the gracious influences of the Holy Spirit on our hearts. Our Lord solemnly declares: "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." It is not enough to be baptised into the Christian faith; for then the impenitent, the drunkard, the adulterer, the profane, the most depraved characters of every description, would be included in the blessings of the Christian covenant: we must be born again, not only of water, but of the Spirit. We must "be renewed in the spirit of our mind;" we must be made new creatures in Christ Jesus. Water is the outward sign, the medium through which this mighty blessing is conveyed to us. But what is the outward sign, without the inward and spiritual grace? and what is this inward and spiritual grace? Let our Church Catechism answer : "A death unto sin, and a new birth unto righteousness; for, being by nature born in sin, and the children of wrath, we are hereby made the children of grace." "You hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins."2. God is said to "take away the stony heart," and to "give them an heart of flesh;" to put a "new heart" and a "new spirit" within them, and to cause them to walk in his statutes; and "to love the Lord their God with all their

heart;" to "circumcise" their hearts; to " put his fear in their hearts, that they should not depart from Him." In short, it is represented as a new creation, in which "old things are passed away, and all things become new;" and in the words immediately following the text, as an entire new man, which, after God, is created in righte ousness and true holiness.” 2

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Now it is impossible to employ language, or find expressions which could place the greatness of this change in a stronger light. It is represented as a radical, universal, and permanent change: and this proves that the agency of the Holy Spirit, to which it is always ascribed, is absolutely necessary to produce it. The same conclusion follows from contemplating the character of God, as an all-pure and holy, as well as an all-merciful Being; from the present relation in which we stand to God, as fallen and sinful creatures; and I might add, from the very nature of heaven itself, the exalted purity of that heavenly world which is before us, and into which the Scriptures plainly tell us, that no unholy, unrenewed, unsanctified person, nothing "that defileth," or that "worketh abomination, or maketh a lie," can enter; but where all the inhabitants, all their employments, are pure, spiritual, and holy.

I wish we thought of this as we should; for then we should see clearly that without holiness, without being "renewed in the spirit of our mind," we could not see God. We could neither possess heaven, nor should we enjoy it, if we could possess it. If any of us find serious religion, serious company, serious reading and conversation, serious and spiritual occupations and services, burdensome and distasteful to us here upon earth; how can we hope, dying in such a state, to be fitted for the enjoyments of heaven: and where is the warrant in Scripture that any change will take place in our character after death? On the contrary, as death leaves us, so judgment will find us. "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still and behold I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give to every man according as his work shall be." And where, I might ask, where is the hope or the promise that, if a man has lived his life without God and vital religion; given up to the world and worldly things; perhaps indulging freely, and without restraint, in its more sinful and licentious courses; or if not this, yet manifestly devoid of all seriousness and spirituality in

1 Rev. xxii. 11, 12.

his religion; confining his thoughts, and wishes, and desires to the present life alone; contented with a little, cold, external, formal service; and deriding everything beyond this as hypocrisy or enthusiasm; what rational hope or promise is there that a man, who has so past his days in this eventful stage of his existence, evidently under the power and influence of an earthly mind, will be suddenly changed on a death-bed, so as to qualify and make him meet for the kingdom of heaven? I do not say what may be done, or what the power of God may not do; I only ask what is done as to this great and saving work on the soul, on a death-bed? The death of the Christian is a happy, a blessed scene; but then it is of the Christian who has been living to God, living a life of faith in his Redeemer. But as to too many death-beds we are called upon to witness, what shall we say? For my own part, I tremble when I think on these things. I have seen many, many death-beds; and must own that I have witnessed very little to afford any rational, or Scriptural hope or comfort, on this head.

Or carry your thoughts for a moment beyond this fleeting scene. Place a sinful, unrenewed, irreligious person, with an earthly, unconverted mind, unchristian tempers and dispositions, in heaven, and how could he be happy there? Would

the vain, the proud, the sensual, the covetous, the self-righteous, find any real pleasure in the society, or in the enjoyments of that blessed world? No, brethren, far otherwise.

You perceive, then, both from the solemn and repeated declarations of Scripture, and the nature of the heavenly happiness, the impossibility of an unrenewed person being admitted into the kingdom of heaven, and the consequent necessity of that change of heart of which the Apostle speaks.

We may consider, next, the nature of this change; what it is, according to the Apostle, thus to be renewed in the spirit of our mind.

You perceive that the change is described as internal: it must take place within; in the heart. The heart is the source, the fountain, of all good and evil; and as the fountain is pure or impure, clean or unclean, so will the streams be that flow from it. Thus God is said to "open" the heart, to "shine into" the heart, to "write his law" in our hearts, and to put it in our "inward parts ;" to "strengthen" us "by his Spirit in the inner man ;" to "shed abroad his love in our hearts by the Holy Ghost;" to "work in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure." Thus we are exhorted to keep the heart "with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life." "A good man, out of

1 Proverbs iv. 23.