Various Descriptions of Hope Not Included, or Only Aliiuded To, in the Foregoing Chapters. A Good Hops

So the apostle calls it, 2 Thes. ii. 16; and connects with it the enjoyment of “everlasting consolation.” There is a richness of expression in these few words, to which no exposition or paraphrase can do justice. Every view we can take of the christian hope, entitles it to this description. It is good, absolutely. Good in its foundation — which is Christ; good in its object — which is heaven; good in its influence — which is holiness; good in its power to support and comfort under all the trials of life; good for all persons from the prince to the peasant; good for all occasions, for prosperity and adversity; good through all the journey of life, and amidst all the agonies of death. Whoever tried it, and found it otherwise than good? Was this adjective ever more truly or more appropriately applied to any object P Will not the believer who entertains it, and feels its blessed influence, joyfully exclaim, “Yes, if there be any thing good on earth, any thing in me, any thing in religion, — it is this. Whatever good things I have, — this is best. I would, if my heart do not deceive me, part with all, rather than this; and if, on the deprivation of property, friends, health, I were asked what I had left, I would answer from the midst of surrounding evils, A good hope through grace, and feel that, having nothing else but this, I should account myself possessing all things.” What multitudes have experienced all this, and found that hope has stood by them, when every thing else had fled. As the sun converts clouds to a glorious drapery, painting them with gorgeous hues, and arraying the whole horizon with its magnificent costumes, — so a believing and radiant heart lets forth its hope upon its sorrows, and all the blackness flies off, and troubles, that seemed likely to extinguish it, serve only as a theatre to display its glory. Is not this good?

But the christian’s hope is good comparatively. How insignificant, little, and mean, are the objects of worldly desire and expectation. What are wealth, rank, fame, pleasure, compared with the glory, honour, immortality, and eternal life, which the believer looks for beyond the grave? They are all of the earth, earthly, — this is heavenly; they are human — this divine; they are transient — this everlasting; they are unsatisfying, leaving the soul a void unfilled — this replenishing its vast capacity; they are fleeting, shadowy, and precarious — this absolutely certain; they are the toys of children, compared with the occupations of a Newton, when handling his telescope, surveying the heavens, ascertaining and contemplating the stars, with his bosom swelling with the hope of discoveries that wUl instruct the world and immortalise himself; they leave the poor, craving soul, exclaiming, “Who will show us any good?” — this compels him, with rapture, to exclaim, “I have found it, I have found it.”

Compare this hope with that of the heathen, and see how good it is. How dim and uncertain were the views of the wisest and best of these, as set forth in the doubting expectations of Cicero the loftiest speculations of Plato, and the dying prospects of Socrates. Were these sages of Greece, these lights of the ancient world, to revisit our earth with no more knowledge than they carried away with them, they might thankfully sit at the feet of a heaven-taught Sunday-school girl, and from her lips learn lessons of immortality which their discoveries never enabled them to reach. As a proof of this, I refer to their sayings. The hope of immortality is styled by Cicero, ‘’A conjecture or surmise of future ages.” Seneca says — ‘* It is that which our wise men do promise, but do not prove.” Socrates, at his death, said, — ‘’I hope to go hence to good men, but of that I am not very confident; nor doth it become any wise man to be positive that so it will be. I must now die, and you shall live; but which of us is in the better state, God only knows.” Pliny says, — “Neither soul nor foody has any more sense after death than before it was born.” Aristotle held ‘Hhat death was terrible, as putting an end to all things. Plutarch called it ‘* The fabulous hope of immortality. How evident is it from the experience and testimony of such men, that reason is inadequate to the discovery of a future state; and that nothing could make this certain to man, except a revelation from God. The trial never could have been made with greater advantages than by the philosophers of Greece and Rome: and these confessed that they could arrive at no certainty on the subject. In this state of things the gospel comes with its glorious discoveries, abolishes death, i. e.y renders its reign but transient; and establishes the fact, not only -of

the immortality of the soul, but of the resurrection of the body; thus solving the great and awful problem of man’s nature and destiny, and bringing in everlasting consolation, and a good hope through grace.

Mohammedanism speaks of its Paradise, — but how grovelling, how sensual, how unworthy the soul of man. The false prophet accommodates his heaven to the animal and lowest passions of our nature, and holds out to the faithful little more or better than the harem of an Eastern despot. He carries his sensual system into the celestial state, and peoples his eternal world with a race of voluptuaries. What a contrast is here presented to the christian Paradise, where flesh and blood are excluded with all their grosser appetites and propensities; and not only is the soul perfect in purity, but even the body is too spiritual for the sensual passions of the flesh.

Little better is the Elysium of the classic nations of .Greece and Bome, or rather of their poets, and it was only poetry. If we consult Homer, Virgil, Pindar, and others, these rise no higher than converse with Gods which are themselves stained with crime, and this intercourse maintained amidst green bowers, gliding streams, murmuring springs, verdant meadows, and warbling of birds; others add mirth and sensual delight. True it* is the philosophers turned away in partial disgust from these low views, yet they had nothing better to substitute, which could be relied upon with certainty. “Now and then a dim ray of light seemed to pierce the clouds of mortality, and point to a region beyond, but while the eye of reason looked at it, it vanished like a meteor, and left the benighted, bewildered philosopher in all his doubt and darkness. I need not further enlarge upon this, than to contrast Cicero’s sceptical apostrophe to the coming day of transition from earth to heaven, with Paul’s triumphant confidence, where he says, — “We know that if the earthly house of our tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of Gt)d, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” There, was Paganism, straining her exploring eye over the dark abyss of the grave, with feeble fluttering hope, and strong prevailing fear, holding up her dark lantern, but gaining no discovery; uttering her inquiring voice, but receiving no response: all was dark and silent to her. Here, is Christianity gazing with steady faith, living hope, and enraptured view, amidst the broad day-light of revelation, on those sweet fields beyond the swelling flood which stand dressed with living green, and adorned with the amaranthine flowers of the celestial Paradise. Oh, precious gospel, which has thus laid open to us not only the glory, but the certainty of a future state of bliss.

It is hardly worth while to bring into the comparison those monstrous, fantastic, and grovelling representations of the future state which are the products of modern Paganism, — the transmigration of souls of the Eastern world from body to body, through millions of ages, till they are at last absorbed in the gods; or the hunting grounds and pleasures of the chase, which form the future of savage tribes. Who can contemplate these varied, but grovelling and uncertain expectations, held by the ancient and modern heathens, and not see, comparing them with the christian faith, the tmth and force of the apostle’s description, when he calls it a good hope P

Compare it with the hope of the Jew. How scanty were the revelations of a future state under the Old Testament. How seldom did the sun of the celestial world seem to break through the clouds and shadows of the Levitical economy, and throw its lustre on the path of even the pious Israelite. In what gloom and deep dejection did he approach the sepulchre. Where in all the law, the psalms, and prophets, do we find those triiunpfaant anticipations of eternal glory, which are so freqnent in the writings of holy Paul? Where do we see the ancient believer looking up into heaven with the exulting expectation that he shall soon be there with God and his saints P How rarely did David strike his harp or tnne his voice in praise of the heaven to come. How seldom did even the evangelical prophet Isaiah rise high on the wing of prophecy till he bathed his spirit in the flood of the excellent glory, and then descended to tell the visions be had seen. One chapter, I might almost say one verse, of the New Testament, tells us more of the celestial iporld, as to the reality and nature of its felicities, than all the pages of the Old. So true are the apostle’s words already quoted, — “He hath abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light by the gospel.” Is it not then a good hope that ckridians have P And then, just for a moment, dwell on its source, as expressed in this verse, “a good hope through grace,** Any hope, the expectation of the smallest favour, even the shortening of the term, or lightening the weight of punishment, would be favour; annihilation would be mercy, for sinners who deserved to be plunged in eternal despair; just as any situation on earth might be esteemed a favour for a man who had been condemned to die, and deserved it. It had been grace to be merely exempted from the bitter pains of eternal death, though our eternal destiny had been to dwell in some world far from God’s presence, and with only some few comforts to make existence tolerable. It would have been a display of grace, rich grace, to bestow upon US all the glories of Paradise for ten thousand ages, and then to extinguish our existence for ever. Had we never heard of eternal life, and had this been presented to us as the object of christian desire and expectation, we should have considered it as a manifestation of abounding favour. But for sinners that had deserved hell to have such a hope as ours, the hope of everlasting life, with all that can make existence a blessing; to have a hope founded on the incarnation, sufferings, and death of the Son of God; to be brought by the new creating power of God into the possession of this hope; is it not a display of grace which will fill the universe with astonishment, and our eternity with wonder and with praise?

A LIVELY HOPE.

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” — 1 Peter i, 3.

In this very comprehensive and beautiful passage, the apostle Peter, like his brother Paul in the commencement of his epistle to the Ephesians, introduces his subject by bursting abruptly into a hymn of thanksgiving. His heart was full to overflowing of wonder, gratitude, and love, and he could not content himself with a mere cold formal statement of the marvellous grace of God. He first ascends to the source of the blessings he was about to enumerate, and finds it only in the abundant mercy of Qod, There is no attribute of God on which as sinners we 80 much depend as upon mercy; and there is no one therefore about which so much is said in Scripture as this. Mercy is the spring and fountain head of 194 Liy£LT HOPE.

the blessings here enumerated, our regeneration and adoption into the family of God; our heavenly inheritance, and our conservation to the vast and eternal possession. It is the lively hope, however, that is the subject of our present remarks. To this we are “begotten,” t.^., we are first made children, and then, as such, being endowed with an eternal inheritance, we, as children, being entitled to it, through the work of Christ, hq)e for it. And to this we are begotten “by the resurrection of Christ.” In an earlier part of this work I have shewn that hope must be preceded by faith, and is founded upon it. We must first believe that there is a heaven, and that it is obtainable by us, or we cannot hope for it; and if we do believe, we must of necessity hope. Whatever therefore produces faith, and strengthens it, must beget hope. The resurrection of Christ is the sum and substance of all the evidence of the divinity of his mission, of the truth of his doctrines, and of course of the gospel of our salvation. It is a cloud of witnesses in itself, and therefore believing this great fact, we are, through the grace of GKmI, brought to hope. But more than this, the resurrection of Christ is the proof and pledge of ours. Believing in his resurrection, we believe our own; for he rose not as a private individual, but as our representative. Thus our faith is confirmed, established, supported by his resurrection, and we are begotten to a lively hope.

But I intend now to dwell on this characteristic of our hope, as lively, or, as it signifies, “a Ucing** one. True personal religion is the opposite of any unregenerate state, which is a state of spiritual death; the unconverted sinner is ‘* dead in trespasses and sins.” H^ioe religion is spiritual life. It is a living, moving, acting foinciple in man’s soul. He has been quickened from a death of sin to a life of holiness. His religious exercises are not the motions of an automaton, but the self-moved actions of a living being. His soul is alive to God, to Christ, to holiness, to heaven. Now just as in the tree each branch, and leaf, and fruit, lives by the principle of vegetable life in the root; and as in the body, the principle of animal life diffuses its influence into each and all the members and organs; as the foot moves, the hand works, the eye sees, and the tongue speaks by the principle of animal life; so, as regards religion, all its graces act from the spiritual life in the soul; faith is a living faith, hope is a living hope, love is a living love. The apostle, it is true, speaks of a dead faith, but this indeed is no faith at all; so we may speak of a dead hope, which is none at all. If there be in reality a hope, it must be a living one. Nearly all the people in christian lands profess to have hope, but in multitudes of cases it is a dead one; it breathes not, moves not, speaks not; it neither makes them holy nor happy; it neither animates to duty, restrains from sin, nor supports under suffering. It is a mere profession. Is it not much to be feared that this is all that many professors of religion, many members of our churches, have in this day? I would not be uncharitable, but I must express my apprehensions, fearful as they are, that large numbers in this day of easy profession, have nothing but a dead faith and a dead hope. Their profession, instead of being the coat of a living man, is the shroud of a dead one. Judging from their conduct, we must conclude that they have neither desire nor expectation of eternal life. Professor, let me ask you what does your hope do for you? Consider this is not a desire fixed on a trifle, which must be a trifling desire,

o 2 exciting no emotion, producing no action, awakening bo anxiety. This is desire of MlvaiioM, of eternal life, of immortal glory. Can such an expectation, if it leallj exist, lie dormant in the soul, an ineffective, inoperative thing, producing no joy, no anxiety, no actitity? Impossible. Let every one, therefore, solemnly ask himself this simple question, — What does my anticipation of heaven do for me? Is it alive in me? Does it move? Does it act? Does it stimulate me to duty, restrain me from sin, comfort me in trouble? Are my character and conduct in any degree those of a man who has fixed his eye, his heart, his expectation, on et«mal life? If not, my hope is a dead one, — a name and a delusion.

In opposition to this, the hope of a really converted man is a limnff one. The word signifies a vigorous, active, spirit-stirring principle, as opposed to the cold, faint belief of Heathenism, nay, even of Judaism. It is an earnest desire and confident expectation of everlasting life. Such a desire and expectation as employs the thoughts and kindles the affections. It acts on the soul, as regards spiritual and eternal objects, as earthly desires and expectations do towards their objects. If a man be looking forward with confident expectation of some great earthly good, some cherished object, which is to influence all his future life, it is uppermost in his mind, it engages his heart, it employs his tongue, it stimulates his activity. If he receive some lesser good, “Oh,” he says, “but I have something far greater to come.” If he has sustained a loss, he replies, ‘’ I shall soon have ample c<mipensation for this.” If he is in trouble, he cheers his mind with the anticipation of the expected good. If solicited to engage in any project which would divert his mind from this, he exclaims, “No. I cannot allow any thing to interfere with my one great object.” This is a living hope. And so is it with the man who has really set his heart upon salvation and eternal life.

I am ready to admit that it is with spiritual life as it is with natural, it may exist in various degrees. There may be vitality, where there is not vivacity. There may be life so feeble as scarcely to be perceived or felt, and there may be vitality in such vigour as to give rise to the expression, “He is full of life.” In reference to the two terms, “living** and “lively,** a hope may, in a very tnodified sense, be a livinp one, yet not a lively one; and on that account I am almost ready to prefer the adverb of our translators to the proposed substitute. The original comprehends both. If there are some professors whose graces, and this among the rest, are not living, in any sense, I am sure there are many whose state of mind is not livdiy. They have desires, but how lukewarm; and expectations, but how uncertain and fluttering. They do not give up the idea of their being christians, and reaching heaven at last; but amidst what doubts and fears these expectations are indulged. In duty, how backward; in spirit, how worldly; in trouble, how disconsolate. How deficient in spirituality and heavenly-mindedness. O, ye half-hearted, worldly-minded, lukewarm professors, I call upon you “to strengthen the things that remain, and are ready to die.** You have only that measure of life which is next akin to death, and is in peril of becoming such.

Believers, be contented with nothing short of a lively as well as living expectation, which shall be an unfailing source of both consolation and holiness; which lifts up your head, and keeps it up, when passing through the rivers of affliction; which remains, when every thing else is gone; which opens a fountain amidst brokeD cisterns; which lives in death, and exhibits heaven to the eye in the dark valley; and which judgment and eternity do not destroy, but only consummate. Let the full tide of spiritual life be poured into this, as one of the many channels through which its holy stream is to flow.

A PATIENT HOPE.

“Remembering without ceasing your work offaiih, and labour of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jewf Christ. — 1 Thes. i. 3. It is somewhat striking, and very interesting, to observe the various combinations of christian graces which are presented to us in many places by the sacred writers, like so many different precious stones in a bracelet, or so many flowers in a bouquet, or stars in a constellation. Each lending its separate beauty to form a resplendent whole. How impressive is that rich chain in 2 Peter i. 5; or Gal. v. 22; or 1 Cor. xiii. 13. The passage now under consideration differs from the last of those referred to, in the order in which the graces stand. Here, it is faith, love, hope: there, hope is put second: and a supplemental and appropriate operation is here ascribed to each, which is left out in 1 Cor. xiii. 13. The same order as here is set down also in 1 Thes. v. 8. This latter collocation, in the passage now under consideration, is in more exact accordance with the nature and relations of the christian’s life: hope is mentioned last, because it is the nearest connecting link between this world and that which is to come. These three virtues are each represented, as we have said, by an epithet which is intended to exhibit them in their practical exercise. We have “the work of faith.” This does not mean that faith is God’s work in the soul. This is true; but it is not the truth here. It must be explained by the analogy of the other two virtues; and as the epithet in connection with them represents their practical operation, so it must be here. “The work of faith,” must mean a working faith. Its best explanation will be found in the second chapter of the epistle of James. In some other places, as 1 Cor. xvi. 13; 1 Tim. vi. 12; 2 Tim. iv. 7, it is represented as a fighting virtue, just as here it is a working one; both implying great exertion. Every representation of this holy principle makes it an active one. Faith cannot be an idle, passive, inoperative assent, but a vigorous and impulsive conviction. It is not the state of mind which, in the exact sciences, perceiving the evidence, reposes upon it, without farther desire or effort; but that of a man, who, believing a report concerning some benefit he may obtain, rouses himself to put forth every effort to secure it. “Shew me thy faith without thy works,” exclaims the true believer, “and I will shew thee my faith by my works.” May I illustrate it by a reference to the steam engine? Faith is the steam power in the cylinder, which sets all the machinery in motion.

“The labour of love” explains itself. Faith works by love; and love works in all those various ways, set forth with such exquisite beauty and elegance in Paul’s personification of charity. The apostle has used a strong term, in application to love, by calling it the “labour’* of love. Love stirs up the whole soul to energetic, vigorous, and persevering action. This operation of love is in substance the same as that which is ascribed to faith, only here it is intensified by a still stronger term; the word ‘* labour” being a more emphatic one than “woisk” Love is the most powerful impulse to vigorous action tkat the soul knows. What will not the mother do for her child? The wife for her husband? The lover for the object of his aifection? How beautifully the expression, * ‘labour of love,” chimes in with all our instincts and our experience. Oh! what an illustration of this have we in the incarnation, life, sufferings, and death of our Lord. There was a labour of love which is a pattern for us, and which will fill the universe with wonder and delight.

But it is “thepaUenee of hope,” to which this section is principally devoted. And is there any characteristic of this grace more obvious than patience? When our hearts are strongly set upon an object, is there any effort too great to make for its possession P — any length of time too long to wait? — any disappointment too severe to «idure, as long as one ray of hope remain unextinguished P How often have we been struck with this, in obeerving the conduct of our fellow-creatures, in referenoe to some worldly object on which their hearts were entirely set. We have seen them working, waiting, and watching, led on by some glimmering light, whidi to every eye but their own was a meteoric delusion; never relaxing their efforts, nor intermitting their expectations, long after all around them saw that the object they pursued must for ever elude their grasp. A very striking illustration of this was seen in the conduct of the crew c the ill-fated ship, the Central America, and which a writer in a Transatlantic journal has employed in illustration of the patience of ehristitm hope: — ‘^ For thirty-six hours they lived on hope. On Friday noon the leak was made known, and all hands began to bale out the engine-room. They go to work calmly and systematically, hoping to conqaer the water there, and thus to regain their steam-power. Till eight o’clock that evening they worked steadily at this one point; regained their steam only to lose it finally. Still all night long the gangs of weary men worked with good spirits, in the hope that the morning would bring relief. And when toward morning their strength began to fail, and the water to increase in the hold, hope was renewed by a lull of the gale, and the assurance of an experienced captain that the ship would hold out. * Every passenger remained cool, and seemed to forget his danger in the united efforts to save the vessel. There was no weeping or exhibition of despair.’ All Saturday morning they keep on baleing, though the storm increases, and the vessel fills. At noon the clouds begin to break; hope revives, and ‘all work like giants.’ Two hours later a sail appears; then hope bursts into joy. Another vessel heaves in sight; and though night is eonung on, the hope of help sustains all hearts. With the calmness and patience that hope alone can impart, they first provide fcnr the weak and the helpless, and though the daylight wanes, they still hope for the returning boats till the fatal lurch of the sinking ship leaves five hundred men upon the waves. Yet even then hope does not desert them. Through the darkness of the night, the flashes of lightning reveal to each his struggling comrades; and each cheers his fellow with the hope of rescue from vessels hovering near. At length when one by one, scores and hundreds have gone down for ever — a solitary swimmer descries in the dim dawn a vessel a mile away. For six hours he has floated on the sea, but the sight gives courage to his will, and strength to bis arms. Almost exhausted he reaches her side, and is drawn on board of her by ropes — * saved by hope”

So let it be with us in reference even to the affairs of this world. Are we engaged in some lawful enterprise; some matter of unquestionable obligation; some pursuit, of the lawfulness of which we can no more doubt, than we can of our very existence; then let us hold on our way amidst all difficulties, delays, and disappointments, sustained by the power, and exhibiting ‘’the patience, of hope.” There may appear but dim lights to cheer even ourselves, and to others nothing but thick darkness, impervious to a single beam, but till the last ray is extinguished in black night, let us never yield to the paralysing influence of despair. Many have given up the pursuit when within a few steps of gaining their desired object. A little more patience would have put them in possession of all they sought.

And if this be true in reference to temporal things, it is equally true in reference to spiritual matters. Are we struggling in the great work of sanctification with some besetting sin, some strong corruption, some powerful enemy, and carrying on the conflict amidst many sad defeats, many humbling disappointments, many mortifying relapses, till we are ready to give up all for lost, and despondingly to say, “I shall yet perish by the hand of Saul?” Let hope come to our rescue, and patience keep up our hope. We must struggle; it is a life and death cpnflict. If we give up, we are lost. There is hope. God will assist us. He has promised to make his grace sufficient for us. If defeated ten times, ten times we must return to the conflict. EecoUect the story of Bobert Bruce and the spider, how, when frequently defeated, he was reclining in despondency, and saw the little reptile.

after many abortive attempts to swing herself from one place to another, succeed at last. Patience in this case was victorious. It roused him from his despondency, called up the same spirit of endurance and resolution in him, and he too, was saved by it. And thus must it also be in the commencement of the great business of eternal salvation. The awakened sinner does not always come at once into the light and liberty of the gospel, or to the full assurance of hope, or faith, or even of understanding. He is like Bunyan’s Pilgrim, heavily laden with the burden of his sins, and falls into the Slough of Despond, and, after floundering long in its miry depths, often feels half inclined to get out on the wrong side; and even after escaping from this danger, finds not immediately his way to the cross of Christ. He prays, he reads, he hears; he mortifies his corruptions, and puts aways his sins, but he is not at peace, and is ready to give all up in despair. If any such shall read these pajj;es, to him I say, — Do not despond: hope on. You are near the cross; look up, there it is. There is the Saviour, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world. I do not bid you wait. There is no reason why you should not this moment believe and rejoice. But should it be that from any remaining ignorance, any cloud upon your mind, you do not see the glorious object of faith, do not give up the matter, but in the patience of hope struggle against your doubts and fears, your false views and false reasonings, your unbelief and self-righteousness, and come to the Saviour who waits to receive you.

And let the timid believer, a feeble and fainting soul, often cast down by reason of the difficulties of the way, and alarmed at his own weakness, keep up his expectation, and his expectation keep up his patience, and his hope and patience keep up his endeavours. It may be “with fear and trembling,” but still let him work out his own salvation, depending upon him who worketh in him to will and to do according to his good pleasure.

To the afflicted believer who nuiy have lost his all by some sudden reverse of circumstances, we say, when we have been shipwrecked, when the storm rages over us, and we struggle in the deep, if we have only a good hope through grace of a better inheritance, we shall emerge at last, though but one solitary plank of worldly substanoe be left us. The hour of deliverance will come to all who maintain the patience of hope in Jesus Christ. But this patience must have its perfect work, and must be attended with the work of faith and labour of love.

In connection with this passage, we may take up another, I mean Rom. v, 3-4. — We glory in tribulation also, knowing that tribulation worketh patieoee; patience, experience; and experience, hope.” The counexion of christian graces with each other, and their operation in the way of producing one another, are in this passage beautifully set forth, somewhat resembling the divisions of the stalks of those plants which are jointed, and in which the parts grow <Mie out of another. The apostle states it as a great and blessed privilege of christians, that they not only rejoice in the hope of glory, but “glory in tribulationa-also;” not, of course, on their own account, but on account of their influence and effects; just as we might rejoice in some present privation, toil, suffering, and perplexity; not for their own sakea, for they are all very painful in their nature, but because of great temporal advantage to be derived from them, easily understand the reality and the reasonable-Vicing in present temporary evil, for the aake of future and permanent good. What was the good which made the apostle glory in tribulation? “Tribulation worketh patience.” We must bear in mind here what I have already said, that patience includes the idea of perseverance as well as endurance. Not of itself does tribulation work patience, for it tends to produce impatience, fretfulness, and an abandonment of its own cause. This result of patience from affliction is the work of God’s grace in the soul, keeping in subjection our natural tendency to repine and rebel. It is a proof of God’s power, wisdom, and love to his people, that he places them in those circumstances, in which he will enable them to exercise one of the most difficult of all graces; thus assisting them to glorify him, and secure to themselves a great reward. If there were no tribulation, there could be no patience, and if no patience, no reward. Yes, this is the only world in which patience can be exercised; there is none in heaven, for there is no suffering there; none in hell, for there is no hope there. Hence it is really an honour, and if we look to the end and issue, a privilege, to be called to suffer. The apostle James represents patience as the perfection of the christian character, —” Let patience have its perfect work, that yc may be perfect, and entire lacking nothing,^’

“Patience worketh experience,*’ The word translated “experience” signifies “trial,” or “proof.” This is usually understood to mean proof of God’s power, faithfulness, and love, in bestowing his grace upon the christian, according to his gracious promise, for support, consolation, and perseverance. And what afflicted christian who has trusted in God, has not had proof abundant of divine support? What a testimony of Grod’s interposition cannot his children bear who have been enabled patiently to endare and persevere? Still, this does not appear to be the meaning: here. I think the “trial,” or “proof,*’ is that of the afflicted christian’s own state. Patience worketh “proof” of the sincerity, stedfastness, and strength of his faith. Tribulation is the testing point of godliness; the crucible, the fire of which reveals ,the nature of the substances cast into it, whether it is gold or dross, or, if mixed, how much there is of each. This is “the fire which is to try every man’s work, of what sort it is.” — I Cor. iii, 13. To this the apostle refers, 1 Peter, i, 7. “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold which perisheth, might be found unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” Tribulation makes, in many cases, sad discoveries of the want of true faith, and in others it makes revelations no less delightful. Many a believer who feared as he entered the cloud, emerged from it with joy and thanksgiving for the knowledge of his state, which he had gained while passing through it.

“Experience worketh hope.” It naturally and necessarily leads to an increase of this grace, not of course by changing or strengthening the foundation, but by showing us that we have really built upon it, and are going on to the possession of its glorious object. Experience in this view of it leads on to assurance. The sufferers who, in the days of persecution, gave up property, liberty, friends, and even life itself, for Christ, could stand in no doubt of the sincerity of their faith, or of their personal interest in the blessings of salvation. Amidst their fiery trials, their faith glowed like gold in the crucible, and proclaimed its own existence and nature. So now also, the tried believer who, with deep submission, unmurmuring acquiescence, and holy peace, can patiently bear

PURIFYING HOPE. 20?

the will of God, has proof of his personal faith, and may unfeignedly rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

A PURIFYING HOPE.

The apostle John has set this quality and operation before us in a clear and positive manner: “Every man that hath this hope in him, (i.e., in Christ,) purifieth himself, even as he is pure.” — 1 John, iii, 3. Every view we can take of the work of redemption, shews its connection with holiness. The Father hath ‘^ chosen us before the foundation of the world, that we might be holy.” The Son did not become incarnate merely to save us from hell, and bring us to heaven; but to “redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.” The Spirit is given to “create us anew unto good works.” If we are called, it is “with a holy calling.” If we are afflicted, that we might “be partakers of God’s holiness.” If we possess the Scriptures, “that we might be sanctified by the truth.” Hpliness was the image of God, stamped upon man’s soul at his creation, which Satan marred, when his malignity could not reach the divine original; and to restore which, is the ultimate object of redeeming mercy. What would justification be without holiness, but like throwing a vestment of purple and gold over a leprous body? What is heaven, but the region, the home, the very centre of holiness P Take away holiness from an angel and he becomes a devil; add holiness to the nature of a devil and he becomes an angel. Were a man without holiness to enter heaven, its blessed inhabitants would retire from him with horror and alarm, as we should on earth from a person suffering with the plague. Without iOS PmiPYCrG HOVE.

holineas a soul in heaven would be Kke a man with a fever at a feast; he could touch. no^iag; taale nifjreiiah nothing. Haice therefore the ni<»a7iTng and force of the apostle’s declaration, that hope is the great pnriief. F<^ar of hell maj do something in this waj; hope of heaven will do more.

The model of chriiitian hntinew is Ckriat, not modj in his divine bat in his human natoze; aod that aatoR^ not only in its heavenl j, bot in its earthlj state. QuisI as the Bian of s(»rows; — as erposed to tempiatioB; as subject to affliction; as the serrmt of God; as the Scat Warning obedience bj the things which he suffbed; ss separate born m and sznncn, thoo dwdlmg in the midst of them. Here is oar model; the infinite, ctem ala^^btj God, nhihhfd in the minjataie form of the perlieci man, presented in dimcnsioiis die eve can compuriiaid. In our leal ktr Christ’s divinitj, let as not forget his hnmanitj. TVe smbi Qirist, the divine man, the model man, most be before os, and oar eje mast be ever opon oar copj and our page.

‘’Eveiy man that hath this hope ptarifieih kiaueif” Whik as a weak, ignorant, and sinfol creature, his dependence is to be upon the Spirit of God; as a rational one, he is to exert all his faculties of intellect, heart, will, conscience, memorr, in this great work of moral purification. The apostle teadies us in this langruage that each individual’s moral cleansing depends, under Grod, principally upon himself; not upon ministers nor sermons, nor ordinances, nor books, — but upon ktrnMHf- — upon his care to watch over the motions of his own heart — upon ice to guard against temptations from without |Ju8 meditation upon Christ’s example — upon his to aeeky by pray, the suoeour of God’s grace.

A man that would cleanse his person from defilement would not merely place himself beneath a falling shower of rain, but would collect the descending water and apply it to his body. He would purify himself: and so must we our souls.

Hope prompts to this; helps us in it; and gives energy and success to our endeavours. All men act as they hope; their desires and expectations dictate and ensure appropriate conduct. This is an instinct of their nature, a moral necessity, an infallible result. If a man have before him any worldly object of desire and expectation, and there be some antecedent which he must possess, in order to gain his ulterior end, he will labour to secure this pre-requisite; this sine qua non. Now the christian’s desire and expectation are fixed upon heaven, his heart is upon this: but he is told “without holiness no man shall see the Lord.” Then he knows, he feels, he determines, that he must be holy. If we have some cherished object of desire, and there be something which must meeten us for enjoying it when it is possessed, we naturally labour to gain that preparedness. The christian knows that he could not without holiness enjoy heaven, if he were admitted to its felicities, and therefore his hope sets him upon this personal purification as his ‘’ meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light.” The desire and expectation of an earthly object make us eager at once to get as much of it as we can, even before we come into full possession and fruition. The christian knows that the chief felicity of heaven consists in absolute sinless perfection. It is his bliss to think that there he shall, according to his measure, be “holy as God is holy.” It would be no heaven to him if he could carry sin with him. Holiness is the richest, ripest fruit that grows on the tree of life,

p in the midst of the paradise of God. The bdicffcr’s kope therefore prompts him to hunger and thirrt after ligfateousness, as a means of enjoying an eameBt, a fnetaale of heavenly bliss. Hope like the tme hearted spies sent by Joshua to search the promised land, cioeses the Jordan, and plucking the grapes of Eshool, returns to bid the soul go forward. When we are Ycrj intent on gaining an object, we are very glad to meet with evidence that we are in the right way to obtain it, and we searrii very diligently for as much proof as we ean aocnmnkte. What is the evidence, the only evidenoe, that can be depended on that we are going to heaven? Holiness — conformity to the example of Christ. Now he who is in earnest to reach the heavenly Canaan, whoee heart is set on that sublime and glorious objeet, will fed an intense solicitude to know if he is in the way to it. A serioas doubt on this subject is distressing to him: known that holiness is the proof of safety, he will ever be anxious to conform himself to the example of Christ. He who is studying the life of Jesus, as a child studies his copy to do something like it, need not doubt his state. He may not, and will not be a peffect resemblance to Christ, any more than the boy at school will equal his copy: but the great Master will approve of the sincere and diligent attempt to do well, although there may be some defects, and dissimilarities, and the writing have some irregularities, and the page some blots.

Nor is this all; the very contemplation of heaven, in which hope indulges, has a tnmsforming power. This passion naturally and necessarily assimilates the mind of the person who cherishes it, to the objeet

hich he has before him. The miser becomes more ily; the sensualist more sensual; the ambitious man more ambitious; the warrior more warlike — by their hopes. Desire and expectation, in relation to earthly things, have a mighty power of assimilation, and may be carried to such an extent as to produce monomania, and the man’s soul becomes quite possessed with the object on which his heart is set. So is it, in rational measure, with the expectants of eternal glory. What is heaven? We have again and again answered that question. It is not a Roman Elysium; nor a Mohammedan Paradise, — but a state where we shall see Christ as he is, and be like him. It is the region of moral purity. Its society is holy — a holy God, a holy Saviour, holy angels, and holy men. Its occupations are holy — the service of God — the song of cherubim and seraphim, crying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty; and all other things in harmony with this sacred employment and felicity. Now every comtemplation of this st|d;e tends to assimilate the soul to its likeness. While ^itlg upoil, it, delighting in it, longing for it, we grow in’mMemblanoe to it. Like as when a migifuyns his face to th6 sun, its rays fall and dwell upon hiS’itkhitenance; or as when a polished mirror is turned to the great luminary, it reflects its splendour; — so the soul of the believer turned heavenwards, becomes heavenly.

If, then, hope produces holiness, how important is it to keep up the power of the cause, in order to the production of the effect. Despondency has a chilling, withering influence upon the holy energies of the soul, like the east wind on flowers and blossoms; while hope is the sunshine of the soul, which cherishes the moral vegetation, and makes it look verdant and flourishing. The christian who would grow in grace, and make advances in spiritual purity, should keep up a good hope. His

p 2

V doubts and fears are not only hindrances to his happiness, but to his holiness also. Despondency is not only nn” comfortable, but unholy.

A HOPS THAT MAKETH NOT A8HAMEB.

“Hope maketh not ashamed, because the loire of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which he hath given to us.” — ^Bomans ▼, 6.

This is a high commendation of the grace we are now considering; one that by contrast will come home to the heart of every believer. It is a peculiarity which can be scarcely affirmed of any other expectation. Can the man of wealth, of pleasure, or of ambition, say this of the object of his pursuit and possession? Perhaps the apostle, when he wrote this passage, thought of that declaration of the Psalmist, — “Our fathers trusted in thee, and were not confounded.” — Psalm xxii, 4. It is the true wisdom of faith to strengthen itself by making a discreet, yet bold and unhesitating use of the experience of others. Especially should the children of the godly, in their religious course and conflicts, apply for their encouragement what their pious ancestors have testified, and, in pleading with God, make use of his dealings with tkem as a ground of confidence for themselves.

There are three, and but three, grounds on which men can be ashamed of their hopes: —

1. When in better states of mind, and in clearer views of the subject, they find that they have desired, and perhaps have obtained, a wrong thing; a thing which no right-minded man ought to have coveted and sought. How large a portion of man’s earthly desires and expectations are fited on objects which religion, reason, and conscience, at length tell them are forbidden by Grod. It is awfid to think what a preponderance of human energy, in many men’s pursuits, is going forth after illicit gains and pleasures. In some few cases, alas, how few! they are at last brought to see their iniquity, and to blush over it. They discover, to their shame and confusion, that they had been kindling unhallowed fires in their soul, and, like Balaam resolutely going forward in a forbidden path. Oh, the confusion, humiliation, and deep compunction which some have felt in looking back upon past objects of desire and expectation. Bad hopes have caused bitter tears to myriads. It is of course a mercy to find out that they were bad, and to abandon them, but how much greater a mercy never to have had them. And this is the climax of all mercy to know, as the christian does, that his is BL “ffood hope.” His desires and expectations are indulged under the approving smile of religion, reason, and conscience. Who ever blushed over the hope of heaven P Let the christian raise his desires to the greatest intensity, let him carry his expectations up to the highest pitch, he never need to check his ardour; he never need to say, ‘^ Am I right in all this P” May I not be yet ashamed of having thought, and felt, and wished, and laboured so earnestly P

2. Men are ashamed of hopes that end in utter disappointment: and how many do? Of the objects of earthly pursuit, how many turn out to be mere shadows P Think what millions every day sit down in grief and dismay, amidst the wreck of shattered schemes, and then lay their heads at night upon their pillows, to pass the sleepless hours of silence and darkness, in ruminating upon defeated purposes and frustrated expectations. How much of human grief arises from this source. True it is, that in multitudes of these cases, men are the victims of folly, as well as of disappointment. They had been employed in building castles in the air. Their desires were the offspring of unauthorised ambition, and their expectations had no other basis than their own wild imaginations. Observers saw, if they did not, that there was no probability in their prospects; their hopes were the speculations of their fancies, like those of the Persian’s mentioned in the first chapter, and they therefore deserved the disappointment they experienced. But this does not apply to all. Even those who are most moderate in their desires, and most sober in their expectations, who have reason, religion, and conscience on their side, and are thus justified both by God and man in their schemes, even these are doomed oftentimes to disappointment. It is said, of God, in dealing with us, “He disappointeth the hope of man.” I admit that, in such cases, there may be no shame felt over the object selected, or the means used; no consciousness of guilt, no blushing for folly; but still, in a mitigated and figurative sense, even such persons are ashamed of their hopes.

This will not apply to the christian. No disappointment awaits him. He, in his expectations of life eternal. Is building no castles in the air. His is ‘’ a sure and certain hope.” Its foundation is the work of Christ, the promise and oath of Gkpd. Should he even be mistaken in his faith, — should he have been following only cunningly-devised fables in resting his belief on the gospel of Christ, — should he sink at death into annihilation, even in that case, he would not live to blush; he will have no existence, and therefore have no consciousness of disappointment. But this is a mere negative view of the subject. The gospel is not a cunningly*devi8ed fable, but a divine reTelation; he will live, and will realise his expectation, and have his desires gratified. No, no; wherever there is disappointment, there will be none here. His most assured earthly expectations may fail; what appear to be substances may be only shadows; what seemed to be stars may be only meteors. But this awaits not the christian. Heaven is no mere speculation. It is a glorious certainty. AH the evidences of Christianity, as a revelation from God, sustain his anticipations. Doubts and fears now sometimes, like fleecy clouds swimming over the sun’s disc, occasionally throw their shadows on his path, and for a little while darken his prospect, but even these will all vanish, and the whole scene of heavenly glory shine out in cloudless and eternal splendour.

3. But there is another cause of men’s being ashamed of their earthly hopes, and that is, the disproportion between the expectation and the fruition. How far short, in most cases, does the reality fall of the anticipation. “Hope tells a flattering tale,” and always looks at its object through a magnifying medium, and usually one of high power, and paints it also in colours supplied rather by the imagination than the judgment. To him who surveys the prospect from an eminence, where everything looks beautiful, the cottage and the homestead are all picturesque; but how different an aspect does it wear when these parts of the picture are surveyed near at hand, with the dirty heaps, and broken windows, and shattered doors, and other signs of poverty, which distance had hidden from view. So is it with our hopes. “Distance lends enchantment to the scene,” which usually dissolves on a near approach. How few of our expectations have been realised up to their full amount. How often, when we

215 HO?K THAT MAMMJUliafe giiiied the object of denre and parMnt, ki?e we exelaimedy with turpriie md grief, — “jAmi it £U» a0/ O thoa gay deceiTer, bow hast thoa begafled and dMaked me. Are all thy promiaet come to Uus?^ In ot dimu ty cases thia b true, and in some, it is abaohitefy affli c ti te* How much time, strength, energy, and monqr hare been sometimes expended upon an object of desire; what expectations have been indulged; what bright Yiskms have been raised; what blissful anticipations have been let loose; what large calculations of coming enjoyment have been made, and all this to issue in the sad confession, ‘’And this is all.” Must not such a man be ashamed of his hope P

Again, I triumphantly say, ‘’ This will never happen to the chrittian,** when he reaches heaven. He will never have to say, ‘’And is this all?** The Queen of Sheba, when she saw the glory of Solomon, confessed with delighted surprise, “That the half had not been told her.” And the glorified spirit will declare that a thousandth part had not been told. A thousandth part of heaven would a thousand times more than compensate for all the time, the energy, the strength we had spent in seeking after it. Could it be obtained in no other way, and could be obtained in this, a thousand martyrdoms, successively endured, would bo a cheap purchase of “the inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away.” If ther« be shame in heaven, it will not be that our hopes wiff” so high, but that they were so low; not that we ex- {KH’tetl too much, but too little. How will it surprise us a« WY^ walk the golden streets, that we could, with sndi a prospect before u«» dwt so little upon it No tannt will thmwn at us from any qoaiter» See what yoor hope ka« coitte to i do you not blush to compaie the lealify with the expectation V^

But now dwell upon the loffic of the apostle, as well as upon his assertion, ‘* Hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost, which he hath given to us.” The “love of God” is an ambiguous phrase, and means, in some places, God’s love to us, and in others, our love to God. Commentators are divided in opinion, as to which of these the apostle refers to in this passage. By a proper explanation, I think both may be included. When a person loves us, and is kind to us, he sheds abroad upon us his love, by conferring upon us liB/ruita. His love is immanent in himself; it is its gifts that are bestowed upon us, and yet in common parlance, we say he has bestowed much kindness upon us. God sheds abroad his love in our hearts, by giving us the Holy Spirit. Now the Spirit of God, by his work in us, gives us assurance that our hope will never make us ashamed; and he does this in two ways: first — By giving us a foretaste, pledge, and meetness of the heavenly inheritance. He imparts such a bright view, and such a deep sense of God’s love to us, and causes this so to fill the heart with joy unspeakable, as to convince the soul, from its happiness in this world, that in the full enjoyment of this love in heaven, there will be no disappointment. Some believers, as John Howe, Halyburton, Payson, as we have showed, and others, have had such a perception and sense of God’s love, as was almost overpowering: and even believers of less stature have known something of this. There are moments in the life of all real christians, when their views and sense of Gt)d’s love, in itself and in its gifts, are so vivid, as to lead them to say, “No — this cannot be delusion — this firame of mind must be God’s work; and if, in this world of ignorance, and earthliness, and imperfection, there be such happiness, — what will heaven be, where the sun of God’s love will, without any intervening doods, poor its full effulgence upon my happy apiiit?”

Then the work of the Holy Spirit is not <»ly to ie?eal God’s love to ns, but to produce in ns love to God in return. “We love him,” said the apostle, “because he first loved ns.’^ In ordinary cases, love generally produces love. It alwavs does here. Whenever the Hoh Spirit really gives a clear view and deqp sense of Giod’s love to us, he, by the same operation of his grace, subdues the enmity of the carnal mind, and produces a genuine and supreme love to God. And who, that knows the reality and power of this divine passion, does not know that it is heaven begun? Christian reader, have there not been moments in your experience, when love to God has been so fervid in your soul, when the heaven-kindled flame has burnt so strongly, as to compel you to say, ‘’ If heaven, as I am taught, is to consist, so far as its subjective happiness is concerned, in the perfect love of God, — I feel assured, from what I now experience, that I can never there be ashamed of my hope.”

And then there is another way in which the work of God’s Spirit assures us we shall never be ashamed of our hope — and that is, this work strengthens our faith in the divine origin and truth of the gospeL We have already shown how faith and hope operate on each other. The former must of course be considered as the originator and sustainer of the latter; but then the latter maj strengthen, by acting back upon, the former. Among the evidences of the truth of Christianity, the experimeMtaL one is, to many persons, the strongest, and to all really converted persons, it carries great weight: “He that believeth, hath the witness in himself.” Br. Chalmers truly says, “That in the course of the believer’s pilgrimage, never does the hope of experience supersede the hope of faith. So far from this, in the very proportion that experience grows in breadth, does faith grow in brightness. And it is this last, which still constitutes the sheet anchor of the soul, and forms the main element of its peace, and joy, and righteousness. It is well that in looking inwardly upon himself, he sees the growing lineaments of such a grace and such a character forming upon his person, as vouch him to be ripening for eternity. But along with this process, he will look outwardly upon God in Christ, and there see, in constantly increasing manifestation, the truth, and mercy, and the unchangeableness of his reconciled Father, — by far the firmest and stablest guarantee of his future destiny. The same agent, in fact, who brings about the one effect, brings about the other. He causes you not merely to see yourself to be an epistle of the Spirit of God, and to read therein the works of your personal interest in the promises; but he also causes you to see the promises, as standing in the outward record, invested with a light, and an honesty, and a freeness, which you did not see at the first revelation of them.” Thus the good works, and the graces of personal religion, which are the fruits of the Spirit, not merely supply you with a foretaste of heaven, and assure you that it will exceed all your highest and happiest attainments now; but they cast back a refiex light on the faith from which they emanated, and equally convince you of the certainty as well as greatness of that celestial state. So that God’s love to us, revealed by the light of the Spirit; and our love to God, produced by the same divine agent, assure us we shall never be ashamed of our anticipations of heaven.

THE HAEMONT BETWEEN HOPE AND FEAB.

All the affections of the soul have their opposites, as love and hatred, joy and grief, hope and fear. These, though seemingly antagonistic, can be shewn to work harmoniously, and sometimes, as in the case before us, to accomplish the same object. There are many passages, as this treatise proves, in which the believer is called upon to hope, to hope perfectly, to have the full assurance of hope, and yet as many in which he is as earnestly called upon to fear. To say nothing of the texts of the Old Testament, which was a system of bondage and fear, there are many to the same effect in the New Testament, under which we have “not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but the spirit of power, of love, and of a sound mind.” ‘’Work out your salvation,” said the apostle, “with fear and trembling.’* “Let us fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.’*” Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.” Very many others might be selected, but these will suffice to show that fear, as well as hope, is a christian grace, and a grace to be exercised not only by the unconverted, but the converted man; not only by the man wUkoni hope, but by the man who has hope. Now as these two are antagonistic in their nature, how can they be exercised by the same individual, in reference to the same object? Does not perfect hope, as well as perfect love, cast out fear? Certainly. But then it must be perfect love in one case, and perfect hope in the other. God has wisely ordained that these two opposite principles of love and fear should rise and fall like the two opposite scales of a balance, when one rises the other sinks. Light and darkness unavoidably succeed each other; if light prevails, so much does darkness cease, and no more; and if light decay, so much does darkness prevail. So it is in the heart of a child of Grod; if divine love decay, and fall asleep, the light and joy of hope go out, and dark fear arises; and if, on the contrary, divine love prevail and come into lively exercise, this brings in the brightness of hope, and drives away black fear before it.” * Another of our old divines represents the matter thus: — “Fear and hope in the soul of a christian are like the cork and lead to a net; the cork keeps it from sinking, and the lead keeps it from too much floating; so it is here, fear keeps hope from degenerating into presumption, and hope keeps fear from sinking into despair. If you do abstract fear from hope, the soul will be lazy, and if you abstract hope from fear, it will sink into despondency. Therefore there must be fear with hope.”t

Let us, however, examine this a little farther. Can any hope, however strong and assured, altogether exclude fearP Certainly not. And the greater the object, the greater will be the liability to fear. To be totally without fear is the condition of possession and fruition. A man in the pursuit of an earthly object, however confident he may be of ultimately possessing it, must admit, theoretically, at least, the possibility, if not the probability, of his losing it. The thought must, and does, occasionally cross his mind, that after all he may be disappointed, and the consequences of disappointment must be at the same time present to his thoughts. This fear may be, and is, far less than his hopes; it may not materially lessen the assurance of. his mind that he shall succeed, but it is

* Jonathan Edwards,
t Dr. Bates, vol iii, 186.

22i HARMO>’T BETWSEX

there, aod it is useful to him, for it hoepB him in action, it sustains as well as prompts ezeition.

Bo is it in the dinne life. As long as heaven is an objeet of hope, and not the subject of poesession, theie must be some degree of fear mnied with it. And this proves that even the full assurance of hope does not mean, as we have shewn, a man’s being as certain of reaching heaven at last, as if he were already in it. The christian hope, like the christian love, when it is perfect, does exclude fear. But what fear? That which has torment; the servile spirit of bondage, which, like a spectre, is ever haunting and terrifying the imagination, filling the soul with such trembling forebodings of wrath to come, as prevents all joy and peace in believing. This is the fear which both love and hope shut out, and keep out from the soul; a fear that is ever trembling under an apprehension of an angry God and a coming hell; a fear that upon every fresh discovery of sin, and every fresh sense of guilt, is thrown into despondency and wrapped in darkness; a fear that, under every new sight of our spiritual enemies, difficulties, and dangers, and every new consciousness of our own weakness, sinks into a paroxysm of despairing helplessness; a fear that turns the soul more frequently to the threatenings of God’s Word than to his promises; that is more frequently at Sinai than at Calvary, and is more apt to dwell upon the torments of hell than the felicities of heaven; such a fear is the spirit of bondage, which is decidedly opposed to the spirit of adoption, and shews that the soul is not yet brought into the liberty wherewith Christ makes his people free. TAii fear hope does cast out. But a fear that produces reverence and caution, that makes its

HOPE AND F£AR. 223

subject watchful against sin, and, in a modified and chastened sense, afraid of coming short of the heavenly felicity, it does not cast out. In fact, the more hope there is, the more fear of this kind there will be.

How closely and how beautifully are these two affections united by the Psalmist, — “The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear him, in them that hope in his mercy,” Holy fear and confident hope therefore may not only consist, but must concur. This striking passage, in which these two affections are so balanced, we should all have as a frontlet before our eyes, and engraven, as upon the palms of our hands. Satan, so skilful in the art of temptation, and so successful in the business of destruction, has machinations adapted to all constitutions and cases; and while he tempts the fearful to despair, endeavours to seduce the confident to presumption, careless security, unwatchfulness, and sin; and never so glories in his triumphs, as when he can make their very expectation of heaven, by its inflating them with some degree of spiritual pride, the occasion of their fall. Holy fear will be to our joy, what the cooling influence of water is to the heated iron, — that which prevents it from firing the whole, by the rapidity of its motion and the intensity of its friction.

We see, then, what is the christian’s true temper of mind. There should be a prevailing, sustaining, assured hope of eternal life, such as is attended with no serious, perplexing, much less tormenting doubt of its final possession, and such as shall enable the believer to go on his way rejoicing; yet this, attended with so much fear of falling short, as while it does not materially interfere with his strong consolation, shall keep him watchful.

224. HOPE IN CHSIST.

diligent, and prayerful. Thus hope and fear, like the two angels that led Lot from Sodom to Zoar, shall conduct the christian from the city of destruction to the celestial city.

“IP IN THIS LIFE ONLY WE HATE HOPE IN CHRIST,

ERABLE.” — 1 Ck>B. XY. 19.

WE ARE OF ALL MEN MOST MISERABLE.” —

This passage has been, to some good people, a source of perplexity, as seeming to suggest the idea that all the happiness which Christianity brings to the children of men, belongs to another world: and that if this fail us, the life of the infidel and the worldling is to be preferred to that of the believer. This is contrary to the views and feelings of all true christians, — for they are ever ready to acknowledge that, even should Christianity be a fable and there were no heaven to come, they have found more true peace of mind and felicity in a life of piety, than they once did, or ever could, find in a life of sin. This is very true, and the passage does not intend to assert that there is no real happiness in the present practice of piety. The apostle teaches in another place, that ‘* Godliness is profitable for ail things, having the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come;” and millions have found it so: he therefore does not mean, in this passage, to contradict the testimony of Solomon, “That wisdom’s ways are vrays of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.” There is a pure and solid happiness in piety, compared with which the pleasures of sin are as muddy streams to the water of the dear flowing spring. So that if there were

HOPE IN CHRIST. * 225

no future state, there is more pleasure in the way of holiness, than of transgression.

Some have supposed the apostle alludes exclusively to himself and his fellow-labourers in the cause of Christ, whose life was one constant and dreadful martyrdom: and truly, apart from the hope of immortality, and the final possession of eternal glory, they were the most miserable of men, especially when to their sufferings we add the self-reproach and agonies of conscience they must have sometimes endured, under the consciousness, if Christ did not rise, of being false witnesses for Grod, in testifying his resurrection. They must, in that case, have been not only the greatest of sufferers, but the basest of criminals. But though in a special manner it was applicable to them, and to all others who have drank to its dregs the bitter cup of persecution, this passage does not apply exclusively to them. That there toa a special and primary reference to them is, I think, evident from what Paul said in his former epistle, — chap. iv. 9-14. And from his mention of his own case, in the 31st and 32nd verses of this chapter.

But still there is also a general principle contained in this passage, — and that is, that the chief happiness of the christian is to be waited for, in faith and hope, and is to come in another world. It is of great importance to bear this constantly in remembrance, as it would check that too great eagerness after amusement, and that impatience under self-denial, which are manifested by many professing christians. We are not so much to seek for perfect happiness here, as to prepare for it hereafter. There can be no doubt that the christian life, whatever felicity it yields, and much it does yield, is, notwithstanding, a constant state of self-denial. We are to

“mortify our members which are upon earth,” and to ‘’ crucify the flesh with the affections and lusts thereof.” There are many sources of enjoyment forbidden to the children of light, to which the children of this world repair without scruple or reluctance. Christians see the joyous countenances of the lovers of pleasure, and hear their merry voices, and feel sometimes a sense of sacrifice in retiring from the forbidden fruit. They are often called to take up a cross, where others grasp a garland of delight.

That man knows not his own heart, or has forgotten it-s history and its occasional yearnings, who denies that he has never felt the motions of the flesh after some of the purest of the works of the flesh. What is it that enables the believer to carry on this life of sacrifice, to separate himself from gaieties and delights which others enjoy? To retire, and sometimes to retire amidst the anger, ridicule, and persecution of his friends and companions? To be laughed at as a puritan, precisionist, or hypocrite? The hope of eternal life. He deems many things which those around him approve, to be contrary to his expectations of eternal glory. Take from him this hope therefore, and he is in some respects a pitiable man. In proportion to the elevation of our hopes are we to be commiserated for their final disappointment. And no one has such hopes as the christian, so high, so vast, so sublime. Is it not a deplorable condition to be in, to embrace a cross, to become ridiculously singular, obnoxious to many, and often to be disquieted in ourselves, by the chase of a bubble, and in contemplation of a vision?

It does not follow however, we again say, that christians would be in fact more unhappy than other men, if there

HOPJB IN CHRIST, 22?

should be no future reward; for even then their expecta< tions of it, and the consolation they have thence derived, would counterbalance their peculiar trials, self-denials and hardships. No, no, the apostle did not intend to teach that apart from a future world, a man would be more happy in vice than in virtue. In the love of God, in purity of life, in the means of grace, in the fellowship of the saints, he has more real happiness than the sinner has in his evil courses. The apostle does not refer so much to their personal feelings, as to their condition and their hopes. At the same time we would most emphatically remark, that the Scriptures do not represent as the only or chief motive to good conduct, that virtue is its own reward. It is so, we know, as we all must have experienced who have practised it. But this is quite too refined, too much opposed in some cases to the temporal interests of mankind, and therefore too feeble a motive for promoting its practice with the generality of men. Mr. Hall has most correctly, as well as most eloquently argued that ‘* the system of infidelity is not only incapable of arming virtue for great and trying occasions, but leaves it unsupported in the most ordinary occurrences. In vain will its advocates expatiate on the tranquillity and pleasure attendant on a virtuous course; for though you may remind the offender that in disregarding them he has violated his nature, and that a conduct consistent with them is productive of much internal satisfaction; yet if he reply that his taste is of a different sort, that there are other gratifications which he values more, and that every man must choose his own pleasures, the argument is at an end.

‘* Rewards and punishments assigned by infinite power,

Q2

22$ HOPE OF THE HT70C1ITE.

afford a palpable and pressing motife, which can newest lie neglected without renouncing the diaracter of a rational creature; but tastes and relishes are not to be prescribed. “As the present world is to infiddity the only [dace of recompense, whenerer the practice of Yirtoe fails to promise the greatest snm of present good; cases which often occur in reality, and much ofiener in appearance; a deviation from rectitude becomes the part of wisdom; and should the path of virtue, in addition to this, be obstructed by disgrace, torment, or death, to perseyere would be madness and folly, and a violation of the great and most essential law of nature. Virtue being on these principles in numberless instances at war with self-preservation, never can, or ought to become, a fixed habit of the mind.”

THE HOPE OF THE HYPOCEITE.

With what frequency and impressive solemnity is this Kubjcct referred to in Scripture, especially in the book of Jol). The complicated sorrows of the suffering patriarch wtro bitterly aggravated by the suspicions, accusations, nud reproaches of his sadly mistaken friends. Adopting tho fnlso principle that character is determined by extfrnnl circumstances, they interpreted his affietive condition as a punishment for his sins, and a revelation of his hypocrisy. Hence the application to him of such language as the following: “The hypocrite’s hope shall p^Tish.** — viii. 13. “A hypocrite shall not come before him.” — xiii. l(J. “The congregation of hypocrites shall bo desolate.** — xv. 34. “The joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment.” — xx. 5. “What is the hope of a hypocritCi though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul.” — xxvii. 8. These passages contain a terrible truth; but they did not apply to Job. A hypocrite is the most odious of all characters on earth, and a character that has always been found upon earth. There are hypocrites in all departments of human action, — in politics, in friendship, in business, in morals, and alas in religion also. “Wherever there is genuine coin, it will be likely to be counterfeited; and the fact of a counterfeit is always a tribute to the intrinsic worth of the coin — for who would be at the pains to counterfeit what is worthless?”

It is the greatest madness, as well as wickedness, in the world, to be a hypocrite in religious profession. The worldling hates him for being a christian even in appearance; God hates him doubly, because he is a christian only in appearance. He has thus the detestation of both, and no comfort in himself. “Yet, if thou wilt not be good, as thou seemest,” says Bishop Hall, “I hold it better to seem ill, as thou art. An openly wicked man doth much hurt with notorious sins; but a hypocrite doth at last more shame goodness by seeming good. I would rather be an open wicked man than a hypocrite; but I would rather be no man, than either of them.” The same good Prelate, in a sermon which he preached before King James the First’s court, — a sermon which has more of awful denunciation against sin, and threatenings against sinners, and descriptions of eternal torment, than the plainest methodist preacher would now like to deliver, — has the following quaint remarks, He that hath only the form of godliness is a hypocrite: he that hath not even a form is an atheist. I know not whether I should sever these two: both are human devils well met: a hypocrite is a masked devil; an atheist is a devil unmasked.

Whether of them, without repentance, shall be deeper in the hell they shall both hereafter feel, I determine not.“* Hypocrisy, in its generic sense, means pretending to religion, while there is none — keeping up the semblance without the reality. But there are two classes of hypocrites — or, at any rate, two degrees of hypocrisy. First, — those who, though they profess to be religious, know they are not, and who have assumed the profession for some worldly advantage they expect to gain by it, either in the way of profit or applause. They are inieiUumal deceivers, and are conscious of the deception they are practising. These are, in the fullest sense of the word, hypocrites. It is to these our Lord alludes, with so much indignation, in his ministry. This is the most disgusting and loathsome species of hypocrisy. The other sort are the formal, refined, and unintentional hypocrites; that is, the men who have but the semblance of religion, yet ignorantly mistake it for the substance.” Now both these agree in this, that they are deceivers, for deceit is the formal constituent element of hypocrisy; but their difference lies in this, that the one designedly deceives the world, the other unintentionally deceives himself: the one resolvedly goes towards hell, the other sets out for heaven, but carelessly mistakes the way: one is a mere

* This is but a specimen, and a slight one too, of the laogaage which even in those corrupt days was addressed by Episcopal lips to Courtly ears. In reading the sermons which in those days were deliTered both by the aerions Episcopal preachers, as well as by Nonconformists, I am aatonished at their plainness, their earnestness, and their fearlessness. Who can read the discourses of Donne, Hall, Brownrigg, Esekiel Hopkins, and of Owen, and especially Baxter, — when Oourts were addressed by the former, and the House of Commons by the latter, — without feeling how much the modern pulpit is inferior, in intense earnestness, to the preachers of those times. It may be they erred on the side of coarse descriptions of the oonsequenoes of sin, and the punishment of sinners; but we err as much on the side of a false refinement, and are almost afraid to “mention hell to ean polite.**

HOPE OF THE HYPOCEITB. 23l

shadow, the other is a rotten substance.” The first is a much rarer character than the other. It is only now and then we meet with hypocrisy in its intentional and grosser form; but on every hand crowds are to be found who are self-deceived. Our cities, towns, and villages, are, to a considerable extent, peopled with them; and they abound even in our churches. Self-deception was not unknown in our Lord’s time, and under his ministry. Even when a cross stood in the way of a christian profession, and in order to become a professor a man must take it up and bear it onward, under these circumstances self-deception was frequent. “Not every one that saith unto me. Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name; and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity.” — Matt. vii. 21-23. This is really one of the most alarming passages of Holy Writ, as shewing how far persons may go in self-deception, and how perseveringly they may continue in it — even to death, and throtigh it, up to the very judgment seat of Christ. When persecution raged, and it might have been supposed no one could impose upon himself by a mere form of godliness without the power, and nothing short of real conversion by divine grace could lead any one to take up the christian name, even then, this modified hypocrisy prevailed, and unsound profession was common. How much more common might it be supposed to be now, when we sit under our vine and fig tree, none daring to make us afraid: when it adds to, rather than detracts from, our respectability: when it calls for so little self-denial and self-sacrifice. I am truly alarmed and terrified at the thought of this state of things, when multitudes are going down to the pit with a lie in their right hand, floating to perdition on the stream of delusion.

Hypocrites may have, and really have, their hopes, even the grosser class of them. They misunderstand the holy and righteous character of God, and endeavour to persuade themselves he is too merciful to destroy any of his creatures. They misapprehend the nature of sin in general, and have light views of their own. Th find out all extenuating circumstances of their sins, and persuade themselves that there is a kind of necessity for their seeming to be religious, combined with an impossibility of their being actually so. Then in order to defend themselves from the accusations of their conscience, they will be often bribing and endeavouring to pacify it with some specious outward performances. When this will not do, they will contrive to shelter themselves under the pretext that there is a little hypocrisy in those who are considered real christians, since none of them quite live up to their {profession. If this is insufficient, they will found their hopes upon the principles of infidelity, and believe that all religion is a sham, and that they shall do as well in the next world, after serving themselves by a pretended religion in this, as they who are sincere. Especially will they lay hold of the failings of strict professors, and bolster up their expectations by saying. If these do much in the way of sin, they may do much more, and get to heaven at last. Hypocrites will often keep up their hope by comparing themselves with others who are openly vicious, and apparently worse than they are; and think themselves religious, not from any goodness of their own, but from the baduess of others. “They raise a structure of reputed holiness, and therefore of hope, upon the deplorable ruins of other men’s character. This was the chief ground of the Pharisee’s hope, — he was not as other men, an adulterer, covetous, swearer, or the like. There are many paths to perdition in the broad way, some of which are more cleanly and some more foul, yet they all lead to the same end; and those shall as certainly arrive at hell that tread the cleanlier paths of a refined hypocrisy, as those that track through the mire and dirt of the grossest abominations.”

, But how shall we account for the false hope of the other class of hypocrites, the unintentional ones? In much the same way as in the preceding case, with some additional causes. Ignorance of the nature of true religion; setting up false standards of personal godliness, such as church relationship, and an orthodox creed; depending upon the opinions of others concerning their state, rather than the testimony of their own conscience; mistaking a mere excitement of the emotions for real conversion; relying upon a public profession as an evidence of the possession of divine grace in the soul; comparing themselves with the great bulk of professors, and concluding that they are as good, and shall do as well, as they; and especially the neglect of close, anxious, serious, and deep examination of their own state. Self-deception begins in ignorance, and is continued by the want of self-trial. A man must dive into his own heart, if he would know his state; he must take the candle of the Lord, which is the Word of God, and go down into the depths of his own soul, and search every comer, just as he would his cellar, in which he feared was concealed a thief, a murderer or a kindling

23-1 HOPE OF THE HTPOCEITB.

finr. No wonder so many are deceiving theniselves, when tker are 90 fearfdllj neglectful of this duty of ‘’ proving their own selves.” It were almost to be desired that in addition to the silent admonition of Scripture, and the earnest exhortations from the pulpit, the sound would break in thunder from the skies, ‘’ Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith,” and that the voice of the archangel, and the trump of Grod, which are to usher in the day of judgment, would awaken the slumbering multitude with those words;” Be not deceived, God is not mocked.’* Ordinary methods lamentably fail. Under the most seardiing ministry, the most alarming sermoM, and the most discriminating marks of sincerity laid down, a fatal delusion sends multitudes to perdition.

But this hope of the hypocrite shall perish. It sometimes dies out in life, and the deceived man sinks down into a comfortless creature, without a beam of joy, or a feeling of peace. It was never more than a dim spark, and now in some great affliction, or sudden calamity, that expircy and leaves him in rayless night. He finds out his deluon and sees that his were but the groundless expectations of an unoonvoted man. The world fails him, and his hope has vanished under the ruins of his fortune. He it«lixes now the force of Bildad’s cutting interrogation; “Can the rush grow up without mire? Can the flag grow without water? Whilst it is yet in its greenness, and not cut down, it withereth before any other herb. So are the paths of all that forget God; and the hypocrites hope shall perish: whose hope shall be cat olf, and whose trust shall be as the spider’s web. He shall Wan upon his house, but it shall not stand: he shall hold it fast, but it shall not endure.” — Job, viii, 11-15. Or under some heart-searching sermon, or awakening book, his false hopes fall from around him, and the dreadful secret is revealed to him, of an unchanged heart. Many carry on the delusion to the bed of death. The last enemy often comes to shatter with dreadful power the vain confidences of hypocritical professors. Then that saying of the Psalmist passes upon them; “His breath goeth forth, he retumeth to his earth, and in that very day, all his thoughts perish.” All his fond expectations then upbraid him to his face; Satan, his greatest flatterer, shall then laugh him to scorn; death shall confute all his confidences, and the dawning lights of eternity convince him that his hopes of heaven were groundless and irrational. Many, however are not awakened even by the harsh voice of the king of terrors, from the dream of a false profession; they pass through the dark valley, with the delusive light of a lamp of their own kindling; but which, the next moment, is quenched in the darkness of eternal night. The hope of the hypocrite then perishes, in the day when God taketh away his soul. Few things are more tormenting to a man than the feelings of disappointment, and it is the climax of all misery, the most venomous of all poison of the spirit, when to these are added the torments of self reproach. How terrible will be the disappointment and remorse of the hypocrite, when death, which closes his eyes to all the scenes of earth, shall open them to those of the bottomless pit.

Oh, think of a man who has been long away from his pleasant home, his wife and children, enduring all kinds of hardships, of bad weather, rough roads, inconvenient inns, great fear of dangers, and much unkind treatment; but who solaces himself all the while with sweet thoughts of his arrival at his own house, and the bosom of his family; but who, as soon as he reaches the threshold of his dwelling, is seized, put in irons, and immured for life in a dark dungeon: what horror, and surprise, and overwhelming disappointment seize and hold him. But what is this, to the horror and surprise of him, who when he expects to arise from the bed of death, to the felicities of heaven, sinks from it, to the miseries of hell. In the case of the traveller just mentioned, if he be a christian, he carries to his dungeon the hope of immortality, and knows that however bitter his disappointment, and however long his confinement, he shall rise at last from that dismal state, to a glorious eternity, made more glorious at length, by contrast with his previous one. But the hope of the hypocrite makes his eternity more miserable, by its contrast with the expectations he had till then indulged. How terrible is the language of Dr. South; “Former happiness is the greatest ingredient of present misery. It would be some relief to a condemned sinner, if with the loss of his hope, he could lose his memory too; but alas, when he shall lie down in sorrow and torment, this will recall to his mind all that peace, comfort, and tranquillity, that his false hopes formerly fed him with. No voice will be heard in hell so loud and frequent as this sad and doleful one. ‘My hopes deceived me, my confidence deluded me.’ Nothing so comfortable as hope crowned with fruition; nothing so tormenting as hopes snapped pif with disappointment and frustration; and were it lawful to wish an enemy completely miserable, I would wish that he might strongly hope, and never obtain. Now from what has been determined, I think we may truly conclude, that of the two, the despairing reprobate is happier than the hoping reprobate. They both indeed, fall equally low; but then he that hopes hath the greater fall, because he falls from the highest place; he that despairs goes to hell, but then he goes thither with expectation; though he is condemned, he is not surprised; he has inured his heart to the flames, and has made those terrors familiar to him, by the continual horrors of his meditation; so that when he dies, he passes but from one hell to another, and his actual condemnation is not the beginning, but the carrying on of his former torment. In short, to express the wretchedness of the hypocrite’s hope, I shall only add this; certainly that must needs be exceeding dismal, in comparison of which despair is desirable.”

These are awful words, and should send an alarm to every heart, and exert an awakening power over every conscience. Under any circumstances that will be a solemn moment, when God taketh away our soul, even though he take it to heaven.

In yam our fancy strives to paint.
The moment after death.

What a conviction will that be, when the disembodied spirit says, “I am in eternity.” Oh, the surprise, the felicity, the rapture, of being able to add, “I am safe, I am in heaven!” It would seem as if the soul would sink under the far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory which will then come upon it, surround it, absorb it. But oh, the dreadful reverse! The indescribable, overwhelming astonishment, consternation, and horror of the hypocrite, who wakes up amidst the scenes of the bottomless pit: it is not for language to set forth nor imagination to conceive, the torment that will in a moment come over the miserable soul, whose first words in eternity will be,” I am lost, lost, lost, for ever: I am in hell.” It is not only happiness that will then expire, but

4^1%^ TV M’ c ilwK i ^pipt will look through the mteii

»«H> ^^MMM’ i:S^’ «!«vtbk* ittpoct of the wofds of M3iiaa:

V)V> ^’>*(^ wiv hiivp thor due effect upon ns afi. ^iik .iKsk .()N^i ;*^ 5* iw4 in »1«^ aolemnity,” Is mine the VvK .w .2K V fHMHc ‘* liop« that will thus * make me .^>;w(M<K^ .H :>. :i ^XHi hope Uiroogh grace.’ Amlooe w .iK ^kMMV’ ^Xnijit s)i «^*ce|)C»m» or am I an Israelite .;k,*lm * t$. ^- ‘(nvpl>$$KW a lie or a troth? Oh, ,lwx«;(<A, .^;)k:itulv uhiti ;$ at stake upon this question. :i X ^M^tMi s ^>U ‘.^ iepettiis upon it. What a lsjxv .1^ ;ixcute4i«mHw. C90$cp attxiooS) honest examina- .i<su ^Hn ;wi4H^»^ ^ttt^i^L dohcitoas, we should be; -rss:’ *.H^>«u9Kk sHii’siix-c^ ihat wt are true christians, ^u« io ^M’ I v ,Hit l.(?4 tts all under the influence N .tKjii.- iipsH^jti*15s OQ^r tx* God the prayer of the bNi..U4»>i, ‘^ S;^>A y O iinxL and know my heart; 11 ‘.u< AitU vt«i’«i i liKHtts; and see if there be any ivKtvi x%e ut ‘4n* ;Md icMu OK in the way everlasting.*’

itv>*^« UN PJUTH.

IVaih 1^ au dwf’ui eetti. It i» that monster, froin the :M^hi ami tnich of which» all sentient beings itfcoil with iniiuciivt alarm and dread. Had it occurred but in ^n«y single injstance» it would fill with surprise and horror all who beheld it. We can form no conception of the feelings of our first parents, when they saw the dead body of their murdered Abel, and for the first time understood the meaning of that word, death. By one of the boldest and most impressive personifications of Scripture imagery, death is called *’ The King of Terrors.^* And who that has witnessed it or duly considered it, will say the metaphor is too strong? O most dreadful point, which art the end of time, and beginning of eternity! O most fearful instant, which shuttest up the prefixed term of life, and determinest the business of our salvation: what things, and how many, and how vast, are to take place in thee! In the same instant, life is to finish, all our works are to be examined, and that state fixed which is to last through all eternity. Merciful God, prepare us by thy grace for that event, so pregnant with eternal consequences.

“It is appointed unto man once to die.” “What is only to be once done, should be well done. If this be done ill, it cannot be mended by dying well at another time. God gives some of our senses and our limbs by pairs, that if one be lost or injured, we might not be totally disabled; but of deaths he gives us but one; so that if that miscarry, all is lost, and we are ruined for eternity. Is it not a solemn and a fearful case, that the thing which most imports us, which is to die, hath neither trial, experience, nor remedy? We have but one life on earth, for which no previous existence can prepare us. We stereotype our history as we write it action by action; but a bad Itfe may be mended, through God’s rich grace, so far at least, as to prevent its disastrous consequences, by a holy death; but for a bad, that is an impenitent and unbelieving death, there can be no remedy. The seal of eternity is set upon that. As the tree leans, so it falls; as it falls, so it lies; as it lies, so it rots. As our life leaves us, so death generally finds us; as death leaves us, so judgment finds us; and as judgment leaves us, so eternity will find us. Since then, eternity depends upon death, death upon life, and life upon a brittle thread which at any moment may be snapped by accident, or cut through by sudden disease; let us all take up, with far more intelligence, seriousness, and earnestness, than he did who first uttered it, the prayer of the hireling prophet, and say, ‘^ Let me die the death of the righteous, and let mv latter end be like his.”

I now turn to the very striking contrast presented in the passage which stands at the head of this section. Both the wicked and the righteous die. Even for the latter, there is no road to immortality round the sepulchre, but only through it. No translation by chariots of fire is granted to them. They must be conformed to their Lord, not only in his life, but in his death. They must die in order that his power might be displayed in sustaining them in the prospect of dissolution, and in their glorious resurrection. His victory over Satan, who had the power of death, will thus be rendered more illustrious by the triumphant resurrection of the saints. But how different the death of the saint and the sinner. The wicked is driven atoay in his wickedness. He would live, but he cannot: he would not die, but he must. He goes not away, but is driven away. He is not led out, but is forced out. His hands grasp the earth, he clings to it, and with a wrench is forced to loose his tenacious hold. Yea, he is dragged out of life, as a criminal, from his home to a place of execution. Cases have occurred in which hell seemed to have begun this side of eternity.

The sinner has sometimes been tortured on the rack of his own horrified imagination, before he was slain by the sword of Divine justice. Blair, in his poem entitled “The Grave,” has strikingly pourtrayed this:

How shocking must thy smiunons be, O Death!
To hun that is at ease in his possessions;
Who, counting on long yean of jdeasore here.
Is quite unftimished for that world to come.
In that dread moment, how the frantic soul
SaTee round the walls of her day tenement,
Buns to each ayenne and shrieks for help, — But shrieks in Tain! — * How irishfuUy she looks
On all she’s leaving, now no longer hers.*
A little longer, yet a little longer.
Oh, might she stay, to wash away her stains.
And fit her for her passage. — Mournful sight I
Her very eyes weep blood; — and every groan
She heayes is big with horror: but the foe.
Like a staunch murderer, steady to his purpose.
Pursues her close through every lane of life,
Kor misses once the track, but presses on;
Till, forced at last to the tremendous yerge.
At once she sinks to everlasting ruin.
Sure ’tis a serious thing to die.

Still we must admit that this is not always the case. Even wicked men sometimes die with apathy, petrified into stones by a stoical or atheistical philosophy; “there are no bands in their death, and their strength is firm.” While others go still farther, and through the power of ignorance and self-deception have a false peace. They may, and do sometimes, die like lambs; but only to wake with the rage, and fury, and misery of scotched snakes, or wounded lions. Their case has been set forth in the section that speaks of the hope of the hypocrite.

But I now turn with delight to the bright and beautiful contrast: — ‘* The righteous hath hope in his death** This I think is one of the few passages of the Old Testament, which refer to a future state. I am aware that

B those, among whom was Bishop Warburton» who oontaad that a future world was unknown to the Jews, or at least is not alluded to in the Jewish Scriptures, explain this expression as signifying nothing more than that, while the wicked are cut off, driven away in their wickedness, by calamities and other visitations of Providence, the righteous should be delivered from the most imminent danger. *’ That sagacious mind could never have confounded two things so essentially distinct, as hope in death, and a hope of escape from death; had it not been necessary to subserve a favourite hypothesis.’* Equally satisfactory and beautiful, is the note of a learned Grerman critic. “A splendid testimony of the knowledge of the Old Testament believers of a future life. The wicked in his calamity, is agitated with the greatest terror. He knows not where to turn. But the godly in this last evil has no fear, he knows to whom to flee, and where he is going.” — ^Dathe in loco. Again! “He dieth in God’s grace, and in an assured confidence of the salvation of his soul, and of the glorious resurrection of the body.” *

That same hope which sustained the christian wider the afflictions, and purified him amidst the temptations and corruptions of Ufe, follows him to the acnnows cl death, and the pains of the grave. The same grand and glorious object whidi had excited his desires, and raised his expectations in life, appears still more gkprioos as it is now near at hand. He rests opcm the suae ibandatian, and Christ is still his hope. He may be abk tkankfnUy, and even triamphantlj to say, with the apostle, **! have ibttght a good fight, I have finished mj eonrae, I have kept the £uth; henceforth there is kid up far ae n cfown of righleoasness, whidi the Laid the nghteons Judge shall bestow upon me in that day:” but he comes not off from the Saviour’s righteousness to trust his own. The labours, the sacrifices, the holy doings of a whole life, spent in the service of God, add nothing to the entireness and strength of his dependance upon Christ. Never, no never, do the sins of his life appear more sinful, nor his righteousness more defective and worthless, to the believer, than when he is dying. Never does he appear less meritorious, less worthy, than when he views his character, his conduct, himself, in the light of an opening eternity. It is then, that with a deeper humiliation than ever, he cries, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.” Then, that he strips off with a holy indignation the last rag and tatter of self-righteousness, and wraps himself more closely in the robe of Christ’s righteousness. And he does hope. Yes. Even the near prospect of his naked soul standing in the immediate presence of a holy God, and with a clear view of all his past sins, does not deprive him of his hope. “I can die,” he says; “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded he is able to keep that which I have committed to him, until that day.”

Then, when all other hopes are extinguished, this remains. The worldling’s expectations all die, not only with him, but before him. He sees one after another failing him. As regards his health, he struggles long against the evidence of increasing decay, and approaching death; till at length the last possibility of recovery vanishes, and he sullenly says “Well, I feel I must die.” In that conviction is included the failure of all other expectations — his flattering prospects in life, his incipient prosperity, his cherished connexions, all fade before his eye like some beautiful vision vanishing in thin air, and he has nothing left. Even the christian is subject to all

B 2 this; he too sees erery earthly hope about to expire in death. Yes — but as these stars of the night pale before him, they are lost in the blaze of the rising son. His earthly expectations dissolve in the bright illumination of heaven’s eternal day which already dawns upon his soul. To the question, ‘’ What have I left, when wife, children, home, fortune, prospects, are taken from me?” he exultingly exclaims, “Heaven and immortality.”

This makes him willing to go. He dies by his own consent. It is a glad surrender, not a forcible ejectment. It is a voluntary taking leave, not an unwilling separation. The christian mariner weighs anchor, sets the canvass, catches the breeze, turns the helm and prow of his vessel towards the shore of eternity, and sails with an abundant entrance into the haven of eternal rest. He is not driven in, as by the force of the tempest, against his will, and half a wreck. He can take death by his cold hand without a shudder, and bid him welcome. ‘’ I can smik at death,” said a dying saint, “because my Saviour smiles on me.” He finds it an awfiU thing to die, to go from world to world, to plunge into eternity, to meet Grod face to face, — but he can do it with composure, and, in many cases, with triumph. He descends to the dark valley with the triumphant challenge, “0 death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” “Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy, for though I fall, I shall arise; and however unworthy, I shall live and reign through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

It is not an uncommon case for those whose hope was feeble all through life, to have it increased and strengthened in their dying moments. The hands that have hung down, have then been lifted up; the knees that were ever feeble, have been then strengthened; the harp, so often unstrung and hung upon the willows, has then been taken down, tuned afresh, and struck to the swan-like song of the dying saint, whose lips, till then, had uttered only strains of doubt and fear. It is marvellous to see in how many cases the timid and desponding have become bold, confident, and rejoicing in the very face of the last enemy, and under his uplifted arm, brandishing the fatal dart, which for aught they knew would the next hour pierce them through. What an encourage ment to the living, to anticipate that they shall be enabled to hope in death. Go forward, thou fearful believer, there is nothing so terrible to a christian in death, as your perturbed imagination leads you to suppose, — like every other evil, it diminishes in appearance as you approach it. The Sun of Eighteousoess often shines vertically over the valley of death. The “excellent glory” sends out its beams into that gloomy pass, to allure the traveller onward. The lights are seen in the windows of his Pather’s house, and Christ will send out the ministering angels to convoy you to his presence; and, more than this, will come himself to meet you. He has told you 80. Believe him. Expect him. He says, “Fear not, I am with thee.” Respond to the gracious promise, and say, “I will fear no evil, though I walk through the vfdley, not only of the shadow of death, but the valley of death itself, if thou art with me.”

But is there no need of admonition, expostulation, and rebuke, to many professing christians on this subject? Is there not a sinful love of life to be overcome, and an equally sinful dread of death? Is there not a practical denial of their hope of immortality in the dread with which many, yea, most, look on to the hour of dissolution? Do not infidels and worldlings, with cutting irony, sometimes reproach us, and tell us that we do not believe in heaven, or we should be more willing to go to it. We belie our professions of faith and hope, or we should have less love of life and fear of death. ‘’If we believed,” they say, ‘’as you do, we should be impatient to be gone.” We deserve the rebuke, and let us profit by it. How forcibly does John Howe expostulate with us, in reference to this unwillingness to die, in the last chapter of his transcendently glorious work, entitled” The Blessedness of the Eighteous,’* — a work which as a whole is one of the subHmest treatises in the English, or any other language. And how earnestly does Baxter follow up the same subject in the words with which I will dose this section.

“What was it that rejoiced thee all thy life, in thy prayers, and sufferings, and labours? Was it not the hope of heaven? And was heaven the spring and motive of thy obedience, and the comfort of thy life? And yet wilt thou pass into it with heaviness? And shall thy approaches to it be thy sorrows? Didst thou pray for that which thou wouldest not have P Hast thou laboured for it, and denied thyself the pleasures of the world for it, and now art thou afraid to enter in? Fear not, poor soul! Thy Lord is there; thy husband, and thy head, and life is there, thou hast more there, a thoasand*fbld more, than thou hast here. Here thou most leave poor mourning friends, that languish in their own infirmiiies, and troubled thee as well as comforted Uiee while thou wast with them, and that are hastening after thee, and will shortly overtake thee. But there thou shalt find the souls of all the blessed saints that have lived since the creation till this age. That are all unclothed of the rags of their mortality, and have laid by their frailties with their flesh, and are made up of holiness, and prepared for joy, and will be suitable companions for thee in thy joys. Why shouldest thou be afraid to go the way that all the saints have gone before theeP Where there is one on earth, how many are there in heaven P And one of them is worth many of us. Art thou better than Noah, and Abraham, and David? than Peter, and Paul, and all the saints? Or dost thou not love their names, and wouldest thou not be with them? Art thou loth to leave thy friends on earth? and hast thou not far better and more in heaven? Why then art thou not as loth to stay from them? Suppose that I, and such as I, were the friends that thou art loth to leave; what if we had died long before thee? If it be our company that thou lovest, thou shouldest then be willing to die, that thou mayest be with us. And if so, why then shouldest thou not be more willing to die, and be with Christ, and all his holy ones, that are so much more excellent than we? Wouldest thou have our company? Remove, then, willingly to that place where thou shalt have it to everlasting; and be not so loth to go from hence, where neither thou nor we can stay. Hadst thou rather travel with us, than dwell here with us? And rather here suffer with us, than reign in heaven with Christ and us?

*’ Oh! what a brutish thing is flesh! What an unreasonable thing is unbelief 1 Shall we believe, and fly from the end of our belief? Shall we hope, and be loth to enjoy our hopes? Shall we desire and pray, and be afraid of attaining our desires, and lest our prayers should be heard? Shall we spend our lives in labour and travel, and be afraid of coming to our journey’s end? Do you

248 HOPS nf DXATH.

knre life» or do yoa not? If not, whj are yoa afinid of death? If yoa do, wby then are yoa loth to paaB into everlasting life? Yoa know there is no hope of immortality on earth. Hence yoa most pass, whether yoa will or not, as all yoor fathers hare done beHere yon; it is therefore in heaven, or nowhere, that aidless life is to be had. If yoa can live here for ever, do. Hope for it, if any have done so before yoa. Gkp to some man of t thousand years old, and ask him how he made shift to draw oat his life so long. Bat if yoa know that man walketh here in a rain show, and that his life is a shadow, a dream, a post; and that all these things shall be dissolved, and the fashion of them passeth away; is it not more reasonable that we should set our hearts on the place where there is hope of our continuance, than where there is none? And where we must live for ever, than where we must be but for so short a time?

“Alas! poor darkened, troubled soul! Is the presence of Christ less desirable in thy eyes than the presence of such sinful worms as we, whom thou art loth to part with? Is it more grievous to thee to be absent from us, than from thy Lord? from earth, than from heaven; from sinners, than from blessed saints; from trouble and frailty, than from glory? Hast thou any thing here that thou shalt want in heaven? Alas, that we should thus draw back from happiness, and follow Christ so heavily and sadly into life 1 But all this is owing to the enemies that now molest our peace. Indwelling sin, and a flattering world, and a brutish flesh, and interposing death, are our discouragements that drive us back. But all these enemies shall shortly be overcome.

“Fear not death, then, let it do its worst. It can give thee but one deadly gripe that shall kill itself, and prove thy life; as the wasp that leaves its sting behind, and can sting no more. It shall but snuff the candle of thy life, and make it shine brighter when it seems to be put out; it is but an undressing, and a gentle sleep. That which thou coaldest not here attain by all our preaching, and all thy prayers, and cares, and pains, thou shalt speedily attain by the help of death. It is but the messenger of thy gracious Lord, and calleth thee to him, to the place that he hath prepared.”