What was the character of His judicial proceedings towards His only begotten Son, who quitted the bosom of his Father to accomplish upon earth, a triumph in our behalf over sin, and death, and hell? Let the prophet declare; the uninspired language of man realizes not the solemnity of the subject. "His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men." "He gave His back to the smiters, and His cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; He hid not His face from shame and spitting." "He was despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not." "The ploughers ploughed upon His back, and made long furrows."

What was the Saviour's whole existence upon earth, but a series of perils, of perplexities, of privations, of sufferings, of vexatious trials? His life was frequently sought, His peace perpetually disturbed, His character constantly assailed. And what was His agony on the eve of His death? Such as caused Him to "sweat great drops of blood!" What was His death? Such as the vilest malefactor only was condemned to suffer! God spare His devoted Son? Did He afflict Him partially? Did He not pour out upon Him the full vial of His inflictive justice? Was ever sorrow like His sorrow? What sinner has He visited so heavily? And this Blessed Victim, doomed to undergo such prodigious excess of torment in

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our behalf, was utterly without sin, "neither was guile found in His mouth." Did ever heathen or Christian delinquent suffer as He suffered? Did ever heathen or Christian martyr die as He died? Did ever righteous man, whether heathen or Christian, live as He lived? God then " "spared not His own Son," pure and spotless though He was, no less pure and spotless than Himself," but gave Him up for us all;" abandoned Him to reproach, to torment, to death. Shall we still say that He was partial in His judgments? God forbid! This were, indeed, to insult Him by a lie the most unfounded and the most audacious that ever fell from human lips. Can we complain of harshness when we consider what the Saviour endured? Can we repine when we mark God's unsparing severity towards the Redeemer of mankind, upon whom, though in Him "dwelt the fulness of the Godhead bodily," He inflicted the heavy, the tremendous penalty of human transgression? Can we think ourselves, under any circumstances, hardly dealt with, when we look at the Cross and behold the dying Saviour suspended upon it, for sin in which He bore no part; a mark of scorn and derision; of abuse and insult; of reproach and blasphemy; while His last sigh was ascending on the aspirations of love towards heaven!

Let us carry in our hearts the remembrance of that Almighty affection, which endured agony, contumely and shame, to save us from everlasting tribulation. Let us bear about with us, as a me

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morial that can never be effaced from our minds while the lamp of life continues to burn within us, "the dying of the Lord Jesus." It is a glorious subject to keep upon our recollections, being one for immortal memories. Who can fail to record it there, that bases upon it the "joy unspeakable and glorified," which is the lot of angels, and will be of "saints made perfect." It is an occurrence that can never fade from the chronicles of time; but will endure through eternity. Great and portentous event! for what is not man indebted to it? For salvation, for immortality, for eternal bliss! Drop on your knees, and humbly thank God for his manifold and great mercies, instead of imagining that He has ever been too severe towards you or any of your fellow sinners. Supplicate His grace. Implore His benediction. Lay your hearts before him as an oblation of gratitude and holy love. you nor forsake you," so leave or forsake Him. He may be relied on, however human agents may fail to inspire our confidence. Beseech Him, then, to succour and defend "when the dust is about to reyou, that, turn to the earth as it was, and the spirit unto God who gave it," you may all have the transporting satisfaction of feeling that "the trial of your faith, being more precious than of gold which perisheth, may be found unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ."

He will "never leave long as you do not

SERMON II.

OUR LAST ENEMY.

1 CORINTHIANS, CHAP. XV. VER. 26.

"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is Death."

THE present life is a scene of perpetual conflict. This is a fact level to the experience of us all. It is made up of vicissitudes, perplexities and sorrows. The sum is a large one, the final amount of the reckoning-death. We note not the accumulating evils as they gather insidiously, but, nevertheless, rapidly-into numerical masses, and are scarcely conscious of their prodigious numbers, when the summons for our departure is heard, and we go to that land of darkness and of silence, whence we shall ultimately emerge to have our account audited by the Almighty Judge, who will acquit or condemn us according to the record before Him. We are all fully alive to the truth, however worldly men may affect to ques

tion it, that here we seek Happiness in vain. We are mocked by a shadow that assumes her shape and counterfeits her likeness, but the original is not with the things of time. Her complexion, adapted to a purer and more genial clime, cannot endure the rough and tempestuous atmosphere of this gross earth, where clouds intervene and vapours float, to obscure her brightness or to mar her permanency. She is unknown, perfect and universal, below the skies. Above them is her abode, among archangels, angels and all the retinue of the Eternal Majesty. Adam banished her from this world, when he established the dominion of sin and death; and, since her banishment, like the dove sent a second time from the ark, she has not returned.

The state of busy pilgrimage lying between our birth and the grave, is an interval of anxious preparation for the condition beyond it, where

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mortality will be swallowed up of life." The term allotted to us in this world, however long, however short, is never an uninterrupted term of peace. Peace belongs to happiness; so that here it is not found unabated and unmixed, but abides with its heavenly comate in those blessed habitations where both are consummated. Heaven is the abode of each-the exclusive abode of both in their perfection. Earth gives a permanent asylum to neither; nor is either ever, even for a moment, found upon earth in that purity in which it is enjoyed by the celestial community. We