ing has been effectual to bring men to God. And everywhere, all men alike, as well the Calvins, the Newtons, and Edwardses, as the unlettered Greenlander and Hottentot, all alike, have bowed their spirit to the cross, and rested for eternity on the Lord Jesus Christ, the Almighty Atoning Redeemer. And at the same time, simple as is the story of the cross, there is in it a depth of meaning so unfathomable, a comprehensiveness so vast and immeasurable, that the daily communion of the minister's soul with it, in his study and in his closet, is fitted above all things to give depth and power to his thinking and energy to his preaching-fitted to fire his soul with ardor in his work, a "woe is me if I preach not the gospel," which no discouragements or trials can dampen. O, how it fired the soul of the Apostle, when, in view of the fact of Christ's death, he looked out upon a world dead in sin, whose recovery and salvation is made possible by the blood of Christ! Men who had not learned the secret power that wrought within him, looked upon his career with amazement, and called him insane. But this he heeded not. "Whether we be beside ourselves, it is to God, and whether we be sober, it is for your cause. For the love of Christ constraineth us."

Such are the men whom God in every age has most highly honored, as instruments in the conversion of souls; men, who like Whitefield and Wesley, and Tennent and Davies, and Nettleton, knew nothing among men, but Jesus Christ and him cruci fied. Having won many to righteousness, they shine as the stars in the firmament forever and ever. Blessed is that church to whom God gives such a ministry.

He then, that like Paul, purposes to know nothing but Christ crucified, does not thereby limit himself to a narrow sphere of life; he does not cramp his mind, by fastening it to one narrow round of duty and study. The farthest from it, possible. As he devotes himself to Him whose name is above every name, so he devotes himself, his being, to the one work of fathoming and unfolding and impressing the one idea, which is above every other idea revealed to man; most sublime, most comprehensive, most mighty, vast enough for an angel's study through eternity; mighty enough to justify his reliance upon it under God, to accomplish all the purposes of his office.

Fathers and Brethren of the General Assembly:

At the close of another ecclesiastical year, under the care of the great Head of the Church, we are gathered here, from our various fields of labor, to mingle our sympathies and prayers, and to inquire what we can do to promote the interests of our common Zion. It is not for me to designate the particular topics of our inquiry, nor to indicate the specific results we should endeavor to secure. But may I not remind you that we all meet in these

assemblies never but once. What we do may be reviewed in other assemblies, but we ourselves shall never all meet to review it till we stand before the throne of God. I see before me but few of those with whom I was called to act a year ago. Most of them are yet in the field, but some have fallen asleep. It becomes us, therefore, to act on this occasion as in full view of the solemnities of eternity. We are reminded, too, by the history of each year, as it passes, that our time is short, and what we have to do for Christ we must do quickly. I cannot speak of all whom God hath taken from the number of our ministry the past year; but there are three of whom I cannot doubt you will permit me to speak for one moment, especially since they illustrate the truths I have endeavored to present.

There are few men who have been the means, in the hands of God, of the conversion of more souls to Christ than the late Rev. JAMES GALLAHER, of Missouri. In Tennessee, his native State, in Kentucky, in Ohio, in Illinois and Missouri, not to speak of transient labors in this eastern portion of the field, his labors in the pastoral office, but pre-eminently in revivals, for nearly forty years, have been abundant and greatly successful. His plain, clear, and earnest presentation of the great truths of the gospel, and especially of the plan of redemption, told with amazing ef fect upon his hearers. In the "big meetings," so called, of the west, few have been so popular, or wielded so much power. He was eminently at home in them. He loved their sacred songs. He loved beyond all things to point the inquirer to the Lamb of God. The call from Heaven to come up higher found him in his favorite work, with the harness on, and appointments out, yet to be fulfilled. The call was sudden, unexpected, but he was ready. The mercy of God in Christ on which he had rested in life, gave him repose in death. The 103d Psalm, and the 53d chapter of Isaiah, always favorite portions of scriptures with him, were peculiarly expressive and precious then. They speak of the mercy of the Lord from everlasting to everlasting, through Him that was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities. As this had been the great theme of his preaching, so was it the source of his joy and triumph in the hour of dissolution.

From another and a very different sphere of labor, and yet one most intimately connected with the enlargement of the borders of our Zion, and the salvation of souls, the excellent and beloved CHARLES HALL has been called to his rest. Familiar, from its earliest beginnings, with our Home Missionary cause, in its general plans and in its minutest details, with a mind fitted to appreciate the magnitude of the enterprise, with a heart that responded to its very centre to the cry of the needy, with wisdom to plan, and energy to execute rarely equalled, with a soul so filled with the love of Christ as to make him entirely impartial in the management of possibly conflicting interests, toiling for twenty-seven

years with unsparing faithfulness, in weariness and painfulness often, in afflictions, in anxieties, in sicknesses, until at length the overtasked frame gave way-the silver cord was loosed, and the pitcher broken at the fountain; it is not strange that the intelligence of his death vibrated painfully through the heart of the Church, and especially through the hearts of those who have been the special objects of his prayers and labors throughout the Home Missionary field. It is not for us to measure the relative influence of men in different departments of labor; but no one can doubt that, though never filling the pastoral office, yet, considering his connection with the vast work of supplying the destitute throughout the land with an evangelical ministry, and considering too his eminent qualifications for the office he filled so long, few if any can have accomplished more for the cause of Christ than he. Seldom has there been exhibited a more striking example of what an undivided purpose and an eye single to the glory of God will enable a man to accomplish.

Your thoughts, my brethren, anticipate me as they turn to the office in this Assembly made vacant by death. Dr. E. W. GILBERT held the office of Permanent Clerk of the Assembly from the memorable era of disruption, 1838, to his death. Long will his memory be cherished by all that knew him. We love to speak of his kindness and patience, of his promptness and fidelity, of his deep solicitude and earnest love for the Church of his affections, her order, her doctrines, her peace and her prosperity. I must be permitted in this public manner to express my own. personal obligations for the timely suggestions of his riper experience, in the discharge of the duties to which I was called by the last Assembly. But it is to his language, in immediate view of death that I call your especial attention. If I ever preach again, is his language, I will preach Christ more. I have preached too much to the intellect, too little to the heart. Thus to us all, will this work of preaching appear, as we look back from the bed of death. Could he have known, when we were about to dissolve the last Assembly, in a few months his work on earth would be at an end, I doubt not he would have arrested our proceedings by an appeal which would have thrilled our every heart.-Brethren, preach Christ more! And now from that bed of death he speaks to us in the earnestness of a soul that was seeing earthly things in the light of eternity, "Brethren, preach Christ more. Know nothing among men, but Jesus Christ, and him crucified."

SERMON DCXXVII.

BY REV. A. ELMENDORF,

PASTOR OF THE NORTH REFORMED DUTCH CHURCH, BROOKLYN, N. Y.

THE EXCESS OF FUTURE GLORY OVER PRESENT SUFFERING. "For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”—Rom. viii. 18.

THIS is not the language either of the feelings or of the imagination, but of a faith which is "the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen." It was uttered by that remarkable man whom the Son of God constituted a chosen vessel to bear his name "before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel," and respecting whom, he who has all power in heaven and earth, in the day of his conversion, said, "I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake." From that hour to the one when he gave expression to the words before us, embracing a long interval, he trod a path of thorns and stemmed the floods of affliction. His enemies hated and hunted him wherever he went; they treated him like a felon and an outlaw; they waylaid him on his journeys, dragged him before magistrates, stripped and scourged him in public assemblies; heaped on him every indignity, subjected him to every outrage, and inflicted on him every cruelty which a satanic ingenuity could invent or a ferocious hand could execute. Disaster, malevolence, and injury, seemed his heritage,-until, in tracing the record of his griefs, though they had by no means yet reached their consummation, he wrote," of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods; once was I stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day have I been in the deep; in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches." Out of the depths of such an experience, but with a heart lustrous with the hope of immortality, and the blessedness of the eternal future beaming upon his spirit, Paul exclaimed, "For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us."

The great theme of the chapter from which the text is taken, is the security of the believer,-the validity of his title to eternal life, a statement of the evidences which prove his right to it, and a protracted and glowing argument to show that nothing in all the universe shall exclude him from its possession. Having reached the very climax of the Christian's privileges, in asserting that he is an heir of God, and a joint heir with Jesus, the elderborn son, the thought seems to occur to the Apostle's mind, that the afflictions incident to the present condition of the believer, may appear discordant with his exalted destiny, when he, at once, declares the necessity of these afflictions as a prerequisite to the end in question,-in the words, "If so be that we suffer with Christ that we may, also, be glorified together ;" and then follows the language of the text,-in our reflections on which, we remark,

I. That the Apostle does not design here to underrate the sufferings of the Christian, either in respect of their real nature or their distressing effects on the present happiness of their subject. He does not mean either to adopt or to affect an unamiable and indurated stoicism, by asserting that pain should not be regarded as such, nor to teach that sorrow is the minister of immediate pleasure. But he institutes a comparison between the afflictions of the faithful disciple and their results, and affirms that the latter so immeasurably exceed the former as to lose any appearance of proportion or correspondence; when thus contrasted they become, as he elsewhere expresses it, "light, and are but for a moment;" while these constitute 'a far more exceeding, even an eternal weight of glory." But let us briefly turn to the sufferings here referred to,-their character, designs, and alleviations.

Whatever of trial or trouble affects the child of God, though by no means peculiar to his calling,-even if it be such as is common to humanity,-because it befalls him, exerts a specific influence on him and accomplishes gracious ends with respect to him, -is, in a certain sense, sacred, and becomes Christian suffering. And here we see one group of God's anointed in the depths of poverty. We advert not now to those who while the winter's wind sweeps over the northern hills, gather around a blazing hearth, or lie down on an easy and well-covered bed; whose persons are warmly clad and whose table is always supplied with what befits a wholesome and generous appetite; but who yet, it may be from pride and unthankfulness, call themselves poor, because they have not all the luxuries and hoards of the wealthy. No, we allude to those who, like their Master, have scarcely where to lay their heads; whose thin garments every breeze penetrates; who can tell of bitter nights and days of hunger, and who as the scanty repast of the evening was finished have often grown faint as the child asked, "Father, mother, what kind hand will bring us bread to-morrow?" There too, as we divide the household of