When we are thus brought to " lay hold on eternal life," we may hope that we have not suffered adversity in vain. We may hope that we have "sorrowed after a godly sort;" and that, " though heaviness may endure for a night, joy will come in the morning." But let not him, whose sufferings have been the consequence of his own follies and crimes, fancy that the sins, of which he has never repented, will be redeemed by the desolation they have caused. Let not him, whose excessive attachment to the present world has been punished with merited failure; whose ardent desire of wealth, or pleasure, or reputation, has been mortified by their loss; and whose fond idolatry to some human object, which he preferred to God, has been overthrown, by its ruin: let not such an one fancy that, because affliction has taught him to "mourn," religion promises that he "shall be comforted." The blessing in my text is declared to those alone, whom affliction has taught to "mourn" for their sins. Under this idea, we see the grace and propriety,

with which it follows the promise to "the poor in spirit." The soul, which is alive to

its necessities, and sees no relief for its po,verty, but in the truths and promises of the Gospel, is admitted to the dispensation of grace. But he, who is convinced of sin, cannot enjoy the peace of reconciliation, before he has felt unfeigned sorrow, for inherent depravity, for actual guilt, and for many deplorable instances of unrepented transgression. In the review of his past life, a life stained perhaps with flagitious wickedness, but certainly devoid of Christian principles, and unadorned with the graces of the Gospel; he sees much to lament. If he cannot convict himself of habitual intemperance; of devotedness to sensual gratification; of an impious contempt of the Divine Being, and an irreverent use of his holy name; if he cannot number, in the book of his remembrance, Sabbaths habitually spent in idleness and vanity, if not in sin: yet, he sees Christian self-denial unknown, or at least confined to the outward act, and not used as the

purifier

purifier of the heart; he sees God forgotten in the hurry of worldly pursuits; and his service, if performed at all, performed with listlessness and languor; with the homage of the lips, while the thoughts and affections were far from him. With views of human nature totally changed; with a clearer knowledge of the law of God; with different ideas of this world and the next; a thick cloud seems rolled away from the Christian's mind. The time for self-flattery is past. He now views sin, through the medium of the Gospel; as abhorrent from the nature of a pure and holy God; as demanding an infinite sacrifice for its expiation; as " crucifying the Son of God afresh, and putting him to an open shame." He views his own particular offences. No longer anxious to palliate and excuse them; he is eager to become acquainted with his own character, in its most concealed recesses, in its most inward foldings. In this painful but necessary task, he applies for assistance to the Spirit of illumination. His prayer is: "search me, O

God,

God, and try me: search me, and know my thoughts; try, if there be any way of wickedness in me; and lead me in the way everlasting."

It may be readily imagined that the secrets of his inmost soul, thus revealed to the penitent sinner, will fill him with deep contrition, and lead him to " mourn" sincerely the errors and vices of his past life. He will "mourn" the estrangement of his heart from God: his long and deplorable ignorance of those desires, occupations, and hopes, which alone are worthy to occupy an immortal spirit; his long and deplorable indulgence of feelings and habits, which have increased his inherent propensity to evil, and degraded his nature below that of the brutes that perish. In a world, where, amidst much to pervert and ensnare us, there is also much to remind us of God; of his power, wisdom, and benevolence; of his hatred of sin, and his approbation of goodness: he has lived as though "the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world," were not " clearly seen;

being understood by the things that are made." With that book within his reach, which contains in its consecrated pages the will of the Most High, declared by his inspired servants; he has treated it with calm and cold contempt; careless of its truths, unalarmed by its threats, uncheered by its promises. While the faithful followers of Jesus Christ, in conformity with the precepts of the Gospel, and under the guidance of Divine Grace, have" redeemed the time because the days were evil; have made every event, however untoward, subservient to their everlasting interests; have robbed prosperity of its dangers, and adversity of its sting: years have passed over his head, not only without improvement, but with increasing guilt. In the time which is past, to what can he look but to mercies abused, to opportunities of amendment slighted, to "fair occasions" of "working out his salvation" " gone for ever by ?" What does he behold in the present, but a soul" dead in trespasses and sins;" a soul, which conscience so long checked

and