SERMON VI.

1 PETER, V. 6th verse.

Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.*

It is the distinguished characteristic of an enlightened community, believing in the efficacy of christian revelation, that, in all seasons of humiliation and repentance, it submits itself, readily and unfeignedly, to the disposal of an Almighty and all gracious Power.

Everywhere, in the holy scriptures, we see maxims of resignation and of submission inculcated. In their public as well as private capacities, our forefathers were told to surrender all their cares, sorrows, and anxieties, into his hands, who loved them with a parent's affection, and without whose permission not a hair of their heads might perish. Our blessed Saviour himself, by the unblemished tenor of his life, confirmed the import

* Preached on Ash Wednesday, March 1824.

ance and the value of such precept and example. It should seem, as if, even to his exalted mind, and refined and perfectly disciplined feelings, occasional abstraction, prayer, fasting, humility, prostration of heart and spirit, were requisite for the important object of his mission—and by way of example to those who, without such abasement of mind and devotional spirit, might be entangled and lost in the briars and thorns of a treacherous world, and thus shut out from entrance into the mansions of everlasting blessedness.

It has been therefore, from a deep sense of the importance and necessity of this abstraction, by penitence, fasting, and prayer, that all the christian churches have set apart this solemn season-" to humble themselves under the mighty hand of God, that they may be exalted in due time: casting (as the Apostle immediately adds) all our care upon him, for he careth for us."

This, alone, is doubtless a great inducement or encouragement for us so to rend our hearts and not our garments and to turn unto the Lord our God, who is gracious, merciful, and disposed abundantly to pardon penitent and humble sinners. But these general principles, strengthened by the great

example of our Saviour, need not be further enforced; and I come therefore more immediately to the particular and sacred business of the day. First, as to its antiquity. From the earliest ages of christianity, it was customary for the Christians to set apart some time for mortification and self-denial, to prepare themselves for the feast of Easter. The christian Lent probably took its rise from the Jewish preparation for their yearly expiation. The Jews began their solemn humiliation before the days appointed for this expiation. Wherefore (says one of our most able commentators upon the Liturgy) the primitive Christians, following their example, set up this fast at the beginning of christianity, as a proper preparative for the commemoration of the great expiation of the sins of the whole world, by the passion, suffering, death, and resurrection of the Saviour, Christ Jesus. The word "Lent" is allowed to be only an old English, or Saxon word, synonymous with Spring: but it is now, and has long been introduced and established in our church as synonymous with the Spring fast: which always begins, so that it may end at Easter, to remind us of our Saviour's sufferings, which ended with his resurrection.

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calculated to promote the glory of God, by forwarding the salvation of man, it is this appointment of a certain set time for all persons to consider their ways, to break off their sins, and to return from whence they are fallen through the infirmities of the flesh and the prevalence of temptation. For though most certain it is, that sorrow should be the constant attendant upon sin, and daily transgressions call for daily penitence - yet fatal experience convinces us of another truth, no less certain that, in a body so frail, and a world so corrupt, cares and pleasures soon oppress the heart, and insensibility brings on the slumber of listlessness and negligence as to its spiritual concerns, which, unless dissipated and dispersed by frequently repeated admonitions, will at length seal it up in the deep sleep of a final impenitence."

"It was wisely foreseen, that, should the sinner be permitted to reserve for himself the choice of a convenient season, wherein to turn from sin to righteousness, that "convenient season" might never arrive; and the specious plea of keeping every day holy alike, would be often found to cover a design of keeping none holy at all. It seemed good therefore to the church, to fix a stated time, in which

men might enter upon the great work of repentance; and what time could have been selected with greater propriety, than this "Lenten " or Spring season, when universal nature, awakening from her wintry sleep, and coming out of a comparative state of death and deformity, is about to put on her garments of glory and beauty to give us a kind of prelude to the renovation of all things? so that the whole creation most harmoniously accompanieth the voice of the church, as that which sweetly accordeth to the call of the apostle, "Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." Thus much this eminent Prelate.

In the third place, you cannot have failed to notice, how these great objects are promoted or accelerated by an attention to the particular service set apart for this day's commemoration: that is to say, having the great sins and heinous offences pointed out to us, of which, if we are guilty, we cannot flatter ourselves with the hope of acceptance with the Deity and which was, from a positive and divine institution, twice enjoined by Moses in the book of Deuteronomy, and afterwards confirmed and observed by Joshua