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SELFISHNESS-SECTARIANISM.

Or, thirdly, perhaps the prophet fled, as he here describes, because he feared some bodily harm at Nineveh. In that case, it was not the Lord's will, it was Jonah's safety-it was not the salvation of a vast city, it was the peace and the comfort of a single soul, that was Jonah's ruling maxim. It was selfishness in man conflicting with mercy in God; and in that state of mind, no wonder though Jonah fled as from the presence of the Lord. If it was thus that he acted, then the earthly overlaid the heavenly, the human the divine. Instead of exhibiting that nobility and grandeur of soul which is required to meet a crisis, and turn it to account, Jonah forsook the secret place of strength-he became one of the myriads who have been vanquished by their own weak hearts, a monument of mortal insufficiency and weakness.

Or, to name no more, perhaps Jonah's reason for this flight to Tarshish was, that he could not brook the thought that any nation but the Jews should partake of the mercy of God. We know that such a state of mind at all times largely swayed the Jewish people; and, if that was our prophet's case, then he fled from the presence of God at the bidding of mere sectarianism. He wished to limit the favour of Jehovah to a few, instead of inviting all to partake of it; and if that, we say, was the sin of Jonah, as some suppose, then he stands forth as the representative and leader of those who would exclude all but a favoured class from the offers of the mercy of God in Christ; he overlays the catholic by the bigoted; he limits to party what is meant for mankind; in brief, he adds sectarianism to his other sins, and who will wonder though sectarianism should disregard the salvation of others?

SIN THE SAME IN ALL AGES.

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But whatever was the reason of Jonah's flight, whatever prompted his despondency and dread, it is of more consequence for us to ascertain how we may profit by his recorded example. And let it not be supposed that we are necessarily innocent of all sin like that of Jonah. Did he forget that it was God who commanded him to go, and did he sin by forgetting that? Then do not we the same, in principle and at heart, as often as we sin in spite of God's command, and hasten to do iniquity when he bids us be holy? Did Jonah recoil from the greatness of the work, and decline to undertake what was irksome or offensive? Then who among us has not often, often refused to mortify his own sin, and fight against his own tendency to evil, because that was opposed to his liking? Who amongst us has not often, often thus acted in spirit like him who would not undertake the work which even the Eternal had given him to do? Were Jonah not to be condemned till he who is innocent of such things had thrown the first stone, is he not certain of acquittal and escape? Or did Jonah fear personal loss and danger by going to Nineveh? Then, O how many will rather encounter the wrath of God than face the wrath of man! How many, for example, will spend their Sabbath-day in sin against their God, however that may expose them to His displeasure, rather than lose the smile, or encounter the frown, of some fellow-creature whom they love or dread! Or did Jonah grudge the mercy of God to Nineveh, as if none but a Jew should enjoy it? Then how many act in the same spirit still, as if God were a respecter of persons like man-as if he had not cast salvation abroad among sinners, inviting "every creature under heaven" to sit

under its shadow with delight! Or, finally, did Jonah shrink from going to Nineveh, because he saw little fruit from his preaching among the Jews, and expected less among heathens? Then how many still do the same, making their own feelings, their own expectations, or their own experience, the standard and the rule of duty --and not the word of the Lord, which abideth for ever! Nay, as the climax of the whole, did Jonah try to flee to a place where God would not be so urgently near, or duty so much pressed upon his conscience, as it was at Gath-hepher? O how rife is that very sin! God is very near to the assemblies of his people; but many flee from these assemblies, because He is there, so that the deserted house of God, and his worship never or rarely engaged in, plainly proclaim that men are sinning now precisely as Jonah sinned. God is very near to the conscience in the preaching of the word; but many flee from that preaching, because God is there they feel as if they could breathe more freely, because they can sin with less restraint, when far from the courts of his house. And God is very near when the sinner, as a suppliant, is pouring out his heart before Him; but many never pray, because God would then, they feel, be near. short, whenever we consent to commit a sin, we are doing in spirit what Jonah did. We forget that we are in the presence of God, or if we do not forget it, we do worse—we consent to sin, even though God, the Holy One, be at once our witness and our judge. Jonah was but one man to a million in Nineveh, and if ever disobedience could plead an excuse, it was there. But who among us can plead such an excuse? Our sins, then, are actually greater than his. Strange, or even incre

In

dible as his conduct appears to many, men are copying it still from day to day, and often in every deed they do.

Those among us who delight to know the true state of the soul, will discover that God is of a truth in this deep Scripture. He is here to lay before us, in the example of his servant, the state of our inmost heart and soul-and why? Is it merely to humble and to pain us? Is the state of the soul thus unmasked in Scripture merely to make the sinner sad? Nay, it is to bring him as a sinner to the sinner's Friend. It is to guide him, with a heart broken and contrite, to the fountain opened for sin; and if that shall be the result of the lessons of this deep passage, so full of the knowledge of human nature when the grace of God is withheld, eternity will find us rejoicing over its humbling effects.

But still other lessons solicit our attention from this passage of the prophet. He took a ship to go to Tarshish, which was most probably Tarsus in Celicia; that is, while fleeing from God, he rushed directly upon danger. In our day, when the art of navigation is so well matured, and when men can traverse the farthest ocean in safety, we know little of the perils of the deep, compared with the men of Jonah's time; and yet he hastened into the midst of all those crowding perils, rather than do as God had enjoined. How like the sinner in every passing age! He thinks to flee from God, and be safe, but in fact he rushes on the bosses of Jehovah's buckler. Madly he expects felicity in the thing which Jehovah has eternally condemned; he anticipates joy, or pleasure, or peace, from that which nailed the Redeemer to the tree, but finds in the bitterness of his soul, that he may as well expect the winds of heaven, or the waves of ocean, to

obey his command, as to find repose for his soul in revolt against his God.

But again, Jonah found a ship, all ready for his purpose. It seemed as if Providence smiled and favoured his flight from the presence of the Lord. And is it not often thus? The sinner, for a time, gets success in his iniquity. He prospers in his way. He spreads like a green bay-tree. But the day of retribution comes. His sin finds the sinner out; and the ship which he found so opportunely, is often but a means of conveyance to the grave. However men may prosper, whatever honour, or applause, or success may be heaped upon them, while they are resisting the Word of their God, that God will visit them at last, and bring them low. The just Judge of the sky will do in every case what he did in the case of Jonah, for the law that binds the planets in their spheres is not so unchangeable as that which links misery and suffering to sin.

Farther, it has been noticed, that while the prophet fled from God, and refused to him his due, he faithfully paid what he owed to his fellow-men-the Spirit of God has carefully recorded that Jonah "paid the fare"-in other words, Jehovah may be robbed, but men shall be uprightly dealt with. And is it not habitually so on earth? The men who seem to spurn the thought of defrauding a fellow-creature, will actually defend the robbing of God of at least a portion of the day which he demands as all his own. On system, these men withhold from Him what he claims as specially his, and then they wonder when his frown withers their mercies, and turns them into a bane. Making haste to be rich, though the souls of their fellow-men should furnish the means