man.

day, rigid abstinence from outward sin, diligent exertion in schemes of usefulness, great anxiety for the spread of the Gospel, perhaps; and, again, an association with what are called religious professors, and a great desire to pick up their religious phraseology. This is the active form of self-righteousness. We are coming to something deeper, something more subtle in the working of self-righteousness in the inner Let me explain this. Men derive peace, or they want to derive peace (strange and paradoxical as it may appear) from their own sin of unbelief. We find, dear brethrenmany of us can understand this, many hearts here can respond to what I say we find many who are pleased with their own unbelief. They tell us they cannot believe the full declaration of Gospel truth. We ask them, Can you believe that God is your Father? Can you believe the record, that God hath given to you eternal life in Jesus Christ? And many are satisfied because they cannot believe, pleased because they belong to the class of more humble Christians; and the books that are abroad in the world are spreading these principles far and wide, leaving, as specimens to be imitated, the history of those humble ones-so humble, that they cannot believe God's truth. Men are satisfied with their sin of unbelief. They think they are timid, humble believers, as they are called. Unbelieving believers !"-Rev. W. H. Krause.

"Every heart that opens sincerely and evangelically to Christ, opens to Him in deep humility and sense of its emptiness and unworthiness; all self-righteou-ness is given up as dung and dross. Now to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.' Here is the true way of justification; when the imputed righteousness of Christ comes, all selfrighteousness vanishes before it. By 'him that worketh not,' understand not an idle, lazy believer, that takes no care of the duties of obedience; no, an idle faith can never be a

saving faith. But the meaning is, he worketh not in a law sense, to the ends and intentions of the first covenant; to make up a righteousness to himself by his own working, to cover himself with a robe of righteousness of his own spinning and weaving-a home-made cloth; no, not a rag of that. Thou must receive Christ into an empty, naked, unworthy soul; or not receive Him at all.”—Flavel.

"'Twas an unhappy division that has been made between faith and works. Though in my intellect I may divide them, just as in the candle I know there is both light and heat, but yet put out the candle, and they are both gone; one remains not without the other; so it is betwixt faith and works."-Selden.

488

REPENTANCE.

"I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face:" HOSEA V, 15.

MAN, as a fallen creature, cannot restore his faculties, so that they should be able to apprehend God. We have none of us any power, by nature, by which we may understand, choose, or love God, as a Being of perfect justice and holiness, as well as mercy and love. Our hearts are so far gone from that original righteousness, in which we were created in Adam, that such a God is offensive to us, and therefore we hate Him, and turn from Him. Why is any book more acceptable than the Bible? Why, if we are left in a room by ourselves for a quarter of an hour, with no other books than an almanack and a Bible, do we take up the former? Why is God not only a rare subject of common conversation, but an unacceptable subject, bringing the person, who reverently mentions His name, into suspicion of preciseness, if not insanity? Why does the world hear with more patience the name of God mentioned in an oath than in a prayer? i.e., blasphemed rather than honoured? There is but one answer that is satisfactory; 'Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks,' and the life acts. If men loved God they would talk of Him with pleasure, they would act to and for God. Whom we love, we talk of,

we applaud, we delight in, we associate with. And does your own conduct, or that of the world, persuade you that God is this object of supreme desire, either to yourself or to them? Speak out plainly, and let not your heart deceive you. Is not this fact? I know it to be so with you. Then ought you not to be convinced that something is radically wrong somewhere? The fact is, that sin has perverted and corrupted all the faculties of your soul; has erased the Divine image, and stamped upon you the depraved image of your fallen. parent, Adam. He begat sons and daughters in his own likeness,' i.c., in his own moral depravity and sin. Is not this a horrid thought? But is it not true, both from Scripture and experience? Does not your own heart inform you that it is so?

"Then what is to be done? Confess it. Go to your God in self-accusation and self-abhorrence. Tell Him that you

have nothing but sin within you; that you are by nature vile, vain, proud, and a creature utterly undeserving. Tell Him that you are unworthy of the smallest crumb that sustains life; and that your sins are more in number than the hairs of your head; that they far exceed your knowledge of them, both in number and malignity; and that, compared with His holiness, you are a fallen creature indeed. Now this sense of sin, of our own sins as individuals, is the groundwork of all real repentance. This denotes that broken and contrite heart, which God will not despise. This was the feeling of him who would only advance to the threshold of the temple, beat upon his breast, and, not caring to lift up his eyes to heaven, exclaimed-'God be merciful to me a sinner!"" Correspondence of the Rev. H. Budd.

"Mine iniquities are gone over my head, as an heavy burden, they are too heavy for me' (Psalm xxxviii, 4). It is a sure sign that a man is awakened out of his sleep, when he discovers the error of his dream. In the drawing up of

water out of a deep well, so long as the bucket is under water, we feel not the weight of it; but as soon as it comes above water it begins to hang heavy on the hand. When a man dives under water, he feels no weight of the water, though there may be many tons of it over his head; whereas a tub half full of the same water, taken out of the river, and set upon the same man's head, would be very burdensome to him, and make him soon grow weary of it. In like manner, so long as a man is over head in sin, he is not sensible of the weight of sin, it is not troublesome to him; but when he begins once to come out of that state of sin wherein he lay and lived before, then beginneth sin to hang heavy upon him, and he groans under the weight thereof. So long as sin is in the will, the proper seat of sin, a man feels not the weight of it, but, like a fool, it is sport and pastime to him to do evil. It is therefore a good sign that sin is removed out of its seat, out of its chair of state, when it begins to be burdensome to us; and such a sense of sin may well be considered as an entrance into a state of grace."-Bogatzky.

"There is a warning conscience, and a gnawing conscience, The warning conscience cometh before sin, and the gnawing conscience followeth after sin. The warning conscience is often ulled asleep; but the gnawing conscience wakeneth her again. If there be any hell in this world, they who feel the worm of conscience gnaw upon their hearts, may truly say that they have felt the torments of hell. Who can express that man's anguish but himself? Nay, what horrors are there which he cannot but express himself? Sorrows are met in his soul as at a feast; and fear, thought, and anguish divide his soul between them. All the furies of hell leap upon his heart as on a stage. Thought calleth to fear; fear whistleth to horror; horror beckoneth to despair, and saith, 'Co.Le and help me to torment this sinner.' One saith she c meth from this sin; and another saith that she comet.