the Church has rested from time to time, since it was first let down from heaven; and all these mountains you are to go up, if you desire to be preserved in that Ark from the destruction which will swallow up all unholiness and ungodliness and sin and disobedience and unbelief.

From all these mountains too, you are to bring down wood for the building of God's House in your souls. You cannot even carry up the wood, as Abraham did for the sacrifice which he was to offer on the mountain in the land of Moriah. But, while for you also God has provided the Lamb for the burnt-offering, it is only on these Mountains that the wood can be found wherewith the sacrifice of that Lamb can be renewed in our hearts. Thus from Mount Moriah you are to bring down the will to offer up everything that your hearts hold most dear and precious to God. From Mount Horeb you are to bring down the knowledge of the living God. From Mount Sinai you are to bring down obedience. From Mount Carmel you are to bring down the resolution to hold fast. to God, and to defy all the powers of Evil that would withdraw you from Him. From the Mountain of Capernaum you are to bring down the spiritual obedience of love. From the Mountain of the Temptation you are to bring down godly wisdom, to see through the snares of the Tempter, and to baffle his wiles. From the Mountain of the Transfiguration you are to bring down holiness, and a yearning after heavenly communion. From the Mount of Olives you are to bring down shame for the sins which caused that agony, and repentance, and contrition. From Mount Calvary you are to bring down the hatred of sin, and love for Him who so loved you, and a readiness to die for Him who died for you, and an

undoubting trust in God's infinite mercy. From the Mountain in Galilee you are to bring down the assurance that He, who had overcome all the powers of Death, will ever be with His Church, and with every faithful member of it, teaching them, supporting them, leading them to all truth. These and the other graces which you are to seek on the Mountains of the Lord, as they stand around Jerusalem, are the wood wherewith you are to build up the House of the Lord in your souls. They are the graces out of which the image of Christ is to be fashioned within you. And then, when God beholds the image of His beloved Son in you, He will indeed take pleasure therein, and will be glorified in you.

O may we all be brought to that state in which God will take pleasure, and be glorified in us! To that end may we daily go up one or other of God's holy Mountains, to seek the wood wherewith we are to build up the House of the Lord! So in the last days, when the Mountain of the Lord's House shall be establisht on the top of the mountains, and all nations shall flow to it,-when thus, by the word of God, turning back the laws of Nature, the downward-flowing desires of man shall rise upward to the Mountain of the Lord,-and when God will thus take pleasure in the flowing together of the nations, and be glorified in the exaltation of the hearts and minds of His people, we also shall be received into that blessed company, who will gather around the King upon His holy Hill of Zion.

SERMON IV.

THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE TWO HOUSES.

HAGGAI II. 1. 3, 4, 5.

In the seventh month, in the one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the Lord by the prophet Haggai, saying,—Who is left among you that saw this House in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord; and be strong, O Joshua, the highpriest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, and work: for I am with you, saith the Lord of Hosts. According to the word that I covenanted with you, when ye came out of Egypt, so My Spirit remaineth among you fear ye not.

SOME time, nearly a month, had gone by, since the prophet Haggai brought the message which we have been considering to the Israelites, to encourage them in their work by the assurance that the Lord was with them; and during that month they had been employed upon it. We may believe that they would set about it heartily and diligently. But, as you know, when a house is a building, days and weeks pass away, before it can make a satisfactory appearance. No little time is spent in laying the foundations; no little again in raising the walls to a proper highth; then more time is needed before the roof can be thrown over yet, until this is done, there will be nothing to give pleasure in its look. This is the case, you know, even with a small house. Still more time is taken up in building a large house and when a church, like this, is to

be built, many months, if not years, roll by, before it is

VOL. II.

F

completed. The first Temple, that built by Solomon, had taken eight years: and, if we call to mind how rich and powerful Solomon was, when he built his Temple, and think how poor and feeble the children of Israel, who returned from the Captivity, were in comparison, we shall easily understand that they might be disheartened, when they saw how little progress they made. Above all would those be cast down, who remembered the old Temple, which was the wonder of the world, in all its splendour and glory. Perhaps, owing to this cause, the people were desponding and flagging in their work, when the prophet Haggai came to them again, and said to them, Who is left among you that saw this House in its first glory? and how do ye see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?

A despondency, such as the Israelites must needs have felt, is very apt to come over those, who have begun to engage in a great work, after the first flush of their zeal has faded away. More especially is this the case, if the work be undertaken, not for any personal interest of our own, but out of a feeling of duty, in the service of God. When we are labouring for ourselves, our carnal heart encourages us and urges us forward: but when we are doing anything for the good of our brethren, or in the service of God, our carnal heart lies like a heavy drag upon the will. It is sad, how soon we grow weary in such works, how soon we think we have done all that we are called to do, all that we can do, how readily we take for granted that we can do nothing to any purpose, and give This is especially the case at first. For the foundations of every work that is to be solid and lasting, must be underground and out of sight: and it is long before we

over.

grow humble enough to labour diligently, although the fruits of our labour are not to be seen even by our own eyes it is long before we become willing to work, under the consciousness that our strength by itself is unable to do anything, and that our whole sufficiency must come from God. When we first set about a work of duty, it costs us so great an effort, we fancy it ought to produce some great immediate result, in proportion to the effort it has cost us; whereas the chief part of our strength will probably be spent in overcoming the resistance within ourselves. In fact too our works, at first more especially, are so very frail and imperfect; we do so little, and nothing well, that, so long as we have not been thoroughly humbled, so long as we continue to attach any value or importance to our labour, we cannot but be disheartened at seeing what a meagre, scanty crop we produce. At the same time a voice will often sound within us, addressing us with a question not unlike that in the text: Who is there among you that saw this House in its first glory? and how do ye see it now? Is it not as nothing in comparison thereof?.

For example, when our hearts have been moved to undertake any work for the strengthening or spreading of Christ's Church upon earth, and when we have thus been led to look round and consider what she is, how she stands in the midst of the world, must not our hearts faint within us, as we think how she is as nothing in comparison with her first glory? Yes, my brethren, who amongst you has heard or read of the Church of Christ in her first glory, under the ministry and rule of the holy Apostles, whose lips flowed with the words of heavenly truth, and whose hands wrought the works of heavenly power, when faith was so strong, that miracles were taking place every