himself to the children of men in such glorious light that none could have overlooked Him; or He might have concealed himself in such darkness that none could have seen Him; but He has chosen a middle course. These things, the great things of Christianity, are hid from the wise and prudent, and revealed to those who are called, in Scripture, babes: "Even so, Futher, for so it seemed good in thy sight.” If the Divine Being had acted otherwise it would have infringed upon the perfections of His nature; but He has communicated His majesty and His mercy in tempered beams. If He had forced himself upon His creatures, he would have infringed upon His majesty; but He has communicated such portions of light as shall guide the serious and humble inquirer, and, at the same time, perplex those who want a pretext for forgetting Him. As this is the case, real happiness is only attainable in consequence of serious inquiry, which begins with the conviction of the vanity of every thing else but God.

We must seek Him humbly and perseveringly. Prayer is a duty, which men were instructed by the light of reason to receive as such; but it was reserved for the gospel of God to show its efficacy. The scope of all Scriptural language is, "Seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened: if ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask Him!" When was prayer ever employed in vain ? It may not be immediately answered; but those who sincerely seek after God are in the way to find Him; in the way to happiness; their path is like the shining light, shining brighter and brighter to the perfect day. He is to be found by a serious perusal of His word; not merely to become conversant with its histories and critical difficulties, but to obtain a guide to eternal life. It is to be regarded as a lamp, which God has put up in the firmament of heaven, to direct us in the way of peace. "Search the Scriptures" is the injunction of our Lord, "for they are they which testify of me." They are as a field in which the treasure is hid; and they who read them with meekness will be made "wise unto salvation.”

Again, an attendance upon all the means of grace is implied by seeking God. He has so incorporated the use of means with the blessing, as to put it out of the power of the wisest men to determine where the one terminates and the other begins. "If thou seek Him, He will be found of thee;" but then it must be seriously, humbly, earnestly, and perseveringly. Seek Him as for hidden treasure; but hidden treasure will never be sought while you suppose you have no need of it. It is strange to hear persons speak of the doubts they have respecting the Scriptures, while they perhaps never devoted a day to the serious perusal of them. If the most uninformed person in this assembly lifts up his voice in prayer, he will find that peace of mind which passes all understanding; that humble confidence in God, compared to which all the wisdom of philosophy is worse than nothing, and vanity. This is the only world, my brethren, in which it is probable we shall have to seek God. In hell, it will not be necessary to seek after God, for there the terrors of his justice and wrath will make Him manifest.

In heaven, it will not be necessary to seek Him, for there the beatific vision will make Him all in all. Here, it is possible to miss the road of happiness, and not find God; but by attending to the still small voice of conscience, we shall be led to find Him. This is a state of probation it is possible, then, to miss God, and it is possible to find Him. If the great truths of religion were to appear so manifest as to overcome at once all difficulties, it would not have been so much a duty to inquire after Him; whereas, now He is "the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him."

Who can comprehend, my brethren, how awful it must be to be cast off from God? It is to lose all interest in His power; to lose all interest in His wisdom; to be nothing to God, and God to be nothing for us; to have Omnipotence engaged against us; to sink into that state which cuts off from happiness. You are not conscious how much God is now doing for you, while you are forgetting Him; but then you will feel your dependance upon God, by losing all those springs of blessedness which you now find in Him. There is a period of respite for sinners. He does not immediately cast them off; but His purpose is fixed. In the mean time, He waits to be gracious; He furnishes them with a variety of privileges; He feeds and clothes their bodies, as well as feeds their souls; gives them friends, and by secret ways guides them through life, and sometimes opens the graves for their friends about them, to remind them of immortality. By His providence, and by the secret strivings of His Spirit, it is evident, my brethren, that He has not cast you off. You young men, He has not cast you off forever! He is awakening that compunction for your sins which I trust you now feel, which, if attended to, will lead you to happiness and to God. If you choose the path of the patriarchs and of your pious parents, it will lead you to the heavenly country; but if you forsake Him, He will cast you off forever. "As I live, saith the Lord, I will lift up my hands and swear that I will execute vengeance upon mine enemies." He now waits to be gracious; but if the season is not improved, He will cast you off; He will "swear in his wrath, Ye shall not enter into my rest." Providence will no longer furnish you with its bounties; the sleep of security will be at an end; the vain dance will come to an eternal pause. There will be no more vain and dissipated society for you, no skeptical books, no lascivious passions to enable you to forget God and forget your misery. How awful will it be to "fall into the hands of the living God!" Yes, my brethren, "if you forsake Him, He will cast you off forever." The means of grace will be at an end. There will be no more Sabbaths to create a pause amid the hurry of life, and to prepare you for eternity. There will be no longer any preaching of that word, which, instead of softening, has hardened, and made you insensible; no example of pious parents, no more any attention paid to you, either by God or man; because the destinies of all will be fixed, when God shall have "cast you off forever." The parable respecting the master of the house coming to reckon with his servants was intended not so much to terrify as to convert us. "Then shall the King say to them

on his left hand, Depart, ye workers of iniquity, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." Some, we are told, will say, "Lord, have we not eaten and drank in thy presence? but he will say, I never knew you. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth;" for at that awful time, "the last shall be first, and the first shall be last." How dreadful will then be the recollection of those checks of conscience which were disregarded, those warnings which were deliberately despised, those movements of the Spirit which were resisted, those parental admonitions which were neglected, when men were taking pains, as it were, to break his bonds asunder, and cast away his cords from them! Painful recollections at that period will be as "the worm that never dies." It is not, my brethren, that we take any pleasure in setting before you these awful truths; it arises from the regard we have to your eternal interests; we wish to prove ourselves faithful to God. These are the truths of Jesus Christ, which He has consecrated by His own lips, in order to divert persons from the path of ruin. God may not yet cast you off; but, depend upon it, the day will arrive when all who have refused the offers of the gospel will be so rejected. He may now determine to withdraw the strivings of His Spirit from you. Your path, indeed, may be tranquil, and you may have no changes; your riches, and luxuries, and every thing about you may put at a distance all serious thoughts of God, and a guilty peace may seem to secure you when the awful prediction of Jesus Christ shall be realized, "Behold, I come as a thief in the night." You may be saying, Peace, peace-you may be saying you caped danger; then your destruction will come suddenly upon you, for your security is merely the security of persons lulled into repose, and the surprise ultimately occasioned is represented in the words, "I come as a thief in the night."

have es

Let each of us remember to seek after God with all our hearts, for they alone are happy who have found God, or are seeking Him. As to those who deliberately turn their backs upon religion, in spite of all the evidences of Christianity, and who deliberately live in a way that God condemns-the deeper they reflect, the more they will find that, if Jesus Christ tells the truth, they must at last lift up their eyes in torment. Delay not, therefore; we would say to such," Now is the accepted time." The offers of the gospel are now made to you. You do not know that they will be repeated. None of us know but that this may be the last time. Secure the blessings of eternity, and apply your hearts unto wisdom. Jesus Christ is saying, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice, let him open the door, and I will come in to him, and sup with him, and he with me." Let us not receive the grace of Christ in vain, but secure to ourselves that itle to immortal life, of which neither things present nor things to come, of which neither life nor death can deprive us; for what can destroy your felicity, if built upon such a secure and immutable foundation? Let such as are seeking God, and have not found immediate peace and comfort, go on. While you continue in the serious, persevering use of praying and reading the Scriptures, by following on you

shall know the Lord. Your fears will soon be all dissipated; for you are going to the regions of light, and are quitting the regions of darkness. While others are pursuing the road to misery, the true Christian is rising above his troubles. Jesus Christ has promised that you shall overcome: He will secure you by his Spirit, uphold you by his hand, and pour unutterable glories upon you above the skies.

Will you then, my brethren, seek after God, or will you seek your all below? What is that honour or wealth for which you are seeking? If it be riches, then place those riches on high, where you can ultimately find them; but let them be the true riches. Place them in Jesus Christ, then you place them as high as God himself; and before you can be deprived of them, He must himself undergo a change. "If thou seek Him," then " He will be found of thee; but if thou forsake Him, he will cast thee off forever."

XVII.

PRIVILEGE OF BOLDNESS IN APPROACHING GOD.* HEBREWS, X., 19-22: Having, therefore, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having a high-priest over the house of God, let us draw near; having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

[Preached at Broadmead, Bristol, Thursday evening, March 6, 1828, preparatory to the Lord's Supper.]

THE gospel is more glorious than the law: retaining all its advantages, with a great accession to them, while all its imperfections are removed. The dispensations of God, in grace, as well as in providence and creation, are successive; in the gospel He has put the finishing hand to the display of his wisdom and grace: whatever we' can desire, either as an incentive to piety or a support under the evils of life; whatever conduces to holiness and hope; all is completed in Jesus Christ, the Author and Finisher of our faith. In the former .hree verses of the text we have a view of the privilege enjoyed by Christians; in the last verse, the improvement of that privilege, as an incentive to piety.

I. The privilege enjoyed by Christians; holy boldness in our approaches to God. By "the holiest" we may understand the celestial' tabernacle, which was typified by that part of the temple. The word' rendered "boldness" has particular reference to liberty of speech, and here to that freedom in prayer with which all devout Christians are familiar; such a freedom as belongs to children, and not to servants;

From the notes of the Rev. T. Grinfield

belongs to those who are not only accepted, but adopted by their Fa ther; whom He invites not only in mercy, but in love; who are regarded as members of Jesus Christ, of his very flesh and bones; brethren of the beloved Son.

This boldness consists of "reverence and godly fear." This the angels in heaven have in a degree far surpassing the saints on earth; they veil their faces, and cry, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty;" yet they are full of love, which expels all servile fear.

"By the blood of Jesus." This alludes to the sacrifices, and especially to the blood sprinkled, on the great day of atonement, by the high-priest within the holiest, sprinkled on the mercy-seat; but none beside might enter there; in token that access to heaven, the abode of the Eternal, was not yet prepared by the offering of Jesus Christ. That tabernacle was a figure of the true tabernacle, and Jesus Christ, "the minister of the true tabernacle," has passed into the heavens for Heaven, therefore, appears to be denoted by the holiest.

us.

This does not imply, as some have thought, that the ancient saints did not go to heaven at their death, as Christians do, but that they attended Christ thither at his resurrection. There seems to have been no real difference, as to the ultimate approach to God, between them and us; but merely as to the present spiritual approach, which was to them less clear and free, on account of Jesus Christ not having then appeared and shed his blood, as He has now done. Hence they suffered fears which are now removed; as the pious Hezekiah dreaded death. Jesus Christ has delivered his people from the bondage of this fear of death, which reigned before his appearance. They were kept, under the law, in a state of non-age, pupilage, and servitude : "but when the fulness or the fitness of time was come, God sent his Son to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons; and because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying Abba, Father."

This boldness, then, consists in a filial freedom of approach to God, like that of a child to a parent; confiding in paternal regard, and in pardon for his offences, as from a wise and affectionate father. Christians become sons and daughters of the Almighty, joint-heirs with Christ, sealed with the Spirit of adoption; they open wide their mouths, and are filled; knowing that He is willing as well as "able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think."

"By a new and living way, which He hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, His flesh." The veil of his flesh, not whole, but torn, rent, lacerated, to let out his precious blood: as He is the Bread of life, not whole, but broken, bruised, and smitten of God for us. This rending of the veil of his flesh was typified by that which took place in the veil of the most holy place at the time of his death. "A new way;" a way unknown to the wisdom of man, and hidden, for the most part, from the ancient saints. "A living way;" a way in which we are made to live before God; "because I live, ye shall live also." "I give unto My sheep eternal life."

"And having a High-Priest over the house of God." By the house