institutions and economical organization, apart from agencies internal and spiritual, Providence and history enter a perpetual