the Lord, without any honest attempt, or even wish, to serve the God above you, or to rejoice in remembering that you are His children, working for Him and under Him,-be sure your sin will find you out. When affliction, or sickness, or disappointment come, as come they will, if God has not cast you off;— when the dark day dawns, and your fool's paradise of worldly prosperity is cut away from under your feet, then you will find out your folly-you will find that you have insulted the only Friend who can bring you out of affliction-cast off the only comfort which can strengthen you to bear affliction-forgotten the only knowledge which will enable you to be the wiser for affliction. Then, I say, the sin of your godlessness will find you out; if you do not intend to fall, soured and sickened merely by God's chastisements, either into stupid despair or peevish discontent, you will have to go back, to go back to God and cry, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before Thee, and am no more worthy to be called Thy son."

Go back at once before it be too late. Find out your sins and mend them—before they find you out, and break your hearts.

SERMON VIII.

SELF-DESTRUCTION.

The Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets."- -1 KINGS, XXII. 23.

THE chapter from which my text is taken, which is the first lesson for this evening's service, is a very awful chapter, for it gives us an insight into the meaning of that most awful and terrible wordtemptation. And yet it is a most comforting chapter, for it shows us how God is long-suffering and merciful, even to the most hardened sinner; how to the last He puts before him good and evil, to choose between them, and warns him to the last of his path, and the ruin to which it leads.

We read of Ahab in the first lesson this morning as a thoroughly wicked man,-mean and weak, cruel and ungodly, governed by his wife Jezebel, a heathen. woman, in marrying whom he had broken God's law, -a woman so famous for cruelty and fierceness, vanity and wickedness, that her name is a by-word even

here in England now-"as bad as Jezebel," we say to this day. We heard of Ahab in this morning's lesson letting Jezebel murder the righteous Naboth, by perjury and slander, to get possession of his vineyard; and then, instead of shrinking with abhorrence from his wife's iniquity, going down and taking possession of the land which he had gained by her sin. We read of God's curse on him, and yet of God's long-suffering and pardon to him on his repentance. Yet, neither God's curses nor God's mercy seem to have moved him. But he had been always the same. "He did evil," the Bible tells, "in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him.” He deserted the true God for his wife's idols and false gods: and in spite of Elijah's miracle at Carmel —of which you heard last Sunday-by which he proved by fire which was the true God, and in spite of the wonderful victory which God had given him, by means of one of God's prophets, over the Syrians, he still remained an idolater. He would not be taught, nor understand; neither God's threats nor mercies could move him; he went on sinning against light and knowledge; and now his cup was fullhis days were numbered, and God's vengeance was ready at the door.

He consulted all his false prophets as to whether or not he should go to attack the Syrians at RamothGilead. They knew what to say-they knew that their business was to prophesy what would pay them

—what would be pleasant to him. They did not care whether what they said was true or not-they lied for the sake of gain, for the Lord had put a lying spirit into their mouths. They were rogues and villains from the first. They had turned prophets, not to speak God's truth, but to make money, to flatter King Ahab, to get themselves a reputation. We do not hear that they were all heathens. Many of them may have believed in the true God. But they were cheats and liars, and so they had given place to the devil, the father of lies: and now he had taken possession of them in spite of themselves, and they lied to Ahab, and told him that he would prosper in the battle at Ramoth-Gilead. It was a dangerous thing for them to say; for if he had been defeated, and returned disappointed, his rage would have most probably fallen on them for deceiving him. And as in those Eastern countries kings do whatever they like without laws or parliaments, Ahab would have most likely put them all to a miserable death on the spot. But however dangerous it might be for them to lie, they could not help lying. A spirit of lies had seized them, and they who began by lying, because it paid them, now could not help doing so whether it paid them or not.

But the good king of Judah, Jehoshaphat, had no faith in these flattering villains. He asked whether there was not another prophet of the Lord to inquire of? Ahab told him that there was one, Micaiah

the son of Imlah, but that he hated him, because he only prophesied evil of him. What a thorough picture of a hardened sinner-a man who has become a slave to his own lusts, till he cares nothing for a thing being true, provided only it is pleasant! Thus the wilful sinner, like Ahab, becomes both fool and coward, afraid to look at things as they are; and when God's judgments stare him in the face, the wretched man shuts his eyes tight, and swears that the evil is not there, just because he does not choose to see it.

But the evil was there, ready for Ahab, and it found him. When he forced Micaiah to speak, Micaiah told him the whole truth. He told him a vision, or dream, which he had seen. "Hear thou therefore the word of the Lord: I saw the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him. And the Lord said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead? And there came forth a spirit, and said, I will go forth, and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And the Lord said, Thou shalt persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do so. Now therefore, behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil concerning thee."

What warning could be more awful, and yet more plain? Ahab was told that he was listening to a lie. He had free choice to follow that lie or not,