for the battle is not yours, but God's."

Our views of Jesus, of the salvation he has wrought out for us, of the sorrows he has endured for us, of the mansions he has prepared for us, are, at the best here below, limited, imperfect, corrupt, and indistinct; but, blessed be God, it will not be so always. The true follower of Christ has a friend and fore-runner in Heaven. The flow of time is rapidly hurrying him onward to his eternal reward. And when he has finished the work allotted him upon earth, he will ascend to Jesus above.

SERMON V.

IMAGINATION:-ITS USE AND ABUSE IN MATTERS OF RELIGION.

PSALM XVI. ix.-" I have set the Lord always before me."

THESE words represent to us the most perfect state of religious discipline which the mind of man can attain. It is nothing less than perpetually realizing the presence of God. There is no power of the human mind, and the experience of all ages attests it, which has less been considered as subservient to the cause of religion than the faculty of imagination. It is too frequently employed against her; too frequently treated as the enemy of virtue, as the ally of vice; as bringing before us pictures, on which the mind should not, and ought not, to rest.

Imagination is, or ought to be, the hand

maid of faith, giving effect and energy to truth; presenting that to the mind as seen, which cannot really be discerned. For example: no man hath seen God at any time. Nor can we, in fact, form to our minds any representation of Him approaching in the slightest degree to truth. But by imagination we can place him near us. We can conceive that he is always at hand, beholds our actions, listens to our words, is privy to our thoughts, and an imagination so disciplined will afford no inconsiderable check to crime. Familiarised with the idea of God's omnipresence, we shall "stand in awe, and fear to sin." The presence of an earthly superior-common observation proves this inference correctis often sufficient to intimidate the most profligate. The eye of a truly pious and upright man has been known to arrest the halfuttered oath on the lip of the swearer. no matter how bad they may be, can resist the influence, or stand the steady observation of a well-known, high-principled, and God-fearing character.

Few,

It is thus, as the Psalmist expresses it, that the good man "sets the Lord always before him." His imagination, purified by re

ligion, and guided by faith, places him in the presence of his Maker during his pilgrimage upon earth; and guards him from the assaults of sin. "Have I not thought on thee," says David, "on my bed, and remembered thee when I was waking?"

He who can thus employ imagination will have transformed an enemy into a friend. He will have made a good servant out of a bad master. And this is a point of no mean importance. For as the imagination is ever active, is always employed, it follows, as a necessary consequence, that it will be doing good or it will be doing harm; it will always be producing and re-producing such images as purify and exalt the mind, or such as tend to weaken and to corrupt it.

Scripture, our best and surest guide in all matters of spiritual import,-has not left us without instances of a properly and an improperly disciplined imagination. Joseph is an instance of the former. His imagination, strictly curbed and regulated, and perpetually realising the presence of God, was to him a defence and a shield. When suddenly assailed by temptation it prompts the noble

reply-" How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?"

The aged Barzillai is another instance of an imagination happily disposed. He had succoured King David in his exile; and when pressed by the grateful monarch, on his return, to exchange the sweets of retirement for the honours of a court, returned this touching reply, a reply which proved that his mind was engrossed by what was to him the most momentous of all topics - his approaching change; that the subject perpetually present to his imagination, was his dying hour.

Can

"Barzillai said unto the king, 'how long have I to live that I should go up with the king unto Jerusalem. I am this day four score years old, and can I discern between good and evil? Can I taste what I eat or what I drink? I hear any more the voice of singing men or singing women? Wherefore, then, should thy servant be yet a burden to my lord, the king? Let thy servant, I pray thee, turn back again, that I may die in mine own city, and be buried

by the grave of my father and of my mother." "

Haman, on the other hand, is an instance of a perverted imagination. His mind is ever