the wounds we receive from time to time, and are strengthened for further battles, and for final victory.

O what a joyous day then should it not be-our Confirmation day! The day on which we are judged worthy to go forth to the battle, and are equipped for it, and sent forth to it, in the Name of the Lord, and are summoned to the life-giving Supper of the Lord!

Should we not say, in the prospect of it, "I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord! Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalemm" Let it remind us of our entry into the Jerusalem which is above. happy they, to whom it shall be an earnest indeed of this! Do we remember the parents or friends who have nurtured us in the fear of the Lord? Or do we see them or our sponsors at hand? Are their hearts burning within them? and are they praying for us? Shall not our hearts burn within us too? and shall we not pray for Psalm cxxii. 1, 2.

m

ourselves and for them? Of what avail their love; of what avail their pains; or what avail our professed returns of affection or respect; if, through our fault, now or hereafter, it is all to have been in vain? What shall the Confirmation day have been, if at the last day we meet them not again, and stand not again with them in the courts of Jerusalem, the heavenly Jerusalem?

Let every one who has, by nature or by office, to care for any of Christ's little ones, say to it, "Lift up thy heart, my child!" As thou walkest to the Church, think of the path to Heaven! As thou enterest the Church, think of Heaven's bright mansions! As thou seest the congregation, think thou of Heaven's host; the holy angels, the Church of the first-born, the spirits of just men made perfect, and of blessed infants taken ere the world had stained them! Bethink thee of all that glorious "cloud of witnesses," who even now compass thee, and behold thee, and are by thee! When thou seest the white-robed

virgin train, bethink thee of those who shall follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth; the redeemed from among men, the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb. And, when thou hearest the choir, bethink thee of the host, who, clothed with white robes, and with palms in their hands, shall stand before the throne, and cry with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb! And, when thou hearest the preacher, think on Him that saith, "Unto him that overcometh will I give the crown of life." And when thou drawest nigh, and kneelest to be strengthened, bethink thee of the hour of judgment, when thou shalt draw nigh before Him that sitteth on the great white throne! Lift up thy heart, my child, and pray, that in that day I may hear it said to thee, and thou mayest hear it said to me, "Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!”

SERMON XV.

ON THE EVE OF THE DEPARTURE OF THE REV. J. G. DRIBERG, AND CATECHIST H. J. HARRISON, TO COMMENCE THE MISSION TO THE GONDS OF THE NURBUDDA.

GEN. xii. 1.

Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, into a land that I will shew thee.

SUCH was the summons to Abraham, the father of the faithful, when God called him to lay the foundations of His Church. The promise annexed to his doing what he was thus bidden do was, "I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing, .

and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed." Abraham obeyed,

and "went out, not knowing whither he wenta."

And how was the promise fulfilled to him? As regards this present life, no more than thus. By faith he sojourned in the "land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles, with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise." But God "gave him no inheritance in it, no, not so much as to rest his foot on." When Sarah died, he had not where to bury her, and bought, for as much money as it was worth, for four hundred shekels of silver, "the field of Ephron, which was in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, that he might bury his dead out of his sight." There he buried Sarah, and there he was himself buried. "There they buried Abraham, and Sarah his wife; there they buried Isaac, and Rebekah his wife; and there Jacob buried Leah;" and when Jacob died in Egypt, Heb. xi. 8. b Heb. xi. 9.

c Gen. xxv,