-and this being sought, is given, and | Herchell, proclaim, 'that you have disgiven with progressive increase. The covered a new planet! that this discovery most exalted and experienced believer has been made with the help of light, needs his daily progressive cleansing; he conveyed through a medium of peculiar may be like Jacob's ladder his head power;'-and all are alert, as all were, may be in heaven, but his feet are still when the on the earth; and while in the flesh, he must remember that sin will strive within and assail him from without, but grace will be given when asked, and given without measure, grudge or delay.

|

Now when man has gone, and prayed, and obtained pardon, when he is sanctified and subdued, he is to be in all things an imitator of the Lord Jesus, he is to cultivate the "mind which was in Christ;" that mind exhibited itself in various demonstrations, one character pervading all, namely, humility. There may be humility of a certain kind where there is no grace, the Lord inculcated humility by precept and by example, he says in the 15th verse of this xiv. chap. of John, "I have given you an example that ye should do as I have done to you," to follow the example we must feel rightly and act in accordance with his will, so

above all, if there be pity in the preacher, | do not exhibit, delineate, and stigmatise -let him appeal to man in his career of the spiritual disease of man-and so urge fame, let him plead with woman in her man to the Great Physician whose righpride of beauty, gentleness, and kindness; teousness alone can atone, whose blood let him confront the soldier in his march, alone can cleanse! while drums beating, banners mocking the breeze, and the shouting of crowds are possessing his fascinated ear; let him stop the lawyer in his black letter lucubrations the cold-hearted clergyman (if such be) in his exclusive love of worldly literature and unsanctified repose; let him stop the angry zealot in his political dia- | tribes, and amid the ebullitions of domineering fanaticism, and say :— -Sirs! read this story of Jesus, the meek and the lowly -read this didactic narrative-perpend its precepts appreciate its importance "understandest thou what thou readest?" here is vileness implied, and pride discountenanced, and selfishness smitten at the root! Are we true to each other? are ministers indeed true to the gifted laity and their private friends?—was Robert Hall (the pride of English DEMANDED IN CONNECTION WITH THIS preachers) true to Sir James Mackintosh when he often wrote to him of things literary and temporal, but spoke not to him of a polluted heart ?—was there not one of the thousand clerics who read and lauded the prose and poetry of the Scottish Wizard, (so called, and who died of weariness of his own spells) to tell him of a cleansing, and a fountain—

The fountain filled with blood
Drawn from Immanuel's veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains?

Let not jealous criticism charge us with
forgetfulness of generosity to the honored
dead; they may have died safely, and
it may be happy; but they were too long
neglected as hundreds of you, the rich
and accomplished, are neglected, because
our ministerial love for you is of stunted
growth, and we are cowards in private
and dare not speak to each of you pri-
vately and individually-boldly, affec-
tionately, perseveringly, as we ought to
speak! Ah, woe be to us, ministers!
if we do not reveal man to himself; if we

II. Let us in the next place consider

THE FEELINGS AND CONDUCT WHICH ARE

CLEANSING.

We consider the gift of the blood and spirit as indispensable, as precious, and of unspeakable comfort; we acknowledge its power, we proclaim its efficacy; let it be ever remembered, that it was given to us" without money and without price," as far as we are concerned; but that it was nevertheless purchased for us; the terms agreed on in heaven, paid in earth, signed with the cross, and sealed with the blood of Jesus. We who have received the gift are paupers, we had nought to give for it; and since we received it, we have nought to offer save what we have received. Gratitude then is most bounden

and the remembrance of what we are and of what God has done for us, ought to be of itself, a most humiliating feeling. Those who feel that they were sinners are subdued, humble, grateful; the poor publican, the Syrophenician woman, the weeping Mary, the pardoned Peter, all these exemplify the feelings which become the cleansed and forgiven: but in our natural state, pride and darkness ob

scure our view. Let me illustrate this, to keep this before us, times of retirement

further. I can imagine in a great city, an institution in which are the daughters of sin and shame who had sought from man a refuge from polution, and the work of ruin, and from God pardon and cleansing. In this establishment, where the penitent daughters of sin have congregated, all is peace, order, obedience, humility, contrition; they feel compunction and shame—the memory of their guilt leaves them not they feel they are poor-they know they had sinned and led others to sin; so they have no pride nor contentions-once it was not thus with them: so, man, in his proud, educated, accomplished, and prosperous state, feels no sorrow-no shame-he knows not his poverty, he would probably adopt the language of Rev. iii. 17, "I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing," and he knows not that he is "wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked;"therefore, it is evident, he knows not God, that he has not yet attained cleansing, for cleansing must bring a memorial of his poverty and unworthiness, and in that remembrance he would have been humbled; humbled, aye, as these poor creatures who knew their sinfulness, for what are we all but vile sinners; who can say what elements of guilt are slumbering at this moment in his soul? Contrast light with darkness, hatred with love; contrast Judas with Jesus, sin with holiness, earth with heaven-and we have some idea what the heart is before a God of absolute holiness: the very angels are not pure in his sight,

"They veil their faces while they cry Thrice glory to their God most high !" Mediation is therefore greatly needed, if we would cultivate humility; we must reflect on what God has done for us. The xvi. of Ezekiel exhibits what the Jewish Church was, and in this a natural heart may be depicted also. The wonder that God would think of us, and does think of us, worms, should never be lost sight of; and

for meditation should be sedulously arranged and adhered to. The Lord, in washing the feet of the disciples, shewed us a beautiful example of the extent to which our sympathy and care should extend; the act most lovely, the example most significant, that what he did for us, (in them) we ought also do for each other, namely, stoop to the humblest, meanest offices, if we can bring comfort, health, or blessing to the people of God.

Now, of all the tender kindly ways in which love can be shewn, asking no return, expecting none, it is when the memories of the dead are brought before us, the sorrow of the widow, and the pennyless, pitiless, unprotected and most endangered state of the orphan. Do you desire to practice love, generosity, humility? in no one way, can you so easily, so speedily, and so usefully fulfil the master's call, as thus, "visit the fatherless and widow in their affliction." Some three hundred little ones of our deceased Protestant brethren exclaim in the language of Lamentations of Jeremiah, v. 3, "We are orphans and fatherless-our mothers are as widows;" these are now fed, clothed, sheltered, and educated by the Protestant Orphan Society. They have had to reject as many more in the last two years, for charity was loitering and needs to be aroused. By no one carnal feeling would I address you, but I would reason thus, "If you love Christ and value his cleansing and will obey his precept, then this noble Society will have many a communication from you; it is easy for many to comply; determine this day, and to-morrow let your bounty find its way to the Office of the Society.

This bounty, this demonstration of love, will testify to man that your profession is sincere. God grant that many here know what this cleansing is. God grant that those who do not, may now and henceforth know it and value it for

ever.

of THE DANGER
THE HAPPINESS OF APPRECIATING WHAT
THE LORD, BY PRACTICE AND PRECEPT,
This truth
must be proclaimed, rigid and awful,
but spoken in love "ye are clean, but
not all !"

OF NEGLECTING, AND

HAS HERE INCULCATED.

III. Let me, in the last place, speak | ship with Jesus; such a heart will say, "that in the friendship and fellowship of Jesus, there is gladness, and honour, and peace, and joy," and the possessors of such hearts will follow him, obey him; love each other, love his poor, love his little lambs, speak comfortably to mourners, and wipe away tears from the eyes of the fatherless; they will speak to them of the friendship of Jesus; they will urge them to seek this friendship, and they will tell them, that this day, Jesus invites poor sinners to meet him and to be his friends.

If the Lord had merely commanded, speaking from heaven, our duty was plain; but he took flesh, inhabited earth, did, himself, fully, plainly, kindly, humbly, explain all that he desired us to receive and fulfil, hence, we are left without excuse. There is danger of trifling, the appeal that touches the heart to-day, (if neglected or its objects postponed for some selfish consideration) were it repeated, next Sunday, would have lost its power; we know not what we do when we quench the risings of conscience within, and bid convictions depart, when we reject the offered pardon and consequently bid charity be silent, and conscience slumber in reckless repose. Another Sabbath, and we may not be here; ere another Sabbath many will be widows, and many will be fatherless. Another Sabbath, and hell and heaven will be encreased in their inhabitants. Dear Friends, when we die, opportunities are then passed away—the orphan's cry is seen no more nor the sob of the widow known any more-nor the voice of the preacher heard any more; we have then lost cleansing, and humility, and benevolence; we had no pity on the fatherless, we pleaded not for the widows, it is a terrible record that declares, "I will have judgment without mercy on him that shewed no mercy."

66

But, ere we close, let us turn to the happy subject of appreciating the truths and precepts of Jesus." Happy the heart that knows it's own joy this day! that feels the spirit of adoption bedewing the soul-that feels peace like a stream gliding over the frame, and an assurance declaring that the heart is right with God. Such a heart will testify to its love for Christ, to its fellow

How shall we persuade men of the honour comprehended in fellowship with Christ! If a man (says St. John xiv. 23.) love me, he will keep my words, and my Father will love him and we will come and make our abode with him." Happy believer! the Father, Son, and Spirit dwelling in him; how faint is all Oh! earthly honour compared to this ! why are we so alive to earthly honour and place and emolument, and so cold when Christ invites us?

Go and tell the subordinate officer that his general invites him to his table, his home, his heart :--tell that general his Sovereign has sent for him to clothe him in ducal robes, and the insignia of England's noblest military order; tell a subordinate clergyman that he is chosen by the Sovereign to wear the mitre of the prelate ; tell the lawyer that he is selected to wear the coif of the serjeant, or the ermine of the judge, and each will be affected-he cannot feel as man if he be not affected; and now, when Christ's message has come, so sweet, so kind, so admonitory, so edifying, what can we do? we cannot resist, we must give our hearts," take them, O Lord, for we cannot give them! keep them, O Lord, for we cannot keep them for thee!” And now, O Lord, bless the appeal, have pity upon these present, dispose their hearts to know and love thee, and to cherish those little ones whose cry this day is, "We are orphans and fatherless, our mothers are as widows!"

THE FATHERLESS.

A SERMON,

PREACHED IN TRINITY CHURCH, DUBLIN,

ON THURSDAY, 2ND APRIL, 1840, ON BEHALF OF THE ORPHANS (TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY IN NUMBER) CONNECTED WITH

THE PROTESTANT ORPHAN SOCIETY,

BY THE REV. THOMAS DREW, A.M.
Incumbent of Christ's Church, Belfast.

LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH, v. 3.

"We are orphans and fatherless, our mothers (are) as widows."

We are ever willing to admit that God is | sympathetic feeling and alarm, when

all wise and all powerful. If we wanted to illustrate this omniscience and omnipo tence in a manner at once simple and convincing, we may refer to prophecy and to the fulfilment of prophecy. God, in his prophetic declarations, evidencing a wisdom beyond the reach of man, and in the controuling power exercised in the fulfilments of prophecy, exhibiting his potency and sovereignty; the history of the times, in which Jeremiah lived, affords a remarkable and satisfactory illustration of what is thus asserted; he uttered many prophecies and he lived to see them fulfilled, even to minute particularity; it was a time of sorrow and suffering, and the pious heart of Jeremiah was deeply afflicted under the sin and obstinacy of his people. No writer, in the Bible, appears to have suffered under more protracted affliction. It has been said of this book of Lamentations, "a sagacious discerner would think every letter written with a tear; every word the sound of a breaking heart, and the writer, a man of sorrows, who scarcely ever breathed but in sighs or spoke but in groans!" The spirit exhibited in his prophetic writings becomes still more deeply imbued with sorrow, in his Lamentations, which cannot be read without

The last chapter

we see how the slow indignation of God has its assured time of visitation and that in proportion to forbearance, may be the weight of indignation. Jeremiah began his prophetic work in the 13th year of Josiah: by his various "shadows" of the "boiling pot," the "marred girdle," "the breaking of a vessel on the potter's wheel," "the yokes," and other illustrative demonstrations, he exhibited the coming events," which were fulfilled with terrific accuracy. (36th) of the 2d Book of the Chronicles, contains a succinct account of the various changes, the depositions of monarchs, the dogged obduracy of the people, the slaughter of many in the very sanctuary, the leading of men captive and the abstraction of brilliant and costly vessels to become the glory of the spoiler in his idolatrous land. All this was done, (saith the 21 v.) to fulfil the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah.” Jeremiah lived to see these visitations, and having previously, with many tears and entreaties, warned the people of them, when the heaviest blow was struck, he proved himself at once true to God, and yet sympathising in his nation's disasters; few have ever furnished such testimonials of their patriotic affliction.