grow in knowledge, be careful that you also grow in grace.

And, my young friends, be not discouraged at the embarrassments which lie around you. There are those who vindicate our doctrine, who have seen it in a very different state from what it is now. When your humble servant commenced his career in life, he does not know that he could count ten individuals who had opened their lips on this continent, in advocating our doctrines; and there were not more than two or three regular societies formed, professing to believe as we do. What a change has he lived to see! I have been engaged in the conflict for more than forty years, and I now invite you to enter on the prosecution of the work before you. I have not met with any thing, in all the means which have been arrayed in opposition to our faith, nor in all the errors which have existed, both on the right hand and on the left, that has produced one moment's discouragement in my mind. Perfect confidence in the truth of God, and in the fact that truth is great and will prevail, has inspired me with courage to go forward, and prosecute the Christian warfare.

Remember, my young friends, that "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places;" and if you contend in the spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall be victors-you cannot be overcome. But if you swerve from this direction, it will not be necessary for your enemies to overcome you-you will be overcome of your selves.

It becomes you, therefore, to "be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is THE WORD Of God."

SERMON VIII.

Delivered in the Lombard Street Church, Sunday Morning,

November 16, 1834.

BAPTISM INTO CHRIST.

"For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus."—GALATIANS iii. 27, 28.

In reading the Epistle from which the text is selected, the hearer will learn, that the Apostle therein designed to dissuade his professed brethren from giving that heed and attention to the rituals of the law of Moses, which certain teachers had zealously enjoined. He expresses much concern for them, inasmuch as he had been informed that they had, in some way, been so diverted from the spirituality of the religion of Jesus Christ, as to seek justification before God in the rites of the law. And hence he labours, at considerable length, to show them, that the law was never designed as the dispensation by which man should obtain divine justification. He endeavours to prove, that the dispensation in which man is justified before God, is that faith or covenant which was confirmed to Abraham before the law was given. And he declares, that "the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after" the covenant was confirmed, "cannot disannul, that it should

make the promise of none effect." In the 8th verse of the third chapter, he is careful to mention the very gospel which was preached to Abraham: "And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel to Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed." And he is equally careful to mention what he understands by the seed of Abraham; for he observes, that it was not said, "of seeds, as of many; but to thy seed, which is Christ." In Christ, therefore, as the promised seed, all nations shall be blessed. In this covenant, men were to seek justification-and not in the rituals of the law.

You discover how this argument bears on the general subject. The Apostle was endeavouring to lead his brethren away from the delusion under which they laboured; and to this end, he desired to convince them that they should seek justification before God, by no other power or dispensation, than by that covenant which God made with Abraham four hundred and thirty years before the giving of the law. His argument is very just. A law must not be allowed to operate ex post facto, nor to disannul any thing which existed by promise before the law was given. It should not therefore be supposed, that the law covenant possessed authority to disannul the gospel covenant which was made with. Abraham so many years before.

The question is asked in the epistle from which the text is selected: "Wherefore then serveth the law?" And the proper answer is given, "It was added because of transgressions, until the seed should come to whom the promise was made, and it was ordained in the hands of a mediator." Moreover,

the law is called a school-master-and the purpose for which it was instituted, is thus expressed to bring us to Christ," not to drive us away from him. We all understand the office and duty of a school-master. It is his duty to give your children such instruction as they may require-but he is not authorized to claim your children as his own, to keep them away from you, or to put them under such regulations that you yourselves can exercise no control over them. He has no right to say to your children, "If you love me, and obey my precepts, you shall be heirs to the estate of your parents; but if you do not love me and obey my commandments, you shall be disinherited." The power and authority of the school-master extends not so far as this. Nor was it in the power of the law of Moses to disinherit a single individual embraced in the covenant which God made with Abraham. That law was simply a "school-master to bring us to Christ," the promised seed. Hence says the Apostle," But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed."

Let us look again at this faith, or covenant. It did not regard the house of Israel, in an especial manner: it did not exclude any nation, kindred, tongue, or people, under heaven. It did not in any degree rest the promised inheritance upon the observance of any outward ritual, by either Jew or Gentile-but it covered the whole race of man. "In thy seed shall all nations be blessed." And this corresponds with the text: "For as many of you as are baptized into Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor