speedy re-union of affection; they bind up the broken heart; they refresh the wearied spirit.

O my brethren! would you learn to apply these consolations to yourselves, begin to make yourselves familiar with the truths and promises of that gospel, from which they are deduced. If these be the results of a belief of these glorious truths; if these be the hopes and consolations of the gospel, I would ask each of you, in the words of Jesus to the sorrowing Martha, Believest thou this?" I ask not whether these things receive the bare conviction of the understanding, whether we assent to them as the common and everyday principles and maxims of science or of art; but whether we acknowledge them with reference to our own selves, and to the grand and important concern of our own eternal happiness. Has our belief that Christ died for sin, led us to die to sin? Has our belief that he rose again for our justification, led us to seek to rise from sin unto holiness? Upon our acceptance or rejection of these hopes and principles; upon our acknowledgment of their influence, and our fulfilment of their demands, depends our destiny in that future world, to which we are all hastening upon the rapid wings of time. While we spurn the chilling creed of the infidel Sadducee, let us be careful to adopt the hopes assured to us by the gospel, in their practical influence upon our

hearts. We know that death is but the entrance to a state of eternal existence, for which the present scene is the only preparation that is allotted to us. We know that the final resurrection, to which we are taught to look forward, will usher in the solemnities of judgment, and summon us to the bar of God. How soon our probation may be terminated we know not: the passing hour only is our own; the next is in the womb of eternity, and we know not what even a moment may bring forth. Can we look forward with humble confidence to the time, when our account shall be demanded? Were it to arrive this hour, could we meet it with the hope of safety ?-could we be content to rest our eternal welfare upon the result of an instant scrutiny into our hearts and lives? There will be a time, when we must do this. There will come a period, which shall for ever seal up our character, either for happiness or misery. Oh! let us make the best use of every fleeting hour; let us pray for God's grace, that the great blessings of his gospel may not lose their due influence upon our souls. Let us seek the privileges of the Christian faith; let us be animated by the prospects of the Christian hope; let us guide our hearts and conduct, by the principles of Christian love. Then, when death shall call us from this short and uncer

tain state, secure in the love of him who "died for us and rose again," we shall "sleep in Jesus," and "when He who is our life shall appear, then shall we also appear with him in glory."

295

SERMON XXI.

THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY.

MATT. xxii. 29.

Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God.

It is not unworthy of our attentive remark, that on most occasions, when required to defend his own statement, or to answer the cavils of his enemies, our blessed Lord replied in the plain and simple language of some appropriate text of Scripture. From the period, in which the arts and violence of the great enemy of mankind were arrayed against him, through the whole of that series of subsequent trials, during which those whom he emphatically described as being of their father the devil, did indeed the works of their father, the simple and unaltered words of Scripture formed his chief defence, against their subtleties and their malice. "It is written;" "Have

ye not read?" To one accustomed to view the words and actions, the general sentiments and conduct of the Saviour, as they exhibit the minute particulars of that character, which was intended to be the model of his followers' imitation; so constant, and so evidently intentional a practice, cannot possibly escape due observation, nor fail to teach an important lesson. We may learn from it the humility, with which we ought to state our opinions, upon the subject of revelation, the simplicity with which we ought to take the statements of Scripture for our guide upon these subjects; and this in the very plainest and most obvious acceptation of their language. For, in conformity with what appears to have been the usual method of the Jewish teachers, we find our Lord seldom dwelling at length upon the arguments adduced, but leaving the sacred text to make its due impression, and to exhibit to the mind of the hearer the natural meaning of its words, the obvious import of its propositions. And if he, in whom all wisdom dwelt, was thus content to refer to the records of truth, without any display of that learning, which, in his infancy, had astonished the wisest of Israel's sages, we may surely be content to take the language of Scripture, in its simplest and most obvious interpretation; without attempting, in the subtleties of a vain philosophy, or in the boldness of a