vinced of their sinfulness, and their inability to save themselves: go on-study your own hearts-bring them to the test of God's word; view the workings of sin there in the light of the Sun of righteousness, and soaring on the wings of faith and love, open wide your bosoms to receive the warmth, and purity, and light of his glorious beams,-to cleanse and purify their dark chambers of abominable imagery. Unless you are doing so, your flight is not the flight of an eagle, the scriptural emblem of a believer; but, pardon my plainness, your flight will be that of an owl, courting the shades of darkness. So soared the saints of old-so must we soar, and the happiest moments of the believer, when groaning under the burden of his sins, and the influence of the world and its cares, will be when he meets his God, who smiles upon him in the midst of his troubles, and turns every cloud to sunshine. The believer knows himself too well to trust for a single moment to himself for comfort, but flying from himself, he seeks that peace which is to be found no where else but in the atonement of Jesus, and in bearing his image. The believer will be ever learning something new of Jesus, and of his own heart, until eventually admitted into the presence of his God and Saviour, when he shall know, even as he is known, and that for ever.

Sunday Morning, August 17, 1823.

SERMON XXXIV.

CHRIST AND HIS MYSTICAL BODY THE CHURCH.

Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven. Yea, the Lord shall give that which is good; and our land shall yield her increase.-PSALM LXXXV. 11, 12.

In the tenth verse, it is said, "mercy and truth are met together-righteousness and peace have kissed each other." This truth is the wonder of all wonders,-that all the perfections of Jehovah should unite in the Messiah: though God, in the creation of the angels, and also in that of man in paradise, had before displayed his goodness, yet the mercy of God did not then appear; indeed, none of the attributes of God appeared in their glory, until God displayed his mercy, and so must it ever have continued, had not God made it known. When the angelic hosts, by transgression, fell from their state of innocence, it was not known :

they indeed involved our first parents in the same ruin with themselves; but a new attribute, at least, an attribute new to them, was made known to the fallen angels by the provision made for the redemption of ruined man : and they knew it to their cost. Truth had declared to our first parents "in the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die;" and the same truth declared that the believing transgressor should live. In the fall of angels, and also in the fall of man, righteousness and truth met together; but righteousness and truth met together in the fall of man, that righteousness and peace might meet in us for ever : mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other." The fulfilment of this truth mercy had provided for, and announced in prophecies, promises, types and shadows, to man. It is true that, under these earlier dispensations, it was not so fully made known, nor so clearly revealed, as it is at present: mercy, it is true, announced it in prophecies, in promises, in types and shadows, to the church of old; but when the Messiah visited the earth, then, and not till then, was the glorious promise fulfilled, “ mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other." But truth shall spring out of the earth, and righteousness shall look

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down from heaven. Yea, the Lord shall give that which is good; and our land shall yield her increase." I shall in these words solicit your attention

I. TO CHRIST CONSIDERED IN HIMSelf.

II. AS THE HEAD OF HIS MYSTICAL BODY THE CHURCH, and

III. CONSIDER RIGHTEOUSNESS AS LOOKING

DOWN FROM HEAVEN IN IMMUTABLE AND ETER

NAL COMPLACENCY ON JESUS.

I. TO CONSIDER CHRIST IN HIMSELF: and here I would lay down this proposition, that the Messiah must have been God, or in Him mercy and truth never could have met together. In what finite being could mercy and truth meet together? In what finite bosom was to be found a temple capacious enough to contain them? The bosom of Deity itself alone could : Christ, speaking of himself, says,—“ I am the way, the truth, and the life:" the prophets also prophecy of him in abstract terms, as a God infinite in mercy, truth, and righteousness; righteousness in two senses,-righteous as a God of vengeance; righteous as an atoning sacrifice to satisfy the demands of that vengeance and from this source flows the peace of the church. Truth as applied to him, is the same as applied to the true God; and it follows

that he must be, and is, precisely what he represents himself to be; and that every thing he says must be true, and every thing he promises must be fulfilled; and so also must his threatenings be accomplished. The greater portion of the human race treat death and eternity as if they had no interest in them; as if eternity, so to speak, were dead, or had transferred itself as a rich legacy to time. But whatever we may think, my brethren, or whether we believe it or not, our thoughts will not alter the nature of things, nor will they avert the danger which threatens us, and why? because God is a God of truth, his threatenings are as full of truth as his promises. Falsehood must have one of two sources, weakness or wickedness: a man may promise, but be incapable to perform his promise, or he may wilfully violate his promise, but these things are infinitely and eternally remote from God.

Again Christ lays claim to all the titles of Jehovah, and also to the essence of Jehovah ; and he proves the truth of his title by the most stupendous miracle ever witnessed.

But to consider Christ in another respect as truth-in his human nature: yes, he chose the most barren spot of created being in which to display his truth,-he chose the nature of man; and it would not be difficult to prove that the