corrupt nature, to precipitate himself into an abyss of misery. That we are all occupied in treading one of these paths, is a fearful thought, and which ought to influence us with a salutary alarm. All of us are in the road to happiness or misery all of us are ascending to the God of heaven, or are descending to the abodes of evil spirits. But how shall blind and wretched travellers know their true country; and be assured that they are advancing in the road which conducts them to a blessed conclusion? The assurance of Jesus rescues us from this afflicting apprehension; I am THE WAY. A road forms the communication between the place whence we set out, and the place whither we tend Christ is that mystic ladder; the one extremity of which is fixed on earth, while the other reaches the sky.

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Our Lord is not merely the Way, as he goes before his disciples as an example; or merely as a prophet, pointing out, by his doctrine, the way of salvation; but it is Christ who has removed the obstacles which, on the part of God, impeded our reunion with him. These obstacles were God's immutable justice, and the state of sin in which mankind were plunged. God is necessarily just and we were exposed to punishment. God is the sovereign magistrate of the world; and we were the violators of his moral order. It seems, indeed, to have been the natural feeling of mankind, that sinful man must contrive some method of satisfying the outraged majesty of heaven. himself has confirmed that idea by the numerous sacrifices which he enjoined for the observance of the Israelites. And yet what suitable proportion can exist between the blood of victims and the grandeur of the Supreme Being? In vain did we attempt to cleanse ourselves by the ablution of lustral waters. length, in the fulness of time, what the efforts of reason, the precepts of philosophy, and even the Law of Moses could not effect,—that has been wrought by the ministry of Christ. No man cometh unto the Father but by him.

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Upon this momentous point, the Gospel affords the fullest variety of instruction. Our Mediator has really satisfied for us: he has really merited our reconciliation. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." When we were enemies, we were reconciled unto God by the death of his Son."

We are further

instructed, that it is Jesus alone who has presented this satisfaction. "He trod the wine-press alone: of the people, there was none with him: he looked; and there was none to help: therefore his own arm brought salvation." (Isa. Ixiii.) St. Paul preaches the same doctrine: Rom. v. 18: "By the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men, unto justification of life." And not only was this satisfaction effected by Christ unaided and unattended; but there is no other, Christ excepted, by whom the satisfaction could have been effected. For if other mediators could have been found; if there were many modes of appeasing the divine wrath; why do the sacred penmen lay such stress upon the immense, the unutterable love of God the Father, in sending God the Son into the world, to assume our mortal nature? But as there never existed, with the exception of Christ, one human being, who was exempt from sin; one who could pay, without being encumbered with debts of his own; one who could impart, to his vicarious death, a value proportioned to the dignity of an offended God; one who could suffer without being swallowed up and destroyed in his sufferings; it must follow from these considerations, that no one could have gone to the Father but by the merits of Jesus Christ. Summon before you the teachers of all other religions: and let us question them, Where were ye when Christ gave his blood a ransom for many ? Where were ye, when he, by himself was paying the penalty to divine justice? What miracles have ye wrought, that we may believe in you? What have ye done for man? Where is Where is your sacrifice? Where is your victim? Instead of removing the corruption of the human heart, ye have cherished it by your flatteries; ye have aggravated it by iniquitous motives of action, and by the profligacy of your evil examples. Ye were incapable to restore to me that God, of whom I had been deprived, through my sins; or of giving back to him that heart which had been estranged from him by my servile fear.

From such guides, let us turn to Christ, who is the Way; and by no other, can man come unto God. He draws us nearer and nearer to God, by weaning us from an excessive attachment to this lower world. No other religion could have promoted true and vital holiness, without which no man can see God.

But Jesus, by the precepts of his Gospel; by suggesting due motives of conduct; by the excellence of his spotless example; by the communications of his Holy Spirit; facilitates our entrance into the Holy City. Above all, it is he whose imputed righteousness sheds a perfume over our prayers, in his great office of mediation: so that if any man sin, we have an advocate with God the Father; and he is the propitiation for our sins. By Christ, as The Way, we return to God. No flaming sword now debars access into Paradise.

§ 5. Christ is The Truth. JOHN, xiv. 6: I am Tнe Truth.

As the apostles, in their future mission, were likely to encounter all the pride of the learned, and the subtle wisdom of philosophers, it was no small encouragement to be assured that they would be armed with the shield of truth; against which all the weapons of sophistry would be shivered into frag

ments.

When man lost his way in wandering from the fold of God, he lost the truth at the same time. When Satan shewed a way of knowledge, truth was no longer to be found. The different opinions among men,-the vain jangling (as the apostle terms it) is a proof that there is no truth among them. Let any man hear what philosophers have said about God, and he will soon see what human truth is. But the truth of God is this: that the Father sends his Son into the world, that all who believe in him, may be saved. Of this, no philosopher ever thought. But this is the truth, on which man has depended ever since it was said in Paradise, "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." The great end of Revelation was to keep up, and explain this truth; which was fulfilled in the person of Christ. Without him, neither the law nor the prophets, nor even the world itself, hath any truth in them. What are all the types of the Law of Moses? What is that greatest of all, the Passover? It is nothing: unless you add to it, "Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us." The Law had a shadow of good things to come: but the body and substance, from whence that shadow was formed, is of Christ. Take away the blood of Christ; and what is the blood of bulls and goats? It cannot

take away sin; it cannot do that for which it was commanded to be shed; and so it was nothing. We are told of a redemption from Egypt; but that was a temporary redemption: nothing will save us but an eternal redemption, of which that was a figure; but the truth is in Christ. He is the true Lamb, the true Moses, the true Aaron, the true Joshua. He is the truth of all that were before him; the true leader and captain of the people of God; the true priest, the true sacrifice. And this was, probably, the glorious subject of his Exodus, about which Moses and Elias talked with him at his Transfiguration for neither Moses nor the prophets have any other truth: Christ is the sum and substance of all.

The natural or created world has no truth without Christ. We see and admire the light of the day; and we may say with the Wise Man, "Truly, the light is sweet; and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun." But this is the light of the eye it is not the light of the mind: Christ is that light: and therefore he calls himself the true Light, whom the sun in the heavens points out to us as the Sun of Righteousness. The natural light of the day cannot enlighten a man that is born blind; but "the light which coming into the world, enlighteneth every man," that alone is the true light. And this, Christ shewed when he gave light to a man born blind from his birth: he did this to teach us, that no man is out of the reach of his light, be his case what it will. From the enlivening rays of that sun, nothing is hidden.

Bread is of great consequence to man's life; but it is so only to his natural life: that alone is "the true bread which cometh down from heaven," and giveth life unto the world. He that eateth of what we call bread, will die afterwards: and even they that did eat of manna in the wilderness, all died. But this is the true bread from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die.

On another occasion, Christ calls himself the True Vine; because everything that can be said of the vine, is fulfilled in him. The vine considered in itself, is but a shadow; apply it to Christ, and it has sense and substance.

Water is made to quench the thirst; but he that drinketh of it, shall thirst again. This is the living water, of which a man may drink and thirst no more; and this is what our

Saviour offered, when he said, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink."

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In like manner, all things in this world that are most necessary and valuable to man, are verified in Christ in him alone, the truth of them is found. And we may thence affirm, that the world we see without him, is not the true world, it is only the shadow of it. The world before us is a bodily world, and made for the body of man: but the true world is made for his spirit, and must be of a spiritual nature. Hence we may understand the two great mistakes which the wise man of the world is sure to make, concerning this world and the other. He judges totally amiss of the Christian and of himself. He supposes his own objects to be real, and the objects of the Christian imaginary: because the one walks by sight; and the other, by faith whereas the objects of the Christian's faith are the true objects, while the man of the world has nothing but the shadow of them; and when he loses the shadow, the Christian gains the substance: when this world goes down and disappears, the world of eternity rises up, and the objects of faith are all realized.

Lord, evermore give us of that world which we see not; and of this which now appears to us, give us more or less, according to thy good pleasure: for we now see how it is possible to possess all things, even while we have nothing. (JONES, of Nayland.)

§ 6. Christ is The Life. JOHN, xiv. 6: I am The Life.

THIS attribute of Jesus was not now ascribed to him for the first time. The Evangelist who records this assertion of Christ, had already, in the opening of his sacred history, announced the Saviour under the same appellation: "In him was Life." And what a blessed hearing is this, in such a world as ours; where death spoils every prospect, dissolves all society, and renders every possession vain and empty. What is our life? It is a vapour that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth; like a cloud that passes over our heads before the wind, and is gone. The only real life is to be found, not in this world, but out of it. Ask the man of pleasure, how he finds it; he must answer