flesh reap corruption," and "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha,”—accursed before Him at his coming. Are we all clear from these maledictions? Is no one among us "sowing to the flesh," living only for the gratification of the passing hour, cherishing the flesh, instead of crucifying it, with its sinful affections and lusts? so absorbed in obtaining or enjoying the good things of this present evil world, that God and His glory, Christ and his kingdom, our souls and their eternity, are forgotten, or uninfluential themes? Or, do we all so love, or desire to love, the Lord Jesus Christ, that not one among us falls under this most solemn imprecation?

Brethren, these are no trifling inquiries, when you see, as you have this day seen, the certain punishment of the guilty, that no single threatening which God has ever directed his servant to utter, can fall harmless to the ground. And yet God leaves not the culprit without warnings; thrice he warned Jehoram though without effect. He warned the old world by the preaching of

Noah; he warned the sons-in-law of Lot by the words of their father. He warned the impenitent Jews by the mouth of his beloved Son; and has He never warned or threatened you? Have you never been laid upon a bed of sickness? That was a warning. Have you never followed to the grave a beloved wife, or husband, or parent, or child? That was a warning. Has the Holy Spirit never carried to your heart, it may be but for a passing moment, some striking text, or some solemn discourse? Then also was that a warning. If you could say, which you doubtless. cannot, that you never were on any previous occasion in your whole life, warned by God, you have been warned to-day, you are warning

now.

Would to God that he might in mercy go further still than this, that He might not only warn, but enforce His warning; not only threaten, but this day induce you to believe his threatening; not only show you the terrors of His wrath, but this moment reveal to you the unbounded mercies of his love; opening to every threatened

sinner a way to escape, and vouchsafing to every soul an interest in the cleansing blood and justifying righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And may we not hope that He will do so? For, are the threatenings of the Almighty certain, and can His promises be uncertain? Shall nothing prevent the fulfilment of the former, and shall any thing intervene to hinder the accomplishment of the latter? No; in the language of an apostle, "As God is true * * * all the promises of God in him (Christ Jesus) are yea, and in him, Amen:" fixed, unchangeably, unalterably, and for ever. And one of those blessed promises is, My word shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that whereto I send it." "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." What would you seek, what would you desire, which is not included here? The child's first sin in infancy, the hoary sinner's last crime in decrepid age, all are within the range of the promise, all come within the scope of the blessed declaration. None need doubt, none need hesitate; the very assurance which it has been the object of

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this discourse to establish, as regards the threatenings of God, applies with tenfold force, yea, with ten thousandfold force to his promises, "Almighty, to destroy, Almightiest to save." If there be one convinced and convicted sinner before God this day, one who is conscious of practices such as we have enumerated, one who is destitute of that knowledge and that love to the Saviour, of which we have spoken, and who is willing now, in the day of God's power, to cry for mercy, to ask for God's Holy Spirit, that he may be enabled to seek in heartfelt penitence and faith the Saviour of the world; to him we say, and we say it at God's command and in God's own words. "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool;" though you have hitherto been an alien and an outcast, come thus to the blood of Chrst, forsaking sin, and you shall be received this hour as a welcomed penitent, a pardoned sinner, an acknowledged and adopted son. For this also is among the neverbroken promises of our God, "Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out."

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LECTURE XI.

2 KINGS Xiii. 14.

"Now Elisha had fallen sick of his sickness whereof he died, and Joash the king of Israel came down unto him, and wept over his face, and said, O my father, my father! the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof."

WE this day arrive at the close of the eventful history which it has been my endeavour plainly and simply to bring before you. I trust, by the aid of the good Spirit of our God, that the effort has not been utterly in vain; but that some features in the portraiture of so holy a man of God may have made that deep and abiding impression upon our hearts, which was intended by the historian who was commanded to record them.

The last scene of the prophet's life is very briefly narrated by the inspired penman; and such is usually the case in the book of God; with