produced by the knowledge of the infinite to be controlled by our wills; whence is it, goodness of God, which can never abandon us in life, or in death; the source of present, as well as future happiness; and the only permanent foundation on which to build our hope. Eternity without this, affords a dreary and uncertain prospect, more calculated to raise anxiety, and apprehension, than to excite satisfaction and joy. To escape from those horrors, which await so many of my fellow beings, would afford me little joy; for with a nature more charitable and perfect than what I now possess, what terror and amazement must the infinite sufferings of the wicked excite in my compassionate and benevolent mind? What an influence has this idea on my best expectations; how it damps the joys of immortality!

But forever let we adore and bless the Father of mercies, who has given me such unquestionable evidence of his almighty good-ence, can alone give it any value in the sight ness, by which I know that the immortality for which he has caused me to exist, is a truly precious and valuable gift of his infinite love; and that he is able to do for me, exceeding and abundantly above all that I can ask or think."

frequently presented to our minds, could not fail of raising them far above the world, producing in us the most delightful sentiments of peace, of joy, and of love.

It does not certainly depend upon ourselves to adopt these sentiments by an instantaneous | act of the will, in the manner we perform any external act of obedience: and in this sense alone it is true, that our sentiments are not under our command. But it is in our power to acquire the dispositions God requires of us; to excite them in our hearts; and to cherish and strengthen them more and more, by reading and meditating on his word, with assiduous and constant attention. Let us daily have recourse to the divine instruction contained in the gospel; where the Son of God himself points out the "things which belong to our peace." This sacred volume is to sincere Christians, "the bread of God which came down from heaven to give life to the soul;" a new and spiritual life, an "eternal life abiding in us." It presents to our contemplation two interesting objects. GOD OUR HEAVENLY FATHER, AND A CELESTIAL IMMORTALITY. And if it is certain that our minds are formed for knowledge, and our souls for love; how are these sacred pages which contain the knowledge of God, and Jesus Christ our Lord, adapted to these ends; according as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain to life and godliness.

Mankind when they disregard the word of God, do not surely attend to the extreme folly and criminality of their neglect. Has the Being of Beings condescended to send his Son upon earth, to enlighten our darkness, to instruct us in his will, to publish life, and immortality, and shew us the road to happiness: has this precious and wonderful light been transmitted to us in his gospel; has he destined us to be born again of uncorruptible seed by his word which liveth and abideth forever;" and shall we suffer our lives to wear away without making any use of it: and while every other book is familiar to us, remain strangers to this sacred volume and immersed in worldly concerns, as though our residence here, were to last forever? How many professing Christians are guilty of this shameful, this foolish neglect! Were it possible that we could desire to be our own enemies, could we take a surer method of success, than with wanton levity to disregard those powerful succours of grace, under which we live? Nay more, were it possible for us to desire to set the Almighty at defiance, could we pursue a more efficacious method, than in thus abusing, perhaps throughout the course of our lives, the precious gifts he has vouchsafed us, neglecting and despising his offered assistance; and treating alike with the disdain of contemptuous forgetfulness, his commands, his promises, and his threatenings? But God is not mocked, nor can we elude the execution of his immutable designs. If we refuse to be enlightened by his word, he will have recourse to the severities of his wrath, to overcome our obstinate resistance; for this

saith the Lord by the mouth of his prophet Isaiah, "the word that goeth forth out of my mouth shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereunto I sent it." How heavy will be the accusation of such hereafter, who have been guilty of this contemptuous and criminal neglect of the divine word!

I rejoice that the digression on which I entered, furnished me with an opportunity of exhorting my fellow Christians to avoid this common, this alarming, and fatal evil.

Let us return to our subject. Since the being who made us, commands us to love him with all the powers he has given us; his nature must be such as naturally to produce this supreme love; St. John founds it upon his goodness, when he says, "we love him, because he first loved us." That infinite goodness, is therefore the only solid foundation of supreme love; I shall now proceed to explain.

In this perfect goodness, I discover three reasons productive of my entire love. The first consists in the benefits I have hitherto experienced, which excite my grateful love. The second arises from the promised blessings of eternity; which produce a love founded on interest. The third, results from that infinite goodness which resides in the Deity, and which constitute him the object of my utmost admiration, and most perfect filial attachment.

The first reason on which I found my love for the Supreme Being, is that of gratitude for benefits received. What are these benefits? Alas! when they are more in number than sand on the sea shore, how can I attempt to enumerate them! Ten thousand have escaped my recollection from my weakness, and alas! ten thousand times ten thousand from my stupidity or inattention. But this I know, that from the first moment of my existence to the present; the goodness of God has not ceased to accompany me, and to bestow upon me every suitable benefit. Let me seek to place them under different classes, that thus I may taste that the Lord is good, or in other words, that I may love him for the multitude of his mercies.

Self

Creation is the first of his benefits. existent, necessary, and infinite, in every perfection, the Divine Being could have no need of me, nor would his power have produced me, had he not designed to manifest his love towards me. The life I have received, comprehends the wonderful and admirable structure of my body, and its various organs, or inlets to the mind. Also, that living soul, with all its admirable faculties, whose excellence as far exceeds that of the body, as life is superior to death; the inhabitant to the habitation: it comprehends the senses I possess, by which I am enabled to behold, and to enjoy the works of nature: imagination, which enlarges the boundaries of those senses and extends my existence to various periods and different parts of the world: memory, by whose assistance I call back a numerous

Since I have been arrived at a state of maturity, how many are the blessings I have enjoyed? Has not the earth brought forth her increase, and been constantly covered with an astonishing profusion and variety of blessings? How manifold are those arising

industry of men! and amidst the general comforts of social life; how many private blessings have I experienced in my particular calling!

train of objects; and which is the receptacle of my acquired ideas: reflection and understanding to combine and perfect those ideas: lastly, reason or intelligence by which I am enabled to discover truth, increase my store of knowledge, and elevate my mind to the sublime contemplation of my Creator: it from the arts and sciences, and from the comprehends that sensibility of heart to which some have given the appellation of moral sense, which naturally inclines the mind to love, and pursue good, as far as it can trace it; and above all to love God as its supreme But I have also said, that the providence good. By all these faculties which are the of God, constantly watches over and supplies gift of God, he has made me susceptible of the wants of my soul. When my eyes first pleasure and joy; and capable of an ever in- opened upon the light, I possessed a living creasing felicity. To sum up all in a word, soul; but that soul was in its lowest state. It he has made me after his own image: my in-contained the essence of all its future faculties, tellectual nature conformable to his, by a ca- but torpid, inactive, destitute of a single idea, pacity of becoming a partaker in the divine of any knowledge whatever, scarce sensible nature, by holiness, perfection, and happiness. What excellence, what dignity then has he bestowed upon me; for as St. Paul says, am Inot also his offspring? is he not my father; am I not his child, and does not this creative act of his will, give me the most solemn and sacred pledge of his immutable love and goodness? for he is a faithful Creator, who will not abandon the work of his hands.

How various, how extensive then, are the benefits resulting from creation! Existence, a body fearfully and wonderfully made! An intellectual soul, capable of knowing, loving, and resembling its Maker! and a pledge and assurance that infinite goodness will never forsake his creatures. "Bless the Lord then, O my soul, and let all that is within me, bless his holy name!"

After enumerating the blessings of creation, I may rank under the second class, those of Providence. And what is providence? With relation to me, it is the continual care with which divine goodness has watched over my body and soul.

Have I ever been forgotten or neglected for a single instant amidst the immensity of the works of God? Has not his wisdom in every varying circumstance, constantly provided and dispensed, that which was fittest and best for me?

My body, which at first was an imperceptible atom, must have perished in its germ, had not divine providence perfected and sustained it. Those who are most conversant with the human frame, most acquainted with its developments, and revolutions; know the amazing care, the wonderful wisdom requisite to bring it to perfection. "I will praise Thee, O Lord, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; marvellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret; and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth; thine eyes did see my substance yet being imperfect, and in thy book all my members were written, when as yet there were none of them. How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! if I would count them, they are more in number than the sand."

of existence; how deplorable would have been its condition, had it not been upheld by the hand that made it! When I compare my present state with the first dawn of reason, I behold in the progress and improvement of my faculties, a subject of gratitude and praise; for however slow, however imperceptible have been my advances, yet in every step I have made towards perfection, I have experienced the blessing of Providence in affording helps and means to those superior faculties, which are destined hereafter to become the sources of my perfection, and felicity. Destitute of such means and assistance, my soul must have remained in a state little better than that of the brutes. It is therefore to the goodness of God, and to his watchful providence, that I owe all these mercies.

But this is not all; greater benefits remain yet to be told; for while my animal powers were acquiring strength and maturity, and my intellectual and rational faculties improving; sin, that destroyer of my perfection and happiness, has manifested itself. The lively impressions made by external objects on my senses, and imagination, have excited in my soul a perverse will, together with violent and unruly passions, which soon becoming habitual, would have totally corrupted my soul with vices alike odious and fatal; had not the paternal care of divine Providence attached to sin, a restraint calculated to suppress its depredations.

And what is this salutary restraint capable of stopping the ravages of sin? It is death, which has passed upon all men, for that all have sinned; it is also all the numerous evils attendant upon a state of mortality, by which infinite wisdom checks the progress of sin, and provides its necessary remedy. Physical evil, or sufferings, he has attached to sin, and made its wages death, to stem the torrent of moral evil. Had my soul been united to an immortal body, and this world my lasting residence, I had been lost. My passions would have become ungovernable, and reduced me to the horrible slavery of vice. But the wisdom of my Creator has prevented this evil, by connecting sorrow and death with this infant state of being, and thereby made it a state of

education. Placed as I am here, a stranger | loved me prior to my existence; since long and a pilgrim; uncertain of sojourning another before it took place he gave his Son for me, day; every object is transitory to me, and and thereby executed the eternal purpose "all is vanity." Is not this calculated to which he purposed in Christ Jesus our repel the force of my passions, and to excite Lord?" my desires after permanent life, and solid good! But lest this should be insufficient, the evils I experience from without, and from within, damp the ardour of my passions, suspend their career, give me time for recollection, that reason and reflection may find entrance into my mind, and incline me to "seek the Lord, if haply I might feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us."

been necessary to the accomplishment of a righteousness, sanctification, and complete scheme of benevolence, proportioned to the redemption." grandeur of the means?

The fourth and last class of benefits, which I have received from the infinite goodness of God are those of revelation, which with relation to me, are the supernatural means by which God in his word enlightens my understanding and fortifies my faith.

Revelation, contains all that which "God at sundry times, aud in divers manners, spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets," together with what he has "in these last days spoken by his Son." How gracious is that providence which has preserved and handed down these valuable oracles which are addressed to me, in consequence of my being born and educated in the church of Christ. When I compare my privileges, I who from a child have known the holy scriptures, with those of a poor savage, who has no hope, and is without God in the world; how greatly ought I to estimate them!

Revelation, by the light of faith, illuminates my reason, it gives me the knowledge of God, my Creator and Father, and of eternal salvation to which I am called. What objects for thy contemplation, O my soul! in a being perfectly excellent, and an immortality perfectly blessed! without these hopes, what were life? and with it, what are its greatest evils?

I can now "look to Jesus, as the author and finisher of my faith;" in him I behold “God manifested in the flesh;" he not only announces to me eternal life, by his promises; but as my forerunner he enters into it, by his death and resurrection, and calls upon me, to follow him. Thus is he become "the way, the truth, and the life;" and if I possess faith in him, I may with St. Paul, "determine not to know any thing, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified; counting all things but loss, for the excellency of his knowledge."

By faith, I become united to my Saviour, from whom I derive continual light. His spirit dwells in me; and with it, all necessary assistance to work out my salvation. As a master he commands me what I am to perform; and will hereafter judge me concerning my obedience. As a physician he administers relief to the maladies of my soul. He is that sun of righteousness which has arisen upon me, with healing on his wings. He is an example, a model for my imitation, a conductor and guide, who will never forsake me in life, or in death: and to the praise and glory of his grace I can affirm, "that without him I can do nothing." Let us therefore be full of thankfulness to God for the knowledge he has given us in this life, of the benefits reserved for us hereafter, and conveyed by that word, full of grace and truth, which was made flesh and dwelt among us, of whose fulness we have received grace for grace.

Let me conclude the enumeration of the manifold benefits of Divine Grace, with the recollection of the succours and means of instruction and improvement it affords, and which surround me under various forms. And first his word, his sacraments, and public ordinances. In his word I possess "all that is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and instruction in righteousness." Let me never cease thankfully to acknowledge the goodness of Providence, who has preserved this valuable treasure, and transmitted it to me, through so many ages.

Nor ought I to be unmindful of those authentic monuments, which the great Mediator of the new covenant established in his church, for the confirmation and edification of his followers. In baptism, I see represented that purification from the uncleanness of sin, which is the end of the evangelical covenant. In the Lord's supper I behold the mean of this purification held forth, in the death of the Son of God.

How great also is the privilege I enjoy in the appointment of ministers and pastors to celebrate divine service and preach and explain the word of God. How solemn and edifying is public worship, where with one heart, and one voice, an assembled multitude join to present their adorations, praises, and thanksgivings; their humiliations, prayers and supplications; to their merciful Creator, and universal Father; who in wisdom and goodness set apart one day in seven for the suspension of worldly eares, and the prosecution of the more important concerns of our immortal souls.

But here it may be inquired, whether faith alone is sufficient for my salvation and sanctification, which is a gift of divine grace, not absolutely necessary since "without holiness, no one shal see the Lord." To this I reply, "that faith in the only begotten Son of God" is sufficient, since we are assured that "whosoever believeth in him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life;" because sanctification is a necessary effect of this "faith, which is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen;" and an entire persuasion of their reality, will necessarily sanctify, transform, and renew our hearts. Can I know the extent of divine goodness, and not love God with my whole heart, and my neighbour as myself? Can I perceive benefit of eternal salvation, and not joyfuay relinquish every thing in this What shall I say of those which are partiworld that may stand opposed to it? Thus cular, and which are constantly at hand, were does faith in Christ Jesus, comprehend all I disposed to improve them. Every valuable those virtues and graces, by which sin and production of human understanding, every the world are to be subdued, and my sanc-book capable of enlightening, and leading me tification and salvation completed; for Christ to good, I owe in some measure to the light

Such are the general succours of divine grace, established in the church of Christ.