result of severance from GOD's Church. Other sovereigns followed in the track-the corruption of prince and people became universal-their ruin, complete.

III. The danger of every sin. Schism is not the only sin that spreads like a pestilence. All sin has the contagious property, as well as the impurity, of leprosy. It extends in the heart, and it spreads in society. "As a spark, falling upon light materials, kindles them with the touch, nor rests, till it has destroyed all; so is the nature of sin, when it has invaded the thoughts of the heart, and there is none to extinguish the mischief. Ever in its progress it becomes more malignant, more and more ungovernable; and thus later sins are ordinarily more virulent than earlier." (S. Chrysost. adv. Gentes.) It is commonly admitted from the idea that it brings with it some advantage. Jeroboam would have worshipped at Jerusalem, but for the shallow maxims of worldly policy; and every sinner excuses himself to conscience on the ground of human prudence, or pretended irresistible temptation. He asks not what GOD has commanded, but what interest and pleasure suggest. He separates duty from advantage, things which God has joined. He reads not the Scripture, he prays not for enlightenment, he trusts not in divine promises-he leaves the plain path of truth for the crooked maze of human counsels. He pretends even, sometimes, religious reasons for all this. O could he foresee the consequence! his deed repeated by innumerable others! and sins of deeper dye, but clearly resulting from his sin, propagated along the line of time! Once

break the law of GOD-once weaken the dread of sin

-a torrent of guilt rushes in, which nought but Omnipotence can stay! And will Omnipotence then interfere? We have no warrant for supposing so. The antediluvians, the cities of the plain, Canaan, Amalek, Israel, were not forcibly reformed, but destroyed. Contemplate the case before us-there is no mystery here-all is plain and natural cause and effect.

O then, when human arguments would induce you to contravene the law of God, look at Israel corrupted utterly, and utterly overthrown, through one sin of this kind. All have influence. If our children or servants, or those who look to our opinion or conduct in any way, see us making light of religion, neglecting the Church or the Altar, acting as becomes not the Gospel of CHRIST, where may the evil. stop? Thousands of generations, so far as we know, will not exhaust it. And oh, to meet all these in the judgment, and to be told that they walked in the way of us, who made them to sin, and see them dismissed to condemnation! What heart could endure it? Dreadful indeed, could Jeroboam have foreseen the slaughters, sufferings, defeat, captivity of the people whom his sin had misguided! but this were as nothing to meeting their souls in the judgment! If we have kept the right way, let us pray and strive to keep it still! If our example has caused the propagation of sin, let us, by life-long repentance, and exertions to reclaim sinners to the obedience of CHRIST, testify our sorrow and our faith! Let us remember, and act on the remembrance, S. James v. 19, 20.

LI.

Ninth Sunday after Trinity.

Subject. The "still small voice."

Text. 1 Kings xix. 11, 12. "Behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: and after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice."

History of Elijah. 1 Kings xvii.; 2 Kings ii. See Ecclus. xlviii.

1-12.

Principal Words.

Tagg hip.

"ELIAS was a man subject to like passions as we are,' (ἄνθρωπος ὁμοιοπαθὴς ἡμῖν. S. James v. 17.) This chapter supplies the proof. Hitherto he appears the mighty prophet, by prayer restraining or unbinding the heavens, calling down fire on the altar of God, standing alone against the king, the queen, their nine hundred and fifty prophets, and an idolatrous populace, extorting from the people an acknowledgment of the true GOD, and executing judgment on the deceivers. Now we see him despondent. Had he been so when the brook dried up-when the widow could only offer him a morsel of food-this would have been defect of faith indeed, but it seems only natural human infirmity. But that he should thus despair in the moment of triumph, appears quite un

natural. Yet it is in reality what proves him av0pwπos ὁμοιοπαθὴς ἡμῖν. It is quite human to rely on Gop in fullest faith in adversity,-to forget Him, or lose faith, in success. Ps. lxviii. 34, 35; Hos. v. 15; Deut. vi. 10-12. When Elijah was poor and persecuted, he leant on his GOD, and wrought wonders; now that those wonders were wrought, he is comparatively insensible of the Power that wrought them. Persecution is again awake, and he fails. Prosperity begets false confidence, even where it is confidence in GOD; because it is a confidence that He will continue temporal success to us, which He has not promised to do. Hence, if it pleases Him to withdraw it, we faint. Ps. xxx. 6, 7. Whether Elijah sinned in leaving his country, and hiding himself in the wilderness, may be doubted; it is probable that he did, as it appears not that he had any command for it, and it seems implied in God's question to him, 1 Kings xix. 9, 13; but his querulous expostulation (1 Kings xix. 4, 10, 14) was surely unworthy one who had received and wrought so much. He had been the doer of great things, and the achiever of great results; [expatiate on these ;] he thought himself better than his fathers, and entitled to repose and renown. Such a frame of mind is soon cast down. Jezebel had been neither converted nor terrified, but only exasperated; the servile people were but half converted; and for this he was unprepared. He becomes despondent and repining: complains, by implication, that, after all he has done, he has received no more than his fathers; that his zeal has not been rewarded as he expected, and prays to die, because he is weary of disappointment and life;

weary, in truth, of his task, which included suffering as well as triumph. Contrast Phil. i. 23-26.

GOD revealed Himself to His infirm, loving, faithful, and illustrious servant, in the way of affectionate rebuke; and, when we consider that we are oμoomadeês, (but oh how unspeakably inferior, even the best!) we may place ourselves in his situation, and listen to the "still small voice:" so that we take heed not to ima gine ourselves deserving the voice of compassion, when, perhaps, we are rather to be saved with fear. (See S. Jude 22, 23.) For GoD is unchangeable; and what He revealed Himself to Elijah, He is now.

The "still small voice," then, may be considered as evincing

I. That "GOD is love." (1 S. John iv. 8, 16.) He was not in the wind, the fire, the earthquake; He was not manifested in these; He is everywhere (Ps. cxxxix. 7, 12; Jer. xxiii. 24); but He is said to be where He is manifested, as in heaven, (S. Matt. vi. 9; 1 Kings viii. 30, &c.); the Tabernacle, (2 Sam. vii. 6); the Temple, (Ps. ix. 11; cxxxv. 21; Isa. viii. 18); the Church, (S. Matt. xviii. 20.) "Not that Almighty GoD, Who holds heaven in His hand, and earth in His grasp, is circumscribed by any local limit; but, in proportion as places are holy, they are called His place, and His habitation. Solomon, who built the house of GOD, addresses Him, in prayer, 'The heaven of heavens, and the earth, suffice not for Thee.' And in the LORD's Prayer it is said, 'Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.' Wherever the will of GOD is done, there is His dwelling-placethat is the house of GOD." (S. Jerome in Isa. lxiii.)