I would add now no precepts, no rules, no mention of particular sins and dangers;-gladly, safely might I leave these to your own heart's reminding, if now, at this new beginning of our time here, we who have been spared to meet each other here once again in God's house and in Christ's presence, would consider that truly, really, and in very deed, Christ is looking upon us with compassion; that is, He knows our danger, and He desires to save us. Believe this to be true, as indeed it is, and then there is a faith in each of us which will bring us to Christ, and bringing us to Him in earnest will lay hold on His salvation.

Oct. 3, 1841.

SERMON XV.

THINGS TEMPORAL AND THINGS ETERNAL.

ST. MARK, xiii. 31.

Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.

THESE words are nearly to the same effect with those of St. Paul where he says, "The things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." It is remarkable that the confession of this great truth has become so universal amongst all Christians, that it seems in consequence with many persons to be looked upon as a thing of course; and they who agree in confessing it are thought to be no more united by so doing in any Christian fellowship, than if they agreed in confessing some axiom of science or of common sense, which no man could dispute without insanity. And thus the great stress laid in the Scriptures

upon the belief of our Lord's resurrection, is apt I think sometimes to surprise us. It seems so natural to us to confess that there is a life to come, that we almost forget that the knowledge of this truth was a matter of revelation, nay, that it was a thing which prophets and righteous men had desired to hear, and yet which in express terms they heard not. This has happened to us, because the great truth of the resurrection has never, I believe, been disputed in the church, since the very earliest age of Christianity. There were some at Corinth in St. Paul's time who said that there was no resurrection, but any later denial of it is scarcely to be found. So the truth being quite unquestioned, we confess it all as a matter of course, and it seems as I said to be no great thing to confess it. But here as in other things it holds, that between not questioning a thing or confessing it with our mouths, and really believing it, there is often a very wide interval. If it were really believed, there could be no doubt as to its importance, no doubt also that the holding this point in common is a very great bond of Christian sympathy. Indeed there is scarcely any thing which would make so wide a difference between those who hold it, and other men; for in truth, to speak generally, the difference between those who believe it, and those who believe it not, is exactly the difference between the spiritually minded and the worldly

minded, the difference between those who are seeking God, and those who are living after the fashion of the world.

Now, let us consider whether we do truly, and in the scriptural sense of the term, believe our Lord's words in the text: "Heaven and earth shall pass away but my words shall not pass away." Here are two points declared to us, what will pass away, and what will not pass away, and the Christian's faith regards both of these together: it is of no less importance to believe in the perishableness of the one, than in the eternity of the other. We must remember this, even while we are considering the two things separately.

First, then, our Lord declares to us, "Heaven and earth shall pass away." By "heaven and earth" are meant this state of things of which we have experience, this earth as it is an habitation of human beings; the sun as it is a light to us, the moon and the stars as in any way connected with man. We know that we ourselves shall all die; nay, we know also by past experience that nations many times die; and so far as it is a death to perish utterly from the knowledge of future ages, so there are many generations of the whole human race, which in this sense are to us dead.

But our Lord's words go further than this; they tell us that there will be an absolute end of all worldly things whatever, not merely great

changes, partial destructions, and partial restorations, that some countries should be swallowed up by the sea, or covered with sand, that some languages shall cease to be spoken; but that all languages shall cease, all countries be desolate, all the human race come to an end. This certainly, and more it may be which we cannot yet comprehend, is contained in our Lord's words, that “heaven and earth shall pass away."

But yet I quite allow that this portion of the text without the other might, and I think would, have very little practical effect. For granting that heaven and earth shall pass away, and that our highest earthly labours are bestowed therefore on that which is perishable, yet still if this perishable is all that we know of, it becomes after all of very great and paramount importance to us; it may be but a poor thing to love, but love we must by the very necessity of our nature; and we must love this, if we know of nothing better. therefore simple declarations of the perishableness of earthly things are really of no effect whatever. No man heeds them, or can heed them; for our nature repels them. The poor man's pittance is no less dear to him than the king's treasure is to the king, and reasonably, because it is his all. And so if this earth be our all, the knowledge that it were to perish to-morrow would not, and I think ought not, to make us love it less fondly

And