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you so? O, yes, if a sense of guilt and unworthiness lie heavy on your heart, you have drunk into the same spirit, which leads all the armies of the Redeemed to prostrate their crowns, and to fall on their faces, before the eternal throne. And this is not less true, if you are chiefly pained and ashamed, because your penitence is not so humble as you feel it ought to be. Your humility would not be genuine, if you were quite satisfied with its depth. The best part of it, is your sense of its defects as a whole, and your desire to sink lower in all lowliness of mind before God.

Well; what do you think now of your own penitence, after having thus looked at heavenly penitence? Of course, you are more ashamed of its imperfections than ever. So you ought. But still, you are conscious of some fellowfeeling with the Church of the first-born in heaven. You also wish for more of their meek

and lowly spirit. It commends itself to both your judgment and your taste. Your heart does not rise against it, as something repulsive or mortifying. You can say with truth, "Blessed are they that mourn." Well; what is all this, but proof that you have been taught of God, and thus that you are training up for the perfect and eternal humility of heaven?

Another prominent feature of the spirit of Heaven, is, the love and gratitude it breathes to the Saviour. He is, emphatically, "all in all," to all the armies of heaven. The very angels, who need no Saviour, desire to look into the sufferings of Christ, and the glory which shall for ever follow them. Did you ever mark the distinction which angels thus make between the sufferings of Christ, and every thing else they study or admire? Of nothing else is it said, that they "desire" to look into it. They do look into every thing

which the universe presents to their notice. Their eye ranges the whole array of the works of Creation and Providence, and tries, no doubt, to penetrate the arcana of both. They are as full of eyes to discern and enjoy, as heaven itself is full of wonders. Nothing,

however, interests or affects them so much, as the sufferings of Christ. The Lamb "in the midst of the throne," is in the midst of every thing, to them! In the midst of universal nature; for by him were all things created, visible and invisible. In the midst of universal Providence; for by Him all things are upheld and regulated. In the midst of universal Government; for he is Head over all things; thrones and dominions, principalities and powers, being subject to him. In the midst of universal knowledge; for "the Lamb is the light" of heaven. In the midst-of universal Glory; for He is the source and

centre of all the "exceeding and eternal weight of glory." By looking into His sufferings, therefore, angels see every thing else, in its true character and chief design: for the full meaning of all things, is seen through the "rent veil" of His humanity, and only through it. Indeed, apart from the atonement, the moral order of the universe is all mystery, and the light of nature all darkness, in heaven itself as well as on earth: for one thing is for ever going on in heaven, which neither suns nor systems, laws nor oracles, can explain— the peopling of Heaven with the reconciled and sanctified enemies of God, from the earth. This world is thus the wonder of all worlds. For, what are stars moving in their courses, or suns wheeling around the magnetic centre of creation, or both flashing their splendours upon the vacant spaces of infinity; compared with immortal spirits, once earthly and unholy,

and alienated; but now, in the image of God, advancing to the throne of God, and taking a place and a part before it, which Angels themselves might covet? Who can wonder, that Angels should desire to look into the cause of this wonderful consummation? There is nothing like this, amongst all the ongoings or results of visible or invisible things. This-is the moral image of God multiplying itself, now that physical creation has stopped; and magnifying itself more than another creation could do. O, it is not from compulsion, nor in mere obedience to law, that Angels look into the sufferings of Christ! The results of His sacrifice, and of the intercession founded upon it, are for ever telling with such effect upon all the moral movements and enjoyments of all worlds, as to keep the new song for ever new, and the universe its widening, willing, welcoming temple. It is in gratitude, and

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