NEITHER language nor fancy can present the consequences of sin under a more appalling aspect than the single word and image by which they are displayed in the text. The whole race of mankind, in their natural and unconverted state these fair, active, and intelligent creatures are here represented as dead; "dead in trespasses and sins." Much of the beauty we behold is not real beauty; the activity is not real activity; the intelligence not real intelligence: They have a name" to live," but are dead." They are like corpses put into action by some medical process, but which have no real life: "Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Solemn indeed is the picture which is thus presented to the mind; and God grant that the mere display of it on the present occasion may produce a due impression upon our souls.

But, my Christian brethren, in proportion to the significance and solemnity of the image thus employed to describe the consequences of sin, is the importance of contemplating it in a just point of view. Nor are the errors connected with this subject by any means few or insignificant. The error of some, is that of so weakening the figure as to deprive spiritual death of all analogy to bodily death; and thus robbing the image VOL. II. I i

of all its force and solemnity. The error of others, on the contrary, is that of conceiving, that, because bodily and spiritual death resemble each other in some particulars, they must necessarily be alike in all; and thus giving to the image an extent of application not intended by Scripture. It is to the last of these errors especially which it is my desire on the present occasion to draw your attention. And to this end I would consider, I. THE POINTS IN WHICH THE DEATH OF THE SOUL, spoken of in the text, DOES NOT RESEMBLE THE DEATH OF THE BODY; and,

II. THE POINTS IN WHICH IT DOES RESEMBLE

IT.

And here I am to notice,

I. THE POINTS IN WHICH THE DEATH OF THE SOUL DOES NOT RESEMBLE THE DEATH OF THE BODY.

1. In the first place, then, it is evident that spiritual death does not destroy the faculties and affections of the soul.-By bodily death, every power of the body is at once extinguished. The inanimate body no longer sees, or tastes, or moves. But it is not thus in the case of the soul. The man spiritually dead, although he thinks uselessly or mischievously, is not without the faculty of thought. The understanding lives, although it comes to wrong conclusions. The will lives, although it pursues wrong ends: the imagination lives, but presents chiefly those images which are calculated to seduce the mind from God and holiness. Carry the man spiritually dead into the counting-house, the study, the farm, or the field of battle, and he may prove himself to be an active merchant, scholar, farmer, or soldier. It was probably of men busy and efficient in their different worldly callings that our Lord said, "Let the dead bury their dead." It was of one who had been a most vigorous offender that he said, "This my son was dead, and is alive again." It is of those full of life

as to their favourite objects, the Apostle declares, "She that liveth in pleasure, is dead while she liveth." In all these cases, the powers are not destroyed, but perverted; the stream is not dried up, but is forced out of its proper channel.

2. In the second place, the man spiritually dead is still in a state of responsibility.-Bodily death puts an end to responsibility. "The grave," says Hezekiah, "cannot praise thee; death cannot celebrate thee; they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth." "In the place where the tree falleth, there it shall lie," says the Wise Man. It is impossible to conceive an individual, by any movement or act of his own, changing his circumstances with regard to God after the body has paid the last debt of nature. But spiritual death does not destroy the responsibility of the soul. It is still capable, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, of awakening, seeking, desiring, believing, loving, acting; avoiding the good, and choosing the evil; and is therefore answerable for the exercise of each and all these powers. Accordingly, the dead in soul are called upon to turn, to repent, to pray, to watch, to forbear, to act; and the most terrible penalties are attached to a negligence of these duties. Those who would teach us that man, in his natural state, is to lie as a mere mass, which is, somehow or other, and at some time or other, without a struggle on the part of the individual, to be put into action by the all-powerful grace of God, should remember, that the injunction of Scripture is not to wait for God, but to "wait upon" him; not sluggishly to slumber till the cure comes, but, in the strength of God, to stretch out the withered arm in order to obtain the cure. Let no man, therefore, be the actual state of his soul what it may, conceive himself discharged, by what is called in the text the death of the soul, from any of the obligations of the living man. The individual to whom improvement is possible, is a responsible individual; and, should he die the second death-even

amidst the agonies of perdition-he shall be compelled to acknowledge himself the author of his own perdition,

3. In the third place, bodily and spiritual death are different in this respect, that in the last case life is within every man's reach.-When once the spark of life is quenched in the body, nothing short of a miracle can restore it. In anguish of soul the mourning friends retire from the awful scene, conscious that art has exhausted its resources, and that the same body cannot be restored to vigour and action. But in the case of the soul it is different. It would be madness for the physician of the body to say to the man in whom animal life was extinct, "Awake," and "arise." But the language of God, to the man dead in trespasses and sins, is, "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." Who does not see the importance of this distinction? If it did not exist, with what feelings of dismay must we come together to-day! Hope would be as entirely banished from earth as from the region of punishment. The unbeliever must remain an unbeliever; the guilty remain unpardoned, and the corrupt unsanctified. But when cheered by the conviction that the "dead" in soul may be "quickened;" may be brought to life by the power of Divine grace; may feel the reviving touch of the Spirit of God, and spring, from the cell of condemnation and embrace of death, into all the holy energy, and living beauty, and usefulness of the regenerated man; how are our terrors diminished! how are our expectations kindled, and our joys en larged! how may we venture to hope that the voice of the Great Father will at some future period proclaim, with regard even to the worst man in this assembly, he "shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord!"-Glorious consideration! What a charm does it shed over every labour of the minister, the parent, the private friend-over the hour of prayer, and even the last struggles of death! I know,' may

the Christian say, the omnipotence of God; I know the munificence of his mercy; I know that he is able and willing to save to the uttermost all that come unto Him; I know that the prodigal of many years, the oldest offender, the widest wanderer from the flock, may be brought back to the Shepherd and Bishop of his soul; and therefore I venture to "hope unto the end," and am comforted.

But let us now proceed to consider,

II. THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH THE DEATH OF THE BODY AND OF THE SOUL RESEMBLE EACH OTHER.

1. In the first place, it is obvious that they spring from the same source.-Sin, in fact, is alike the parent of both. It is equally true in both cases, that, "through the offence of one, many are dead;" that the transgression of our first parent, which filled our houses with disease, and our streets with mourners, has also inflicted upon us that deeper curse of corruption which estranges us from God, and brings us under the solemn sentence of his law. Sin, which sows the seeds of bodily dissolution, sows the seeds of spiritual death. Sin indisposes us to holiness, blinds the eyes, sears the conscience, shuts and depraves the heart, and fits us for the inheritance of the spirits in darkness. Who, with a just view of the consequences of transgression, can reasonably make light of it? Who can see it thus scattering death and condemnation in its course, and not turn from that course to the happier path of the Divine commandments?

2. But, secondly, bodily and spiritual death are alike in their universality.-Of the one it is said, "it is appointed unto men once to die;" of the other, "if one died for all, then were all dead." As the sentence of bodily death has passed on all men, so has that of spiritual death. It is not more certain that you, as an individual, shall die in body, than that your soul, if as