gious indifference? And yet it is referrible to that same disregard of the will, that same insensibility to the favour, and that same enmity to the excellence of God, in which originate the more glaring and heinous sins of men. Little is thought of unthankfulness, prayerlessness and pride; yet the root of all this is making God nothing, and ourselves everything. How small and venial is supposed to be the sin of insubmissiveness and dissatisfaction; and yet what an infringement of divine rights, and what disdainful neglect of the divine designs! A worldly spirit is put among the little offences, if indeed allowed to be an offence at all; but it is treason against the throne of the Eternal:-" if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" *. -"the friendship of the world is enmity with God" +" whosoever will love the world, is the enemy of God."

Here too we learn much respecting the desert of sin. When in this radiancy we see sin, we best understand why it is so punishable. This subject throws over it a mysterious and appalling awfulness, and expands our sight of it to unmeasured vastness. The heart-oppressive-the mind-confounding views, which the scriptures give of the consequences of sin, are drawn from that unapproachable and insufferable brightness, which opposes its withering and consuming beams to evil in all its forms. The Great Supreme steps forth from his everlasting habitation to display and work out his own glory in the highest excellence and happiness of the universe; and will he not trample down and destroy whatever resists his designs? We may perplex ourselves as to the desert of sin; but what do we know of it? Do we † James iv, 4.

1 John ii. 15.

comprehend that AWFUL, INFINITE GLORY to which it is opposed? Can we fix and limit the kind, the degree and the duration of punishment, who know so little of the ETERNAL EXCELLENCY which is contemned, opposed and outraged, and who understand so little of the remote and eternal tendencies of the offence? Shall we measure this infinity by our little scales? Who can decide and settle these awful matters, but He who understands them? His decision let us take then; and the reasons which we cannot trace, let us believe, lie deep in that incon-ceivable glory to which sin opposes itself. The more however we learn of that, the more we shall see the justice, the fitness, the propriety, the necessity of that punishment which is awarded to sinners.

have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee; wherefore I abhor myself. and repent in dust and ashes."*

II. How sure a detector of false systems of religion is the great principle of doing all things to the glory of God! The test may be safely, if wisely applied. We ought well to understand what it is to act to the divine honour, before we decide what accords with it, and what conduces to it. It is now presumed that we have some just and scriptural views of this subject; and we are allowed to make some use of them in estimating the claims of any religious opinions or system of religious opinions. We may suggest a case or two for the sake of illustrating the mode of applying our principle. If, for instance, a man tells us that. God made a law which was too strict for his creatures, and which he therefore softJob xlii. 5. 6.

ened and lowered to meet their weakness; we wonder at the insult which is offered to the wisdom, justice and authority of God. Was he so unskilful as to make an unsuitable law? Was he so unjust as to require obedience to a law too rigorous? Or if not unjust in his first requirement, was he so regardless of his own inalienable and infinite Authority, as to dispense with his righteous claims, and thus virtually tolerate disobedience? Surely that system has more regard for the divine honour, which recognises the perfect righteousness of the original law; which secures its inviolability and honour in the obedience and death of the Mediator; and which provides for the recovery of man to the unalterable law from which he had swerved. We may also submit to the same test the supposition that the divine law is dispensed with on the ground of the grace of the gospel-that obligation is displaced by exuberant and superabundant favour. It is surely enough to say against this pernicious notion, that it nullifies the moral government of God, belies his nature, makes Him the licenser, and his Son the minister of sin, and robs God of the everlasting obedience and service of creatures.

The Scriptures commend themselves to us on the very ground of their tendency to promote the glory of God. If in any set of notions proposed to our attention, we can perceive no such tendency, we may justly suspect their truth and authority. If we see nothing in them of the "shewing forth of his righteousness," of "the depths of the riches of his wisdom and knowledge," of "the excellency of his power," of "the riches of his mercy," of the "praise of the glory of his grace," of the "honour and power and

glory and might and dominion due to God and the Lamb for ever and ever," of the everlasting issue in God's being "all in all; " we may reasonably conclude that it is not " the doctrine according to godliness." Nor can that system of religious opinions be correct which proposes to man a lower end than the divine glory; nor that which does not require the spiritual, devout, practical and earnest pursuit of this high object; nor that which does not furnish motives to recommend and endear it to us, and the tendency of which is not obviously to lead us to it. That theory of religious sentiments lies open to strong suspicion which makes a mystery of "doing all things to the glory of God," or which finds but a figment, in "glorifying God in our bodies and spirits which are God's." But we remark further respecting this essential principle

III. How deplorable the aspect it gives to the condition of those who live to themselves and not to God! Some such perhaps will read these pages. Suffer the word of serious but friendly expostulation. You, as well as all others, are seeking some end in what you purpose and in what you do. If it be not a godly, it is a worldly one. Suppose you are successful in its pursuit, to the utmost of human wishes and expectations. What do you gain? You hew broken cisterns that can hold no water.

You reap the wind. You grasp at phantoms and shadows. You feed on ashes. You toil for what is to perish

in the using. You doat upon the world which passeth away, and the lust thereof. You sow to the flesh and of the flesh you reap corruption. Grasp,

* Gal. vi. 8.

*

aspire, indulge to the utmost; and you are still poor. and miserable and blind and naked. The glitter of gold, the splendour of station, the blandishments of gratification, noisy mirth, the loud bravado, affected ease, the careless air, the thousand simulations and arts, are insufficient to hide at all times, the destitution, the desolation, and the woe which reign within you. The "hell and destruction," of the heart are, in spite of every effort to conceal them, sometimes "uncovered." Unhappy wanderers, you sometimes feel that you are in a wrong track, and are affrighted at the distance, the loneliness, and the dangers of the horrid wilds to which you have strayed. You feel to some degree that you have "forsaken God"-that you are "without God in the world." If you felt this in its extent, nothing could enliven, nothing could relieve the frightful solitude of your forlorn and widowed spirit-the region of gloom and death. But to this loss, and want, and dreadful void, has to be added, the positive guilt, and the fearful and endless consequences of this wrong choice. Do you think it can be a thing indifferent to God, and harmless to yourselves, that you disesteem his excellence, spurn his will, undervalue his regard, and that you oppose him by your spirit, aim, and conduct, in that which forms the grand end of all he does? Is it safe to resist that glory which, whilst it diffuses life and joy and beauty through the universe, is still a "consuming fire" to its opposers? Are you not fearful that you should be stricken to eternal death by that power which smote Herod," because he gave not God the glory?"+ If you thus "contemn God," have you not reason to apprehend that you *Heb. xii. 29. † Acts xii. 23,