life;" but there is but one gate, and one ready to be offered, and the time of my way, through which every living soul departure is at hand. I have fought a must rise to heaven-if to heaven he rise good fight; I have finished my course; at all—and that is through faith in Jesus I have kept the faith; henceforth there is Christ, and through that holiness which laid up for me a crown of righteousness, follows that faith-if that faith is genuine. which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall Let all ranks, then, from the highest to the give me at that day; and not to me only, lowest, learn this precious truth from the but to all them also that love his appearBook of God. Believe in Christ, and be- ing." lieve in him with the heart unto righteous- My dear friends, if this dignified terminess. This is the effectual way to be taken nation of our earthly trials be an object by every individual who wishes to obtain we desire to gain-if the state of our souls the diminution of the divine judgment now at death shall decide our eternal fate-if ravaging our land-by every individual the hour of our departure from time shall who wishes to obtain for himself a ground be the hour of our passage to happiness of peace in the prospect of that death or misery everlasting, I put it to your unwhich its approach may bring to him, but derstanding, if you will reflect, how carewhich, at all events, must soon come to fully, how intensely, how incessantly, we him. Let it be the business of all men to should prepare for its approach. Because consider what faith is to beseech the we do not see it, we are apt to flatter ouring grace of God to bestow it, and to enable selves that it is far distant. But need I them to follow after holiness, without which tell you, my mortal brethren, that you they can never please nor see God. were born to die? If, at this solemn moMy brethren, these are the means-the ment, a heavenly messenger should descend cherishings and actings of faith-these are from the sky, and announce the time of the means by which you may make your-your departure, as to an ancient was done, ond selves, as I have said, instruments of good-thy sickness shall be unto death-this to the public, and by which you may make week shall be thy last week on earth,— yourselves ready for the hour in which the Son of Man shall come.

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even this night thy soul shall be required of thee,-who among you would be ready Now, surely, any long detail or remark for this message of terror? Alas! what is unnecessary to convince you, that for tears of affliction would run down our the hour of the Son of Man coming, the cheeks at the remembrance of our sinsmost important duty which a mortal has what prayers we would give for a short to discharge, is in the command to make prolongation of our trials—what thoughts himself ready. O, my brethren, how de- would we have of those we left behindlightful will it be to you-how delightful what solicitude would be felt to finish our will it be to the friends that may surround work of sanctification! But is an angel your dying couch, if you shall be one of from heaven necessary to tell us that we those sainted men who, having been tried are mortal-that our appointed days are with tribulation, tried to the end of your few? As for the days that are gone, and earthly career by the world and seduction, the ages that are past, what has become of shall be ready, at the call of your God, to the multitude that filled them? Let us resign its enjoyments, and, standing on the look around in quest of those in our own verge of eternity, shall be solaced with a time-let us look around us in quest of conscience void of offence, when reflecting those whom but a few moments we saw on the past, and refreshed with the pros- with delight on the stage of life, the compect of an everlasting kingdom in the panions of our youth, the friends of our heavens? The ministers of religion are bosom, the children perhaps whom nature called to furnish consolation to the dying, designed to be props of our declining and they see them in various conditions years, whither have they gone? A voice of character and feeling. But they will from their grave pierces the heart of the you that eye cannot behold a more thinking soul, and calls on us all to be sublime, or more instructing, or edifying ready to follow them. Listen, then, to spectacle, than the deathbed of a good this warning voice. It accords with the man-full of humble confidence in God-dictates of universal experience-every rejoicing in the approbation of his own change in our condition reminds us of its heart-triumphing over the fears of the truth-infirmities as they draw upon us, grave and singing, when he thinks himself tell that the hour of our departure cometh. standing on its very verge,-"I am now In this, the day of a merciful visitation

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in this our present escape from the dread-ready. No painful retrospect will disquiet ful malady, let us attend to the things that our consciences-no anxious forebodings belong to our peace-let us cherish the terrify our souls. If we lead the life of dispositions, and hopes, and habits, the the righteous, we shall die their deathremembrance of which may cheer our we shall depart like them, and be with departed spirits-let us learn lessons of them-and our work shall follow us unto righteousness from the judgments of God the habitation of our heavenly Father. let us lay up for ourselves treasures in I only add, and let all join in the prayer, heaven, and then when our Lord comes,-Do thou, O God, to whom belong the whether he come in the first watch or in issues of life-do thou stand by us in our the second-whether this day or to-mor- dying moments-support our feeble limbs row-whether in the hour of our worship in their passage through the dark valley, or in the hour of business—whether when and receive them into their everlasting we are asleep or awake-he will find us rest, for Christ's sake. Amen.

ON THE AGENCY OF GOD IN HUMAN CALAMITIES.

A SERMON, PREACHED IN GEORGE-STREET CHAPEL, GLASGOW, ON THURSDAY, 22d MARCH, 1832, BEING THE DAY OF THE NATIONAL FAST.

By the Rev. RALPH WARDLAW, D. D.

"Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?"-Amos iii. 6.

This is a supplementary topic to those discussed on the former text, from the prophecies of Micah; and I wish to be understood, although without any very pointed mention of them, as having reference to the distresses of our own times, and country, and city.

mutual expression of hopes and fears, of the infliction of evil, in contradistinction wishes and alarms, of animation and dis- to three things-to CHANCE, to IDOLS, and couragement of sources of danger and to SECOND CAUSES. means of safety!-Now, when the voice of the Lord cried unto the city, the cause for alarm was as real, and far greater, than at the sounding of the trumpet of battle. This is the sentiment expressed in verses 7, 8. "The Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?" A truly benevolent spirit feels it a most painful I. We distinguish the agency of Jehorestraint, to keep back either the warn- vah from CHANCE.- Chance is a word very ing of evil, or the tidings of good. This common in the mouths of many: but it is was one at least of the impelling motives a word of the meaning of which very few in the bosom of the apostles, when they of those who use it have ever set themsaid, We cannot but speak the things selves to form any definite notion. The which we have seen and heard;"-and in truth is, chance is nothing. It is a mere the bosom of Jeremiah, when, having been term for human ignorance. When we subjected to the persecuting violence of say that an event has happened by chance, his enemies, and having found all his we seldom think at all what we mean. If warnings so unavailing, he formed the we intend to say that it has had no cause,— resolution of shunning farther suffering that is atheism. It is the exclusion of all by silence: "I said, I will not make mention superintending agency. But the only of Him, nor speak any more in his Name: but his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.' (Jer. xx. 8, 9.)

rational meaning of the word (if a rational meaning it can be said to have) is, that we are in ignorance of the cause or causes of the event. The poet speaks truly, when he defines chance in these terms

"All chance-direction, which we cannot see."

There is a natural atheism in the human heart, a constantly prevailing tendency to forget God. This tendency (alas! for There is an atheism, directly and properly our nature!) is more powerful amidst so called, which denies the existence of a the abundance of the enjoyments of life, God altogether. There is an atheism, than under the pressure of its calamities. which admits existence, but excludes all So true is this, that adversity has many a superintendence of human or created time been made use of as a means for beings, and of their respective concerns. counterworking the pernicious influence Such of old, was the atheism of Epicurus of prosperity, the former bringing back and his followers; which, however, had the heart which the latter had led astray. so far the merit of consistency, that it How rare is the case of a sinner brought associated the denial of providence with to repentance and serious religion by pros- the denial of proper creation. And simiperity and success in life! But the in-lar, though diversified in some particulars, stances have not been few, of persons have been the godless systems of some "chosen in the furnace of affliction," moderns. But certainly we might as well subdued and reclaimed by adversity. We have no God, as a God that takes no indare not say, however, that this is the terest in his creatures, and exercises no natural effect of divine judgments operat- superintendence over them. We might as ing on human corruption. They tend rather to fret, and provoke, and alienate. The sentiment of the text is the exact And there is, moreover, a sad propensity reverse of this,-that there is a God, and to overlook the hand of God in them al- that he directs and governs all things. together; so that men stand always in The sentiment is not to be confined to our need of having it pointed out to them, own world. It extends to all worlds. In and pressed upon their observation. It is all parts of the unmeasured creation, He to the solemn truth of the divine appoint- is ever present, ever felt!" This is the ment of calamities, that the attention is uniform affirmation, and the pervading called, and called impressively, by the principle, of the Bible. It runs through question in the text-" Shall there be evil all its contents, with an application such in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?" as the most heedless reader can hardly We shall consider the Lord's agency in overlook. Its maxim is—" All things are

well have no God as no providence.

in this our present escape from the dread-ready. No painful retrospect will disquiet ful malady, let us attend to the things that our consciences-no anxious forebodings belong to our peace-let us cherish the terrify our souls. If we lead the life of dispositions, and hopes, and habits, the the righteous, we shall die their deathremembrance of which may cheer our we shall depart like them, and be with departed spirits-let us learn lessons of them-and our work shall follow us unto righteousness from the judgments of God the habitation of our heavenly Father. let us lay up for ourselves treasures in I only add, and let all join in the prayer, heaven, and then when our Lord comes,-Do thou, O God, to whom belong the whether he come in the first watch or in issues of life-do thou stand by us in our the second-whether this day or to-mor- dying moments-support our feeble limbs row-whether in the hour of our worship in their passage through the dark valley, or in the hour of business-whether when and receive them into their everlasting we are asleep or awake-he will find us rest, for Christ's sake. Amen.

ON THE AGENCY OF GOD IN HUMAN CALAMITIES.

A SERMON, PREACHED IN GEORGE-STREET CHAPEL, GLASGOW, ON THURSDAY, 22d MARCH, 1832, BEING THE DAY OF THE NATIONAL FAST.

By the Rev. RALPH WARDLAW, D. D.

mutual expression of hopes and fears, of the infliction of evil, in contradistinction wishes and alarms, of animation and dis- to three things-to CHANCE, to IDOLS, and couragement of sources of danger and to SECOND CAUSES. means of safety!-Now, when the voice This is a supplementary topic to those of the Lord cried unto the city, the cause discussed on the former text, from the for alarm was as real, and far greater, than prophecies of Micah; and I wish to be at the sounding of the trumpet of battle. understood, although without any very This is the sentiment expressed in verses pointed mention of them, as having refer7, 8. "The Lord God hath spoken, ence to the distresses of our own times, who can but prophesy?" A truly be- and country, and city. nevolent spirit feels it a most painful I. We distinguish the agency of Jehorestraint, to keep back either the warn- vah from CHANCE.- Chance is a word very ing of evil, or the tidings of good. This common in the mouths of many: but it is was one at least of the impelling motives a word of the meaning of which very few in the bosom of the apostles, when they of those who use it have ever set themsaid, "We cannot but speak the things selves to form any definite notion. The which we have seen and heard;"-and in truth is, chance is nothing. It is a mere the bosom of Jeremiah, when, having been term for human ignorance. When we subjected to the persecuting violence of say that an event has happened by chance, his enemies, and having found all his we seldom think at all what we mean. If warnings so unavailing, he formed the we intend to say that it has had no cause, resolution of shunning farther suffering that is atheism. It is the exclusion of all by silence: "I said, I will not make mention superintending agency. But the only of Him, nor speak any more in his Name: but his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.' (Jer. xx. 8, 9.)

There is a natural atheism in the human heart, a constantly prevailing tendency to forget God. This tendency (alas! for our nature!) is more powerful amidst the abundance of the enjoyments of life, than under the pressure of its calamities. So true is this, that adversity has many a time been made use of as a means for counterworking the pernicious influence

rational meaning of the word (if a rational meaning it can be said to have) is, that we are in ignorance of the cause or causes of the event. The poet speaks truly, when he defines chance in these terms

"All chance-direction, which we cannot see."

There is an atheism, directly and properly so called, which denies the existence of a God altogether. There is an atheism, which admits existence, but excludes all superintendence of human or created beings, and of their respective concerns. Such of old, was the atheism of Epicurus of prosperity, the former bringing back and his followers; which, however, had the heart which the latter had led astray. so far the merit of consistency, that it How rare is the case of a sinner brought associated the denial of providence with to repentance and serious religion by pros- the denial of proper creation. And simiperity and success in life! But the in- lar, though diversified in some particulars, stances have not been few, of persons have been the godless systems of some "chosen in the furnace of affliction," moderns. But certainly we might as well subdued and reclaimed by adversity. We have no God, as a God that takes no indare not say, however, that this is the terest in his creatures, and exercises no natural effect of divine judgments operat- superintendence over them. We might as ing on human corruption. They tend well have no God as no providence. rather to fret, and provoke, and alienate. The sentiment of the text is the exact And there is, moreover, a sad propensity reverse of this, that there is a God, and to overlook the hand of God in them al- that he directs and governs all things. together; so that men stand always in The sentiment is not to be confined to our need of having it pointed out to them, own world. It extends to all worlds. In and pressed upon their observation. It is all parts of the unmeasured creation, He to the solemn truth of the divine appoint- is ever present, ever felt!" This is the ment of calamities, that the attention is uniform affirmation, and the pervading called, and called impressively, by the principle, of the Bible. It runs through question in the text-"Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?" We shall consider the Lord's agency in

all its contents, with an application such as the most heedless reader can hardly overlook. Its maxim is-" All things are