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God. This, it must be acknowleged, was a very discouraging situation. Now to them did our Lord address Himself in the text; because his Gospel was adapted to deliver them from the observance of those Legal Ceremonies, and to discover to them a more certain, a more easy way to "make their peace with "God, and to find rest unto their souls." Our Saviour addresses Himself also to all sinners in general; but more especially to humble, repenting sinners, who feel their spiritual miseries, and who fervently pray to be delivered from them.

"Come unto me," says our Saviour to guilty souls,

ye who labor and are heavy laden." How clearly does this image express the miserable condition of sinners, when they become acquainted with themselves! The path of vice appears flattering to those who walk in it, who abandon themselves to sin, and who never reflect on the melancholy consequences awaiting it. But different is it with a religious man who fears God, who believes His word, who has a love for Religion, and who is not familiarized with vice. What grief,. what remorse, what anguish does such an one feel, who after having, grievously, offended God, opens his eyes on the precipice on which he stands! Nothing is more melancholy than the state of such a man, nothing equals the misery of his soul. Sometimes it is the chagrin of. having, carelessly, fallen into the snares of sin, notwithstanding the many and powerful reasons to dissuade from it, which covers him with shame and confusion. Sometimes it is the sorrow of having offended God, his heavenly Father, which upbraids and torments his conscience. Sometimes it is the dread that God will reject him, that He will not receive him within the arms

of His mercy, which fills him with alarm and horror. Sometimes it is the loss of his repose which he deplores; the privation of those consolations which he received in prayer, in the congregation, in the Holy Communion. Sometimes it is the thought of death which may surprize him in that deplorable state; the impression of another life, of a Judgment, of Eternity. All these thoughts which present themselves by turns to his mind," set themselves in array against him," and render his days miserable. O the uneasiness and apprehensions which sin, where it is felt, occasions in an heart that hopes for Salvation! Well might our Lord represent sinners of this description, as heavy laden with the burden of their offences! And yet how much better is it to groan under this weight of sin, than to live unconcerned at the consciousness of offending God, as we see the worldly, the unjust, the covetous, the voluptuous do, who feel no alarm about their spiritual state, and no concern how they shall answer to God for their conduct. To sinners afflicted with the remembrance of their sins; to contrite and wounded spirits who severely reproach themselves with their transgressions, and who "hunger and thirst after " righteousness"-these are they to whom the Blessed Jesus offers rest from their labors and comfort in their sorrows. In His gracious Invitation, all sinners, it is true, are included. "All ye come unto 66 me, and be saved." But He requires as an indispensable condition that they amend their lives-that they feel the need they have of God's Grace-and that they become new creatures.

II. I shall now consider in the second place the rest which He promises to the sinner.

It appears from what hath been already said, that it consists in the pardon and remission of all our sins, and in the advantages which accompany this remission of them.

Our Lord gives rest and comfort to sinners, by reconciling them to God, by restoring them to His love and to His favor which they had forfeited by their transgressions. The greatest calamity which can befal an human creature is to be the object of God's displeasure. Now this displeasure is a natural consequence of transgression. Hence sinners are called in Scripture," enemies of God, children of wrath." But Christ hath removed God's displeasure towards sinners, by offering the merit of His death, of His sacrifice, through which God is reconciled to us.

Our Lord gives rest to sinners by delivering them from the punishment to which they were liable by sin. That punishment is Death. Not simply that death which consists in the forfeiture of the present life--but in the loss of the soul, in an eternal separation from God, and in the misery which is the consequence of that separation. Now Christ by His death, by suf fering in our place and stead, has preserved us from death and condemnation.

Our Lord gives rest unto sinners by delivering them from the remorse, the anguish which sin produces, by establishing in them that peace and tranquility which they lost through sin. For since the Son of God has undergone the punishment which awaited us; the heavy burden of sin is removed, and in consequence fear and alarm should be banished, and peace and tranquility established in the soul. The sins which a Christian involuntarily commits, bring with them much uneasi

ness; but not continuing, habitually, to commit them, they do not separate him from the love of Christ; they do not deprive his soul of that peace, which is a pledge of the eternal peace we shall one day enjoy in heaven; since St. Paul assures us, that there is no con"demnation to them that" in heart and mind "love "God."

Let us, farther, consider that the rest which our Lord promises is not, unnecessarily, withheld from us. He is not like kings and princes of the earth who are slow to pardon, and whose policy is to keep the guilty and rebellious between hope and fear. If He, sometimes, delays to "speak peace unto our souls;" it is not that He is insensible to the horror of our situation: but by thus withholding His loving kindness, to compel us to feel more sensibly the weight of our miseries, to make us estimate more highly the value of the rest which He in mercy gives us, and to render us more attentive to our ways hereafter, more solicitous to preserve the peace, the Grace we have obtained of Him. But ordinarily, the Blessed Jesus is, always, disposed to come to our support, always ready to comfort us, to give His peace to the broken and contrite heart. What enhances the value of this rest is, that it is universal, and is offered to all. "Come unto me all "ye." He excepts no one. The greatest sinners may hope to find, in the Gospel of Christ, "rest unto "their souls." The Redeemer of the world, uniformly, taught that an entrance into Heaven was open to all, provided they would believe in Him and obey his Gospel. Blind and infatuated mortals! to neglect the merciful offer of the Saviour of your souls, and to prefer the short-lived pleasures of sin to that peace, to

those

those consolations which Christ Jesus proposes to you in His communion! The rest which is offered to us is complete it wants nothing. It produces in the heart of him who receives it, a real peace, a "good "hope" of salvation which nothing can disturb, but our relapse into, and continuance in, some atrocious sin. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God, "through Jesus Christ our Lord." To support ourselves in that happy state, we must, continually, be on our guard against sin, and diligently avoid falling into it. To enable us to do this our Blessed Saviour has made a most gracious provision. For at the very time that He comforts us, that He gives to our souls the peace, the tranquility they had lost-He accompanies this peace with his Grace, with His support, with His sanctifying Spirit, which enables us to conflict with, and, eventually, to "overcome the world,"

It is necessary to make one reflection more upon the words, "I will give you rest." Is this the language of a mere creature? What! Does our Lord undertake to give us rest, to remit our sins, to exempt us from the punishment to which the Justice of God has condemned us? He goes still farther. He undertakes to reconcile us to God, to establish us in His love, to open to us the gates of heaven which our sins had closed against us; for all this is comprized in the rest which is promised to us. Is this the act of a mere creature?" Who is this that forgiveth sins? Who," we may again ask, "can forgive sins, but God only?".

This rest comes from Him, who is at once the Creator, the Redeemer, the Sanctifier of our souls; and He expects us to accept His invitation, “Come unto

" me