SERMON XXVIII.

ROM. xiii. 12.

The night is far spent, the day is at hand : let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.*

WHOEVER has been accustomed to peruse seriously the compositions of the great Apostle, from whose Epistles the words of my text are selected, cannot fail to have discovered in them a wonderful capacity of mind, adapted to all circumstances of life, and more especially calculated to promote the best interests of mankind. If any one may be said to have been (as he really was) preternaturally called, or appointed, for the great work of human salvation, it was the author of those thirteen Epistles which immediately succeed the Acts of the Apostles; and which are now published to the world,

* Preached at St. Mary's, November 28, 1824.

not in the order in which they were written, but according to the importance of the communities to which they were addressed. Among these, those to the Romans and Corinthians are to be particularly noticed for the importance and variety of the topics introduced in them-for the acuteness of reasoning and earnestness of persuasion-and for the magnificence of imagery and of diction by which they are distinguished and adorned. But the Apostle had good cause for the exercise of such intellectual energies. He was selected to be the reformer of the most powerful, but most corrupt and immoral communities at that time existing. Vices the most odious, and crimes the most appalling, had marked the Romans and Corinthians, when St. Paul -who, previously, had been" breathing out threatenings and slaughters" against the church of Christ - was chosen by the Almighty to become a testimony and a tower of strength in support of a crucified Redeemer. Accordingly, you find every where-throughout the same great Apostle's writings, the deepest sense of contrition and humility, mingled with exhortations the most convincing and commanding. The author seems to be constantly separating himself from the

cause which he advocates. Of his own ef forts, he always speaks with a temperatè but conscious triumph: of his own merits, or demerits, with the deepest sense of unworthiness:-he says, that he is the least of all the Apostles-that he is not meet to be called an Apostle and why? because he persecuted the church of Christ.

Yet, deep and unfeigned as was the sense of his own unworthiness, it pleased God to enable this consummate teacher to assume a uniform tone, or tenor, of the most simple, but convincing, argument throughout all his Epistolary compositions. That presence of mind-that consciousness of truth-that command of reasoning and of persuasion, which made Felix tremble upon his judgment seat, and almost persuaded King Agrippa to become a Christian-are discernible in the close argument, lucid explanation, and, at times, irresistible pathos or invective, of the compositions of St. Paul.

These preliminary remarks lead us to a close examination of the Epistle from which the text is taken, and more especially of the words of the text themselves-which have been repeated to you in the service of the day. It is from the last but three of the chapters from

the Epistle to the Romans; and you observe, my brethren, how, as the Apostle comes to the close of his Epistle, his earnestness and anxiety seem to increase: an anxiety, not exclusively applicable to the ordinary purposes of human life, but connected with, and directed to, the great and eternal interests of life and death-time and eternity. In the preceding verse, he tells the Romans that now it is high time to awake out of sleep— not of that sleep which is the result of bodily labour, and which refreshes us for the customary occupations of the coming day—but of that sleep, which is the sleep of death, or of the extinction of all moral, virtuous, and proper feeling connected with their hopes as heirs of immortality. This is the sleep out of which the Apostle is so anxious that the Romans should be shook. It is for their delivery from such an entrancement, or slumber, that St. Paul applies all the energies of his mind, and pours forth all the warmth of his feeling—adding, as a most especial reason why they should be so roused, that "their salvation is nearer than when they believed" —that is, nearer than it was when they first received the faith of Christ.

And then, in the words of the text, assign

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ing an additional reason: the night is far spent the day is at hand "-meaning, the then dark state of persecution of the pure Christians by the unbelieving Jews and Gnosticks, was well nigh over: and the more joyful state of quiet and calm was then, like the dawn of day, approaching. "Let us therefore," adds the Apostle, "cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light." In other words, if such be the promising prospect before you, be worthy of its realization: let it oblige you to perform the deeds of the day: all actions of Christian purity, which shun not the observance of men: which claim and even challenge inspection: casting off those works which are done only under the cover of darkness ;—such as, in the following verse, are designated as “rioting and drunkenness, chambering and wantonness, strife and envying :" but, on the contrary, telling the Roman converts to put on the whole armour of light: that is to say, to be strengthened and secured in the panoply of faith and good works. This is the sound and enlightened advice, which the great Apostle of the Gentiles gives to the voluptuous and perhaps wavering Roman community-to whom this important Epistle