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Important lessons are to be gathered from this sad his

tory.

1. See the exceeding sinfulness of sin.

Sin in God's sight; it is rebellion against him: this is its malignity. How men mistake it! Murder, theft, treason, and such sins as affect society, are held as deadly transgressions; but impiety and profaneness, Sabbath-breaking and sensuality, these are esteemed light and venial! But, "be not deceived, God is not mocked," "for all these things will he bring you into judgment:" "for these things the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience : consider Pharaoh, Saul, Ahitophel, Judas: gaze upon the stagnant lake where Sodom once stood-trace the marks of the deluge-and say, "how shall we escape?" "Repent ye, and believe the Gospel," &c.

2. See the imminent danger of stifling convictions!

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Pharaoh resisted evidence, till no evidence could convince him: silenced his conscience, till it ceased to speak; every act of resistance made way for another, until the heart became callous and desperate. Oh beware of resisting the grace of God! (Acts vii. 51.) Dread "a seared conscience," (1 Tim. iv. 2.) "Grieve not the Holy Spirit!" "He that, being often reproved, hardeneth his neck," &c. (Prov. xxix. 1), shall die without remedy.

3. See the undeviating faithfulness of God to his word.

Did he not say he would waste Egypt with his plagues? Did he not say he would destroy Pharaoh and his host? and "did so much as one of them escape?" (ch. xiv. 28.) God is faithful in wrath, and in holy indignation! But did he not say he would deliver Israel? and not one of them perished! He is "faithful and just" in mercy and in love, to forgive and save! "God is not a man that he should lie, nor the Son of Man that he should repent!"

God is faithful in judgment: oh let men humble themselves, and flee from the wrath to come!

He is faithful to forgive: oh let the guilty flee to him and find peace by the blood of the cross! Here is abundant salvation; pardon, peace, grace, holiness. Let his people trust him, and they shall be safe from all pursuers-neither the sea nor the desert shall keep them from the heavenly Canaan !

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Proverbs xxiv. 30-34. I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding; and, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone-wall thereof was broken down. Then I saw, and considered it well: I looked upon it, and received instruction. Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: so shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth; and thy want as an armed man.

WISDOM gathers instruction from every visible object however familiar; nature and art, man and his works, the animate and inanimate world, all contribute their share of information, and yield food for reflection. Thus our blessed Lord directed the minds of his hearers to the most sublime truths by means of the simplest illustrations; and Solomon, in this and many other passages, conveys instruction upon the same system.

The Royal Philosopher has his attention drawn to a field and a vineyard in ruins, "all grown over with thorns and nettles, and the stone wall broken down:" he finds that this was the property of "a slothful man, and a man void of understanding." The sight induced reflection: "I saw, and considered it well: I looked upon it, and received instruction!" He pondered over it in his mind, he reflected on the probable cause of this desertion and desolation, and he was convinced of the true origin of it! It was "a little sleep, a little slumber," and "a little folding of the hands to sleep;" habits of self-indulgence and indolence gradually contracted, by little and little, until "poverty had come in as one that travelleth;" that is, step by step, as it were by stealth, so slowly, so gradually, till at length actual" want broke in as an armed man," from whose sudden and terrible grasp there was no escape. Such, in very many instances, are the causes of poverty and ruin.

* This Sermon was originally preached in the order in which it now stands: it was subsequently preached for an infant school, and the substance of the two following sermons was interwoven with it. It was again delivered on a similar occasion, with the matter only of the third sermon on this text added to it. I have here broken the subject into three distinct discourses, as affording a specimen of the different methods in which an illustrative text like this may be legitimately

treated..

Now, there is a strict and accurate analogy between providence and grace; the economy of the one kingdom strongly resembles that of the other: and, as similar figures are often used in Scripture with reference to our spiritual affairs, I shall not hesitate to apply the moral of the text to the conduct of Christians with relation to their souls. And may the Great Husbandman be present with us, and water this, his vineyard, with the dew of his blessing, while we pursue this analogy!

I. EACH MAN HAS A FIELD AND A VINEYARD ENTRUSTED

TO HIS CARE:

-The immortal soul: this is that field, that vineyard. The figure is so applied by Solomon in Canticles i. 6, "They made me a keeper of vineyards, but my own vineyard have I not kept!" The nature of this soil is evil, and only evilbarren in all that is good, it yields spontaneously only corrupt and noxious weeds: "For of ourselves we be crab-trees that can bring forth no apples. We be of ourselves such earth as can but bring forth weeds, nettles, brambles, briars, cockle, and darnel." Such is our Church's testimony. (Homily on the Misery of Man, Part II.) Like a wild

country our hearts must be reclaimed; the native woods and jungle must be cleared away, before we can plough or plant or sow. Great is the task which is allotted to every man, who would save his soul and cultivate it for eternity: toil and care and pains must he bestow all his days; and his task would be hopeless but for the promises of God.

II. HE IS PROVIDED WITH VARIOUS IMPLEMENTS OF HUSBANDRY, WITH GOOD SEED, sure DIRECTIONS, AND ANIMATING PROMISES.

We are not commanded to "work out our salvation with fear and trembling," without adequate directions and suitable promises. As the plough and the harrow and the spade are given to the honest rustic, and he is commanded to use them diligently, so God has given us the means of grace. Here is the good seed, the word of God both written and preached; we are diligently to read and hear it: here are the blessed Sabbaths; we are to sanctify them, and devote them exclusively to the culture of our souls: here is the holy sacrament of the Lord's Supper; we are to partake of it continually;-prayer, too, in public and private, must be persevered in night and day: our souls are to be fenced round with vigilance, with devotedness, self-denial. And to all these is added, the faithful promise of God's Spirit, the dew of his blessing, by which alone our hearts can be softened to receive the seed, or to yield a harvest of joyful holiness.

III. SEE THE SOUL, THE VINEYARD OF SUCH A LABOURER. He has laboured, toiled, and wept and prayed long time; his heart was by nature very hard; evil weeds were no sooner cut down, than they sprung up again; daily was his task renewed; and long time it seemed almost in vain. But he has had "long patience, till he has received the early and latter rain," (James v. 7): and now there are signs of vegetation-buddings of christian tempers, old sins have given way, old habits have been corrected-and the graces of the Holy Spirit begin to flourish: "love and joy and peace," and "virtue and goodness and truth."

These effects will generally be commensurate to the means used: as we sow, we reap. Though all is of grace, and the free gift of God, yet there is a proportion in his operations: "the diligent soul is made fat"-the active, laborious, selfdenying Christian will reap accordingly. When we go by a fruitful field, well cropped and free from weeds, we exclaim, here is a good farmer, although we know that it is God's sun and light and air and moisture which have made his corn to grow. So the passing stranger, who beholds the patient virtue and holy consistency of the diligent believer, exclaims, "this is a field which the Lord hath blessed"-here is a harvest ripening for the skies: "Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit," (John xv. 8): these are the souls which yield some an hundred fold, some sixty fold, some thirty fold." (Matt. xiii. 8.)

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IV. OBSERVE THE DEPLORABLE CONDITION OF THE SOUL

DESCRIBED IN THE TEXT.

1. Here is a desolate and neglected soul which once was cultivated.

The description is an affecting one. A natural wilderness is often luxuriant in wild beauty, and presents pleasing images to the mind; but if, amidst the nettle and the thorn and the wild flowers, we discover the traces of former cultivation, painful thoughts of desertion and desolation are suggested here is a ruined wall, and there a flower or a shrub which betrays the hand of man; but now all is a neglected desert!

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Such is the state of the soul of the backslider! Time was when it appeared as the garden of the Lord, planted and watered and fenced in, and choice flowers bloomed there, and rich ripe fruits of holiness and peace and love were gathered! All was bright and beautiful and cheerful! But now how changed! The wall of the Lord's protection is broken down; the wild boar tramples it under foot; the tender flowers are crushed; the graces of the spirit droop and die; wild, rank, luxuriant weeds of pride and lust and

manifold corruptions spread themselves all over the vineyard; scarcely a trace of former cultivation appears-all is barren and desolate !

2. And whence the cause of this sad change?

Let us ponder it and gain instruction! What could have occasioned such desolation and misery? Was it any great crime and desperate wickedness? No! it was only "a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep!" The day of small things despised, he fell by little and little! His spiritual poverty came on him as one that travelleth— step by step; so gradually, it was almost imperceptible! He was a little longer in the world and a little shorter in prayer; he was a little cold, and a little careless, and a little slothful; one little thing was given up after another, until the Scripture was seldom read; prayer became a dead service and a lifeless form: then sin and the world crept in; he became alienated from God;—and now see the imminent peril of his soul!

3. The miserable end to be dreaded :

-"want may come upon him as an armed man"-terribly, suddenly, irresistibly! To this source St. Paul traces the desperate condition of some whom it seemed scarcely possible to save: "they had been enlightened, and tasted the heavenly gift; were made partakers of the Holy Ghost," &c. If such should fall away or apostatize, "it is impossible to renew them to repentance;" or, as the phrase implies, "as difficult as possible," almost impossible! And why? Because, using the very figure of the text, they are like "barren earth nigh unto cursing, whose end is to be burned." And what is the remedy against such a condition? Diligence as opposed to sloth: "the work of faith-the labour of love;" and all he desired for the Hebrew Christians was, that "they would shew the same diligence, and be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises." (Heb. vi. 4-12.) Most perilous condition!-nigh unto cursing!" Who does not shrink from it? Who does not fear "this armed man?" To what a desperate state may a little sloth and neglect bring us! If found in this state by death we perish, as thousands have perished before us, whose souls were once apparently flourishing.

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1. Let all examine themselves.

What is the state of your vineyard, of your soul? Has it ever yet been enclosed and cultivated? Or is it in its native wildness? Of this you must give account to God! You

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