ing. He stands at the door of every heart, and knocks. Our enemies he fought unto the death, and he hath conquered them in death. He hath singly bent our tyrants, and put into every man's hand a patent of his liberty. And now he goeth about and about amongst us, rousing us with songs and sweet melody to rise from slavery and be ourselves again. He asks nothing of us for what he hath done-he lays on no new masterybut shows the ways of heaven and of sinless happy creatures, and craves us by the memory of his death, and by our own eternal life-all our life long, craves us to be ourselves again, to be the noble sons of God as our father was.

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Call you this a reign of terror? a reign of judgment? a reign of punishment? What then is a reign of mercy, persuasion and forgiveness ?-He takes no hostages of you, lays on no fines for the past, no penalties for the future-free forgiveness even unto the end, unto sincere repentance. Surely God is slower to judgment than 'man isSurely unto the last he putteth off- Surely there is not any thing he would not do, sooner than bring it to the grand and finishing stroke of everlasting doom.

The argument of this discourse thus completes itself. Man, it seems, by all his institutions for securing his welfare, is made for responsibility, and for submitting himself to judgment, when all other methods fail of preserving the peace. This is the nature of man, wherever he is found and

into whatever community he enters. God, legislating for man, hath adapted himself to this his nature, placing him under responsibility; yet taking every measure of his wisdom, and applying to every faculty of human nature by each kindly, noble method, to secure sweet harmony; putting off issues of judgment to the last, and not ringing the knell of doom until every other note and signal hath entirely failed to have effect. Therefore, he having taken that course which men uniformly take and admire, is devoutly to be adored for accommodating himself so sweetly to our nature and our condition.

OF JUDGMENT TO COME.

PART II.

ACTS XVII. 30, 31. GOD COMMANDETH ALL MEN EVERY WHERE TO REPENT: BECAUSE HE HATH APPOINTED A DAY, IN THE WHICH HE WILL JUDGE THE WORLD IN RIGHTEOUSNESS.

THE CONSTITUTION UNDER WHICH IT HATH PLEASED GOD TO PLACE THE WORLD.

HAVING shown at length in our former discourse that it is not unpleasant to the nature of man, nor uncongenial with the softest, tenderest relationships of human life, to be held under responsibility to God, and amenable to his future judgment,-we now proceed to examine the constitution under which he hath actually placed us, and upon which he is to enter into judgment with the sons of men. For God, who in this respect might be a pattern to all lawgivers, hath so contrived it in his wisdom, that his laws and ordinances should lie in narrow compass, and he hath brought them by his providence within the reach of slenderest means, while in his wisdom he hath written them, so that he who runneth may read, and the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein. Upon us, therefore, the knowledge of them is incumbent ; and surely he will not hold us guiltless if we refuse to lend our ear to those words which he hath been at so much pains to reveal. Let us, therefore, gird up the loins of our mind, and draw near with full purpose to discover what the Lord our

God, our creator and our preserver, our father and our friend, requireth of his children, in order that, if we find it good and wholesome, we may walk before Him in the cheerful obedience of an enlightened and convinced mind. For while allegiance to any constitution, human or divine, is blind prejudice and slavery, so long as you know it not, neither are convinced of its wisdom, it doth become, when the mind approves it as right and just, both dutiful and honourable to adhere to it; and the strictest obedience is then the greatest freedom, being emancipation from that which the mind rejects and obedience to that which it approves.

There is a great peculiarity in the divine constitution, and a great difficulty in bringing it completely before the mind; not because of the number of its details, but because of that intermixture of justice and mercy in which God hath made it to consist. And yet, if he open our mind to comprehend, and guide our pen to express the wonderful harmony of these its parts, and the wise adaptation of the whole to the present condition and faculties of man, we shall present the purest the most just, the most merciful institute under which man can live, and to which the mind will spontaneously offer the witness of every good and noble sentiment.

The first office, which the Christian lawgiver discharged, was to take to task the principles upon which men had been wont to regulate their sentiments and actions, and to substitute in their stead others by which they should be governed.

This discourse, delivered upon the mount, which contains the spirit of his discipline, divides itself into two parts:-First, of outward or overt actsSecondly, of inward sentiments and feelings.

Amongst outward acts, he gives the first place to the inflicting of injuries. The law current in his day, and still current in all well-governed societies, that whosoever killed another should be in danger of the judgment, he refines upon, by threatening both judgment here and hell hereafter, to every one who, without a cause, should allow himself in anger against his brother, or rate him for a fool;-thus striking at the root of injuries, by prohibiting the hot and hasty language in which they originate, crushing quarrels in the bud, by making the first outbreak of them as criminal as their ultimate termination. The second place he gives to the retaliating of injuries upon which the lex talionis-an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth-was the current maxim of his day, as it is still. This he utterly abrogates, forbidding to resent or even to resist evil, but to repay it with good; a law which, being understood in the letter, would abrogate all law, making us slaves to the worst of masters, the evil passions and ungoverned wills of the wicked;-but being understood in the spirit, forbids all revenge of injury, and all defence which proceeds in the spirit of revenge; not prohibiting self-defence, nor suits for justice, nor restraints of wickedness; but cautioning us to proceed in these with a benevolent spirit for the reformation of the evil-doer, for the main