blood pass sluggish through our veins. Every thing would be thrown into confusion, and creation itself sink into nothingness. The chain of successive generations is hung upon him ;-in him we live, move, and have our being. Our life, hangs like a thread upon him; he raises and cuts down every flower; the instruments of life and death are in his hands; he gives life and takes it away again by the word of his power. Every thing is at his disposal; he orders every thing in heaven and earth; angels delight to minister to him as his servants, while devils tremble at his word. By the power of his word were all things created; "he hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out the heavens with a span," and hath made this handful of earth. Having established laws whereby the operations of his hands are exhibited, he upholds and preserves them inviolate. All the concatenation of causes and effects, all the complicated machinery of nature is upheld and preserved by him. Nothing in nature is allowed to encroach on the territory of another; but every property of matter and the elements are kept separate and distinct, and prevented from introducing confusion in the place of order, and destruction. in the place of safety. Without his word to uphold, chaos and old night would once more recover their universal and unlimited dominions, and desolation stalk like a giant through the earth. By him the intelligences

E

of heaven are preserved in obedience, saints on earth are upheld, and the malice of devils and wicked men is restrained. He is indeed the centre of all creation, all glory, and power, from which each radii proceeds: he is at once the centre and circumference of a circle without limit, without beginning, and without end.

Such, my Brethren, is the nature of the person whose life and death were figured out by innumerable types symbolical of his humiliation and exaltation, and declaratory of that great atonement that was to be made for our transgression. Such was the person, whose way kings and prophets had appeared to prepare, concerning whom holy men of old in times past spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, who was the subject matter of all prophecy, and the expectation of all nations. He came entrusted with secrets which none but himself were permitted to reveal, to teach doctrines unknown to the wisest of men, to confirm hopes excited by others, and to do a deed which would empty hell and fill all heaven with hallelujahs.

The mystery, that was hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ, was now made manifest. The arrival of the Messiah had already been announced by the Baptist, like as the sun is ushered in by the fabled Lucifer. At length he appeared above the horizon like some well-omened planet to mariners in ancient times, cheering and animating

their bosoms with a hope of a safe arrival at their peaceful haven, where their sorrows would be forgotten, and their troubles remembered no more. The purpose for which he came, was worthy of his mission; for it was to make an end of sin by the sacrifice of himself once offered, and by bringing in an everlasting righteousness. And this leads me to consider,

Secondly, The object of the mission of Christ.

The words in the original, which we have translated purged, or more literally having made a lustration or purification of our sins, is a legal phrase in reference to the lustrations under the law. The eternal Son of God, in the part of my text, which I am now considering, is introduced in the character of a High Priest offering an atonement for sin. The infinite majesty of his person gives dignity to the priesthood which he exercised, and value to the sacrifice he offered. The apostle had already contrasted him with the prophets, which God had raised up; but he here compares him and his priesthood with the highest personage and office under the law.

The high priest under the law was chosen among men, and exercised his office for a few years of this mortal life; he himself had need to offer sacrifices for himself; he was of like passions with those for whom he offered up the victim. Compassed about with the same infirmities, subject to the same diseases and death, and standing in need of the

same mercy as his fellows; the Jewish high priest exercised the functions of an office, which from the nature of its types and ceremonies carried with it the stamp of infirmity, the seeds of mortality, and tokens of a speedy abolition. The sacrifices themselves bore marks of insufficiency: for it is evident that sins committed by a moral intellectual being, could never be expiated by a creature devoid of intelligence.

Punishment or misery, which from the nature of things is the unavoidable consequencé of sin, must ever visit a transgressor or his substituted sufferer of the same nature and order of being. Sin has been committed in the essential spirit and body of man; the punishment, therefore, must fall upon soul and body. The substituted sacrifice then, must be a being possessed of the same spiritual and corporeal spirit as ourselves, who must suffer both in flesh and spirit. "It is then impossible," as it is written," for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin.". Upon the same principle, no other different order of being, whether more or less glorious than man, can expiate the sins of men, because a transgressor requires a substituted sacrifice of the same nature as himself. We see then the necessity of the Son of God suffering in the form and fashion of a man to expiate our sins. Man has sinned in his spirit and flesh. Christ therefore, suffered in body and in his reasonable soul.

The High Priest here recommended to our notice is not like the Jewish priest of the order of Aaron, but of Melchisedec, exercising his office not for a few fleeting years, but for ever; possessing different passions, but like feelings with ourselves; standing in need of no mercy, but rather exercising mercy upon us; entering not into the holy of holies, but the heaven of heavens; and purging away our sins not by the blood of bulls and goats, but by the sacrifice of himself. The glory of the Godhead was now veiled in human flesh; the Son of God laid hold of the seed of Abraham; the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Thinking it is no robbery to be equal with God, the Son of God "made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross ?."

We are not called upon to contemplate a Jewish priest offering up a Jewish victim, but rather the great high-priest of all nations, Jesus, the mediator of a better covenant, confirmed with better promises, and ratified by more precious blood. I speak to you not of ceremonial defilements, or the blood of victims, but of moral pollutions, and the blood of an incarnate God. I speak not of priests entering into the temple, and sprinkling the altar