Epistle of the Hebrews. "The just shall live by faith." And if you would know what faith is, it presently goes on to teach us:

Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen :" that is, it is fixing our hearts in such a manner upon the unseen blessings of another world, upon the presence of an unseen GOD, the prayer of an unseen MEDIATOR, and the support of an unseen SPIRIT, that for their sake we shall be content and pleased with every thing in this world, except our sins,— shall be willing to venture all our chance of happiness and comfort, both here and hereafter, upon the mercy of GoD in the death of JESUS CHRIST.

We must take care not to imagine that we fulfil the conditions of the New Covenant, and have true faith in JESUS CHRIST, if we merely believe that CHRIST died for us, and look up to HIм to be saved at last. The faith which is to justify and save us must run through our whole conduct, -must cause us, both in good and bad times, to give ourselves heartily up to God, desiring always to have HIM choose for us, and making up our minds, if need were, rather to die than offend our SAVIOUR. This is waiting for GOD" like a Christian; and whatever may be said of present relief and comfort, certain it is, that in no other way but this can you ever hope for pardon and salvation at the last day.

But there is another thought, which surely would prevail on us to be patient and quiet in affliction, if we would in earnest attend to it and that is, the remembrance of our past sins. He who seriously believes, and deeply recollects, that it is nothing but the free mercy of GoD which gives him any chance at all of pardon, cannot surely grumble or complain, as if he had a right to choose his own condition. He perceives, from the bottom of his heart, how unworthy he is of the least of God's mercies: and his worst troubles are so far a comfort to him, that they give him a comfortable hope of his not being cast off by his heavenly FATHER;" for whom the LORD loveth, HE chasteneth; and Scourgeth every son whom He receiveth." HE considers that every feeling of bodily pain, every loss of outward comfort, is a testimony to his soul, that GOD is yet dealing with him as a father: that He has not yet cast him entirely away from His presence, nor finally taken His HOLY SPIRIT from him. So the

Apostle teaches every sick person; "If ye endure chastening, GOD dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the FATHER chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons." He, therefore, whose conscience troubles him with any sin, cannot do better than resign himself patiently to the shame and pain of that remorse, or of any other punishment which GOD sends upon him: thankfully acknowledging that it is all the work of perfect justice and mercy, and fearing nothing so deeply, as lest God should withdraw His hand, and leave him to go back to his old sins and therefore beseeching HIM continually, rather to make the remembrance of his sins more grievous to him than it is.

If we still want something to reconcile us to trouble and affliction, let us pass on from the thought of our own unworthiness, and from the thought of God's relief, promised sooner or later to patient resignation; from these thoughts let us pass on to the remembrance of what our blessed LORD and SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST endured so calmly and meekly for our sakes. He who had no sin, no unworthiness, to make HIM bear His affliction quietly: HE who could have delivered HIMSELF, with a word spoken, from all His calamities at once and for ever: He chose rather, out of mere love and pity to wicked men, His betrayers and murderers, to go on suffering to the end, to wait God's time for His deliverance, and say, from His heart, what we too often repeat with our lips only, "Not My will, but THINE be done." And has JESUS CHRIST borne so much for us, and shall we not be content and thankful to bear, for His sake, some short affliction for our eternal good? Did the Just die on the Cross for the unjust and sinner, and will he refuse to bear, it may be, a few hours' pain or languor for the love of so merciful a SAVIOUR?

Such are the great and unspeakable reasons why Christian people, lying under God's afflicting hand, should quietly wait for HIM, that is, make up their minds to be afflicted as long as it pleases HIM, and yet to wear a cheerful countenance to the very best of their power, and keep on trying to be thankful, as they may, for the sorrow and pain which they cannot help feeling.

But I observed, that there are some peculiar dangers we are in of deceiving ourselves, and going wrong in respect of this

great virtue of resignation. And this I must now endeavour to explain.

Many persons are apt to imagine, when they hear talk of resignation and quiet endurance, that such instructions concern those only who are in any great trouble or sorrow; that we must wait till God send some great sickness upon us, or visit us with the loss of a dear friend, or of all our worldly substance, before we can learn to practise these duties.

Such persons do not rightly consider the true condition of human life, which must be a yoke and a burden, in every case, even where people seem to be most highly favoured, as far as the goods of this world are concerned. Ask those who are most prosperous among us, and seem most entirely to have their own way, if they have not some secret thorn in their sides, which keeps embittering their best estate, and hinders them from being so easy and happy as any slight observer would suppose they must be. Now here is their trial in respect of patience and resignation: namely, in their way of governing their thoughts and feelings with regard to this imperfection in their lot-this "sore place," as one may call it, whether known or unknown to their neighbours.

I take it for granted that every one has a struggle of this kind to go through, because, even if we are not conscious of it ourselves, there is in our most flattering enjoyments, at all times of life, a sense of imperfection, which keeps urging us on to seek something further. Perfect ease, peace, and contentment, cannot be had in this world. Now, if people will not make up their minds to this, if they will not wait God's time, and God's way, of making them happy and comfortable, then they will first of all fall into repining and discontent, will be uneasy, and fret against their MAKER, as if it was in their power to get away from under His yoke. And since they cannot do this, cannot shake off the burthen of the LORD, they will in the next place be tempted to hide their eyes from it, and do what they can to forget it. And what have they to turn to, when they turn away from God?— what have they to turn towards, but only things trifling or wrong?

It is much, if in long indulgence of restless and discontented thoughts, we have not been tempted to set our minds upon things positively forbidden and wicked; to covet our neighbour's goods,

and indulge imaginations of evil things. But even if, by Gov's infinite mercy, you have been restrained from such deeper spots of iniquity, yet even mere diversion and amusement becomes sin, when it is followed for the sake of keeping out serious thought. For what in good earnest can be said for a man, who, if he were asked fairly to say, why he is so fond of this or that amusement, this or that study, could only answer, "It is to avoid thinking of the God who is watching me, and the Judgment-seat of CHRIST, before which I am soon to stand." Such a temper is self-convicted at once, and will not bear excusing for a moment.

It is just the same with regard to those who lose themselves, not in pleasure and amusement, but in the business and bustle of the world. They encourage themselves with the thought, that they are doing good to their neighbours; that they are publicspirited persons, great benefactors to the world. And so very often they are; and it is the more melancholy to see them neglecting and forgetting that other world, which, after all their labour, their skill and anxiety, must be all in all both to us and to them. For we must not deceive ourselves in an affair of so great consequence. If we do kindly by our neighbour, because it is natural and pleasant to us to do so, or because we like to be well thought and well spoken of, or because we rejoice to find and feel our own power and skill, and to be of consequence in our neighbourhood, we may have the reward we desire, and more, in this present world; but we must not dream of being any the happier, in the next world, for such virtue and charity as this. What we do for the love and fear of GOD, that God graciously rewards in Heaven, for the sake of JESUS CHRIST.

do to be praised and respected by man, can never be to us in another world.

But what we any comfort

Upon the whole, it appears that all persons, whether they are under any great affliction or no, have need to practise the virtue recommended in the text-the most comfortable virtue of resignation and patient waiting for GOD. If they are in joy and high spirits, they must learn to moderate and command themselves : they must practise the fear of GOD, and the continual remembrance of His presence; and this is so far a sacrifice, that it requires constant pains and self-denial, at a time when our corrupt nature finds it most difficult to practise such lessons. If they are

in a quiet, regular course of worldly amusement and worldly business, then they have need of continual efforts to lift their hearts upwards, and live above this present world, even while they are living in it. And so in every other case that can be supposed the whole world is a school of resignation; and if we could once, by the blessing of God, learn that one truth in perfection, we should have come as near as fallen creatures can come in this world to the temper of Heaven itself.

But the more excellent and heavenly it is to be thus patiently minded, the more careful should we be not to mistake our own condition, or to imagine that we have arrived at true Christian resignation, when perhaps we are idling away our time and thoughts in mere sloth and carelessness. There seem to be persons in the world who take whatever happens easily enough for a long time together, just because they are not used to give themselves any trouble about any thing. They have their own round of accustomed enjoyments, and as long as they are not disturbed in that, come what will, it makes very little difference. Such persons may perhaps be very unconcerned at real and great calamities; at the loss of a near relation, for instance; but their unconcern has nothing in the world to do with Christian resignation. It is mere selfish indolence, and no better.

Others get over the ills and anxieties of life, as it seems to themselves, and not seldom to others, tolerably enough, by the help of a bustling, hurrying kind of cheerfulness, which, where it is not put on to conceal some secret disquiet, has surely much more to do with a man's bodily health, with the state of his blood and spirits, than with the love and fear of GOD, and the hope of a world to come. They say, they "let nothing daunt them," not even the presence of an offended God, nor the daily approach of death, while their sins are yet unrepented of. This may be high spirit and fortitude in the eye of the world, but in the eye of GOD, and of all who will take God's word, it is no better than desperate and wilful blindness. If we will not acknowledge it now, we shall, we must acknowledge it when we come to die, That no sorrow, no disquiet, I had almost said no despair, is so sad a condition for a sinful man, as the mirth and ease of one who enjoys himself merely because he has got rid of the remembrance of GOD.