is above the world, to the virtue the apostle so forcibly describes. In longsuffering and kindness, in opposition to petulance and envy, in meekness and humility, in opposition to pride and censoriousness, in disinterestedness and consideration for others, in opposition to selfishness and jealousy, in a spirit blessed with cheerfulness and content, by a knowledge and deep persuasion of the truth, in a mind endued with faith and hope, above the trials and afflictions of the world, in all these things, see the practical exercise of Christian charity; see that heavenly virtue to which the Gospel points.

Try yourselves, my brethren, your feelings and your conduct: without those motives, which compose the Christian grace of charity, all your advantages, all that the world teaches you to covet and to value, are as nothing; you are as sounding brass, or as the tinkling cymbal; you have not one virtue or one grace which shall survive the grave. You have sown to the flesh, and shall of the flesh reap

corruption. Charity in man is a spark of the same heavenly flame which burns so brightly in the love of God. It is the seasoning principle which shall preserve us in the trial we must all undergo: it shall revive in a future world, and be the foundation of our existence in a life of spiritual enjoyment. In this world abideth faith, hope, and charity: faith, by which we know in whom we trust, and by whose holy influence and sufferings we are sanctified hope, by which we are taught to rise above the trials and afflictions of the world, and to consider heaven the future home of the Christian: charity, by which all the virtues and graces of the Gospel are united and sanctified. But the greatest of these is charity; for in charity all are united and made perfect: it believeth all things, it hopeth all things; and will hereafter, in a world of happiness, perfect those virtues and graces which we have practised and exercised here.

Impressed then with the inestimable value of this Christian grace, let us con

clude in the apt and beautiful words of one of the collects of our church. "O Lord, who hast taught us that all our doings, without charity, are nothing worth, send thy Holy Ghost, and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of charity, the very bond of peace, and of all virtues, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before thee. Grant this for thine only Son, Jesus Christ's sake."

SERMON IX.

CORINTHIANS, XIII. 13.

"Now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity."

HAVING treated of charity as a virtue peculiarly spiritual, having shown its blessed influences extending both to this world and to the world to come, there are yet other points of view in which it should be considered by us. Far from exhausting so fertile a subject, we have but touched on those principal points, which will attract the attention of the inquirer: much will be still left to be done before the outline given us by the apostle is filled up, or before this great Christian virtue is fully understood. No one will peruse attentively this justly celebrated passage without the vastness of the subject in

creasing upon him: he will read in every phrase and expression a meaning opening out the most extended views of the wisdom and mercy of God, as displayed in his scheme of salvation, embracing as it does all persons and people, as well in time as eternity. He will draw back in silent admiration from the vastness of a subject beyond his powers, and penetrate only into such portions of it as affect his eternal welfare and salvation.

It is said in the text, "Now abideth faith, hope, and charity," that is, in this present time. The apostle has shown in the preceding verses, that when prophecies, and tongues, and knowledge shall fail, charity shall still survive; but returning to the subject of charity, as it affects this life, he shows, in the words of the text, its superiority over faith and hope. It is to this point that I wish to direct your attention, and to show the extent and meaning of the declaration—that of these three the greatest is charity. In doing this I shall not make its importance