and sent to condemnation. Turn with humble penitence to the cross of Christ, and approach God by him; bend your knee before the throne of grace, plead the merits of the Redeemer's blood, and be "reconciled by his death."

May God grant you these blessings for the sake of his Son. Amen.

VII.

ON THE DISCOURAGEMENTS OF PIOUS MEN.*

[PREACHED AT BEDFORD, MAY, 1815.]

NUMBERS xxi. 4.—And the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way.

It is generally understood and believed that the Old Testament is in great part typical. The history of the deliverance of Israel is a type of redemption by Jesus Christ; the paschal lamb a type of the great Passover. The journey of the people through the wilderness represented our pilgrimage through this world; and the land of Canaan was a shadow of the heavenly rest. Viewed in this light, many parts afford direction and consolation peculiarly suited to individual experience.

I shall take leave to accommodate this passage as an expression of what frequently befalls the

* Printed from the Notes of the Rev. Samuel Hillyard.

people of God in this world; their "souls are greatly discouraged, because of the way."

The present life is a way; it is not the end of our being it is not our rest, it is not our abode; but the place of our pilgrimage, a passage to eternity.

There are two ways; the way to heaven, marked out by the example of Christ, and the way to perdition, marked out by an evil world. But there are many discouragements that the christian meets with, though he is in the way to heaven. These we shall point out in the first place, and then direct you to some considerations to remove these discouragements.

I. I shall point out the discouragements in the way; and, in doing this, I shall keep my eye on the pilgrimage of the people who were originally referred to in the text.

1. The way is circuitous, and therefore discouraging. This is suggested in the beginning of this verse: "And they journeyed from Mount Hor, by the way of the Red Sea, to compass the land of Edom;" they took a way which was round about, which added to the tediousness of their journey. Their nearest route would have made it comparatively easy; but, instead of taking this, they went up and down in the wilderness. When we consider what God had done for this people in Egypt, it might have been expected that all the way would have been prosperous; that joy would have been heard in their tents, and triumph attended their march; and it would have been seen that they were the people of God by the blessings

which they enjoyed: but, instead of this, they met with delays, hinderances, and troubles, till they murmured against Moses and Aaron, saying, "Why were we brought out hither? Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt.” Thus, souls that are brought to Jesus, and delivered from the slavery of sin and the curse of the law, in their first ardour overlook trials, and think of nothing but enjoyments; they do not anticipate the fightings and fears that are the portion of God's Israel. After a time, through want of watchfulness and care, the love of their espousals begins to decline, the world regains a degree of influence, the Spirit is grieved, and they fear God has become their enemy: they seem to themselves to go backward, and, indeed, are in danger of doing so, if they neglect to watch and pray; and much time is spent in mourning, retracing, and recovering, the ground that has been lost. This is too common a course there is provision made for something better; there are promises and comforts which should encourage us to advance from strength to strength; but, through our neglects, we feel that we go backward instead of forward, and are therefore discouraged.

2. The way is through a wilderness, and is, therefore, discouraging. Moses reminded Israel of this, in Deuteronomy: "You remember how you went through the wilderness, a waste land, not sown or tilled, where there was no trace of human footsteps, and where no man dwelled." A wilder

*Exod. xvi. 3.

ness is distinguished by the absence of necessary sustenance there was no corn, nor vine, nor olive; nothing to sustain life. Thus this world is a state of great privations; men are often literally straitened with poverty, penury and sorrow, and know not how to conduct themselves in their difficulties: the supplies which they once had may be exhausted; and, though they have seen the hand of God in affording them what was necessary on former occasions, they are ready to say, Though the rock has supplied us, and the manna has descended, yet "can God spread a table for us in the wilderness?" With respect to the blessings of this life, they live by faith, and frequently have no provision or prospect for futurity.

But, in a spiritual sense, this world is also a wilderness. It has no natural tendency to nourish the spiritual life; nothing is derived from it of that kind: though spiritual blessings are enjoyed in it, the christian knows they are not the produce of the soil; the "bread" which he eats "cometh down from heaven;" the perpetual exhibition and communication of that one bread is all his support. Jesus Christ says, "I am the Bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead; but he that eateth of this bread shall never die. My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed."* The ordinances of the gospel do not support and comfort us any farther than there is a heavenly communication and influence attending them. This is not peculiar to the poor : *John vi. 48-50, 55.

the rich, who abound in worldly things, feel that this is a wilderness to their souls; they feel that there is something to which earthly treasures are not suited; wants which they cannot supply. The same bread that feeds the poor must feed them, or they will be lean from day to day: on this they depend as much as the meanest around them. David felt this when he said, "I stretch forth my hands unto thee: my soul thirsteth after thee, as a thirsty land."* "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. When shall I come and appear before God?" "Deliver me from the men of this world, who have their portion in this life." "Then shall I be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness." There was nothing on earth to satisfy him; he felt the present world to be a wilderness, because it was a state of absence from the divine presence. The christian is a child of promise and of hope, and his eye is directed to the "glory that shall be revealed."

Again there is much intricacy in the christian's pilgrimage. There were no paths in the wilderness; the Israelites could not have explored their way but by the direction of the pillar of fire and of the cloud so the christian knows not how to explore his path. There are doctrinal difficulties by which we are perplexed, and errors to which we are continually exposed, and which we know not how to escape but by attention to "the light that shineth in a dark place." There are voices that are heard Psalm xlii. 1, 2. Psalm xvii. 15.

*Psalm exliii. 6.