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more of our secret characters than the Lord may see good to reveal to them, as he represents himself to do in the parables of the sheep and the piece of money; where friends and neighbours are summoned first to hear of the recovery of what was lost, and then to rejoice that it is found. Likewise," continues our Lord, "I say unto you there is joy in the presence of the angels of God, over one sinner that repenteth." Luke xv. 10. But those among the ministering spirits who are especially placed about ourselves, as we know them to be, certainly are at least as well aware of our words and actions as any fellow mortal. Our open sins are committed in their presence; but if they know no more of our contrite sorrow than usually appears in the aspect of a congregation when whispering their confession of those sins to God in public worship, marvellous indeed must it be in their sight that we should so harden our faces!

In like manner, our public thanksgiving—how cold a return must we feel it to be, even when our hearts are warmest, could we but fairly estimate the amount of loving-kindness expended upon us during the lapse of the few days since our last assembling together to render thanks for the great benefits that we have received at his hands.' We are the only oblivious parties: the devils do not forget how often they have been repulsed, and their best-laid plans baffled when they thought to harm us; nor do the holy angels forget the errands of

mercy on which they have sped to our succour, help, and comfort. Strange must it be to them, when, laden as we are with such incalculable benefits, and met together to unite in proclaiming them,

Hosannas falter on our tongues,

And our devotion dies.

Yet what are these interpositions of Providence in guarding our daily path, compared with the interposition of redeeming Love, which snatched our souls out of the jaws of destruction, translated us from the power of Satan to the kingdom of God, and secured to us an inheritance among the saints in light! We utter the name that is above every name, and angels rejoice, and devils shrink. We speak of the mystery of his holy incarnation, and the song of Bethlehem is ready again to burst forth from the lips of the heavenly host; we remind him of his fasting and temptation, and they whose infernal leader was vanquished in that awful field, are ready again to yell out, "We know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God." We talk, alas! with what unmoved faces and feelings! of his agony and bloody sweat, his cross and passion, his death and burial, and they who witnessed the anguish endured for us are present to mark the expression of self-abasement and heart-broken penitence of the rebels for whose ransom the Lord of glory stooped so low. We name his resurrection and ascension-can we name them coldly, seeing

that when He arose from the dead He led captivity captive, and received gifts for men, even for the rebellious, even for us, that God might dwell among us? Surely it would somewhat quicken us at least to greater reverence of deportment, greater animation and devotion, to consider what witnesses are among us, and to what they have been witnesses, from the creation of the world to this day.

Yet it is a small matter to be judged of man's or of angels' judgment; he that judgeth us is THE LORD. If He be for us, it matters not who else is for, or who may be against us. Angels, principalities, powers, are nothing we need not to conciliate the favour of the good, nor to deprecate the malice of the evil legions, for He whose we are, and whom we serve, is King and God over all. He bids us watch, he tells us to gird our loins and to trim our lamps, not as trembling slaves, who dread the approach of a severe master, but as honoured guests, expecting the Bridegroom's coming, that we may rejoicingly partake in the marriage festivities. His bride is now a mourning widow; he calls her as a woman forsaken, and grieved in spirit, for the enemies of her absent Lord have usurped his dominion, and darkened the earth with heathenism, and polluted it with blood; and in the place where she should sit, a shameless harlot assumes her name, and brands it with the infamy of her own crimes. Well may the Lamb's wife, bewailing the desolation of His heritage, stand on

her tower, and watch for His coming, whose right it is. Then shall ensue the universal reconciliation of all that God made to harmonize together, and which Satan prevailed to disorganize; then shall the tabernacle of God be with man, and HE will dwell among us, who is the author, not of confusion, but of peace. Then, "the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.” Dan. vii. 27. Whatever sin has displaced, shall again fall sweetly into its assigned station; Man shall be a merciful, a loving ruler over the inferior creatures, who in their turns shall cease to prey, the strong upon the weak; and he shall again enjoy unrestrained communion with those heavenly beings between whom and himself sin has placed a gulf that neither can pass, except the Lord bridge it over for them. When all things that offend and that do iniquity are gathered out, when the mother of harlots is hurled from her proud seat,-where she sits a queen and now boasts that she is no widow, and shall see no sorrow,and has received her appointed portion, her plagues of death, and mourning, and famine, and utter burning with fire, all coming upon her in one day; then, and not till then, shall the night-watch of the Church give place to the glories of a day that knows no going down of the

sun.

That this time is not now far off, we have abundant proof in the signs that thicken around us. The period that remains is but as an hour, and surely we may watch with the Lord that one hour. All the malignity of Satan that raged against our Master on the fearful night of Gethsemane will now be stirred up for a last effort against his Church: and the trial will be severe, the conflict terrible, even as the issue will certainly be gloriously triumphant. Whatever glimpses we may have caught of the world of spirits in the course of this inquiry, must be turned to good account; for we shall soon need to exercise judgment in the discerning of spirits. The sixth vial, under which there can be no doubt that we now live, is marked by the going forth of the three unclean devils, of whose miracle-working power we are forewarned; and He who has deigned to show us things to come, has not set forth cunninglydevised fables to amuse our fancy, but revealed solemn truths to guide our steps aright, when our path becomes perplexed beyond all that we have known hitherto, or that the experience of the Church has recorded. He that is born after the flesh always persecutes him that is born after the Spirit; but now we shall have the author of all corruption of the flesh persecuting the Lord in His members; and we shall do well to measure, so far as we can, the extent of that power which is coming against us, that we may not only be the better prepared to withstand in the evil day, but also the better able

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