not appointed a priest after the order of Melchizedek, that cleanseth from all sin, there had been no hope for me.''

Again, the word teacheth men to pray. Affliction often brought David to his knees; and, after this, he stands forth as a witness, that seeking God in affliction is the first step towards deliverance. "This poor man," says he, "cried; and the Lord heard him, and delivered him out of all his trouble."

David had also seen the ungodly prosper: his foot had hereon well nigh slipped:-but affliction brought him to himself and to the word of God; and then, and not till then, he saw the end of these men. The word of Moses had shown him before the end of the wicked: but it is one thing to read the Bible, because it is our duty; and it is another thing to fly to that Bible as the relief of our doubts and difficulties.

Once more, after receiving many mercies and many deliverances, David found himself in the midst of a sinful and distracted family: the word of God had taught him to look to heaven alone for comfort; but, like Lot, he lingered-he would fain have found some rest for the sole of his foot in his own house :-who does not resemble him herein ?-Fain would he have had the young man Absalom spared! But affliction, at length, broke the enchantment, because it was a sanctified affliction; and he looks up, as he was taught, to a covenant God alone for comfort. says, "Although my house be not so with God; yet he has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, and this is all my salvation, and all my desire."

He

Thus we see affliction may, in the hand of God, become an excellent Expositor of his Word. "Now,"

says David, "have I learned thy statutes;" now it is that I have learned them from experience and affliction,—more practically, more perfectly, more inwardly, more experimentally.

While I

There is one point in which this remark holds especially true for the word of God shows us all how much we are members one of another; and with how much sympathy and tenderness we should feel and act one towards another: yet, even among true Christians, who is the man that has thoroughly learned this lesson before he is afflicted? say sympathy, and tenderness, and kindness, and forbearance, and patience, and love are so strongly enforced in the gospel, who is the man that has learned this lesson of sympathy? Is it the man in health? Is it the prosperous man? Is it the strong man? Is it the man whose neck has never yet bowed to the yoke of affliction? We know the contrary. Even Christ, as the Apostle speaks, was tempted, "that he might know how to succour them that are tempted:" and it is often good for us that we have been afflicted, if it were only that we might know thereby how to sympathize with others; and thus learn, not only the statutes, but the temper of our Master.

Am I, then, speaking to any of you, my dear hearers, as persons now in trouble? Let me ask you whither you are going for relief in your trouble. It is a critical time with you-a time of special teaching: and what have you learned under your affliction?

Have you heard God speaking to you, as well as the Bible? Have you spoken to him again, as the author of your trials?-for "affliction springeth not out of the dust." Have you, with Hezekiah, prayed

1

unto the Lord with your "face turned toward the wall"-in secresy and solitude? Have you, with St. Paul, carried the "thorn in the flesh" to the Saviour? He knew of no deliverer nor comforter, but Christ; he carried, therefore, his trouble to him; and found his grace sufficient under that trouble. Bring the matter home-Do you thus honour Christ as the only one "that openeth, and no man shutteth; thut shutteth, and no man openeth?" Above all, have you begged him to sanctify the affliction, that it may thereby become a teacher of the word? Do you go for comfort to your Bible? Do you find that Bible interpreted by facts and your own experience?— then are ye witnesses for God: ye have the witness in yourselves that the Bible is the word of God. If it be so, you know, by your own feelings, better than I can express it to you, how good it is for you that you have been afflicted.

On the contrary, if you have been often in the furnace of affliction, and yet your vanity, your pride, your worldly mindedness, your carnal affections have in no degree departed from you, then hear the word of the Lord-affliction is God speaking to the heart, one way; and his word now speaks to your conscience in another. Read in the fourth chapter of Amos, where he says, "I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah; and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel! and, because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel!" The day of judgment approacheth, therefore, brethren, be ye ready: for "he who hard

eneth his heart, shall surely be destroyed, and that without remedy."

Christians! be wise to use your afflictive dispensations as from God. The winter season is precious to the husbandman; for he then sows his corn: so is it with the Christian: weeping must not, therefore, hinder sowing. Affliction, when sanctified, is a gift: "It is given," says the Apostle, "in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his name."

Affliction, indeed, is the only gift for which we are not commanded to pray; but a wise and instructed Christian will know that he ought to pray for a sanctified use of it when sent: we ought to pray that all this cost may not be in vain; we ought to pray that, by all these afflictions, we may be brought nearer to God, and more out of the world, and never doubt any word of God, or murmur against any of his dispensations, however much we may for the present suffer. In sickness and pain, we not only send for a physician, but we commit ourselves to him; we take thankfully his medicines, though they are unpalatable; we trust to him, that he will restore us to our health.

Ah! which of us thus trusts the Lord? Who is there among us, that thus takes his bitter medicines, though we are sure he cannot mistake our case? Physicians may err: He cannot. And yet, has he never taught us by past trials?-have we never received relief in times past? Who that is thoroughly instructed can avoid saying, with David, from what is past, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes?"

Take then, Christian! your particular case to the

Bible this day: and that case will open to you much meaning in the Bible, while the Bible itself will throw a meaning on your case, however dark: it will place your situation in a new point of view: you may so have the good word brought home to your hearts and consciences, that, like Hannah, you may go away "no more sad," but "rejoicing in the God of your salvation."

May we all be so instructed in the school of affliction, that we may stand as those that are spoken of in the seventh chapter of the book of Revelation :— "These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb!"

SERMON X.

TO CHILDREN AND PARENTS.*

PROVERBS iv. 1.

Hear, ye children, the instruction of a father.

THE speaker here is King Solomon; who, while he is about to offer some very interesting remarks, and to enforce some very instructive doctrines, calls for a particular attention. He calls as one that is a father, as a man of experience, as a man of an affectionate heart; and he declares that he himself was instructed in this way, under the blessing of God, so

*

This sermon was preached at the first establishment of schools for religious instruction at St. John's chapel.