kingdom of God in the heart cometh not with observation, and none are disposed to say concerning it, "Lo here," or "Lo "there." Hence the Christian, uninclined to make a display of his excellence, and more willing to be, than to seem, religious, rarely becomes an object of very favourable inspection to mankind, and not unfrequently sees his true character unknown, as well as unacknowledged. The hypocrite, at the same time, is always employed in soliciting for himself the character of a Christian. Hence, when a weak man, he makes a perpetual parade of his discoveries, his gifts, and his attainments. When a sagacious man, he discerns that this bold exhibition must disappoint itself, and resorts, therefore, to measures less exposed to scrutiny; and these are often so well devised, so specious, so like the humble, meek, and gentle character of Christianity, as to pass usually without suspicion.

But when the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed, these fetches and concealments, these pretences and resemblances will entirely vanish. The hypocrite, the merely decent professor of Christianity, will stand forth in all his native deformity, and will be seen as he is, a gross and dreadful sinner. His hypocrisy will only render him more guilty and more odious, more abominable in the sight of God, and more despicable in that of the virtuous universe.

At this time the meek and lowly Christian will appear more excellent and amiable by means of his former modest, self-denying deportment. He will now be acknowledged before the assembled universe as the friend of God and man, as the follower of Christ, as voluntarily consecrated to the great cause of truth and of righteousness. As such, Christ will not be ashamed to receive and confess him, and will, on the best grounds, welcome him to his arms, his kingdom, and his blessings; while at the same time, and with equal propriety, he will say to all those who have merely assumed the character, as a cloak for their sinister and base designs, "Depart, ye cursed, into ever"lasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels."

Among the things which will pre-eminently contribute to make this separation clear and this contrast incalculably impressive this will be one; mankind, nay, the whole intelligent

universe, will be forced to see the immeasurable distance be-
tween truth and falsehood, holiness and sin.
In the present
world this difference is often denied, often considered as insig-
nificant, and usually feebly felt, and dimly perceived.

Than these no opinions can be more groundless, false, and
unhappy. Between the objects in question the difference is
infinite. The love of truth and holiness on the one hand, and
the love of falsehood and sin on the other, constitute the whole
moral distinction between Gabriel and Satan, between Paul and
Judas. Nay, the love of truth and holiness forms the whole
moral beauty and greatness of Jehovah, and constitutes the
boundless difference between his infinitely perfect character and
that of a being equally powerful and immensely malevolent.
Truth obeyed and holiness practised are the cause and the
amount of the celestial glory. They form heaven, they create
the angelic character, they will generate themselves throughout
eternity, the endlessly progressive happiness of the intelligent
universe. Falsehood obeyed and sin pursued would make the
universe eternally miserable, and will in fact produce, to a
great extent, the misery of hell. This immense difference will
now be seen in a full, overwhelming light; and so different will
appear
the characters of the friends and the enemies of God.
In the language of the Prophet Malachi,-Mankind will re-
turn, and discern between the righteous and the wicked,
between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.
But a book of remembrance will be found for those who feared
the Lord and thought upon his name. "And they shall be
"mine," saith the Lord of Hosts, "in the day when I make
"up my jewels; and I will spare them as a man spareth his
"own son that serveth him.”

,,"

J

SERMON XXIV.

SERMON II.

CONSIDERATIONS ON THE FINAL TRIAL,

ECCLES. XII. 14.

"For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil."

In the former part of this discourse, after explaining the text, I proposed to derive from the doctrine which it contains, several observations. Of these I mentioned the following:

I. How unprepared are we, in all probability, for the disclosure of our characters, indicated in this passage of Scrip

ture.

II. What a mighty change will, in consequence of this disclosure, be made in the state of men.

III. On the solemn day when this disclosure shall be made, the difference between the righteous and the wicked will be seen to be far greater than is commonly believed in the present world.

I will now proceed to finish the design with which I selected

this passage of Scripture as the theme of our meditations at the present time, and observe,

IV. That our own character will appear to us widely different from what we have been accustomed to believe it in the present world.

Every person who has read the Bible with any attention must have remarked that it presents very different views of the human character from those which we and our fellow-men are ready to entertain. Every such person must have perceived that man is there exhibited as far more sinful than he has been accustomed to imagine. Probably, very few have risen from reading the two first chapters of the Epistle to the Romans without feeling that they present views of human nature far more gross, odious, and humiliating than they can easily admit to be just. Particularly, there are few who do not secretly refuse to apply this description of the human character to themselves, and rejoice that it is not their own character. I do not intend that we rejoice because we are not heathens and idolators, or because we are not Jews and reprobates, but because we have not the same sinful nature that gave birth to the several gross crimes which form this painful description of man as a moral being.

When we read in the Prophet Jeremiah this declaration, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately "wicked; who can know it?" we are rarely willing, though it is uttered by God himself, to believe it true in its full import, even concerning our fellow-men; much less are we ready to believe that our own hearts are thus deceitful, and thus wicked.

Few employments can be more useful or more necessary for such beings as we are, than to inquire why our views of this subject differ so widely from the views of Him who searcheth the hearts and trieth the reins of the children of men. That his must be right, that ours, so far as they differ from his, must be wrong, can need neither proof nor explanation. Nor is it less evident that, whenever our apprehensions of a sub

ject so important and so practical are wrong, they must be injurious and may be fatal.

Among the reasons which lead us to false views of our own character, the following deserve our very serious attention.

First, We are so accustomed to the perpetration of iniquity, that we often sin without being conscious of it, even at the time of transgression.

To commit sin is with us a thing of course, a thing done by all men every day, and by most every hour and every moment. It enters into all our habits of thinking and acting, and in unrenewed men is the sum and substance of every moral habit. Even renewed men sin incomparably oftener than they are ready to believe. But whatever is thus habitual, and therefore continual, naturally ceases to be an object of particular attention, and to a great extent, of any attention at all.

Besides, to attend critically every moment is altogether too wearisome an employment to beings who are subjects of so much sloth of mind as men. Few persons, comparatively, are willing to attend critically at all. Fewer by far can bring themselves to undergo so much mental labour as is involved in that perpetual attention which is absolutely necessary to make us acquainted either with our hearts or with our lives.

Further, we rarely attend minutely to objects which give us pain, unless when we cannot avoid it. Our moral character is always a painful object to us, so far as we either are, or believe ourselves to be, sinful. Self-examination is terrible to wicked men, and is rarely taken up in such a manner as to be of any use to them whenever they can find a way to escape, and, unhappily, an escape is almost always in their power,

In addition to all this, we form at very early periods of life such favourable opinions of our character as persuade us that it is unnecessary to undergo this labour and pain, and therefore feel justified in neglecting to scrutinize our conduct.

Finally, we form such gross conceptions of the divine law, of its extent, spirituality, exactness, and perfections, and thus possess such apprehensions of what it requires and what it prohibits, that we are very often ignorant of the true nature of