that in our Saviour which those who were looked up to as the great, and the learned, and the religious of their day, could not or would not discover. Above all, they had a hidden depth of veneration and love for their Lord, which He well knew was yet to burst out into a flame of devotion that would enkindle the whole world. Still they were but men. Their hearts were not yet thoroughly weaned from this world. Besides this, they had wrong notions. They had adopted the pernicious system of figurative interpretation, by which the whole Church was at that time led astray. They knew nothing of a suffering Messiah. We may well imagine, therefore, with what horror and surprise they must have started, when, at the very moment their hands were stretched forth to receive crowns and kingdoms, Jesus Christ lifted up the veil that concealed the future, and there, close to them, in their very path, in the only narrow way that led to the promised kingdom, they saw the hateful cross, on which, amidst a thousand shocking circumstances, they were to behold the object of

their love and the fountain of all their honours, expire in weakness, and shame, and torment. The Apostles were men, and, therefore, they could not receive such a discovery unmoved. Peter was the first to rebuke our Saviour for submitting to such indignities, and received from him a severe exposure of that worldliness which was still lurking at the bottom of all his devotedness and zeal. It was then, my brethren, that Jesus Christ took the opportunity of teaching that awful and universal lesson, of which the text is part, and of laying down, once for all, the conditions of His kingdom. "When he had called the people unto him, with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake, and the gospel's, the same shall save it. For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in ex

shall come in the glory of his Father, with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Whosoever, therefore, shall be ashamed of me, and of my words, in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father, with the holy angels '."

It is scarcely possible to conceive a more humiliating proof of the folly and wickedness of our corrupted nature, than the fact that such an appeal should be made to our understanding by our blessed Redeemer. "What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" What shall it profit him? And is it then possible, that we are so fallen, so insensible to every noble and generous feeling, that we hesitate to choose between wickedness and goodness, and that our choice is to be determined by the quantity of advantage or enjoyment which each has to offer? Surely there must be some who do not need to make such a calculation, and whose de

'Matt. xvi. 24-27. Mark viii. 34-38.

cision is made on other and higher grounds. Surely there must be some who love their God, and delight to do His will. There must be some who hate sin for its own polluting loathsomeness, and to whom it would be no favour to be allowed to indulge in transgression with impunity. Surely there must be some who love Him that first loved them, and shed His blood to save them; who are transformed in their inmost affections and desires into His image, and find a real, a present, an abiding happiness in following the footsteps of His purity, and charity, and self-denial.

True it is, however, that such a calculation, as our text suggests, is but too necessary to be made by every one of us; and equally certain, that those who would seem least to require such considerations, are not those who are least alive to their importance.

Such a question as our Saviour here proposes, need never have been asked, were there not in our hearts an inborn propensity to evil, and, at best, even in those who are walking in obedience to the

Spirit of God, a weakness and frailty, a liability to yield to temptation, and to lose the vivid, governing, and animating perception of true and eternal blessedness, amidst the crowding, distracting pressure of sensible objects. We are in fact prone to do wrong; and we are surrounded by a world of snares and seductions, to escape from which will require the aid of every consideration and every motive, which the word of God addresses, either to our affections or our judgment. Besides this, my brethren, a truly devout Christian is not a man urged on by an impetuous and unreasonable excitement. His choice is not the result of a blind impulse; an over-heated imagination; an enthusiasm for which he can assign no sufficient cause. He stands prepared to give to every man a reason for his conduct, and for that inspiring hope which determines him to do and to forbear, at the bidding of his Creator. He is prepared to say, why it is that he is ready to relinquish every enjoyment, even to lay down life itself, at the command of Jesus Christ. The service of God is a reasonable service. We are bound to know