and he threw himself down before him in the hall. What did that son do? He just leaped over his father's body, and went out to join his comrades. There is not one of you but would say, "That was an ungrateful wretch, not fit to live." Ah, sinner, what would you do with Christ in such a case? Why, many of you, I believe, if he were to throw himself down before you and plead with you, would step right over him.

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WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE.

WOULD like to weigh men, and so I will put the scales up here. Imagine them hanging down from heaven in this hall, and that we are to be weighed. Perhaps if Belshazzar, who was astonished at being found wanting, had seen the scales, he would have been as willing as most of you to leap into one pan with the expectation of seeing the other go up. The majority of people want to use their own scales, feeling pretty sure that by these they would weigh heavier than their neighbors. He (the speaker) would weigh them in God's scales, which were evenly paired and balanced, and the weights would be the Ten Commandments.

HOMELY ILLUSTRATION OF A SINNER.

OU

γου You know that when the perfect God gave a law, it had to be a perfect law, a perfect standard. No man ever kept that law. Christ only did it, because he

was divine. I challenge any man or any devil to find a blemish in his life or character. So he was able to become the sinner's substitute. In England there used to be a game played with bows and arrows. A man would have ten arrows, and if he missed sending them every one through a hoop, he was called a "sinner." Now suppose that clock is a hoop. I send nine arrows all through, but miss the tenth. I am a sinner. Then some one else here, says: "Let me try it." He misses every one. We are both "sinners," and he no more than I, though I have only missed one arrow. Oh, my friend, if you sin in one point, and every one has at least done that, you must number yourself among the ungodly.

EVERY MAN A FAILURE.

EVERY man, from Adam down, has proved a failure.

Man was a failure in Eden; he became a wreck

there. Man was also a stupendous failure under the Mosaic covenant. Then see what a failure man was under the judges and under the prophets. Walk up and down the streets of London or New York, and see the young men reeling down to a drunkard's grave. Look at them all around you hurrying on to destruction. Oh, man has ever been and is a failure. So, my friends, let us learn this lesson, that man without God is a failure, put him where you please; the law condemns him; he is at war with the God that created him.

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THE IDIOT'S MOTHER.

KNOW a mother who has an idiot child. For it she gave up all society, almost everything, and devoted her whole life to it. "And now," said she, "for fourteen years I have tended it and loved it, and it does not even know me. Oh, it is breaking my heart!" Oh, how the Lord might say this of hundreds here. Jesus comes here, and goes from seat to seat, asking if there is a place for him. Oh, will not some of you take him into your hearts?

2. THE ATONEMENT.

"God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” JOHN 3:16.

SUBSTITUTION.

IF you take this doctrine out of my Bible, I will leave it here to-night, for it is no good to me. This doctrine belongs to the Bible. You find it like a scarlet line running all through the book. "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God," but Christ died for the guilty, "the just for the unjust." He died in the place of sinners; and if I have him, I have taken him as my substitute, and I am saved. In the time of Napoleon I., a certain man agreed to join the ranks in the place of a comrade who had been drafted. The offer was accepted, the battle took place, and the man was killed. Some

time after, another draft was made, and they wanted a second time to take the man whose substitute had been shot. "No," said he, "you can't take me; I'm dead. I was shot at such a battle." "Why, man, you are crazy. Look here, you got a substitute; another man went in your place, but you have not been shot." "No, but he died in my place; he went as my substitute." They would not recognize it, and it was carried up to the emperor, but the emperor said the man was right. Napoleon the First recognized the doctrine of substitution. But think of this, my friends, the great Emperor of heaven has recognized the doctrine of substitution; if he had not, where would our hope for eternity be? Dashed to the ground. Ask me where my hope of substitution is, and I answer, Jesus for me! I have broken the law. Yes, but Christ sends me a message, and he says, "I will take your place, and you shall take mine.” Take him as your Substitute and Saviour.

IT

THE FREE GIFT.

T is a free gift, presented to "whosoever." Suppose I were to say, I will give this Bible to "whosoever," what have you got to do? Why, nothing but to take it. But a man comes forward, and says, "I'd like that Bible very much." "Well, did n't I say 'whosoever'?" "Yes; but I'd like to have you say my name." "Well, here it is." Still he keeps eying the Bible, and says, “I'd like to give you something for it. I don't like to take it for

nothing." "Well, I am not here to sell Bibles; take it, if you want it." "Well, I want it; but I'd like to give you something for it. Let me give you a penny for it; though, to be sure, it's worth twenty or thirty shillings." Well, suppose I took the penny; the man takes up the Bible, and marches away home with it. His wife says, "Where did you get that Bible?" "Oh, I bought it." Mark the point: when he gives the penny it ceases to be a gift. So with salvation. If you were to pay ever so little, it would not be a gift.

THE BLOOD UPON THE DOORPOST.

THERE

HERE was a little child (so runs the legend), the firstborn in the house of an Israelite; and you know God said that, in every house where the blood was not upon the doorpost, the firstborn should be smitten by death. The little girl was sick, but she was afraid that the blood was not upon the doorpost; so she asked her father if he was sure he had put the blood upon the doorpost; and the father said, "Yes, he was quite sure; he had ordered it to be done." But the little girl said the second time, "Father, are you quite sure that the blood is there?" "Yes, my child," answered the father; "be quiet, and sleep." But the child could not sleep. She was very sick and very restless; and as night came on, and it grew darker and darker, and nearer and nearer to the time when the angel should pass over Goshen, she got still more nervous and restless and uneasy; and at