Can we find these means in the world-in the lights and efforts of unassisted reason?

Can we find the means of securing our spiritual perfection and happiness in the world? The world is the enemy of our spiritual and immortal hopes; the world is the enemy whose temptations we are to shun with the greatest solicitude, whose allurements we are to resist with the most sacred resolution for inspiration hath pronounced-" The friendship of the world is enmity with God." With the world, indeed, we must in some measure be occupied; to its numerous duties we must be sedulously attentive; of its innocent pleasures we may occasionally and with moderation partake. But if we give up to the world the whole of our affections and of our time; if we expect, by the devoted pursuit of its treasures and honours, and by the eager indulgence of its pleasures, to advance our true perfection and happiness, how great will be our disappointment! how deplorable our mistake!

Commune then with your own hearts concerning the world; consult your own experience, appeal to your experience, and see how vain are all its allurements, how uncertain all its plans, how unsatisfying all its joys, and how dangerous and corrupting its temptations. Idle and delusive, then, the expectation to advance our spiritual perfection and happiness by devotion to a world which lieth in wickedness, whose flattering prospects terminate in disappointment, and which is to be consumed the fires of the last day.

Can we advance and secure our spiritual perfection and happiness by the unassisted lights and efforts of reason?

But what does unassisted reason teach us? Does it yield certain information concerning any one topic interesting to our perfection and happiness? Does it disperse the darkness which surrounds the existence and character of the invisible first cause? Does it allay the apprehensions which transgression, alarming and rousing the conscience, excite s? Does it open to the trembling spirit the bosom of mercy, on which it may in safety repose? Does it dispel the anxious doubts which agitate the soul when she approaches the confines of time, and with eager, but with vain desire, seeks to explore the unknown region of eternity? Ah! here it is that human reason, when we most need her consoling support, leaves us to cruel uncertainty and doubt. Commune, then, brethren, with your own hearts; call in the wisdom of the sages of the world, and see how little light, how little satisfaction reason can afford you in the interesting concerns of your spiritual perfection and happiness.

Baffled in our appeal to the world, to the light and strength of unassisted reason, we have but one resource-the Gospel of Christ.

The exalted truths which it reveals afford the only certain means of advancing and securing our everlasting perfection and happiness. How bright the lustre which the Gospel sheds on the character and attributes of the Almighty Being whom we are to serve, and by whom we are to be judged! How rich the provision which it makes, in the grace and mercy of a Saviour, for our recovery from our low estate of guilt and misery! How luminous the path which conducts through the valley of the shadow of death to immortal glory! The treasures which the Gospel unfolds, while they enrich and gladden the

heart, can never be corroded by care and disappointment-can never be wrested from us by death, the destroyer of all earthly treasures. On the unsearchable riches of the Gospel commune seriously and earnestly with your own hearts, and you will find at length the pearl of great price-that exalted happiness which will gratify your most ardent desires, which will prove worthy of your most noble powers, which will be your companion throughout the ages of eternity.

In the Gospel of Christ, then, you find the only certain means of securing your spiritual perfection and happiness. Commune then,

Lastly, with your hearts, and inquire concerning the progress which you have made towards the attainment of these infinitely important objects.

Jesus Christ is offered to us in the Gospel, as our all-sufficient Saviour. That mercy which allays the pangs of guilt, and diffuses through the heart the holy peace of God-that grace which will be made perfect in our weakness, which will enable us to triumph over all the enemies of our salvation -that fulness of bliss eternal in the heavens, surpassing at once our conceptions and our desireshe offers us, as the free gift of his infinite love. Our complete and final title to them he rests on our sincere repentance for our sins on our lively faith in his power, mercy, and grace-on our steadfast obedience to his laws, and submission to his ordinances, as our rightful Sovereign and Lord. Are we desirous to fulfil the conditions on which he suspends these infinitely exalted blessings? Are we, through his grace, continually advancing towards the fulfilment of those conditions?

Let these be the infinitely important topics on which, in the hours of sacred retirement, you commune with your hearts. If the result of the solemn inquiry should be, that you are indifferent to those means of securing your spiritual perfection and happiness which Jesus Christ has provided in his Gospel; if it should appear, that, while he offers you the inestimable blessings of his mercy, you continue insensible of their value and of your need of them, regardless of his ordinances and laws; determine, without delay, no longer to contemn that Gospel which is the power of God unto salvation-no longer to cast from you the immortal glories which a divine Redeemer offers you. Consecrate the moments of retirement to your eternal interests, to your souls, to God your Saviour, and implore his pardon, his intercession, his renewing and sanctifying grace.

If, on the contrary, the result of this sacred communion should be, that in the humble exercise of penitence and faith you have devoted yourselves to your Saviour, and sought his mercy and grace in the ordinances of his church, resolve to adhere, with a stronger faith and more ardent devotion, to him, who alone is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of your God.

You have now seen, brethren, the subjects on which this sacred communion with the heart should be exercised-on our spiritual character and destiny-on the means of attaining our spiritual perfection and happiness-on the progress which we have made in securing these infinitely important objects.

Let us consider the motives that should thus to commune with our hearts.

It is an honourable employment.

urge us

What is it which in the world affixes reputation to character? Is it not thoughtfulness, consideration, prudence, and caution in the management of worldly business, and in the various pursuits of life? This thoughtfulness, this consideration, so honourable to you in the world, we call on you now to exercise on objects infinitely more important, and which of themselves will stamp dignity on all the means employed to obtain them. To pass through the world totally regardless of those pursuits and duties which are necessary to our welfare and prosperity in it, would be justly deemed folly and madness. What shall we say of those who pass through the world entirely indifferent to their spiritual character, heedless of those immortal interests, in comparison with which all temporal concerns are but as dust in the balance? What shall we say of him who never retires from the busy scenes and gay pleasures that surround him, to commune with his heart concerning his spiritual and immortal interests, the means of securing the favour of that Almighty Judge, at whose tribunal he is to receive his everlasting doom?

Brethren, this sacred communion with the heart is essentially necessary.

It is necessary to the sinner-to him who is living in a state of impenitence and forgetfulness of God.

Alas! if he never stops for a moment in the career of transgression; if he never for a moment pauses, and permits conscience to raise her remonstrances at his sinful course; if he never gives