than God. Psalm xciv. 8-10, is repudiated. So, when the Father, Son, and Spirit, have done all to redeem, and sanctify, and save them, it is undervalued, rejected, contemned, blasphemed. Are we speaking? is it possible to speak too strongly on such a topic? when ministers, magistrates, senators, and nobles, are all pleading for Popery and profanation of the Sabbath. Yet, surely there will be a remnant according to the election of grace. God, we trust, has reserved to himself twice seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal. God is speaking to Britain, as he did of old to Jerusalem, (Jer. vi. 8.) Jesus is weeping over Britain, as He did over that devoted city, (Luke xix. 41.) But however dark the political horizon, however subtle, and even gross, the iniquity that prevails in our land, however dire the judgments impending over us to the sheep of Christ, our language must still be that of strong, everlasting consolation, and good hope through grace. God is requiring of them to keep the heart with all dilligence. The heart generally means, in Scripture, the whole moral nature of man, including his understanding, conscience, will, and affections. The whole soul, body, and spirit, is to be kept pure and spotless for God's Spirit's inhabitation. Improve the most precious promises, the freest imitations, and the richest privileges. The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Are, then, the consolations of God small with you, when not only the Creator, but every creature, is yours? You not only, negatively, do not want, but possess all things. There are many delightful spots still on this earth's surface, which the howling blast never reaches, and the drenching rain never saturates; but where gentle gales constantly play, bearing on their wings odours surpassing those of the hawthorn and the rose. But combine all the most delightful spots on earth into one, it would bear no comparison with the mansions above. Where Jesus, the Mediator of the New Covenant, and Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the redeemed, are located, is the first world unerring wisdom contrived, and Almighty power executed. It was called into existence on the morning of the first day; exactly at the instant the Saviour was born, and arose from the tomb at the very break of day, sooner, rather than later, (Matt. xxviii. 1; Mark xvi. 2; John xx. 1.) It was furnished, instantaneously, with all its bright inhabitants, angels and archangels, cherubim and seraphim. At nine in the morning, the first hour of prayer, and that in which He was nailed to the cross, the eternal Son, accompanied by some of the host of heaven, called into existence this world of ours. Then the morning stars,

created that very morning, about five or six hours before, sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy. With hea ven alone we have at present to do. There the eye of faith must rest, directed and strengthened, like Stephen's. Your citizenship is in heaven. You should be practising daily some of the anthems of the blessed. Grace must forerun glory; and just according to the degree of grace obtained and improved here, will be the full weight of glory hereafter. Thus shall it be done to those whom the King delighteth to honour.

Grace makes the slave a freeman. 'Tis a change
That turns to ridicule the turgid speech
And stately tone of moralists, who boast
As if, like him of fabulous renown,
They had, indeed, ability to smooth
The shag of savage nature, and were each
An Orpheus, and omnipotent in song:
But transformation of apostate man
From fool to wise, from earthly to divine,
Is work for Him that made him. He alone,
And He, by means in philosophic eyes
Trivial, and worthy of disdain, achieves
The wonder; humanizing what is brute
In the lost kind, extracting from the lips
Of asps their venom, overpow'ring strength
By weakness, and hostility by love.

Patriots have toil'd, and in their country's cause
Bled nobly; and their deeds, as they deserve,
Receive proud recompense. We give in charge
Their names to the sweet lyre. The historic muse,
Proud of the treasure, marches with it down
To latest times; and Sculpture, in her turn,
Gives bond in stone and ever-during brass
To guard them, and t' immortalize her trust:
But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid,
To those, who, posted at the shrine of Truth,
Have fall'n in her defence. A patriot's blood,
Well spent in such a strife, may earn indeed,
And for a time. ensure to his lov'd land
The sweets of liberty and equal laws;
But martyrs struggle for a brighter prize,
And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed
In confirmation of the noblest claim,

Our claim to feed upon immortal truth,
To walk with God, to be divinely free,
To soar, and to anticipate the skies.

Yet few remember them. They liv'd unknown,
Till Persecution dragg'd them into fame,

And chas'd them up to Heav'n. Their ashes flew
-No marble tells us whither. With their names
No bard embalms and sanctifies his song:
And history, so warm on meaner themes,
Is cold on this. She execrates, indeed,
The tyranny that doom'd them to the fire,
But gives the glorious suffrers little praise.

He is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves beside. There's not a chain

That hellish foes, confed'rate for his harm,
Can wind around him, but he casts it off,
With as much ease as Samson his green withes.
He looks abroad into the varied field

Of nature, and though poor, perhaps, compar'd
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight,
Calls the delightful scen❜ry all his own.
His are the mountains, and the valleys his,
And the resplendent rivers. His t' enjoy
With a propriety that none can feel;
But who, with filial confidence inspir'd,
Can lift to Heav'n an unpresumptuous eye,
And, smiling, say-" My Father made them all!
Are they not his by a peculiar right,

And by an emphasis of int'rest his,

Whose eye they fill with tears of holy joy,

Whose heart with praise, and whose exalted mind
With worthy thoughts of that unwearied love
That plann'd, and built, and still upholds, a world
So cloth'd with beauty for rebellious man?
Yes-ye may fill your garments, ye that reap
The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good
In senseless riot; but ye will not find
In feast, or in the chase, in song or dance,
A liberty like his, who, unimpeach'd
Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong,
Appropriates nature as his Father's work,
And has a richer use of yours than you.
He is, indeed, a freeman. Free by birth
Of no mean city; plann'd or ere the hills
Were built, the fountains open'd, or the sea,
With all his roaring multitude of waves.
His freedom is the same in ev'ry state;
And no condition of this changeful life,
So manifold in cares, whose ev'ry lay
Brings it's own evil with it. makes it less:
For he has wings, that neither sickness, pain,
Nor penury, can cripple or confine.

No nook so narrow but he spreads them there
With ease, and is at large. Th' oppressor holds
His body bound; but knows not what a range
His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain;
And that to bind him is a vain attempt,
Whom God delights in, and in whom he dwells.

COWPER, Tasi

SERMON III.

"Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his."— NUMBERS Xxiii. 10.

THESE are the words of one who loved the wages of unrighteousness. Covetous, and worldly-minded, and disobedient though he was, he was employed to deliver some of the counsel of God. As gold is not corrupted by being mingled with the impurest substances, and water can be conveyed pure through pipes of the basest materials, so God, who hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty, and base things of the world, and things which are despised, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence, can and does employ the ministrations even of wicked men, to benefit and build up His Church. Balaam was employed to predict the prosperity and future felicity of the people of God; and Judas to preach the Gospel, and, perhaps, convert mankind, though, after their services were over, we have the utmost reason to believe, they were both vilely cast away. The deepest laid designs of the devil himself have been overruled to benefit the Church of Christ; and, consequently, the most crafty and corrupted of his children can be made instrumental, though they intend the very reverse, of promoting the cause of the God of truth. The employment of such base and unworthy instruments, instead of detracting from, adds to the dignity and glory of God. It exalts His almighty power, and is a foil to reflect His unspotted holiness, and thereby magnifies His work which men behold. Balak, the king of Moab, called Balaam his friend, and stimulated his exertions by the prospect of a great reward to curse Jacob, and to defy Israel. He was forbidden by Jehovah to go; yet he went; and when the angel of the Lord withstood him, the dumb ass was made to reprove the madness of the prophet. Being, at length, permitted to go, under certain conditions, he went; and Balak remonstrated with him in being so long in coming, when he was both able and willing to promote him to honour. Balaam answered him, Lo, I am come unto thee. Have I now any power at all to say any thing? The word that God putteth in my mouth that shall I speak. To assist him

self in his divination, or, perhaps, rather, in some degree to punish Balak for his temerity and folly, by putting him to considerable trouble and expense, he commanded him to build seven altars, and to offer a bullock and a ram on every altar. After this was done with religious exactness, the Lord put this speech into Balaam's mouth, How shall I curse whom God hath not cursed, or how shall I defy whom God hath not defied? For from the top of the rocks I see Him, and from the hills I behold Him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations. Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.

In discoursing from these words, by the help of God, I shall, first, Shew who are the righteous with whom wicked men would wish to die, and to remain with for ever. Secondly, Shew what is the nature of his death. Thirdly, Attend to the wish so strongly expressed, Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.

First, I am to shew who are the righteous, whose death and future destiny Balaam here wished to attain. Notwithstanding the numerous passages containing the terms just or righteous, which express the same character, there are only two that need to be quoted as defining those who are truly righteous. Peter says, And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and sinner appear? It has been supposed, that he here means one who in his life and death answered the perfect justice of the law of God. If any man could, since the fall, have been conceived and born free from sin, and had, during his whole life, kept the law in thought, word, and deed, then righteousness would have been attained by the law, and such a person would have died in perfect peace, and been completely happy for ever. Such a man, however, never was, nor will be found. Paul says, For as by one man's disobedience, many were made sinners; so by the obedience of one, shall many be made righteous. In this verse, he evidently contrasts the first and second representatives of mankind,-Adam and Christ. In Adam all died; and in Christ all who believe and obey Him shall be made alive. By Adam many were made sinners; by Christ shall many be made righteous. Christ obeyed the law which Adam should have obeyed, and He endured the penalty which Adam had incurred. He was born perfectly holy; and His life, on His own account, as well as in behalf of those He represented, was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners. Those