only enables us to put forth new wings, and to soar to new realms, and to enjoy in all its splendor and its fulness that life which endures for ever.

But the language of Jesus is, "Whosoever believeth" hath eternal life. The assurance of heaven does not mean that a man leaps from the love and the practice of sin into a sort of Mahometan Paradise, or Pagan Elysium; he that believes on the Son of God has eternal life. It is a personal and present prerogative, and he that has it is conscious of it. If we are destined to enter into heaven, we must carry heaven with us now. If there never has been a little heaven within us upon earth, we shall never enter into a larger heaven with God in glory. Heaven begins in the individual bosom, and culminates in the glory that is to be revealed. The love of God comes to us in the shape of life; it remains within us in the form of life, and that life flowers in everlasting joy and felicity.

These are the two great classes of mankind those that have from the first Adam naked and perishing souls; and those that have from the second Adam everlasting life. There may be circumstantial, national, ecclesiastical, physical, moral distinctions, but all these are evanescent as the clouds that sweep through the sky. These two great, broad distinctions are lasting as the great bright stars that shine still and far beyond us; they who belong to the company of the lost — and of all categories that is the most awful — or they who belong to the glorious company of the saved, and are now living, justified, and adopted. Let us not look at heaven as if it were all in the future, but recollect it must begin now in the individual heart. All that the judgmentday does, is to perpetuate what is now. "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; he that is unholy, let him be unholy still" that is hell. In fact, Christ continues the impulse that began on earth, and that impulse is everlasting heaven ;

and Christ permits in them that believe not the impulse that began at birth, and that impulse, unarrested, is everlasting hell.

But whilst there is this broad distinction, let me explain very briefly how one may be changed. "Whosoever believeth." Then there must be a personal act on our part. No man finds himself in heaven, and is surprised how he ever got there. No man finds himself among the lost, and is startled by the unexpected discovery. Every man knows in his calmest and most solemn moments quite well whither he is going. He sometimes so trembles at his own thoughts, that he will not let himself hear the whispers of his own conscience. Many a man would rather face a foe armed with all the weapons of battle, than his own conscience; and the struggle of thousands every day is to get rid of the monitions of that faithful monitor within -the presentiments, and prophecies, and forebodings of a conscience, that knows quite well whether it be at peace with God, or still a stranger altogether to the gospel. Before this change can take place, you must believe in Christ Jesus. It is, "Whosoever believeth;" not, “Whosoever doeth," "Whosoever suffereth," "Whosoever payeth," but "Whosoever believeth." But, what is believing? Just putting confidence in this testimony of God; it is the acquiescence of the inmost man in this blessed truth, that there is now a provision so glorious, that God's mercy can reach me while it reflects his own glory; that there is now a Saviour, the exponent of God's love for me why not for me? — and believing thus, I am justified by faith, and have peace with God. It is the simplicity of the gospel that is, unfortunately, shall we say, its greatest stumbling-block. Too many ministers of the gospel, by giving elaborate metaphysical disquisitions on subjective and objective divinity, upon faith, and virtue, and vice, obscure that glorious truth, which comes with the

splendor and the simplicity of the sunbeam, "Whosoever believeth in the Son of God shall not perish, but have eternal life." It is just confidence in God, confidence in the testifier, confidence in the testimony. It is coming to him penetrated with a deep sense of our ruin, and with a lively apprehension of the perfection of the work of him who came to save us. But, you perhaps say, Am I quite sure it is for me? The question is, Why not for me? You are not to sit down, and say, Why for me? but you are to explain and answer this expression, Why not for me? You are a sinner, you are lost, you are perishing. Then you are the very person that Christ came to save; and if you see this, and rely upon this glorious provision, and look to glory, and happiness, and heaven in the strength of it, and say, I will show how thankful I am by how holy I live, and by delighting to do all the commandments of him who loved me, then you have peace. Just as the Israelite dying in the desert looked to the brazen serpent, and that instant recovered, so the sinner, serpent stung, dying, perishing, in this world's desert, is called upon simply to look at, to believe on, to put confidence in Christ, and to have thus everlasting life. It is just taking God at his own word; it is saying from the very heart, "Amen," to all that God has done.

The great sin that will be the destruction of not a few will be, that they knew this, and despised it; that they heard this, and perished notwithstanding. The text is the first note of the everlasting jubilee; to believe in this is your instant duty. Do not say, "I cannot." Cannot! You can put confidence in the Bank of England, confidence in your parent, confidence in your brother, confidence in a merchant, and cannot put confidence in God! Are you not ashamed to say, "I cannot believe?" And if you are conscious that you cannot, do you not know of him who said,

"My strength is made perfect in weakness," "Ask, and ye shall receive." The consciousness that you cannot believe, is the first pulse of everlasting life; but the declaration of want of confidence in God expressed by "I cannot," is only a deceptive way of saying, "I will not."

Let us not die with bread before us. I believe the most awful ruin is that which begins its descent on Calvary, and at the foot of the cross: the most terrible midnight is that whose twilight begins by the setting of the Sun of righteousness here below. Flee from the wrath to come; be Christians. Arise, and go to your Father, who "so loved you, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

CHAPTER XX.

FAITH AND HOPE.

"The steps of faith

Fall on the seeming void, and find

The Rock beneath."

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things HEBREWS Xi. 1.

not seen."

We have seen a portion of the "cloud of witnesses" in the Church before the Flood. They walked by faith in the days of Noah, as we do now. Faith was the secret of their victory, as it is of ours.

Man can easily understand, in his natural condition, why love, obedience, and truth should be commanded in the Scriptures. These are graces which he can admire, even when he refuses to practice and embody them in his conduct. But the mere natural man, unacquainted with the great truths of the gospel, is unable to comprehend why faith should be made so much of in every part of the gospel. For example, it seems to him rather the ground for an objection to Christianity, than a reason for its Divine origin; that men should be exhorted so often to believe, and, as he supposes, should be exhorted so seldom to do, to act, to obey. He reads such passages as these, "If ye have faith as a grain of mustard-seed, ye shall say to this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you." He reads again,