This then is the hope with which the gospel supplies believers: other than this is deceit and disappointment. Walking in faith and love, looking forward with meekness and Godly fear, purifying our souls from their inbred corruption, we shall "be ready to give to every man that asketh us, a reason for the hope that is in us." But if these graces be strangers to us, if our confidence of reward want these marks, established by the word of truth, by how much is it better than despair? Better in this, that, wearing the appearance of hope, it steals a few years from an eternity of horror, till death tears off its mask; but in this far worse, that false ill-grounded hope hardens us in carelessness and impenitence; while despair may drive us to repentance, and repentance lead us to believe unto salvation. Indifference on this subject is madness; for if our hope be vain, heaven, the object of hope, is lost for ever. Hear, learn, study the scriptures with prayer; become fully acquainted with your own selves; compare your hope with the di

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rections of that heavenly guide; and, if you would find it genuine and unfeigned, "work out your salvation with fear and trembling; give diligence to make your calling and election sure." Lay aside every weight, and the sin that doth so easily beset you ;" suspect the friendship of the world, fear its pleasures, despise its gains, if either or all may seem to interfere with that best of friends, that richest of enjoyments, that "pearl of great price," a good and quiet hope of everlasting life." "What shall it profit a man if he should gain the whole world and lose his own soul, or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"

SERMON XVII.

CHARITY OR CHRISTIAN LOVE.

1 ST. JOHN, iv. 7.

Love is of God, and every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God.

WHEN the gospel begins its first operations upon men, it finds them in the main all alike. Selfishness, pride, and carnal desire, are the spirits which have dominion over them; by these their souls are coloured; by these, for the more part, their conduct is formed. To destroy these spirits, and in their room to plant those which are heavenly, is the work of the gospel. heaven it was devised, and to fit men for heaven it was brought by the Son of God. The new character therefore which it comes

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to plant can be one only-the character of him who sends his Son, of him who reigns in heaven. The heart in which the good seed is sown and flourishes is changed from its natural character, earthly, sensual, devilish," to that which, proceeding from God, fills the whole space of heaven as light and heat are poured from the sun at mid-day. This character is love and holiness.

Without intending to separate two Christian graces, which, as one, are for ever wedded together, my present design is to consider the first particularly.

Love is of God, and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God." In one sense, as our souls and bodies were originally formed by the Almighty, every thing within man which is not evil is of God; and among the rest, that love and natural affection which has prevailed among all people at the worst of times. It cannot be supposed but that even at Sodom, Gomorrah, and Babylon, places wiped out from the sight and knowledge of man for their wickedness, such affection was shewn

in numberless instances between friends, kindred, husbands and wives, parents and children. But the same qualities have been repeatedly observed among brute animals who are not only capable of being strongly moved by affection for their offspring, but also by attachment to one another, to animals of a different kind, even to human beings. These qualities, therefore, have nothing to do with the salvation of the soul; they are not of grace; they are no marks of a regenerated and heavenly disposition; they are not, in the apostle's sense, of God. Love in this carnal sense has been deeply felt, and in the most lively manner exhibited by persons who certainly could not be said to have been born of God, nor to have known God, inasmuch as they have lived and died in open contempt of his commandments.

That Christian grace which in the text is called love, and which the scriptures as frequently term charity, is a quality of a much higher and very different nature. Not confined to a few objects peculiarly united to us by ties of blood, by mutual