salvation. "The breaker is come up before" the company of the redeemed: "they have broken up, and have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it and their king shall pass before them, and the Lord on the head of them 1." Who amongst us can dare to remain cold or careless, whilst the tidings of this salvation are ringing in our ears? Assuredly we all need the message which is here conveyed to us. The evil which we have done, and the good which we have left undone, are evidences enough to show that an arm mightier than our own is required to help us. Yea, the sins which have gathered so quickly about our path,-when walking therein according to our own devices," have taken such hold upon" us, that we are "not able to look up; they are more in number than the hairs of" our head, and our "heart hath failed us 2." And yet, like Israel, we are permitted to draw near unto the Lord, to hear His Word, to keep His ordinances. His wisdom, His love, His power, His justice, are all revealed unto ourselves, as mercifully as unto them;-revealed, not by the slow process through which, as we have seen, the words of the Law were translated, verse by verse, unto the listening multitudes of Jerusalem, but, speaking to us, from earliest childhood, in the dear accents of our mother-tongue; and associated with all those blessed ordinances of the Church which 2 Psalm xl. 15. 1 Micah ii. 13. track our footsteps along each path of our pilgrimage on earth; and seek, with a faithfulness and diligence that are never wearied, to sanctify to our souls' eternal welfare, each passing incident of our lives. We know that the heart swells with thankfulness, and that tears, more eloquent than words, pour down the cheek, when earthly benefactors compassionate our sorrows and supply our wants. But what compassion or what aid can be compared with His, who has heaped upon us such benefits as these ;-who hath thus sent His Anointed "to preach good tidings unto the meek, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound: to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn; to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified'?" Yes, my brethren, we have indeed been made partakers of that new covenant which the Lord, by the mouth of His prophets, declared that He would make "with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; not (saith He) according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in 1 Isaiah lxi. 1—3. the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people 1." Thus, it is our privilege to know that we are no longer under the Law, but the Gospel; no longer under the covenant of works, but the covenant of grace. the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ 2." "For Let us take heed, however, to ourselves, that, in so confessing that truth of Christ which has made us free, we mar not the confession by abusing the freedom. We are freed from the Law as a covenant; but we are not freed from the Law as a rule. The curse that was due to sin has been taken away; but thereby only a more solemn obligation has been laid upon us to avoid sin. The liberty, therefore, which we enjoy, as the redeemed of Christ, must not be used "for a cloak of maliciousness 3" neither must His truth be held in unrighteousness; nor His Gospel be so received by any man, as that He should forget the requirements of the Law. And, remember, that, in preach 1 Jer. xxxi. 31-33. and Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27. 31 Pet. ii. 16. ing the Law, we do not put forth its terrors, in order that men may be affrighted or despair; but that they may be startled from the slumber of a false security, and fly for refuge unto Christ. To preach the law alone,' (saith a Bishop of our Church in the seventeenth century,-than whom, certainly, no man can be found to give more direct and emphatic testimony to the free grace of God),- to preach the law alone by itself, we confess, is to pervert the use of it; neither have any power or commission so to do; for we have our power for edification, and not for destruction.-It was published as an appendant to the Gospel, and so must it be preached: it was published in the hand of a Mediator, and it must be preached in the hand of a Mediator: it was published evangelically, and it must be so preached. We have commission to preach nothing but Christ, and life in Him; and therefore we never preach the law, but with reverence and manuduction to Him'. On this ground, the Apostle commands us to owe nothing but love to each other; "for he that loveth another (he saith) hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love 1 Bishop Reynold's Treatise on the Sinfulness of Sin. Vol. i. pp. 347-349. 8vo. ed. thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law'." It fulfilleth the law, observe, by constraining us thus to "judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead; and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again 2." Hence the petitions which we have offered up this day, in our solemn Litany, unto the good Lord, that, by the mysteries of Christ's redeeming power, and by the coming of the Holy Ghost, He would deliver us from sin and wrath; and hence the public rehearsal in our ears of the commandments, once written by the finger of God at Sinai, followed by our united supplication unto Him, that He would have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep these laws. Who then, I ask again, can venture to remain unmoved, when brought within the hearing of these promises, and the observance of these ordinances? The mere formalist may indeed do so; the hypocrite, the proud, and the impenitent may lay this burden upon their souls ;-but what shall their end be? Must not their fruit wither, and they themselves, like every other plant which our "heavenly Father hath not planted," be "plucked up by the roots," and cast forth as brands for the burning 3? And must not the bare contemplation of such an 3 |