be called a Christian; the latter will put other objects alongside of Christ, to share in the adoration due to Him alone, and that is virtually rejecting Him-" not holding the Head." For instance, the Papist will put the Virgin Mary forward, as entitled to equal adoration with the Lord Jesus Christ. Downright Infidelity-a positive "not holding the Head -a rejecting of Christ. Moreover, there are those who pass for Protestants, who will put proud free will, the mind of the creature, the ability of man, the merits of mortals, and the like, to share in the adoration that is due only to Christ. The language which is used in the verse just preceding my text is "worshipping of angels;" and this is rebuked and rejected in the Word of God. When John was in the isle of Patmos, and had had the revelation brought to him by the mouth of an angel, he says, "And when I had heard and seen, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel which showed me these things. Then saith he unto me, See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book, worship God!"

But now I turn to congratulate you, my hearers surely I may, those who sit in Grove Chapel; and I trust the strangers too-that you are accustomed to adore the precious Christ, co-equal, and coeternal with the Father, and indivisible from the Father. Surely you acknowledge Him as "God over all, blessed for evermore! The proclamation of Jehovah is, "Let all the angels of God worship Him;" and, surely, if He is the object of worship to angels, He must be so to the believers in Grove Chapel. This is the will of the Father, "That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son, honoureth not the Father, which hath sent Him;" consequently, "not holding the Head," is the sealing of damnation to the soul. But we, beloved, are they who "hold the Head;" we are they who hold that all honour is His due-that all praise is His due that all glory is His due-that all might, majesty, and dominion are His due; as John heard them singing in the realms of bliss, "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever! Amen." The whole of the songs which the apostle heard, whilst he was in that state of exile, always went to the glorifying Him that sat upon the throne, the Lamb, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father. Sure I am, that some of my sweetest moments are those in which I can breathe out these words most fervently in Jehovah's bosom. And sure I am, that with the creed I possess, and the life bestowed upon me, heaven would be no heaven to me if I had not this precious Christ to adore and worship unto all eternity. He shall have all the praise and all the honour; for "they shall hang upon Him all the glory of His Father's house, the offspring and the issue; all vessels of small quantity, from the vessels of cups, even to the vessels of flagons;" yea, unto all eternity shall the glory hang upon our precious Eliakim, our precious Christ. Angels adore Him in heaven; glorified spirits adore Him in the inner circle of the celestial ranks. Lost souls are filled with horror at His name, whom they can never love and never trust. Demons tremble at His word, having been vanquished by Him in the war in heaven between Michael and his angels, and the Dragon and his angels. Every real believer upon the earth-and this is a sweeping expression-every real believer upon earth, without one

single exception, adores the precious, glorious Christ of God with homage, honour, and glory equal to that which is given to the Father. "There are Three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these Three are One;" and there is no possibility of adoring one without adoring all. The real Christian adores God the Holy Ghost for His marvellous operations, as well as for His eternal registration. He adores God the Son in His headship and substitution; he adores God the Father in His decretive enactments; and adores the Triune Jehovah in the mutual engagements and indissoluble compact of love and mercy, which secures the salvation of all the elect of grace. This constitutes our worship.

We pass on to one point more, with which we intend to close-"not holding the Head," by dividing the life of Him practically; and be prepared if I am led to say some severe things here. I want Christians to hold the Head." If you hold the Head in the way in which the world does not, and cannot hold Him, I just ask how you hold Him up to view before the world? how you hold Him up to view in the sight of free-willers; and in the sight of Pharisees, Infidels, and Papists? whether His image is to be seen upon you, and His likeness borne by you? whether His cause interests you? and whether your lives, your talent, your property, and your influence, are laid out to glorify Him? You know that we read of some who profess to know Him, but in works deny Him. God grant there may be none such amongst you! A very, very solemn description of character, who profess that they know Him, but in works deny Him. The apostle James was led to say, "Show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works." He never said, anywhere, that his works created, or purchased his faith, but that they were the produce, or result of his faith; therefore he says, I will show you the one by the other. And I am anxious, the little time I may have yet to stay upon earth, that my hearers, as well as my own soul, and life, and body, should be more than ever consecrated to Jesus, and devoted to His precious name, How is it with you, dearly beloved? You pass to and from the house of God, your business, your familie and your friends; but how often are your minds, your thoughts, and your hearts led out to commune with Him? How much of what you have at your command is consecrated to His service? What sayest thou to body, soul, and spirit being engaged to glorify Him? Have you read, with an obedient spirit, "Ye are not your own, but ye are bought with a price;" and therefore "glorify God with your bodies and your spirits, which are His?" Have you ever said to Him, as David's faithful soldiers did to him, "Thine are we, Lord Jesus, and on thy side?" Is there a willingness on your part to make a surrender of everything to His precious name and cause, so that He may be glorified. Oh, bring these queries home; I will not push them further now, but I give them to you as a kind of train of thought, to lead you to closer self-examination in your own closets, and at your own homes; and if you pursue these inquiries, you will presently discover that your Christianity is, after all, but of a meagre description, and you may well cry out, "Quick en thou me, Lord! quicken thou me, according to thy word!" May He send us a rich supply of quickening grace this morning, and cause us to "hold the Head," to hold fast by Him, until we shall dwell eternally with Him, and His name shall have all the glory! Amen.

Delivered in Grove Chapel, Camberwell, Sunday Morning, May 6, 1849, BY THE REV. JOSEPH IRONS.

"And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. And He took the cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them; and they all drank of it. And He said unto them, This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many."-Mark xiv. 22, 23, 24. It is written that "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin; " and I am very anxious that whatsoever my hearers, as well as myself, shall engage in pertaining to religious transactions, may be an act of faith. If I publish the glorious truth of God, insisting upon every one of its grand doctrines, all its precious promises, and all its infal lible privileges and precepts-to publish that acceptably to God must be an act of faith; not only believing in the truth of these things, but verily believing that God will not let them fall to the ground, but make use of them. If I proclaim them, and you listen to them, and receive them as a mere matter of idle curiosity or amusement, or to confirm a sentiment, it is nothing less than a mockery of God. If you receive them not by faith, the solemn sentence will stand against you which the Holy Ghost, by the apostle, has recorded, "The word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it." Again we say, that "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin." Now, as we intend to associate this evening around the festive board, in compliance with the injunction of our beloved Lord before his death, I am very anxious that every communicant should have a clear and distinct understanding of the nature of that ordinance; and not only so, but a believing apprehension of his Published in Weekly Numbers, 1d., and Monthly Parts, price 5d.

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personal right to, and interest in, it. Then it will be an act of faith; but if not, it will be sin.

With this object in view, my mind has been led irresistibly to this portion of Holy Writ, which gives a condensed view of the ordinance instituted by our Lord Himself. The more anxious do I feel to enter minutely into our Lord's institution of the supper, because of the shameful and scandalous perversions of it which are abroad in the day in which we live, and which are palmed upon superstitious multitudes by means of the carnal, cunning contrivances of ungodly men. It becomes the sent servants of the living God to consider themselves as "set for the defence of the gospel;" and my intention is, this morning and evening too, if God spare me, to place before you, in as clear a manner as I can, what this feast is; who are entitled to participate in it; what they receive when approaching it, and what the Master says concerning it. I would do the same with regard to every other feature of the glorious gospel of the blessed God; and ardently do I desire in every discourse to set forth the things of God, not merely so that I may be understood, but so that I cannot be misunderstood; that "the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err in consequence of any statement of mine, but that the language shall be too plain and unambiguous to be mistaken by any person possessing common intelligence.

I will now invite your serious and prayerful attention to the verses which I have just read, in order that we may approach unto the table of the Lord this evening with a clear apprehension of what is designed by the institution, and a blessed appropriation of what He communicates by it, without an atom of superstition, which perverts and poisons it. The devil has taken infinite pains to corrupt and pervert the things that are most sacred. Regeneration, for instance, is to be frittered away and virtually denied by making it an act of the creature; and so, on the contrary, the ordinance of baptism itself is to be rejected, and denied to the very persons for whom God designed it. Both are perversions of Scripture through carnality. So, also, of the ordinances of prayer and preaching; they are thrown into carnal channels in these days. The preaching must be an eloquent harangue; the prayer a stiff form of orthodox or heterodox words, as may happen. But we want to distinguish the reality from these shadows and externals, and we insist strongly that the precious statements in the verses I have read have a spiritual and all-important meaning, and can only be understood by those who are taught of the Holy Ghost.

To the text, then, let me invite your attention under four particulars. First, the gospel feast itself; second, the ordained guests; third, the orthodox viands; and, fourth, the declaration of the Master of the feast, "This is my body, and this is my blood."

I. Then, let us glance at the gospel feast, as exhibited to our view in our periodical approach to the table of the Lord. What is it that we are to feast upon? What is it of which Jehovah Jesus says, "This is my body, and this is my blood" when He presents the morsel of bread and the cup of wine? It is His own Person-the glorious, perfect, complete God-Man. It is His redemption work, accomplished and perfected by Himself, which constitutes the gospel feast. Moreover, it is both His Person and His redemption work in official

engagement and responsibility; and this latter particular I must dwell upon, because it is so generally overlooked-the glorious Person of Christ. "He that eateth me, even he shall live by me." I pray you, are we to understand this to mean the mastication of a literal kind of literal flesh, made such by some transforming power which creatures claim, and blasphemously enough pretend, to possess? Verily not. It is an eating which the new man only is capable of. It is an eating and drinking of a spiritual kind, and every real believer knows what it is to feed on the preciousness of Christ, and to drink the blood of Christ by faith.

Then do mark what is essential to this; a knowledge of Him, a confidence in Him, and a love to Him; and wherever these are possessed there will be a spiritual feasting upon Him; He will be upon the table continually. We shall rise in the morning with hunger to feed upon Him. We shall want all the day to be refreshed with meal after meal upon Him in the exercise of living faith and in real communion with the precious, glorious Christ. confess I do not like to sit down to a common meal without knowing what I eat; and shall my soul have something ambiguous, something strange, something heterodox, something mystical, and far apart from what faith can comprehend? God forbid. I must know Him for myself; for "This is life eternal, to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." And this knowledge must be derived from His own Word, by the teaching of His own Spirit, and through the medium of close intimacy with Him.

Look well, then, to the attainment of this knowledge. This knowledge of Christ must be derived from His own Word; and we find it there stated emphatically that "He is the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express image of His person.' We find it expressly stated, that “He is the Creator of all things;" and that “without Him was not anything made that is made." We find it expressly recorded there, that "all the angels of God are commanded to worship Him." It is positively set down, that "He and the Father are one;" and yet that "He is bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, and is not ashamed to call us brethren." And when He condescends to speak to our hearts, as some of us have been reading this morning in Hawker's portion, "I am Joseph, thy brother-I am Jesus, thy brother," and brings us thus to receive the testimony, knowing it is the testimony of God, how should we prostrate ourselves before him! Then will follow our confidence in Him. Now here there is no eating of this precious Christ until, by the ministry of the Holy Ghost, this faith which apprehends and discovers what the word says of Him, is brought to confide in Him; and this will lead to holy association and standing intimacy kept up between Jesus and the soul. Oh how I long for more of this; for, like the apostle Paul, I would fain say still, that "I may know Him." Why, Paul did know Him, and had known Him for many years; and yet he goes on to crave, "that I may know Him." That is, that I may know Him_more intimately; and, by knowing Him more intimately, confide on Him more firmly; and rest upon Him, assured of iny salvation in Him; so as to confide in His word, to confide in His work, to confide in His will, to confide in His official character, to confide in His obedience as my own, to confide in His sufferings as atoning for me, to confide in His intercession as habitually and continually going on within the veil on my be