But you, perhaps, have done something more than giving a mere attendance on the means of grace. You have felt something of compunction for sin, something of an awakening of conscience, something of self-condemnation for your words and works of evil. Will this, then, establish the point? No, Did not brethren, this alone is no proof that the kingdom of God is come. Did not the first exclaim, "Now, therefore, Pharaoh and Judas feel the same? forgive, I pray thee, my sin only this once," and did he not turn back again to folly and perish by his stubbornness and rebellion? Did not Judas repent himself, and yet die the death of a suicide and a reprobate? It is evident, then, that feelings such as these are insufficient to establish the fact.

Do you ask, why they are so? What are their defects? We reply, their No sinner defect is, if they stand alone, that they want a right foundation. ever yet felt himself lost-that is, had a real saving conviction of sin-without Christ. It is not until he has been presented to the soul by the Spirit of God as the great remedy for sin, that sin is ever truly, scripturally, savingly felt There are many convictions of sin without and deplored and renounced. Christ, but they are all transitory, all worthless. Your convictions of sin may in fact be natural; you may discern so much of iniquity in your past conduct, that you are unable to close your eyes to the reality of its guilt. This, then, will produce convictions; but you may be endeavouring to stifle these convictions, you may be endeavouring to drown them in company, or in occupations in resisting every impression. As we have read of the deer who runs till he shakes out the arrow that has pierced him, or the convicted felon who files off the fetters that confine him; the whole bent and purpose of your mind may be to get rid of these convictions, to shake off these impressions, and to escape. Therefore they cannot necessarily prove that the kingdom of grace has come into your heart. They may, indeed, be the blossoms; but then we are all aware that blossoms are often blown off before the fruit is set.

But, again, your convictions may have gone still further: they have not evaporated as soon as they were formed; they have led to action; they have been followed by some degree of reformation and a renunciation of those sins to which you were once devoted; and you ask, are not these unquestionably the coming of the kingdom of grace? Alas, we are compelled again to reply, not necessarily so; you may truly have forsaken your sins, but you may have The fear of God's punishment for done so from many an unworthy motive. sin, the love of the world's approbation, the desire to stand well in society, the injury of your health or your business, may have deterred you from your past transgressions. Or you may have outgrown one kind of sin, and while you are imagining you are in the kingdom of grace, you may be only exchanging one sin for another that is better fitted for your present taste, your present occupation. As the adder changes his skin every year of his life, but under every suck change he keeps his poison; so the unconverted sinner, under every partia reformation, under every change of outward circumstances keeps his corrupt unaltered heart, and is the unconverted sinner still.

Shall we then say we must conclude that the petition of the text must be for ever offered, and yet no light be given, no means by which to ascertain if it be ever granted? By no means, my brethren; only be honest in the inquiry, only be faithful to your own souls, and you shall never be left in doubt, whether, as regards yourself, the kingdom of grace be come. We would say, then, that you may take encouragement upon this subject if you feel a desire, not for a partial

reformation, but an entire one; not the giving up some, but every sin; not by the fulfilling some of the Lord's commandments, but all of them, however difficult, or however contrary to our natural inclinations; and, together with these, an increasing knowledge and love, and desire to please God in Christ Jesus; if the Saviour is increasingly precious, and sin increasingly hateful to your souls. We say increasingly, for we would lay much stress on these being progressive works. The kingdom of grace consists in no sudden impulse: it is manifest in the gradual change of the whole man; the gradual developement of the whole Christian character; the gradual subjugation of every temper and lust, and passion, and thought to the obedience of Christ. Do we see the drunkard become sober; the licentious, chaste; the proud, humble; the worldly, spiritual; the irritable, meek? and do we behold these outward reformations going hand in hand with inward improvement, with secret prayer, with private searching of God's word, with a humble, child-like reliance upon the blood, and righteousness, and strength of a crucified Redeemer; and have we any doubt of the establishment of God's kingdom in those hearts? Can it admit of a question? No, blessed be God! Of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of the bramble do they gather grapes. We may say without fear of mistake here, the God of heaven is setting up a kingdom which shall never be removed, but standeth fast for ever: this is God's work, and marvellous in our eyes. Blessed is every mother's son who can find these things in his soul: he carries a kingdom within him, and that kingdom of grace shall be unquestionably succeeded by the kingdom of glory. One word only in conclusion to trembling, doubting, and yet believing and obeying souls. You inquire, can you, without presumption, take to yourselves these exceeding great and precious promises-a life of holiness, a peaceful death, and a glorious eternity. You say that the kingdom of grace has never really found an entrance into your heart; but why do you imagine this? Because you cannot discern it? How many a poor doubting child of God had the kingdom of grace in his heart long before he ever thought or saw it there? The cup of gold was in Benjamin's sack, yet he knew it not. Jacob wept during many a year of his declining life for Joseph's death, whilst Joseph was at that very time riding in the second chariot of Egypt. You may be ignorant of the existence of grace in your heart, you may deplore its absence, and you may even weep for it, while it is there securely, there for ever.

But you doubt the existence of this kingdom, because the kingdom of sin is still so strong within you in hardness of heart and the remains of corruption. You may, even when the stony heart has been taken away, and the heart of flesh has been given you, you may have much remaining hardness of heart. But this is evidently different from having a hard heart. The best wheat field you ever saw in your life was not free from weeds; but you would have thought it strange to hear that field called a field of weeds. You may have many corruptions striving within your hearts; yet your knowledge of them, and grief for them, and striving against them, may be the impress and marks of the presence of the kingdom of which we speak within you, as the nonexistence is of its absence. Only mark this: Is the continual frame and demeanour of your souls a holy frame? Do you ever allow yourselves conentedly in sin? Are you continually following hard after God, and seeking dim in his own appointed way, through Jesus Christ. Are you often thinking of God? So often you can say with David, "How precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! If I should count

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them they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee” my waking thoughts are still with thee." If you can but find these things in your souls, then take courage; be assured that the kingdom of God is within you, that kingdom which he hath himself pronounced to be righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost; that kingdom whose builder and maker is God. What more would you desire? An assurance of an entrance into the heavenly kingdom? Do not for a moment doubt it. God does not educate his children for hell; such training, such teaching, such chastening as yours, can never be "his way is perfect." He has wasted. "As for God," as the Psalmist says, of his own sovereign will established the kingdom of grace in your heart on earth; he shall not hold his hand until he has established you in his kingdom of glory in heaven.

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Thy kingdom come," let all that is Oh, then, brethren, when we say, May it now be our delight, our joy, our within us praise his holy name. strong consolation, to live as the citizens of that blessed kingdom of God; and then shall it for ever and ever be our exceeding great reward to dwell within its precincts, to mingle with its inhabitants, to take part in its occupations, to stand around its throne, to behold the glory of the eternal Jehovah whom we love, throughout the ages of eternity.

THE FIRST PRINCIPLES OF RELIGION.

REV. J. LEIfchild,

CRAVEN CHAPEL, SUNDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 24, 1833.

"He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him."-Hebrews xi. 6.

It is well, sometimes, to look back to the first principles of religion. It is well to show to infidel and sceptical men, that we are not ashamed of having the various dogmas of our religion probed to their deepest recesses, and their foundations scrutinized and examined. It is well to show men, who are slow of heart and reluctant to believe, that there is no foundation whatever for that reluctance, and that it is perfectly unjustifiable. Finally, it is well to show believers themselves, that their principles are so firmly grounded in the nature and constitution of things, as to warrant their absolute confidence in them for time and for eternity.

Now, the first principles of religion are such as these:-That there is a God: that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are a true revelation from him of his character and his designs: that this revelation was designed to have a supreme influence on human minds and characters: that momentous consequences are suspended upon its having its due influence, or our failing through apathy or neglect to attend to it. Some such principles as these are alluded to in the text:-" He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him."

First.

THERE IS A GOD. This lies at the foundation of all truth. Now, to prove this to those who deny it, or attempt to deny it, it would not be sufficient to say that the Scriptures assert it, since they pretend to deny the truth of the Scriptures. It must, therefore, be proved to them on their own principles, on principles which no man can refuse to admit, without denying himself to be a man. This can be done; and it must be gratifying to believers to know that it can be done, and to be assured that, in doing it, the being and attributes of God are demonstrable by human methods.

The admission of any thing, followed out by a process of legitimate reasoning, necessarily conducts to the being of a God; for either that thing must have been produced by some other, or it must have produced itself. Now, nothing can produce itself, since this were to suppose that it existed as a producing cause before it had a being; it were to suppose that a thing might be and might not be at the same time-that it might be able to produce, and that it might not be produced-which is an absolute contradiction. Nothing can produce itself; it therefore must have been produced; and that which produced it, must either have been itself produced, or have been unproduced and existing from eternity. Thus we must go back from one to another, until we necessarily arrive at a first

cause producing all, itself unproduced-a cause uncaused; and that is God. We must do this, or else we must suppose an eternal series of second causes producing one another without any first cause for their coming into existence, The admission of any thing to exist, followed up by a process of legitimate reasoning, will conduct to the being of the First Great Cause—that is, GoD.

This argument applies to a thousand things as well as to the production of All motion supposes a mover, generation. It applies, for instance, to motion. That which moves

something which moves, since nothing can produce itself. it, must either have been moved by some other power, or have been uncaused and eternal. We must go back, therefore, from motion to mover and to mover, till we come to the first moving cause existing from eternity in itself, which is none other than the GOD, the Cause uncaused, which we have ascertained by the other process advanced.

This argument proves the past eternity of God. Could you suppose a period when He did not exist, then you must suppose a passage, a transition, a motion, from one state to another; that is, from a state of not being to a state of being. But this motion must have had a mover, and that mover must have been prior to God, must have been God himself. So that this is but shifting the object, and still driving us up to the past eternity of God.

Since no cause from This argument proves the future eternity of God. without contributed to His being, so no cause from without, superior to Himself can make him cease to be: and as His being is equal to his essence, it is clear that He could not make himself cease to be. It is, therefore, an axiom of the soundest reason, as well as of the Sacred Oracles-that "From everlasting to everlasting, Thou art God."

The argument proves the simplicity, the unity, the oneness of the Divine nature. These terms, you are all aware, are used in opposition to composition, to a compound being, a being compounded out of several principles and made into one being. But you cannot suppose that of the Divine nature; for then it would follow, that the principles of which that is compounded existed prior to itself: then, it could not be that First Cause, that uncaused cause, which we have ascertained.

These properties of the Deity admitted, all the other attributes of God necessarily follow. When we say this, we mean, of course, as to our mode of apprehension: for, indeed, we ought humbly to beg of God to grant us leave to speak of him according to our own powers of perception. And this we may do unblameably, if we do not exalt ourselves by supposing that we know him as he knows himself. The attributes of God, strictly speaking, do not follow one another, nor depend the one upon the other, but inhere in his Divine nature, compatibly with the simplicity and oneness of that nature-just as the various faculties of our own souls. But they follow according to our apprehension; that is, having admitted the one, we must necessarily admit the other.

From the properties of God that we have noticed will follow, for instance his immensity; for He that is the first cause of all things must be everywhere, must be present with all things that he has caused-in heaven, in earth, in hell, and everywhere-in all his perfections. From these will follow, also, the infinite knowledge of God. The first mover must from necessity be acquainted with all movement; the origin of all power must be the origin of all knowledge. From these will follow the inflexible justice of God: for He that knows all things must know what is right and best; and, his power being in harmony with his