strongly moved towards spiritual blessings, and towards Christ the sum of them; and having once tasted of his sweetness, they can say, Because of the savour of thy good ointments, thy name is as ointment poured forth. They that are elevated to a supernatural being, can admit nothing into competition with his love; and this it is that lies under these words.

Numbers have promiscuously been his guests at this time, and the greatest number think they came to good purpose; but know, that you are so far from partaking of Christ in the sacrament, that you have not so much as smelt his perfumes, if you be not strongly taken with his love. Great are the praises and many the duties you owe him for so rich favors; and therefore show your good will and endeavour some payment. But know that none of them are current, except they be stamped with love. If you love not, you do nothing. All your labors and services without it, are as so many ciphers, they amount to just nothing; and with it, the meanest of them will find accept

ance.

You have briefly in the words Christ's loveliness and the Christian's love, the former the cause of the latter; both couched under borrowed terms, according to the whole strain of this allegorical song, on which the true experimental knowledge of this divine love is the best commentary.

In all love, three things are necessary-1, some goodness in the object, either true and real, or apparent and seeming to be so; for the soul, be it never so evil, can affect nothing but what it takes some way to be good; 2, there must be a knowledge of that goodness; for the most excellent things, if altogether unknown, affect not; 3, there must be a suitableness or agreement of that good thing with the nature of those who should affect it; otherwise indeed, how good soever it be, it is not good to them.

Now all these we have clearly in this love. I. the goodness, the excellency of Christ, expressed by precious ointments; II. the manifestation and making of it known, signified by the pouring forth of his name; III. his fitness and congruity with them who are here mentioned under this denomination, virgins; such as have the senses

of their souls not stopped with the pollutions of the world, but pure and active, and therefore, as the apostle speaks, exercised to discern good and evil. These three requisites thus happily met must needs produce love; Therefore the virgins love thee.

I. the excellency of the object; Because of the savour of thy good ointments. How true is the apostle's word, when he calls Christ the believer's all things! And that radical grace of faith, because it apprehends Christ, hath a kind of universality; and it is reasonable too, it alone being to the soul what all the five senses are to the body. It is the eye, and the mouth; a wonderful eye, it sees him who is invisible; the mouth, it tastes that the Lord is gracious; yea, take these two both_together in one place, Psal. xxxiv, 8; O! taste, and see that the Lord is good. It is the soul's ear; for what else is meant, when it is said, He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear? And was it not that touch which Christ took special notice of, and with good reason distinguished from the common touch of the multitude that was crowding about him? That touch alone draws virtue from him; Some one hath touched me, for there is virtue gone out of me. And lastly, as it is all those other senses, and Christ is its object in reference to them all, so here, in its smelling, it finds the savour of his fragrant graces, and by that works love; Because of the savour of thy precious ointments.

What strange odds is there betwixt the opinion of Christ's spouse, and that of the world who know him not! They wonder what she sees in him desirable; she wonders that they are not all ravished with his excellencies. They prefer the basest vanities in the world before him; she finds the choicest and richest things in the world too mean to resemble the smallest part of his worth. See in this song how busily and skilfully she goes to all the creatures, and crops the rarest pieces in nature and art to set forth her well-beloved, and seems to find them all too poor for her purpose. One while, she extols him above all things beautiful and pleasant to the eye; another while, above things delectable to the taste, as in the ormer verse, Thy love is better than wine; and here

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she prefers the perfume of his graces to the most precious ointments.

When a natural eye looks upon the sacrament, to wit, of the Lord's supper, it finds it a bare and mean kind of ceremony. Take heed there be not many of you that come to it and partake of it with others, who prize it little, have but low conceits of it, and do indeed find as little in it as you look for. But O what precious consolation and grace doth a believer meet with at this banquet! How richly is the table furnished to his eye! What plentiful varieties employ his hand and taste! what abundance of rare dainties! Yet there is nothing but One here; but that One is all things to the believing soul. It finds his love is sweeter than the richest wine to the taste, or best odours to the smell; and that delightful word of his, Thy sins are forgiven thee, is the only music to a distressed conscience.

Thy good ointments. The holy ointment of the sanctuary under the law, was composed according to God's own prescription; Exod. xxx, 25. And they were straitly forbid to imitate it or make any like it, to signify the singular holiness, the matchless worth of the anointing oil of gladness, wherewith our High Priest, the Lord Jesus, was anointed above his fellows. And in this he is incomparable, that his ointment he hath not from without. It was his own divine nature that perfumed his manhood with these precious ointments. God and the Spirit of the Lord, are said to have anointed him; Psal. xlv, 7; Thou lovest righteousness and hatest wickedness; therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows; and Isa. Ixi, 1; The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. But know, that this Spirit and the Father are one in essence with the eternal Son. In that mystical song much like to this, the 45th psalm, it is said, his garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, as he comes forth out of his ivory palaces. When he came down from his glorious court above to dwell among men, he apparelled himself like them: he was clothed with human flesh; but yet that vesture was so transcendently enriched with all graces, as

with costly perfumes, that men might easily know there was more under them than a mere man. Yea, even in that low estate did such beams of his glory shine through, that all whose eyes were open did clearly behold them, and know him to be no less than the only begotten Son of God, by this, that he was so full of grace and truth. And these are, in a word, the precious ointments whose delightful smell is here commended.

Now to enumerate and describe these graces, what tongue of men, yea, or of angels were sufficient? What other is the main subject of the whole scriptures? What mean all the figures and ceremonies of the law, the costly furniture and ornaments of the temple, the rich vestments of the high priest, that fine linen, that silk and gold, those gems and precious stones? Was any one of them, were they all, any other than shadows and dim resemblances of the matchless perfections of Jesus Christ? It is strange, that Christians have so low conceits of their high Redeemer. What is the gospel, but a more clear and plentiful pouring forth of those ointments? What was the great labor and business of the holy apostles, but the diffusing of Christ's graces through the world? I determined to know nothing among you, save Jesus Christ and him crucified, says St. Paul to his Corinthians. What is that other sacrament and this, but coverts under which Christ conveys himself and his graces to the believing soul, while the profane and slight-hearted receivers are sent away with empty elements? Thus you see how ample a subject these graces are in the general. And truly, the consideration of any one particular of them, might be the employment of many hours. Would you hear of the wisdom of Christ? Look what the apostle says of it, Col. ii, 3; In him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; not some drops of wisdom, no, nor streams, but a fountain; not one treasure, but treasures, many treasures, yea, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; yet, not obvious to every eye, but, as treasures are, hid. The children of wisdom, who are the world's fools, have some knowledge of this his wisdom, and draw from it for their own use; but to sound the depth of it, who can be able?

No less admirable is his holiness. He is both the im

maculate Lamb, and the undefiled sacrifice. Such a High Priest became us, Heb. vii, 26-became us! Yes, holy, harmless, and undefiled: the more we were defiled with sin, the more stood we in need of an undefiled and spotless High Priest. It was as expedient that he should be unlike us in that, as that he should be like us in all other things. Therefore, as for the legal priesthood there was a holy consecrating oil, so this immortal High Priest was anointed with most entire and complete holiness. And this perfect holiness of his is set forth as myrrh, the best ointments and spices; myrrh which is of a virtue preservative from corruption. He was not only of excellent smell while he lived among men, but this myrrh did likewise preserve and exempt him from contracting any corruption or pollution, by the bad air of sinful company; so that he conversed with sinners, that he might convert them, without any danger of infection.

And as he was thus extraordinarily anointed with the spirit of wisdom and holiness, so likewise with the spirit of meekness; therefore he is called The Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world. His voice was not heard in the streets. And take in that other grace which he himself mentions together with his meekness, as being near in nature to it, humility; Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart. Indeed humility is an odoriferous grace. It is a gracing grace; it adds a kind of sweetness and lustre to all other graces; yea, it serves singularly as a character for the trial of the truth of all other graces. As balsam, which is the chief of precious ointments, used to be tried that is the truest and best, which, put into any liquor, goes to the bottom; that but slight which swims above-so those graces are most upright, that are accompanied with most humility. And that this may be out of doubt, you know that Jesus Christ, of whom we now speak, as he had most grace, so was he most exemplary in humility. And certainly the sweet smell of this good ointment did fill the whole house, when he washed his disciples' feet; as is said of the ointment that Mary poured upon his feet, in the foregoing chapter, John xil.

Amongst many other of his gracious qualities that might be mentioned, there is one we cannot but take par