one pilot, and one freight; they are all freighted with precious treasure, and they are all steering towards the same port. Oh! is not this blessed unity? My soul rejoices as I sketch the picture before you, and seems to feel, that in the midst of all the apparent diversity, there is real unity in the Church of God.

Oh! what a motive should this give us, to work it out, and to seek by every means in our power to display it! Oh! how should it lead us to ask-If our Lord had in His eye a lost world, and this was the object He had in view, why does it so little lie upon your heart and upon my heart? He would gather up His from the whole world; and He would have this principle exhibited, that the Gospel of His grace is a uniting Gospel.

Ah! beloved, if some of you that hear me, had but this solemn thought, as I went over the truth! I spake of some going on towards the same port; where are you going? I ask you, as before the heartsearching God, where are you going? whither are you steering? whither is your course? Where are your sails? why, they are but your passions? Where is your pilot? why, it is but self-will? Where is your compass? why, it is but the opinion of others? Where is your fruit? There are but empty boughs; nothing on them. Where is your ballast? why, you have none. Where is the port that you are steering to? Awful thought! what is the port?-ah! what is the port? Oh! that you may be led to pray earnestly over that question. It is a long eternity; it is either heaven or hell. Do not say, 'I am a member of a Church;' so was Judas. Do not say, 'I am a member of a Church;' so was Simon Magnus. Think of that twentieth chapter of the Acts-" grievous wolves among the flock," and "men arising of their own selves, speaking perverse things." Think of that eleventh of the first of Corinthians; a scrambling for the supper of the Lord, and some drunken! Oh! to be satisfied with just being a member of a Church, is a most fearful delusion. In apostolic days some did "creep in unawares;" did you? These are heart-searching questions; he that speaks them, would desire to have them put to his own spirit.

Perhaps some of you are indulging a secret misgiving' Is it all true? is Christ the Messiah? is the Bible true ?' My brother, we hate our divisions, they are hateful, and from my very soul I hate them, and mourn over them; but come and speak to us on that

which is vital, that which is essential, that which is fundamental, and we are all as one man. Come and ask us what merit we have: none. Come and ask us what sin we have: all sin. Come and ask us what righteousness we plead: the righteousness of God. Come and ask us what we think of mercy: we want it every moment. Come and ask us what we think of grace :-I want grace to help me in the moment of need, and every moment is a moment of need. Come and ask us what was it that gave us a new heart: we say, it was the love of God, the mere love of God; some may hesitate to go further with me, but I love to add, the sovereign love of God. I cannot leave it out; but some who agree not with me in the word, yet exclude all idea of worthiness in themselves, as much as I do; those who are taught of the Spirit of God do, for they hate all self-assumption, and lie low before God. Ask us all, where are our happiest moments: in communion with God. Ask us all, where are our bitterest moments: afar from God. Ask us all what we most desire for ourselves: conformity to God. Ask us all, what we most desire towards one another unity in Jesus.

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Oh! that God may lay these things upon our hearts and consciences; and the glory shall be His to all eternity.

THE BLESSED DEAD.

A SERMON,

BY THE REV. J. H. EVANS, M.A.

PREACHED IN JOHN STREET CHAPEL, KING'S ROAD, BEDFORD ROW, ON SUNDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 20, 1846.

"And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord, from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works do follow them."-Revelation xiv. 13.

SHORT as the period of my absence from you has been, yet death has made large and wide ravages. Six have been summoned out of this Church to the eternal, invisible world. Our aged sister West, our aged brother Jeakes, our aged sister the widow Cooke, our brother Warner in middle life, our sister Stubbs in middle life also, and our sister Neville in all the freshness of youth.

Yes, they have had their summons. They have escaped from the twilight of this world to the glorious light of heaven; from a world of conflict, to a world where conflict is known no more; from a state of constant sense of unworthiness, to the realisation of their full blessedness in Jesus. They are delivered from sin, the source of all sorrow:-oh! that it were felt to be the source of your sorrow, and my sorrow; it is the source, but oh! to know it as the source, the great source of all our grief on this side heaven!

It is an unspeakable mercy, that in all their cases, we believe, we have all reason to be assured, the summons was to glory. It was not the summons of a Judge, an angry Judge, bringing them to His bar; it was not the summons of a King, commanding their obedience; it was the summons of a Father, and that Father a holy, righteous God, full of love, whose justice had been eternally satisfied VOL. XIII.-No. 456.--September 24, 1846.

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on their behalf, whose law had been satisfied and glorified on their behalf, and who, having accomplished according to His infinite wisdom that which He had purposed concerning them, sends for them-sends for His soldiers out of the battle-field, sends for His children to His bosom, sends for His weary wanderers to come to their home.

Two of our sisters, and our brother, were in extreme old age. Our brother Warner, and our sister Stubbs, were in middle life :ob! how deep were her sufferings, and that for years! Our sister Neville had just joined the Church; the flower was in its early bud -and a lovely bud. All telling us, that "all flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of grass; the grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but (blessed be God,) the word of the Lord abideth for ever."

And besides these, there was one, the daughter of parents perhaps now present, a dear and lovely specimen of the grace of God, who was here as long as health lasted, though never joined to this or any outward section of the Church of God: yet a lovely flower of the Lord's garden, one of the loveliest I ever saw. And there is my beloved brother and father, Adams, whom conscience tells me, and my deep affection tells me too to speak of: a man from whom, of all men, I confess, I have received the greatest good in this place. We have often heard his voice here; we shall hear it no more. No, he is "clean escaped." But where shall we see bis like ?—for meekness, humility, devotedness-the bird on its wing, ready to fly in a moment for any service; faithfulness such as I never met with before; and tenderness that could look upon the feeblest one, and bear it. But I speak not to his praise. He is gone to his rest. Last Friday his body was consigned to the grave in Southampton Street.

I need not tell you, beloved, how at my first departure from you the Lord made me to feel the perishable nature of earthly happiness. In the family where I sojourned, the family of one of my dearest friends upon earth, a minister of the Establishment whom I love almost as my own soul, his wife was "taken away with a stroke," almost while I was there.

All this is deeply touching, deeply affecting. But it is deeply encouraging too; when we see how the Lord Jesus Christ is enough,

and makes His poor saints enough, to conquer sin, and death, and the grave, and hell. It ought to give us much hopefulness, that when our hour comes He will be the same to us, for He bears His feeblest ones as much upon His heart as His strongest:-oh! that that may be known to you and to me, and lived upon by you and by me. It ought to lead us, too, to much weanedness from earth, since we see how in a moment our dearest friends may be taken from us. It ought to make us covet communion, real communion with them, while we have them; and not waste our time in mere sympathy of taste and mere conversation. It ought to lead you and me to solemn inquiry—Am I prepared to die? Ah! compared with that, every other question is, as Cecil said, “ a grave impertinence."

All these circumstances seem to speak to us in commendation of this precious portion of the Word. They seem to throw a blessed light upon this passage : "I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth : yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works do follow them."

You observe, here is a double testimony; here is the testimony of the voice from heaven-here is the testimony of the Spirit in the Word. Oh! never forget, the Spirit beareth testimony in the Word, by the Word, not by fancies.

Here are two points for our serious and prayerful consideration. In the first place, remark who are the "blessed :" "the dead"they that "die in the Lord." Then let us consider briefly, what is the true ground of their blessedness. "I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works do follow them."

I. With regard to the first point, it seems a strange thing to pronounce "the dead" blessed. It is quite contrary to nature. The world would give no such decision; the world would say, 'Blessed are the living, blessed are the young, blessed are the healthful, blessed are the beautiful, blessed are the rich, the mighty, the clever.' No, says God; "blessed are the dead, that die in

the Lord."

Nothing is more evident, than that death is an unwelcome subject