an eternal weight of misery; the of religion who, deeming themselves disquiets of this life, for the agonies of another; and grief which, at the worst, may be endured, for the worm which never dies, and the fire which is never quenched.

3. A third class, very different from the last, consists of those who, because their outward circumstances are prosperous, assume that the judgment of God is already pronounced in their favour, and that they have therefore little need to prepare for the judgment-seat of Christ. As the one concludes that the sufferings of this life will preserve them from the sufferings of another, so the other imagines that their prosperity here affords them a sufficient promise of happiness in the world to come. God, they flatter themselves, would not bless those with success, with whom he was displeased. Their sentence, they therefore think, is already passed; and if they also shall be called to stand at the judgment-seat of Christ, it will be rather to swell his triumph than to submit to his scrutiny. But here I would again ask, what is the ground of such an expectation? Does not the Bible often present to us the very worst men in the most prosperous circumstances, as if, by bestowing wealth on them, God meant to shew how little value he sets upon it? "When I went into the sanctuary, then saw I the end of these men. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places." In what awful language is the fall and judgment of one of the mightiest and most prosperons men the world ever saw described. "How has the oppressor ceased! Hell from beneath is moved for thee, to meet thee at thy coming. Thy pomp is brought down to the grave: the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee." And in another place, "Hell hath enlarged herself and opened her mouth without mea sure: their glory, and their multi tude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth shall go down into it."

4. Lastly, there are professors CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 115.

the children of God, though they obey not the truth, may reason thus: "My interest is secure in Christ. My life is hid with Christ in God. My sins are forgiven; my fate sealed. My name is written in the book of life. God witnesseth with my spirit that I am a child of God, one adopted into his family: I cannot be cast out. Why therefore, should I think of the judgment-seat of Christ, as a thing which will affect me?" But are such profes sors of religion already judged and acquitted? Who, then, are those who shall say, Lord, Lord," to whom Christ shall answer, "I never knew you?" Who are those that shall plead the works they have done in his name, and yet be spurned from his feet as men unknown to him? Let none of us presume on our profession, that we shall not also stand before Christ to be judged. Our profession is to be measured and weighed, our sincerity to be estimated, our solid worth to be tried, by the balance of the sanctuary. We may have a naine to live, and yet be dead; dead to all the real ends of our being, to the honour of God, to the real good of our fellow-creatures. "We must all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in the body according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad."

III. I would, in conclusion, make a few observations on the nature of this judgment, drawn from the character of the judge before whom we must all stand.

1. We may be assured that every thing will be there decided on the principles of the Gospel of Christ: Aud what are these? That by faith we are saved; by faith we are justified;-that faith worketh by love; that faith without works is dead. What then is our hope? Are we trusting in our moral lives, in our having abstained from certain sins, and practised certain virtues ?" By grace," says the

3 11

above, who rest not day nor night giving glory to God and the Lamb.

the judgment-seat of Christ;" and let us turn to the Lord, for he will yet have mercy upon us, and to our Worthy art thou to receive power God, for he will yet pardon.

But, on the other hand, what an unspeakable consolation is it to the humble disciple of Christ, that he also is to stand at the judgment-seat of his crucified Master! If we are of this happy class, we shall go to no tribunal with the laws of which we are unacquainted; we shall go

and

and riches, and wisdom strength, and honour and glory; for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, and hast made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign for ever and ever. Amen."

to be judged by the everlasting Go-To the Editor of the Christian Observer. spel. We shall behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world; we shall see him, once despised and rejected of men, once degraded and crucified for our sakes,

now exalted to the throne of his Father, now robed with the glory which he had laid aside, now able to fulfil his promises, to accomplish his redemption, to reward his servants, "The Lamb which is in the

midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." The power of his grace and the efficacy of his blood are not exhausted. "Fear not: I am the first and the last. I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of hell and of death." As I before asked whether there were among us hearts hard enough not to be awed by the threatenings of religion, so I now ask, Are there hearts hard enough not to be softened by its promises and invitations? What more could God have done for his vineyard? What strains of encouragement, of love, of grace, are left untried by the kindness of God our Saviour? O may our hearts be touched by them! May the all-sufficiency of divine grace appear in our progress and confirmation in holiness! May Christ and his salvation be precious in our eyes! In the different stages of life, and on the bed of death, may this be all our consolation and all our desire! Then shall we rejoice before him at his coming. Then shall we join that blessed assembly

Is the clerical gentleman who proposes a very important question, through the medium of your correspondent NASCITUR, will condescend to notice the remarks of a lay brother, the following are much at his them a place in your valuable pubservice, provided you will allow

lication.

I conceive, then, that a clergyman, who believes those peculiar doctrines which distinguish Christitems, is bound, both as a minister anity from all other religious sysof the Gospel and as a son of the his parishioners as soon as he enters church, to preach those doctrines to upon the duties of his cure. The be very numerous, but to me they reasons assigned for this need not appear extremely cogent.

he undertakes the "cure of souls." On being inducted into the living, The souls of all his parishioners are and duty is to "watch for souls as committed to his care. His calling one that must give an account" of and that not with the empty husks them. He is "to feed the flock," tions of "philosophy falsely so calof mere ethics, or the dry speculaled," but with "the bread of life," without which the souls must perish of that "flock which God will require at his hands." Let him then institute a few computations in moral arithmetic; and first let him ascertain the value of the soul.

"Knows he th' importance of a soul in mortal?

Behold this midnight glory; worlds on

worlds!

Amazing pomp! redouble this amaze ;

Ten thousand add, and twice ten thousand

more;

Then weigh the whole; ONE soul outweighs
them all;

And calls the astonishing magnificence
Of unintelligent creation poor."

Suppose next, that, according to a prudent plan of gradually introducing the light of the Gospel into his parish, he lets six months pass away before he throws upon his congregation the full blaze of evangelical truth suppose, too, that his parish contains a thousand souls who have no saving acquaintance with the Christian religion. Let him compute how many of these will probably die in the course of that six months, and he will find that they will be at least eighteen. Now, since "faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God; for how shall they hear without a preacher ?" the great probability is, that these eighteen souls have " perished for lack of knowledge," and gone to their final, "account with all their imperfections on their head,"

In opposition to this statement, it may, I am aware, be urged, that a clergyman, by a slow and gradual introduction of evangelical principles into his sermons, may insinu ate himself into the favour of his people, and thus ultimately gain more to the fold of the great Shep herd. But this, I fear, is neither more, nor less, than, doing evil that good may come. It is certainly in fringing upon apostolic precepts, and deviating widely from the primitive pattern. The great command to "preach the Gospel to every creature,' is doubtless binding upon every clergyman so far as to preach the Gospel to every creature in his parish, who does not attend to scriptural truths delivered by other mi nisters of the Gospel. So that, if eighteen souls die before he commence his operations as a minister of the truth, he manifestly breaks this command. He is also "inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost" to take upon himself the office of a Christian minister: he therefore

ought to appropriate the language of an apostle to himself" Whe unto me if I preach not the gospel ;" and, in fact lies under the weight of that woe so long as he neglects so to preach. He is likewise bound to imitate the example of those who "ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ;" and is under the same obligation as Timothy was, "to shew himself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth: to preach the word; to be instant, in season, out of season; to reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all long-suf fering and doctrine; to watch in all things; and make full proof of the nature of his ministry."From these passages, I think it evident that no Christian minister can safely, and without violating his al legiance to the great Head of the church universal, blench för a sitgle week from a full and unequivocal statement of the genuine doc trines of the Gospel.

こ

.

Let us next notice what is requir ed of him as a clergyman of the church of England. On induction into his living, he must read before his congregation, the thirty-nine ar ticles, and declare his unfeigned assent and consent to them. Also, conformably to the 59th canon, "Every parson, vicar, or curate, upon every Sunday and holy-day, before evening prayer, shall, for half an hour or more, examine and instruct the youth and ignorant per sons of his parish in the ten-commandments, the articles of the bes lief, and in the Lord's prayer; and shall diligently hear, instruct, and teach them the catechism set forth in the book of common prayer." Now, this duty of instracting and cate chising the young persons of the parish, thus enjoined weekly, will most probably be as new and extraordinary to the parishioners, as any doctrinal pecularities a clergy

man can introduce into bis sermons;

and will doubtless expose him to as much odium and contumely from the thoughtless and irreligious. And