vine existence beam forth in a flood of light from every part of the universe, he shuts his eyes upon it all, and walks about in a deep darkness of his own creation. When God offers himself to him as a Protector, a Guide, a Saviour, he insultingly turns away from him as if he had no existence but in the dreams of children; and commits himself to the protection of chance. When immortal glory is fairly within his reach, and the path to immortal glory is clearly marked out to him, his eye is attracted away from the brightness of this prospect, and he would fain have us believe that his heart lingers joyfully upon the black horrours of annihilation. He determines that he will not exist, when God has decreed to him an immortality; and while he imagines that he is dancing about the grave of his own spirit, he is really dancing on the margin of that gulf in which his spirit will writhe and sink amidst the horrours of an ever living death. Yes, God himself has called him a fool; and the experience of his whole eternity will show him how well he deserved the name.

I was about to ask, Do I wrong the Atheist if I call him a brute? But this is rather what he claims to be, than what he really is. He may indeed, upon his own principles, herd with the wild beast upon the mountains, or creep with the reptile on the earth; and there is not one of the animal creation, so terrible for its fierceness, so contemptible for its littleness, so disgusting for its loathsomeness, but he may consistently take it to his bosom as a brother; for though he is compelled to acknowledge that human reason is somewhat above animal instinct, yet he regards both as accidental properties of matter, which are destined to expire in an eternal night of unconsciousness. But though he may be a brute in his feelings, and a brute in his aspirations, he

will find himself far removed from a brute in his destiny: for that spirit within him shall run parallel in its existence with the immortality of God. Yes, he is my brother ; and I would fain proffer him the aid of a brother's hand, to lead him out of this labyrinth into which he has voluntarily plunged: I would fain proffer him the sympathy of a brother's heart, in view of his being dead to all the glories of an immortal existence: I would fain proffer him the benefit of a brother's prayers, that his heart may begin to beat to the honour not only of a creating but redeeming God. Come, then, thrice blessed Christianity, and cast out the unclean spirit from his bosom : come and pour thy light upon his eye, and take up thy residence in his heart! In the brightness of thy beams let him see the immortality of his own spirit! When the sun henceforth rises upon him, and the face of nature smiles upon him; when his eye is filled with beauty, and his ear is filled with melody; let him see that in all this there is a testimony to the existence and presence of God! Lay upon him thy wonder working hand, and mould him into a fit companion for the angels! Divine Christianity, be thine the work of subduing him, and thine the glory of the conquest!

LECTURE II.

CHRISTIANITY CONTRASTED WITH PAGANISM.

ROMANS I. 16.

I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.

IN CONNEXION WITH

ROMANS I. 23.

And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four footed beasts, and creeping things.

It may possibly occur to some of you that, in passing from Atheism, a system which acknowledges no God, to Paganism, a system which recognises a plurality of gods, I am making a somewhat violent transition. But a moment's reflection, I think, will satisfy you that the distance between them is much less than you might at first imagine. The doctrine of the divine existence is the foundation of all religion. As Atheism completely annihilates religion by blotting out that doctrine, sò Paganism bereaves religion of its glory by a wretched perversion of it. The territories of Atheism do indeed constitute the darkest part of the whole region of errour;the part which lies nearest to the abodes of eternal dark

ness but adjacent to these are the dominions of Paganism; and so much do they resemble each other, that an Apostle has actually described the latter by a reference to the most distinguishing characteristic of the former.

The leading feature of Paganism, you all know, is idolatry, or the substitution of the creature for the Creator as an object of worship. We have no means of accurately fixing the period when idolatry took its rise, or of ascertaining the manner in which it originated.— Some have conjectured that it existed before the flood; and that it must have been included in that fearful description of antediluvian wickedness-that "all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth." Be that as it may, we are assured that, within four hundred years after the deluge, it had, to a great extent, overspread the world; for, at that period, God called Abraham out of Chaldea for the special purpose of preserving the knowledge of his unity and perfection. From that time to the period of Messiah's advent, idolatry prevailed among all the nations, with the single exception of the Hebrew; and even that nation was not at all times exempt from it: and with the same exception, in connexion with those who have embraced the religion of Mohammed, and those who have experienced the benign influence of the gospel, the whole world has been under its dominion from the last mentioned period down to the present hour. Its standard has been reared not only in the midst of intellectual degradation and gross barbarity, but in the very heart of civilization and refinement ; and if the wild Indian of the wilderness deifies the animal that bounds through the forest, or the reptile that crawls beneath his feet, so also has "the glory of the uncorruptible God been changed into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four footed beasts,

and creeping things," by the immortal poets, and philosophers, and orators, of Greece and Rome. It is estimated that, at this hour, idolatry in connexion with the monstrous system of errour to which it belongs, constitutes the religion of no less than five-eighths of the world's whole population. It is, of course, subject to various modifications, arising from the peculiar circumstances of different countries and different periods; but in respect to all its essential features, it is, in every country, and at every period, the same.

My design in this discourse is to exhibit the contrast which is presented by the two passages which I have just read to you;—the contrast between Paganism and Christianity. You will perceive at once, however, that I can do nothing more than treat the subject in a general manner; not only because the field which it opens is of almost immeasurable extent, but because a large part of the facts connected with it could not be recited in consistency with the decorum that is due to the circumstances in which we are assembled. In illustrating the character of Paganism, I shall feel myself at liberty to select facts from any part of the wide field before me, without respect either to the past or the present, to a state of refinement or a state of barbarism.

We will consider the contrast between the two systems in respect to

I. The DOCTRINES which they inculcate :
II. The WORSHIP which they enjoin:
III. The MORALITY which they produce.

I. The DOCTRINES which they inculcate.

1. Paganism teaches that there is a plurality of gods: Christianity, that there is but one God.

4*