their weaknesses. How true it is that few characters can bear to be inspected minutely! And the longer that we live and come in contact with each other the more we feel there is for God to pardon in the best and for us to forgive in the very worst. But in that happy state when all things shall be made new we shall converse with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the world's grey fathers. I should like to have the opportunity of asking Adam what he felt when he fled from God on that day when he first felt sin, and what Eve thought when she heard the sound of her retreating steps from Eden, and saw the beautiful rose withering in her hand; and man went out into a world depopulated and dismantled, to water it with the tears of his weeping eyes, and to fertilise it with the sweat of his brow. We shall then see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and Paul, and Peter, and John; and the Waldenses, who were faithful amid the faithful few; and Luther, and Ridley, and Latimer, and Knox, and Cranmer, and Chalmers, and Wesley, and Whitfield, and thousands of whom the world was not worthy. What a brilliant society! what a glorious converse! what a delightful intercourse! and in the midst of all Him who is the adoration of all, the trust of all, the key-note of all song, the Alpha and the Omega of all wisdom, the Lamb upon the throne, before whom they cast their crowns in flashing showers, and join in anthems that have no discord and in strains that have no weariness: Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive honour, and riches, and glory, and power, and dominion for ever and for ever."

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We shall have in absolute perfection what we have now imperfectly-new hearts. Regeneration upon earth culminates in perfection in glory. At present the best of Christians sometimes feel worship and sermons to be a weariness. It may be sometimes want of interest in the discourse, but it is perhaps as often weakness and weariness in the hearer. Many a time while the preacher speaks the hearer's thoughts are wandering after something else. One must feel very much for men of business,

who, weary and exhausted by the toils of the week, come into the sanctuary on Sunday. How hard to keep their thoughts from wandering out of the place of worship! They feel on Sunday all the weariness of exhausted nature. But we shall then have hearts so changed that worship never will be weariness, service will never become bondage, God will never be feared or fled from, but always loved. The cold polar atmosphere that is around our hearts shall be warmed with all the fervour of heaven. No unclean spirit shall touch the heart; no evil thought that we deprecate or deplore shall find hospitality in it; no disturbing power shall affect it, no vacillation shall ever influence it; but with hearts warmed with the love, changed by the power, and purified by the presence of the Prince of Peace, we shall love him as we never loved him before, and seeing him as he is we shall adore and worship him as we ought evermore.

We shall have there what we have in its incipient state upon earth, a new conscience. But conscience in its best estate upon earth is very imperfect indeed. We all know that the accusations of conscience outnumber its excuses. We all know what the feeling of regret is, what the more poignant and terrible feeling of remorse is. Such feelings shall cease to be; the conscience shall be the realm of perfect right; its instincts the echoing oracles that respond to the will and perfectly obey the behests of God himself. The whole conscience always and everywhere will be pure, perfect, holy. There shall be no regret, nor remorse, nor sighing, nor grief, nor sorrow. And there shall be when all things are made new also new intellects. When man fell every faculty that he had fell with him. Man's body has not now the physical perfection it had in Paradise, man's memory has been weakened, man's intellect has been shorn of its mighty power, man's conscience has become diseased, and his heart degenerate and infected with sin. Well, a day will come when the horizon that now limits the excursions of intellect will be vastly enlarged. At present the greatest intellect is the first to acknow

ledge that the more it sees the greater is 'the darkness beyond the horizon which bounds its vision. It was Sir Isaac Newton who said when congratulated upon his most brilliant discoveries: "I am but like a child gathering sea-shells and pebbles on the shore, whilst the great unsounded ocean I have never fathomed lies beyond." So the most gifted intellect in this world, the intellect of him who could unbraid the sunbeam, who could cast his measuring line around the stars, who could weigh them in scales, who could estimate their distances and densities, and calculate their speed-that intellect is no more to be compared with what it will be in that higher, purer, happier, better state when all things are made new, than a child's mind is to be compared with his. Then we shall think what now we only dream of, and we shall speak what now we only think, and we shall do and dare what now we only talk; and we shall see infinite resources of gratification, of joy, of happiness, of delight, in every flower, in every tree, in every star, in every pebble, in every text and promise and verse; for our horizon will be enlarged; all things will be made new. The contrast will be great between this clouded, damp, ungenial world and that bright, that blessed, holy, and beautiful home, which eye has not even seen a glimpse of it, nor ear heard a just expression of its greatness, nor heart conceived the things that God has laid up for them that love him.

Have we received the new nature in this world which is the apprenticeship for those new things that will be enjoyed in that world that is to come? Christianity begins in regeneration upon earth; it culminates in the restoration of all things made new. Faith in this economy looks to an unseen Saviour; love embraces him and holds him fast, and will not let him go; hope takes his promises into its heart, and rides at its anchorageground amidst the storms of the world undisturbed. But at that day faith will be lost in actual sight; hope will be merged in perfect having; and then having loved him unseen we shall love him when we see him with

it.

our whole heart, and strength, and might. Grace in the individual heart ripens into glory in the age to come. Have we now new hearts? Has God the Spirit changed our nature? Are we made new creatures? It has been ascertained by science that the density of the planets so varies that if a person were taken from this earth and placed on the planet Jupiter the greater density is such that his own weight would crush him into atoms; whereas there are other planets where the density is so much less than the density of our earth that we should not be able to stand upon the ground, we should be lifted out of it and above it. That shows that the inhabitant must always be made fit for the place in which he is to dwell. It applies morally as well as physically. They that are the heirs of heaven must be made fit for Grace on earth makes us meet for glory beyond it. And the way to reach that grace is, Christ and him crucified. That is the door that opens into glory; that is the pathway, more glorious than Jacob's ladder, that rises from earth's deepest grave to heaven's highest throne. Are we trusting in that name? are we pleading that perfect sacrifice? are we found in him? Can we say, Blessed Saviour, I feel how many are my sins, my imperfections, my weaknesses, my wandering thoughts, my sins of omission and commission; but thou knowest that the little trust I have in thee, and it is little in comparison of what it should be-and the little love that I bear to thee, and it is cold in comparison of what it should be-I would not give up for the whole world; I would meet martyrdom boldly rather than renounce my trust and my hope in thee?

LECTURE XXII.

THINGS IN REVERSION.

CHRISTIANS in this world may be homeless-bread may fail them and water not be sure-but in the world as it will be there is a glorious reversion. It is preparing for our entrance and enjoyment, far off in summers we shall surely see.

"For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him."-ISAIAH lxiv. 4. "But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.' 1 CORINTHIANS ii. 9.

THOSE things which we are told the eye has not seen and the ear has not heard, the Spirit of God has revealed to them, in the one passage, that wait on him; in the corresponding passage, that love him. If the Spirit, therefore, has revealed them, they must be in the Spirit's own record, namely, the inspired Scriptures, which are given to us for our learning. Let me therefore try to make you up an inventory, simply and plainly, from the Spirit's own record, of those great things and good things which are held in reversion, prepared, and laid up, for those that, in the one passage, "wait upon him;" for those that, in the other, "love his name." Wha are some of those things? We read of a kingdom is to come; a kingdom not yet arrived, else we s praise him for it; but a kingdom that is promise therefore we pray for it: "Thy kingdom come.' description of this kingdom given by the Spirit of