If, on the other hand, you incline to the last of these ways, I must direct you to count the cost: be assured it will be hard and disagreeable to the flesh. The difficulties which attend it are given as the reason why it is so little occupied.

If you incline to this way, there may be great difficulties attending your entrance; for strait is the gate. While you are under convictions, and your hearts are not subdued to the obedience of Christ, these difficulties will appear insurmountable. To escape the wrath to come, it will appear absolutely necessary that you should enter in : yet to forego all hope of mercy on the ground of your good deeds, or even of your prayers and penitential tears, and to sue for pardon as one of the chief of sinners, wholly for the sake of Jesus Christ, is hard work for a proud heart. If you enter in, it is also necessary that you give up all your former idols, without a single reserve; but this also is hard work to a corrupt heart: these are things which make many people hesitate about religion for a long time, labouring under darkness of mind, and unable to find rest for their souls. But let me add, these difficulties exist only in your own mind: ye are not straitened in God, but in your own bowels. If you can be contented to accept of mercy as one of the chief of sinners, all will be easy. Come to Jesus as such, and you will find rest unto your soul: and if his name be precious unto you, bis yoke also will be easy, and his burden light. Denying self, taking up the cross, and following him, will then be no hard service, but your very meat and drink. The way of salvation through his a toning blood, will also be a source of joy unspeakable, and of peace which passeth all understanding; and you will be amazed at your former ignorance and aversion.

Further: There may be hard struggles attending your progress; for, narrow is the way. You may meet with contempt from the world, persecution from your connexions, and if you be faithful, with many a bard speech, and hard measure, from loose professors; you may be annoyed by temptations from without, and confounded by strong struggles from within; old companions may invite you to turn back; the allurements of the world may be placed on the right hand and on the left, to induce you to turn aside; and

through the remaining corruption of your nature, you may be too apt at times to listen to their counsels; you may also expect to meet with things that will make your heart sink within you; despondency may lay fast hold of you; and the very hand of God be stretched out against you. Let me add, however, that this way is infinitely less rugged than that in which Jesus walked to accomplish your salvation and if your heart be with his heart, I need not add more to reconcile you to it.

Moreover: In pursuing the narrow way, you may have but little company; for few there be that find it. Compared with the ungodly, religious people are but as the gleanings of the vintage; and your lot may be cast in a part of the world where few of those few are to be found. You may reside in a village where no one cares for Christ, or in a family that calls not upon his name. In such eircumstances, you may be the object of derision; a man wondered at, and persecuted; and even hated by your nearest relations ! But be of good cheer: though there be but few who will accompany you, yet those few are the excellent of the earth. You will also hold society with an invisible host of heavenly spirits that watch over you; a host so numerous, that more are they that are with you than they that are with your adversaries; and what is more than all, the narrow way leadeth unto life.

Thus, reader, life and death are set before thee; which wilt. thou choose? Recollect that the destruction which awaits the ungodly, is not a loss of being, but of well-being; it is the loss of all that is desirable, and an exposedness to all that is dreadful; the weeping of desolation, the wailing of despair, and the gnashing of teeth which attends the most intolerable anguish. Consider also that the life which awaits the godly, is not mere being, but wellbeing; it is an entire freedom from evil, and an eternal enjoyment of bliss, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, and which hath not entered into the heart of man to conceive. It will also be heightened by the trials through which we pass to the possession of it.

If you enter the strait gate, and walk in the narrow way, an abundant entrance will be ministered unto you, into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ: but if found pursuing the broad way, you shall hereafter strive to enter into that kingdom, and shall not be able.

ON CHRIST'S WASHING THE DISCIPLES' FEET.

John xiii.

THIS significant action, so full of kindness and condescension on the part of our Saviour, is recorded for our example. Happy shall we be, if we truly copy it. Here is no affectation of humility, but humility itself; nor is it performed as a mere ceremony, but to teach us in love to serve one another. Its being done at a time when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, renders it additionally impressive. It was the same night in which he was betrayed: a night in which it might have been thought, his own approaching trials would have engrossed his whole attention: yet then he was fully employed in behalf of others; setting an example of brotherly affection, ordaining a standing memorial of his death, fortifying, by a speech full of unparalleled consolation, the hearts of his disciples, and commending them to the care of God his Father. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; not only in making his soul an offering for sin, but in every step that led on to that awful crisis.

Laying aside his garments, he took a towel, girded himself with it, poured the water into a basin, and went from one to another, performing the work of a menial servant. When it came to Peter's turn, his feelings revolted at the idea. Lord, saith he, viewing his dignity on the one hand, and his own insignificancy on the other, dost THOU wash my feet? Jesus answered, What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter: intimating that he bad a reason for so doing; which though it might not be manifest at present, would at a future time be rendered plain. Nay, saith Peter, almost indignantly, thou shalt never wash my feet! As though he had said, 'This is too much, and what I can never submit to !'

Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. What! If he washed not his feet? No, his soul, from the pollution of sin. Transitions like this, from things natural to things spiritual, were usual with our Saviour. Thus, when he had healed a blind man, he took occasion to observe, For judgment I am come into this world, that they who see not, may see; and that they who see, may be made blind. The answer in the present instance was to this effect; Dost thou account it too great a stoop for me to

wash thy feet? Let me tell the, I must stoop lower than this, or woe be to thee! I must cleanse thee from a defilement much more loathsome than this, or thou canst have no part with me in my kingdom.'

Peter, perceiving now that he spake of the purifying of his soul from sin, suddenly changed his tone. Lord, saith he, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head. q. d. If this be thy meaning, I know that I need to be cleansed throughout.'

Jesus saith unto him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet; but is clean every whit, and ye are clean, but not all. As it is sufficient for persons who have bathed their bodies in the stream to wash the defilement attached to their feet by walking on shore; so they that have believed in Christ, shall never come into condemnation, and need not the repetition of a passing from death to life ; but merely an application for the pardon of their daily sins. Such was the character of all the disciples, except Judas, who, notwithstanding his profession, was yet in his sins.

From this interesting conversation, we are taught several important truths.

First: We may sin against Christ, under a show of modesty and reverence for his name. There is no doubt but that Peter's first objection sprang from these motives: and had he yielded to the first answer, perhaps he had been blameless; but to resist after he was assured that his Lord had a good reason for what he did, though he at present did not comprehend it, was setting up his own wisdom and will against his. Nor was this the first instance in which Peter was guilty of so doing. When our Saviour spake of going up to Jerusalem, and of suffering many things, and being killed, and rising again the third day, he rebuked him, saying, Be it far from

thee, Lord; this shall not be unto thee. In all this he savoured not the things that were of God, but the things that were of men.

There is much of this spirit in our self-righteous objections to the grace of the gospel, and self-willed oppositions to Christ's revealed will. One pleads, that salvation by mere grace is dishonourable to God's moral government: but let him know, from the example of Peter, that there may be a regard to Christ's honour, which he doth not require at our hands; and that we should act much more becoming by acquiescing in his will, than by obtruding our own conceits in opposition to it. Another alleges, It is too much for a sinner so unworthy as I am, to hope for so great salva- ✓ tion. But can you do with less? and is it the comparatively worthy that mercy delighteth to honour? True wisdom will fall in with that way of honouring God which is revealed in the gospel; and genuine modesty will not dispute with the Saviour, but humbly take him at his word. And the same spirit that receives his grace without hesitation, will obey his precepts without delay; not asking why or wherefore the Lord requireth this, but accounting it our meat to do his will.

If

Secondly: A cordial and practical acquiescence in the way of salvation through the blood of Christ, is necessary to a participation of his benefits. It may seem rather singular that Christ should suspend his blessing on his own act—If I wash thee not, &c. but that act supposes the concurrence of the party. He stood ready to wash Peter, and stands ready to wash the foulest of sinners. therefore they be not washed, it is owing to their preference of pollution, or their self-righteous objections to the way of being cleansed. To feel ourselves entirely polluted, and ready to perish; to despair of being cleansed by any thing that we can perform, or work ourselves up to; to place no dependence on prayers or tears, on our bitterest repentance or most unfeigned faith, considered as acts of holiness; and to repair altogether, vile as we are, to the blood of Jesus, as to a fountain set open for sin and for uncleanness-this is the hinge of true religion; without which, we shall have no interest with him in his benefits, nor portion with him in his heavenly kingdom. If we come not to him as polluted sinners to be washed, our iniquities are still upon our head; and Vol. VIII.

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