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den homage, the praises of your Lord.

-In your intercourse with men, let your eye "look ever unto him;"-whatever may be the part that is assigned you, whether it be to act or suffer, remember that he has gone before you on the way, and that the scene which you now tread, was once trod by him. Remember what was the "spirit" that animated Him,— what that prevailing principle which led him" to despise all glory, and to endure "all shame" in the discharge of the high and eternal service to which he was appointed. Remember, lastly, that his "father is also your father, and his God "is God."

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II. There is yet, however, a farther view of this subject:-Ye have seen the close of your Saviour's life,-ye have seen him "humble himself, and become obedient "to death, even the death of the cross.'

It is now that revelation opens to you a mightier scene, and that the veil is withdrawn from the eyes of mortality. "Wherefore God also hath highly ex"alted him, and given him a name "which is above every name, that at the "name of JESUSs every knee should bow, "of things in Heaven, and things in "earth, and things under the earth, and "that every tongue should confess that "Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of "God the father."

Such is now the glorious completion of that humble and pious life “ which "was once despised and rejected of "men!" And such, my young friends, (whoever you may be), is the final scene to which ye also are called. Ye are the children of the same Father; ye also are fellow workers in the same service, and the same " "mind" which was in him may also be in you. In that Heaven

to which he hath ascended, he now prepareth mansions" for those that love

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him ;" and " your labours and tribula"tions, which are but for a moment,” may also be crowned, by his redeeming hand," with an eternal weight of glory."

"What then shall separate you from "the love," and from the imitation of Christ? "Shall tribulation, or distress, or

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persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? God forbid!" for through all these, his triumphant step has passed before you, " and in all these things, ye also may be more than conquerors, through him that loved you."

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SERMON VII.

ON THE EVIDENCE WHICH ARISES FROM THE NATURE AND CHARACTER OF THE GOSPEL.

ST MARK, XV. 39.

"And when the Centurion that stood over "against Him, saw these things, he said,

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Truly this man was the Son of God."

EVERY year, my brethren, to those of our communion, brings round the grateful season, when we commemorate the arrival of the Author of our Faith, and the Leader of our Salvation; and, in the progress of time, every year also brings

forward to us the young of our congrega. tions, who are entering upon the eventful stage of life, and taking upon them the obligations of that religion into which they were baptized.

In obedience to these affecting circumstances, it has been the usual practice of this place, to devote the season to some explanation of the nature and evidences of the Christian faith;-to select from the great mass of evidence, some of those familiar illustrations which may suit the apprehensions of the young or the busy,and, by the prosecution of these subjects, to lead them on, (under the blessing of God,) to a right estimate of the majesty of that service in which they are to be engaged, when they celebrate the birth of the Saviour of the world.

Of this privilege I wish, in the present season, to avail myself, and, (surrounded as we are with the young, not

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