asylum remain open for him? O where shall he go? Can you ask such a question? He will go to his father: "I will arise, and go to my father." What! go to that God whom he has insulted with so much audacity? Let him not deceive himself. No, he is no longer his father; he is an avenging God. Let him rather dread his indignation. He only fears his aversion and his absence; he only fears that he may not sufficiently love him. But how shall he be able to soften him? Ah, you little know the power of that divine love that inflames HIM! That love is stronger than the most inveterate habits: it breaks in pieces every chain: it is stronger than human respect-it braves it; it is stronger than death-it triumphs over it; it is stronger than the justice of God-it disarms it; it is stronger than the sovereign Judge-it converts him into a Father. SCRIPTURE SUPERIOR TO AFFLICTION IN THE scripture is full of instances, to prove that if the word of God will not awaken sinners, nothing will. And we see enough in these days to convince us of it. Men sometimes meet with things, by which we should think it impossible that they should not be reformed, if we did not see the fact. They sometimes hear the warnings of dying men, who are expecting to go to hell; they are affected for a while; but the solemn warning does but just touch them, and passes away. Sometimes they themselves are laid upon a bed of sickness and their lives hang in doubt before them they are brought to the sides of the grave, and their hearts are full of terror; yet, if they recover, they soon forget it, and return to the ways of folly and wickedness. Sometimes this is repeated-they are taken sick again-arc again in extreme danger-their hearts are again full of terror, and many promises and vows are made; yet, on recovery, they forget all, and again return to sin and folly! Such things may convince us, that where the word of God is not effectual, neither sickness, nor any thing else, is likely to be so. ADOPTION. THE brightest beam, the warmest ray of the fire of divine love that ever broke into the region of creation, and shone upon the children of men, was God's declaration-that the offspring of nature, the heirs of corruption and death, should be his own children, and the heirs of immortality and infinite fullness.-Who, upon such terms, would not choose to say to corruption, "Thou art my father; and to the worm, thou art my brother and my sister?" Infinite love surmounts all impossibilities. He deigns not to say to the miserable victim of corruption, descending into the unrelenting jaws of death, I will remit the sentence; I will award the blow: No; but he says, Let it fall; be not afraid; thou art my son. Look up to heaven; behold the sun by day, and the moon and the stars by night. When your eyes can penetrate no further, call in your imagination, and soar infinitely beyond them. While you are walking in darkness, stumbling amongst the rubbish of corruption, under the momentary apprehension of which shall be your last fall; when you shall never gather your feet, nor rear your head again upon the theatre of nature: then lift up your eyes. Do they fail you? No matter.-Give unbounded scope to your most towering conceptions; let them break through the barriers of creation-launch into the regions of eternity, the realms of uncreated day, and say, -Yonder I still live-there I have a Father still -if I am to be a reptile of nature no longer; still I am what is infinitely greater,—I am his son. DIVINE GRACE VICTORIOUS. WHEN all our spiritual foes rise up, as it were, to pursue us; when guilt, and terror, and despair surround us; when the wrath of God seems just overtaking us, and Satan is ready to seize us as his captives; when all seems lost, and self-condemned, and with no apparent way of escape, we can scarcely utter even a short impassioned prayer -at this gloomy moment divine grace hastens forward a free pardon rescues the sinner; Satan and all his forces are stopped at the very instant of victory; their legions roll back with dismay; the deep swells around them; it repels, it covers, it overwhelms them; and the ransomed fugitive celebrates on the shore the glory of his deliverer. HE that is entirely of the world finds it a world of conflicts, and cannot escape many a wound from it. But the worst of his case is, that he has no physician to apply to, "though the sorrow of the world worketh death." What a blessed thing it is to fight for the truth; for the honour of God; for everlasting life; to strive for the noblest prize; to wear celestial armour; to have free access to that Tree, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations, and which heal every wound upon the immediate application; to fight with the Captain at our side, and to be sure of the victory. Ir were in vain to seck to escape from the condition of our place in the dominions of God. A mind of wandering and melancholy thought, impatient of the grievous realities of our state, may at some moments almost breathe the wish that we had been a different order of beings, in another dwelling place than this, and appointed on a different service to the Almighty. In vain! Here still we are, to pass the first part of our existence in a world where it is impossible to be at peace, because there has come into it a mortal enemy to all that live in it. Amidst the darkness that veils from us the state of the universe, we would willingly be persuaded that this our world may be the only region (except that of penal justice), where the cause of evil is permitted to maintain a contest. Here, perhaps, may be almost its last encampment, where its prolonged power of hostility may be suffered, in order to give a protracted display of the manner of its appointed destruction. Here our lot is cast, on a ground so awfully preoccupied; a calamitous distinction! but yet a sublime one, if thus we may render to the Eternal King a service of a more arduous kind than it is possible to the inhabitants of any other world than this to render him; and if thus we may be trained, through devotion and conformity to the Celestial Chief in this warfare, to the final attainment of what he has promised, in so many illustrious forms, to him that overcometh. We shall soon leave the region where so much is in rebellion against our God. But we shall go where all that pass from our world must present themselves as from battle, or be denied to mingle in the eternal joys and triumphs of the conquerors. METHOD OF LIVING BY FAITH. WHEN a truth has fully received the sanction of the judgment, the second office of faith is, by attention and conception, to keep it habitually before the mind, so that it may produce its proper influence upon the character. This is to live by faith; and in this consists that operation of the great principle which effectually distinguishes it from all pretended feelings and impressions assuming its name. We speak, in common language, of a head-knowledge which does not affect the heart; and of a man who is sound in his creed, while he shows little of its influence upon his conduct. The mental condition of such a man presents a subject of intense interest. His alleged belief, it is probable, consists merely in words, or in arguing ingeniously on points to which he attaches no real value. These may have been impressed upon him by education; they may constitute the creed of a party to which he has devoted himself; and he may argue in support of them with all the energy of party zeal. In the same manner, a man may contend warmly in favour of compassion whose conduct shows a cold and barren selfishness; but this is not be |