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what is there that can shake our constancy

or corrupt our fidelity?

Set yourselves then without delay to acquire an early habit of strict self-government, and an early intercourse with your heavenly protector and comforter. Let it be your first care to establish the sovereignty of reason and the empire of grace over your soul, and you will soon find it no difficulty to repel the most powerful temptations. "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith; quit yourselves like men; be strong," be resolute, be patient; look frequently up to the prize that is set before you, lest you be weary and faint in your

minds. Consider that every pleasure you sacrifice to your duty here, will be placed to your credit and increase your happiness hereafter. The conflict with your passions will grow less irksome every day. A few years (with some of you perhaps a very few) will put an entire end to it; and you will then, to your unspeakable comfort,

* 1 Cor. xvi. 13.

comfort, be enabled to cry out with St. Paul, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me in that day*"

2 Tim. iv. 7, 8.

LECTURE V.

MATTHEW IV.—latter part.

THE former part of the fourth chapter of St. Matthew, which contains the history of our Saviour's temptation, having been explained to you in the preceding Lecture, I shall now proceed to the latter part of the chapter, in which an account is given of the first opening of our blessed Lord's ministry, by his preaching, by his chusing a few companions to attend him, and by his beginning to work miracles; all which things are stated very briefly, without any attempt to expatiate on the importance and magnitude of the subject, which was nevertheless the noblest and most interesting that is to be found in history; an enterprize the most stupendous

and

and astonishing that ever before entered into the mind of man, nothing less than the conversion of a whole world from wickedness and idolatry to virtue and true religion.

On this vast undertaking our Lord now entered; and we are informed by St. Matthew, in the 17th verse of this chapter, in what manner he first announced himself and his religion to the world. His first address to the people was similar to that of the Baptist, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. The very first qualification he required of those who aspired to be his disciples was repentance, a sincere contrition for all past offences, and a resolution to renounce in future every species of sin; for sin, he well knew, would be the grand obstacle to the reception of his Gospel.

What a noble idea does this present to us of the dignity and sanctity of our divine religion! It cannot even be approached by the unhallowed and the profane. Before they can be admitted even

into the outward courts of its sanctuary, they must leave their corrupt appetite and their sinful practices behind them. "Put off thy shoes from off thy feet,” said God to Moses from the burning bush, "for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." Put off all thy vicious habits, says Christ to every one that aspires to be his disciple, for the religion thou art to embrace is a holy religion, and the God thou art to serve is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot even look upon iniquity. In some of the ancient sects of philosophy, before any one could be admitted into their schools, or initiated in their mysteries, he was obliged to undergo a certain course of preparation, a certain term of trial and probation, which however consisted of little more than a few superstitious ceremonies, or some acts of external discipline and purification. But the preparation for receiving the Christian religion is the preparation of the heart. The discipline required for a participation

* Exod. iii. 5.

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