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we wish to form, out of these fragments, the notion of a perfectly wise and good man, we know it is a mere fiction of the mind, without any real being in whom it is embodied and realized. In the belief of a Deity, these conceptions are reduced to reality; the scattered rays of an ideal excellence are concentrated, and become the real attributes of that Being with whom we stand in the nearest relation;—who sits supreme at the head of the universe, is armed with infinite power, and pervades all nature with his presence.

The efficacy of these sentiments, in producing and augmenting a virtuous taste, will indeed be proportioned to the vividness with which they are formed, and the frequency with which they recur; yet some benefit will not fail to result from them, even in their lowest degree.

The idea of the Supreme Being has this peculiar property— that, as it admits of no substitute, so, from the first moment it is impressed, it is capable of continual growth and enlargement. God himself is immutable; but our conception of his character is continually receiving fresh accessions,-is continually growing more extended and effulgent, by having transferred upon it new perceptions of beauty and goodness; by attracting to itself, as a centre, whatever bears the impress of dignity, order, or happiness. It borrows splendour from all that is fair, subordinates to itself all that is great, and sits enthroned on the riches of the universe.

IV. CONSOLATIONS OF RELIGION.-Finlayson.

WHAT is it, O child of sorrow, what is it that now wrings thy heart, and bends thee in sadness to the ground? Whatever it be, if thou knowest the truth, the truth shall give thee relief. Have the terrors of guilt taken hold of thee? Dost thou go all the day long, mourning for thy iniquities, refusing to be comforted? And, in thy bed at night, do visions of remorse disturb thy rest, and haunt thee with the fears of a judgment to come? Behold, the Redeemer hath borne thy sins in his own body on the tree; and if thou art willing to forsake them, thou knowest, with certainty, that they shall not be remembered in the judgment against thee.

Hast thou, with weeping eyes, committed to the grave the child of thy affections, the virtuous friend of thy youth, or the tender partner whose pious attachment lightened thy load of life? Behold, they are not dead! Thou knowest that they live in a better region, with their Saviour and their

God; that still thou holdest thy place in their remembrance; and that thou shalt soon meet them again, to part no more.

Dost thou look forward with trembling to the days of darkness- -when thou shalt lie on the bed of sickness-when thy pulse shall have become low-when the cold damps have gathered on thy brow-when the mournful looks of thy attendants have told thee that the hour of thy departure has come? To the mere natural man, this scene is awful and alarming. But, if thou art a Christian, if thou knowest and obeyest the truth, thou shalt fear no evil. The shadows which hang over the Valley of Death, shall retire at thy approach; and thou shalt see beyond it the spirits of the just, and an innumerable company of angels,-the future companions of thy bliss,-bending from their thrones to cheer thy departing soul, and to welcome thee into everlasting babitations.

V. THE DEATH OF THE WICKED.-Massillon.

THE remembrance of the past, and the view of the present, would be little to the expiring sinner: could he confine himself to these, he would not be so completely miserable; but the thoughts of a futurity convulse him with horror and despair. That futurity, that incomprehensible region of darkness, which he now approaches, conscience his only companion; that futurity, that unknown land from which no traveller has ever returned, where he knows not whom he shall find, nor what awaits him; that futurity, that fathomless abyss, in which his mind is lost and bewildered, and into which he must now plunge, ignorant of his destiny; that futurity, that tomb, that residence of horror, where he must now occupy his place amongst the ashes and the carcasses of his ancestors; that futurity, that incomprehensible eternity, even the aspect of which he cannot support; that futurity, in a word, that dreadful judgment, to which, before the wrath of God, he must now appear, and render account of a life, of which every moment almost has been occupied by crimes:Alas! while he only looked forward to this terrible futurity at a distance, he made an infamous boast of not dreading it; he continually demanded, with a tone of blasphemy and derision, Who is returned from it? He ridiculed the vulgar apprehensions, and piqued himself upon his undaunted courage. But, from the moment that the hand of God is upon him; from the moment that death approaches near, that the gates of

eternity open to receive him, and that he touches upon that terrible futurity against which he seemed so fortified-ah! he then becomes either weak, trembling, dissolved in tears, raising up suppliant hands to heaven!-or, gloomy, silent, agitated, revolving within himself the most dreadful thoughts, and no longer expecting more consolation or mercy from his weak tears and lamentations, than from his frenzies and despair!

Yes, my brethren! this unfortunate wretch,-who had always lulled himself in his excesses, always flattered himself that one good moment alone was necessary, one sentiment of compunction before death, to appease the anger of God, despairs then of His clemency. In vain is he told of His eternal mercies; he feels to what a degree he is unworthy of them. In vain the minister of the church endeavours to soothe his terrors, by opening to him the bosom of divine mercy; these promises touch him little, because he knows well that the charity of the church, which never despairs of salvation for its children, cannot, however, alter the awful judgments of the justice of God. In vain is he promised forgiveness of his crimes-a secret and terrible voice resounds from the bottom of his heart, and tells him that there is no salvation for the impious, and that he can have no dependence upon promises which are given to his miseries, rather than to the truth. In vain is he exhorted to apply to those last remedies which the church offers to the dying; he regards them as desperate reliefs, which are hazarded when hope is over, and which are bestowed more for the consolation of the living, than from any prospect of utility to those who are departing. Servants of Jesus Christ are called in to support him in this last moment; whilst all he is enabled to do, is, secretly to envy their lot, and to detest the misery of his own: his friends and relations are assembled round his bed to receive his last sighs, and he turns away from them his eyes, because he finds still amidst them the remembrance of his crimes. Death, however, approaches: the minister endeavours to support, by prayer, that spark of life which still remains: "Depart, Christian soul!" says he: he says not to him, "Prince, grandee of the world, depart!" During his life, the public monuments were hardly sufficient for the number and pride of his titles. In this last moment, they give him that title alone which he had received in baptism; the only one to which he had paid no attention, and the only one which can remain to him for ever. "Depart, Christian soul!" Alas! he had lived as if the body had formed his only being and

treasure; he had even tried to persuade himself that his soul was nothing; that man is only a composition of flesh and blood, and that every thing perishes with us. He is now informed that it is his body which is nothing but a morsel of clay, now on the point of crumbling into pieces; and that his only immortal being is that soul, that image of the Divinity, that intelligence, alone capable of knowing and loving its Creator, which now prepares to quit its earthly mansion, and appear before His awful tribunal. "Depart, Christian soul!" You had looked upon the earth as your country, and it was only a place of pilgrimage from which you must depart. The church thought to have announced glad tidings to you, the expiration of your exilement,-in announcing the dissolution of your earthly frame. Alas! and it only brings you melancholy and frightful news, and opens the commencement of your miseries and anguish.

Then the expiring sinner, finding, in the remembrance of the past, only regrets which overwhelm him; in all which takes place around him, only images which afflict him; in the thoughts of futurity, only horrors which appal him; no longer knowing to whom to have recourse; neither to created beings, who now leave him; nor to the world, which vanishes; nor to men, who cannot save him from death; nor to the just God, whom he looks upon as a declared enemy, and from whom he has no indulgence to expect:-a thousand horrors occupy his thoughts; he torments, he agitates himself, in order to fly from Death which grasps him, or at least to fly from himself. From his expiring eyes issue something, I know not what, of dark and gloomy, which expresses the fury of his soul; in his anguish he utters words, interrupted by sobs, which are unintelligible, and to which they know not whether repentance or despair gives birth. He is seized with convulsions, which they are ignorant whether to ascribe to the actual dissolution of his body, or to the soul which feels the approach of its Judge. He deeply sighs; and they know not whether the remembrance of his past crimes, or the despair at quitting life, forces from him such groans of anguish. At last, in the midst of these melancholy exertions, his eyes fix, his features change, his countenance becomes disfigured, his livid lips convulsively separate; his whole frame quivers; and, by this last effort, his unfortunate soul tears itself reluctantly from that body of clay, falls into the hands of its God, and finds itself alone at the foot of the awful tribunal!

VI. THE CRUCIFIXION.-Bossuet.

WHEN Our Redeemer expired on the cross, sympathizing nature was convulsed! The sun was suddenly enveloped in midnight darkness, and confusion reigned! But I shall pass these terrific events, in order to lead your attention to more important objects. The cross erected on Mount Calvary was the standard of victory, to which even Thought was to be led captive, and before which Imaginations were to be cast down; that is to say, human wisdom and sceptic reluctance. No voice sublime was heard sounding from a thunderbearing cloud, as of old from the heights of Sinai! No approach was observed of that formidable Majesty, before whom the mountains melt as wax! Where, where was the warlike preparation of that power, which was to subdue the world? See the whole artillery collected on Mount Calvary-in the exhibition of a cross, of an agonizing Sufferer, and a crown of thorns!

Religious truth was exiled from the earth, and idolatry sat brooding over the moral world. The Egyptians, the fathers of philosophy; the Grecians, the inventors of the fine arts; the Romans, the conquerors of the universe; were all unfortunately celebrated for the perversion of religious worship, for the gross errors they admitted into their belief, and the indignities they offered to the true religion. Minerals, vegetables, animals, the elements, became objects of adoration; even abstract visionary forms, such as fevers and distempers, received the honours of deification; and to the most infamous vices, and dissolute passions, altars were erected. The world, which God had made to manifest his power, seemed to have become a temple of idols, where every thing was god but God himself!

The mystery of the crucifixion was the remedy the Almighty ordained for this universal idolatry. He knew the mind of man, and knew that it was not by reasoning that an error must be destroyed, which reasoning had not established. Idolatry prevailed by the suppression of reason; by suffering the senses to predominate, which are apt to clothe every thing with the qualities with which they are affected. Men gave the Divinity their own figure, and attributed to Him their vices and passions, Reasoning had no share in so brutal an error. It was a subversion of reason, a delirium, a phrensy. Argue with a phrenetic person, you do but the more provoke him, and render the distemper incurable. Neither will reasoning cure the delirium of idolatry. What has learned

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