his neck and kisses him. He does not despise him for his rags and misery. He does not upbraid him for his former sins. He welcomes and pardons, and gives to him all that he needs. He does not wait to hear his confession before the kiss of forgiving love assures the son that he is at once received back as a child. Thus is it with our Father in heaven. He notices the first sigh, the first desire, the first tear, the first prayer. For one step the sinner takes, and this, too, by His grace, He takes twenty steps to meet him. He blots out the sins of a lifetime in a moment through the precious blood of Christ, clothes the sinner in the fair garment of the Saviour's righteousness, and imparts to him a new heart, with power to combat and overcome the sinful habit by which he was once lep captive. He gives true joy to the brokenhearted, and the help of His Spirit to begin and carry on a new and holy life.

Dear reader, if yet far from God, come to Him at once. Acknowledge your sin, take the lowest place, and plead nothing but the Name and merit of Jesus. He will not despise nor reject you. He will cast all your sins into the depth of the sea, and subdue all your iniquities.

'NOT SO BAD AS THAT.'

OOR old man! I often met him along the road; and I don't think I ever

saw him without heaving a sigh and feeling sad at heart. He was outwardly the worst man in the little country parish where I then lived. He seemed set upon evil. Night after night would he spend in the Greyhound, and bring others there with him. He was past seventy at the time I refer to, and was living altogether an ungodly, irreligious life. He caused many to fall; and not a few young men might trace their ruin to his example. Yet he never would believe that he was in any danger. Well do I remember one day striving very earnestly to awaken him to repentance. I met him in a quiet spot by the roadside, and reasoned with him about the way he was walking. As

plainly, and yet as tenderly as I could, I spoke to him of his sins. I reminded him of his drinking habits, and of the harm he had done to others. Then I pointed out to him that at his time of life his remaining days must be few, and that after death came the judgment. I assured him that God's threatenings were all true, and that the wicked would be turned into hell, and all the people that forget God. But it was all of no use. I saw plainly that he did not believe a word I said about his sin or his danger. He looked this way and that, and was very loth to stay a moment. 'Oh, not so bad as that!' he said, as he turned on his heel, and went his

way.

A few more years were given him, and then the end came. I had gone to another part of the country; but I heard the particulars of his last days. He was the same man as ever. He died as he had lived. He gave no sign of sorrow for the life he had led; nor was he known to offer a prayer for mercy. As far as man could judge, he died hardened and impenitent. I cannot but fear that he went down into the dark valley with the terrible load of sin unforgiven, and without one ray of hope in the Saviour of sinners.

The story may teach us that conscience may become utterly insensible. If men continue in sin, not only does evil habit grow stronger, but the senses become darkened. But there is another lesson we may learn. Men shut their eyes to the terrors of eternal judgment. They wish to believe that there is no great day of reckoning, and no Judge before whom they must appear: and at last they succeed in deceiving themselves. Or if they allow that some punishment must follow, they imagine that it is far less than they are told. 'Not so bad as that,' is their thought. And so, with blinded conscience, and fast asleep in their sins, they go down to the grave, unprepared to meet God.

'Not so bad as that!' Ah, men profess to know better than the Son of God, and to have larger views of God's mercy than He who died to redeem us!

No man ever loved the lost and the perishing so much as the Saviour; and yet no man ever spoke such solemn words of the sinner's doom. He who was Incarnate Love-He who went about doing good, and at last gave His precious blood as the ransom for our sins -He speaks in no uncertain voice of the issue of unbelief and sin. 'Except ye repent,

ye shall all likewise perish.'* 'Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.'t 'The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.' In words like these Christ often spoke. He tells of the rich man in his torment, and the great gulf that separates between the saved and the lost. He tells of the day when He shall separate the righteous from the wicked, as the shepherd divideth the sheep from the goats. He tells us of the just sentence which shall then be pronounced against sinners: 'Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire; prepared for the devil and his angels.'

And we dare not doubt His word. He is the very truth itself. He cannot be deceived; and He would not deceive us. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but His word shall not. pass away. Let us believe and fear. Let us flee to His mercy, since we cannot stand in the great day of His wrath.

But why should men perish? Why should they ever know the terrible condemnation of * Luke xiii. 3. ‡ Matt. xiii. 41, 42.

+ Matt. vii. 19.