them through thy truth-thy word is
truth." He prays to God that this may
be the case. Make it the subject of prayer
for yourselves. Read the word of God with
this prayer. Sanctify me with this truth,
that it may make me wise unto salvation
-that it may purify and renew this my
hard heart. The word has often been
read, and God has often borne testimony
to it as effecting his gracious designs in
the soul. I believe that God has not
left himself without a witness regarding
its power, and that many have felt it in
their hearts to be the wisdom of God and
the power of God unto salvation—that
some have felt it to be the light of life to
their souls-enlightening their minds, sub-
duing their hearts to his love and his
obedience-breaking the fetters of sin,
and restoring them to the liberty of free-
born souls. If this have been so with
you, the word will be a precious word for
you; it will sweeten your solitude-it
will attend you in society--it will be
the manna of your life, the treasure of
your soul, and you will hide it and keep it
fast in your hearts, that you may not sin
against God.

Again, my friends, what degree of
sanctification do you possess-what degree
of the image of Christ do you possess?
When I speak of sanctification, remember
I do not mean external reformation of
manners-this is very good in its place:
I do not mean a mere outward conformity
to the word of God-that may be mani- |
fested by one in the gall of bitterness and
bond of iniquity: but I mean an inward
conformity to God, a deliverance from the
slavery and defilement of sin. Sanctifica-
tion is nothing less than that a man be
brought to the entire conformity of his will
to the will of God, and to the obedience
of every command. Is this the case with
you, my friends? How many are there
who profess to believe in the authority of
God's word, that are unacquainted experi-
mentally with this great work upon their
souls! Now, I ask you, what rise in the scale
have you made with regard to the Gospel?
I do not look for the extinction of sin,
but its subjection, and its increasing

subjection; and as it declines, for the
image of God to be advancing in your
souls. If the good work is begun it will
be carried on; but are you seeking for
the overthrow of sin ?--Seek for its
overthrow by the word and by prayer.
Your sanctification, from first to last, is
of grace-your conformity to Christ can
only be effected by the word of God—
He works by means, and renders these
efficacious to the ends for which they
are designed. You may not understand,
and may not be able to explain, how it
works, no more than you are capable
of explaining fermentation by leaven;
but if it be a real change, that change
will be perceptible; and, although you
may lament that you feel that it is so
very small compared to the means you
have enjoyed, yet its reality you will
feel, and you will be anxious that God
would perfect it in your hearts, rooting
out every root of bitterness. If you are
sanctified in any measure, you will be
looking to the world where there is no
defilement with longing anticipations.
Wearied souls look to heaven as a place
of rest from toil; sorrowful souls look
forward to heaven as a place of deliver-
ance from grief; afflicted souls look
forward to heaven as a place of rest from
pain; captive souls look forward to heaven
as a place of godlike liberty; and sancti-
fied souls look forward to heaven as a
place of complete freedom from sin.
Feeling the remains of corruption, expe-
riencing the struggles of the flesh against
the Spirit, knowing the yielding of the
soul to temptation, you will be saying,
Ob, that I had the wings of a dove, that
I might flee away from this vain and
sinful world, and be with Christ, so that
I might be in that world where I may
breathe a purer atmosphere, and mingle
with a purer society! And oh, have your
eyes directed upwards in prayer, that the
word of God may be the means of sancti-
fying you, of renewing you, of rendering
you meet for the enjoyment of it! The
Lord of his infinite mercy prepare us
for heaven, where are fulness of joy and
pleasures for evermore! Amen.

It may be proper to state, that when the Sermons are reported, and not communicated by the clergymen them.
selves, nor revised by them before going to press, as is the case with those of the highly eminent divines in the
present Number, a little liberty is occasionally taken in shortening them to suit the prescribed limits of the publica-
tion, so that in some cases they should rather be considered Notes of Sermons, than the Sermons at full length.
This remark may be supposed to refer, more or less, to all the reported discourses, but unless where we prefix the
word "abridged," we caution our readers against supposing that they are much curtailed. We have received
repeated complaints about the shortness of Sermons when the Sermons were given at full length, and by the clergy-
men themselves.

JAMES CHAMBERS, 48, Hanover Street, Edinburgh; and J. MACLEOD, 20, Argyle Street, Glasgow.

PRINTED BY ANDREW SHORTREDE, THISTLE LANE.

A SERMON PREACHED ON THE AFTERNOON OF SABBATH, 21ST OCTOBER, 1832,

By the Rev. JOSEPH SOMMERVILLE,

Minister of St. John's Chapel, Glasgow,

amicable terms with the adherents of both parties; to maintain a kind of see-sawing between the votaries of dissipation and the children of holiness-to aim at once-for earth and heaven; to "fear the Lord and to serve their own gods;" to have all the combined happiness which the gratifications of sense and time can afford, and to inherit all the felicities which Christianity can minister, and which immortality can supply.

But surely, my friends, it would be a superfluous waste of time and arguments, to stop to demonstrate the impossibility of uniting things so essentially distinct and discordant in their natures-of reconciling what is so absolutely and perfectly at variance of harmonizing interests so totally dissimilar-of amalgamating elements, in their very essence, of utter and eternal contrariety.

no account can you, in this question, belong to an equivocal race, or occupy an intermediate or middle position.

In many cases of every-day life, neutrality is not only lawful, but commendable. In many questions of intricate solution, and difficult interpretation, implicating the reputation, the property, or happiness of our fellow men, where the evidence is dubious, and almost equally balanced, it may be the dictate at once of wisdom and discretion, to hold the judgment in suspense, and to come to no decision. In domestic feuds, in private dissensions, and in the fierce collision of stormy passions, it may be often advisable to stand neutral, and to take part with neither set of combatants, seeing interference may tend to irritate, rather than to reconcile-to exasperate, rather than to allay, animosities; to foment, rather than to heal, divisions. But it is far otherwise in matters of religion, and in the high interests of immortality. Here no reserve can be admitted-no demur or debate sanctioned -no discreet caution allowed-no indif

Though the population of this globe is composed of many different races of men, discriminated by a thousand graduated shades of spiritual character and situation, yet are they all comprehended by the Spirit of God under two divisions only-ference tolerated; for in this case, every the church and the world; believers and unbelievers; those who are in a state of spiritual death and condemnation, and those who are in a state of spiritual life and reconciliation; children of God, and children of the devil; heirs of grace, and heirs of wrath; those who are in Christ Jesus, and those who "lie in the wicked one."

Between those two great and opposite classes, there is, even in this present life, "a great moral gulf fixed," so that they who would pass from the one society to the other, are unable; and the broad line of separation and seclusion cannot, on any account, be violated. He that is not with me," says Christ, "is against me." "No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." Be assured, then, that in a matter of such infinite moment as this, it is impossible you can be any thing else than exclusives, or can, with any degree of safety or consistency, stand in doubt or incertitude. You must, of necessity, be either the friends or the foes of God; either the devoted servants of Christ, or the avowed despisers of the great salvation; you must be inlisted either on Jehovah's side, or on that of his adversary; for on

motive, as it is most obvious, must be urgent and immediate, that you make an option, that you choose your side, and that you resolutely, and inflexibly, and for ever, adhere to it.

As you have, then, been constituted moral agents, left to the freedom of your own wills, with a capacity to choose and determine for yourselves, we ask you, in the language of the text, "whom you will this day serve?" And in propounding to you this question, it is the farthest possible from our intention to insinuate, that we regard it as one of small import, or of trivial or temporary moment, which may be evaded, disregarded, or postponed, without great detriment or hazard to your eternal interests. On the contrary, we avow, that we consider this question as one of transcendant consequence, and infinite magnitude, proposed, not as the Shibboleth of a party, but as the grand and paramount concern of all; that it embraces whatever can, to an immortal spirit, be most dear and vital-being auspicious or fatal to all his hopes for eternity, productive to him of unmeasured benefit, or of incalculable disaster. We do unequivocally and solemnly avow, that the one side of the alternative is life, that the reverse of the alternative is death; that paradise is

on the one side, and perdition on the other; that the one choice lays the foundation of an empire of felicity and of glory, greater and happier a thousand-fold than heart ever conceived; while the other decision will impregnate an infinitude of existence with lamentation, wo, and despair. In making your option, too, in this matter, you must stand solely on your own responsibility. You must of necessity be a party in this case, to your own eternal shame or renown, to your own enduring bliss or misery. The very nature of the case precludes the adoption of all coercive and compulsory measures. It rests with yourselves to determine, on which side the scale shall preponderate. The decision is committed into your own hands. The whole is left to your own discrimination and choice. Nothing remains for us but to make the proposals. Like advocates, we can do no more than state the case and plead the cause. You, the judges, sit and hear it tried, must weigh and sum up the evidence, return the verdict, and by that determination stand or fall for ever.

We propose, then, in the first place, to submit for your adoption, one of the two sides of the alternative specified; and, in the second place, to advert to the particular time when this election is to be made.

I. We are to submit to your choice one of the two sides of the alternative proposed. And the first particularized, is the tragical or fatal side.

hardness of conscience; if the great enemy of souls has, by the potency of his sorceries, and by the brilliancy of his enchantments, so fascinated your minds, and so debauched your hearts, as to make you stumble at every step, and receive erroneous impressions from every object; if, in the science of spiritual arithmetic, you discover such a stultification of intellect, and incapacity of moral discrimination, as to prefer a life fleeting as the shadow, to an existence of infinite duration; if you deem the pampering of the appetites, and the gratification of the propensities of the "vile body," as of weightier consideration than the improvement of the powers, and the assurance of the well-being of the never-dying spirit; if the most evanescent and unsatisfying of animal indulgences far overbalance, in your estimation, the purest and the sublimest of celestial ecstacies; if flames and torments unutterable have deeper charms for you than triumphs and transports inconceivable; if you wish to be the greatest architect of ruin" that ever existed, the destroyers of the largest amount of righteousness and felicity which the world ever beheld, then declare yourselves at once to be the devotees of ungodliness, and the heirs of wrath. Plunge headlong into every excess of criminality and frenzy; cast away from you the last desire and hope of salvation; pronounce boldly and fearlessly the decision, that you have "judged yourselves unworthy of everlasting life;" and say in a spirit betraying an equal defiance of the thunders of divine judgment, and the pleadings of divine compassion, Who is the Lord that we should obey his voice? we know not the Lord, neither will we serve him; for we have loved strangers, and after them will we go."

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If you listen to no other but the dictates of your own carnal and unrenewed inclinations; if it seem good unto you to follow the popular current; if you are determined to exhibit the last excess of madness and wretchedness, and to be guilty of the most daring and atrocious deed of self-destruction which it is possible for a creature to per- If you greatly prefer the pleasures and petrate; if such be the incurable fatality pursuits of a present world; if it have of your nature, the invincible hardihood attracted and satisfied your fondest regards; and intractability of your mind, your con- if a predilection for its degrading slavery, firmed regardlessness of every consideration its ever fluctuating frivolities, and its of glory, happiness, and self, and your utter ruinous excesses, has become the darling insensibility to the highest claims of ten- and dominant passion of your soul, then derness, generosity, and gratitude, then see that you adore no other idol than the choose the service of idolatry-embark world-that its spirit and maxims be idenin the basest thraldom to which Satan can tified with all your sentiments, and tastes, degrade his votaries-be the veriest slaves and mental operations-and that you of your own natural corruptions--the most permit no other object to interfere with its devoted martyrs to the servitude of that claims of affection, or to dispute with it iniquity, whose fruit is shame, and whose the rights of supremacy. See, that you wages is death. If you have been smitten bow implicitly, and without control, to