messenger to the captive Jews, was in danger of being flattered into a good opinion of his hearers, while they attended him in crowds. But God, who searcheth the heart, plainly tells him, they meant to compliment his eloquence, not to receive the word at his lips, Ezek. xxxiii. 31. "They come unto thee as my people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness. And, lo! thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument; for they hear thy words, but they do them not.". O, my brethren! there are those who seem to be religious, who are regular, and apparently devout in their attendance on ordinances, and yet refuse Him that speaketh from heaven. They assume the Christian name, but they have not "the mind of Christ." They profess obedience to Christ in the Gospel, but they "will not come to him that they might have life."-They have the form of godliness, but are strangers to the life of God in the soul. They do many things in obedience to Christ, but they have not renounced their vain confidence nor their most beloved lusts. They are returned by repentance, but not to the Most High. Their faces are towards Canaan, but their hearts are in Egypt. Ó fearful delusion!-Sirs, methinks the very mentioning of these things should be enough to alarm us;

enough to put us all upon a heart-searching inquiry; enough to bring us with a trembling solicitude to the Throne of Grace, crying, "Lord, is it I?” "Search me, O God! and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." The graceless professor, though not far from the kingdom of God, is the most unlikely to enter. Publicans and harlots enter before him. And, O distressing thought! after a life of profession, to find a "Mene, Tekel" written against us in heaven; and to hear that Jesus, whom we now profess to love, with lips full of indignation, sentence us to dwell with everlasting burnings, as those who would not hear his most gracious voice! Oh! this were the very emphasis of woe!

SERMON II.

HEB. xii. 25.

See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh; for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on carth, much more shall not we escape if we turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven.

(SECOND SERMON FROM THE TEXT.)

HAVING thus stated this melancholy fact, that many refuse and turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven, it may be proper to inquire into the occasion of this strange and injurious conduct.

As to the Jews, their opposition to the Lord Jesus in great measure arose from the mistaken notions they had formed of the promised Messiah, and from their strong prejudices in favour of the Mosaic Institutions. They could not easily relinquish their highly raised expectations of worldly eminence and dominion, and follow the despised Nazarene. They could not easily bear to see the sacred institutions of Moses, and all their venerable rites, like a wornout garment thrown aside as of no further use, and the religion of their pious fathers exchanged for what appeared to them a novel system. These

prejudices (separate from the consideration of the sacrifice that must be made of the emoluments of office by the very many who served the sanctuary) no doubt operated powerfully, and were hard to overcome. We have not these difficulties in our way; and yet the messengers of a Saviour's love, in our nation and in our day, have too much reason to mourn and cry, "Who hath believed our report?" The blessed Jesus, whom all the angels in heaven worship, whose sacred Name is sweetly sounded on all their golden harps;-Jesus, who, "though he was rich, yet for our sakes became poor," who changed the glory which he had with the Father before the world was, for the insults of mortals, and the shame and agony of the cross;Jesus, who loved us and died for us, is treated with a cold neglect or a determined opposition. He comes to win the nations with blessings purchased with his blood. He comes to call us from a state of condemnation, from the very confines of hell, to his everlasting kingdom and glory, but he is refused.

He renews the kind overture, and earnestly expostulates; "Turn ye, turn ye; for why will ye die?" "Come now, and let us reason together: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." "Hear instruction and be wise, and Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of iny doors for whoso findeth me, findeth life, and

refuse it not.

shall obtain favour of the Lord; but he that sinneth against me, wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me, love death." But, alas! what multitudes, in proud disdain and contempt, or in trifling indifference, turn aside from him, and will not give him the hearing. While their ears are open to every one who will feed their vanity, or gratify their curiosity, or consult their worldly interest, they treat the blessed Redeemer as an impertinent intruder, when he would sound the sweet accents of salvation in their ears, and lead them to eternal glory and joy.Sirs, this is a most serious matter: let us inquire into the reasons of it, and see if there be not a remedy.

Some turn aside from Him that speaketh from heaven, because they do not know, and are deter mined they will not believe, that it is the voice of God. There are not a few of those who laugh at all religion as a mere delusion, and treat the Bible as a book of fables. Indeed, Sirs, the growing infidelity of the present day ought to be bitterly lamented by us. The principles of it are eagerly caught at by a depraved mind; and the patrons and abettors of it, inflamed with hellish zeal, are diffusing their poison in all companies; and, alas! with too much success. Does it ever operate, my dear friends,

in

any of your minds? Let me entreat you, not to be Christians merely because your parents were such, but to be serious in your inquiries. With the noble Bereans, search the Scriptures, and let them speak for themselves. They carry their own inherent