if the clouds begin to gather, and God seem about to give you "the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction." Rather prepare to bid sorrow welcome. Rather receive it with a solemn joy, with a thankful submission. There are other forms which attend its sad and measured march, besides those of anxiety and anguish. As it approaches, palled in deep night, there are other voices, which fall on the listening ear of faith, besides those which swell the shriek and mingle in the dirge. The spirits of the de-7 parted righteous throng about calamity, as it turns its fatal step towards the believer's door. Their utterance it is, which is so distinctly and sweetly heard, amid the murmurings of the gathering storm, "O child of God, wouldst thou be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers?" wouldst thou forget thy Master's word, "In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world?" wouldst thou be an exception to an experience whereof all we are witnesses-ay, and the son of consolation it was who spake the wordsthat, “through much tribulation must men enter into the Kingdom of God."

LECTURE XX.

Spiritual Decline.

GALATIANS V. 7.

"Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?”

IN a recent discourse, we took occasion, from what is recorded of Asa-that his heart was perfect, though the high places were not removed out of Israel-to speak to you of the possibility that there might be decay at the heart in the matter of religion, though as yet the life gave no signs of spiritual decline. But we have since felt as if we had not gone sufficiently into so important a matter, as if we had not examined with due accuracy the symptoms of the insidious disease, as if we had not exposed with due faithfulness how frequent its occurrence, and how fatal its tendency. And as I purpose leaving you to-day for a brief period of necessary relaxation, I should not feel easy if I did not go at greater length, and with greater minuteness, into this matter of spiritual decline-for how possible it may be-ought I not even to say, how probable ?—that there are some amongst you who have begun well in a Christian course, but who have been gradually growing

slacker and slacker, less earnest in duty, less fervent in affection; and to whom therefore may fitly be addressed the pathetic remonstrance of St. Paul to the Galatians, "Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?" Perhaps we shall only be repeating—at all events, only amplifying-the statement in a former discourse: but better do this, better weary you with repetition, than run any risk of leaving you with vague and indefinite notions, where it so much concerns your safety that you should be alive to your danger. Observe then, that, if we take as our topic of discourse what is called spiritual declension; if we endeavour to examine the symptoms, and expose the peril, of that moral disease which eats away religion in the soul; we are not to be regarded as speaking only to those-though such are not excluded-who prove, by outward and undeniable signs, that they are forsaking their God and Redeemer-the disease is rather one which, like that fatal malady, which leaves the cheek beautiful and the eye brilliant, whilst it rapidly undermines the strength, may allow external appearances to continue specious and flattering, though the work of death is fast going on within. Observe, for instance, what is said, in the Book of Revelation, of the Ephesian Church. "I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience; and how thou canst not bear them which are evil; and thou hast tried them which say they are Apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars; and hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted." Here, by a reduplication, and even a repetition, of epithets, the idea is strongly conveyed of an active, persevering, and patient religion-a

Church, of which all this could be said, must have been distinguished by great readiness both to do and suffer in the cause of God and his Christ. Yet the next words are, "Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love." It is not laid to the charge of the Ephesian Christians, it is not even insinuated, that they laboured less than at first-but it is distinctly asserted, that they loved less, as though that, which alone can give the action any worth, may be on the wane whilst in the action itself there is no perceptible difference.

Let us set ourselves, then, to the examining whether men may not have a name to live whilst they are dead in God's sight. May God enable us to be at once faithful and affectionate in detecting and exposing the signs of a disease, under which, as we have said, it is but too possible that some amongst you may be labouring, the disease of religious decline. May his Spirit, without which there can be no right understanding of the things of religion, be our guide whilst we endeavour to show you, in the first place, how you may find out whether, according to the words of our text, you are ceasing to "run well;" and in the second place, what reasons there are for regarding the condition so described as one of pre-eminent danger.

Now we have already pointed out to you that there certainly was spiritual decline in the case of the Ephesian Christians-they no longer had that ardent affection which they had felt and displayed when first converted from idolatry they were not as warm in their love towards God and the Saviour; and they are plainly told, that, unless they repented, and did the first works, they should quickly be visited with the removal of their candlestick.

But in the last also of the Apocalyptic Epistles, which is that to the Church of the Laodiceans, you have a denunciation of lukewarmness, the being neither hot nor cold in religion, and an assertion of such indignation as felt in consequence by God, as you can scarcely perhaps find expressed in any other part of Scripture. This lukewarmness which is charged on the Laodiceans, can be only a greater degree of that leaving their first love which is charged on the Ephesians; and the utter loathing, with which the lukewarm are spoken of, must indicate, that, where spiritual declension has gone far, the man who is its subject is held of God in perfect abhorrence. The language in our text will apply to any or all of the stages of the disease for the ceasing to run well may indicate a slight, and almost imperceptible, decline of speed, and extend also to the slow and hesitating step which can scarcely be said to make any progress in the heavenward path. Thus there may be various stages of the disease; from that of the man, in whom love is not quite as ardent as at the first, to that of another, in whom it scarce retains any thing of its original fervour. Amongst those who have really "run well" in religion, and who still, to all outward appearance, are true servants of Christ, we may have many who are wasting away through the spiritual consumption— some on whom the malady has only just gained a hold, and others whom it has already reduced to little more than moral skeletons. But whilst we endeavour to lay before you certain of the symptoms of spiritual decline, you must be honest and fearless with yourselves: if you will not, as we proceed, search into your own cases, and see how far they answer to our description, in vain might