altogether devoted to God. Make it your chief concern to live by faith in Christ your Saviour, bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, and meditate day by day on the coming of the Lord and on the glory which shall follow. Live thus in holiness and righteousness before God; in faith, and peace, and hope; and then, when all other hopes shall perish, and all this world's pleasures come utterly to an end, you, with all God's faithful people, will receive the "end of your faith;" the fulfilment of your hope, and the satisfaction of every desire of good, that ever you have ventured to entertain. And "now may the God of hope, fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost."1

1 Rom. xv. 13.

SERMON XII.

IMPENDING JUDGMENT.

ZEPHANIAH i. 14—16.

"The great day of the Lord is near, it is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of the Lord: the mighty man shall cry there bitterly. That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. A day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers."

THE day of tribulation here spoken of, refers to the destruction of Judah by the armies of Nebuchadnezzar. But my purpose in selecting the words of the prophet for the subject of our present meditation, is to lead you to consider the character of that day which is yet to come upon the world, and of the awfulness and desolation of which the text presents us with a vivid and fearful description. What, therefore, I shall endeavour to press upon your attention is, first, the prospect of future events as disclosed to us in the word of God; and, secondly, what the ministers of God are, meanwhile, to proclaim to their people, and what re

ception their testimony is likely to meet with; and may God open the hearts of all, to receive with meekness, that word of truth which, if received aright, will save the soul.

First, then, we are to inquire, what is the prospect before us, as made known to us in the word of God. What is that which has been revealed from heaven by the High and Holy One who inhabiteth eternity? It is this: that a day is coming, a day of wrath; a day of trouble and distress; a day of wasteness and desolation; a day of darkness and gloominess; a day of clouds and thick darkness; a day when not only the sickly and weak, the superstitious and timid, shall tremble for fear, but when even the mighty man shall cry bitterly, and the proud man shall come down from his pride, and the stout-hearted shall be seized with alarm. This, then, is the prospect before us; and this, remember, is not a highly wrought and exaggerated account of that day which creation is waiting for. Awful as the description is, it falls short of what the reality will be. If the inspired prophet could speak in such terms of terror of the judgment of Jerusalem, where shall we find language strong enough to declare the terrors of the judgment to come? God's former judgments have been but types of that greater judgment which is yet to be inflicted.

The truth of His threatenings, and the power of His arm, have in some measure already been seen; but the time is yet to come, when both His truth and His power shall be more universally confessed.

Time, my brethren, ere long, will bring about that predicted day, for whose coming the world, for the most part, is so ill prepared. This day is little thought of: its character, its certainty, its near approach, are but little considered. But this has always been the case. Men have scarcely ever believed that God would, indeed, fulfil His word, and punish them for their sins. Did not the world before the flood, disbelieve that the flood would come? did not the Jews before the captivity, disbelieve that Jerusalem should be taken? and did they not, before their final dispersion, disbelieve what our Lord with tears had told them, that their house should be left unto them desolate? It is nothing new then for men to disbelieve the truth of God. It is not a strange thing that they should refuse to believe what they wish may never come to pass. And surely, these considerations might well make all reflect, and constrain them to go and search with all anxiety, the written word of God, to see if these things be So. For it is from His word we learn that a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of

wasteness and desolation is about to come upon this deluded world. That such a day is at hand, the word of the Lord declares. It is vain, therefore, to wish that it were otherwise. It is foolish to go blindly on, and to fancy that all is safe. It is dangerous to endeavour to put back the force of the word of God, and to settle down into self-satisfied security, without ever having given ourselves one hour's anxious thought, one hour's real concern, about that upon which-if what we speak is true-our soul's eternity depends.

Even suppose, that God had not so clearly stated in His word as He has, that this great and terrible day is drawing nigh, is there not enough in the state of the world to justify the thought, that such a day will come? Look around you on the way in which most men live. Do they give to God the honour due unto His name? Are not deceit and guile in our streets? Is not mischief also and sorrow in the midst of the world? Do we not see uncleanness, drunkenness, Sabbathbreaking, extortion, oppression, and hypocrisy ? Do we not hear the voice of the blasphemer, the slanderer, and the impure? Are not children brought up for the most part without any real regard to God; brought up chiefly for this world, and its pleasures and its business? Go into many a respectable family: stay with them from morning