least scrutiny into the state of their own hearts, consider themselves entitled to all that is consolatory in the doctrine of a particular providence, when, alas! it is too evident, that they are living without Christ and without God in the world. I beseech you then to examine yourselves whether you be in the faith, and whether the love of God be shed abroad in your heart, by the Holy Spirit given unto you.

The doctrine of Divine providence is a source of delight to the Christian,

4. By giving him the assurance that it is both his duty and his privilege to divest himself of all anxious care, with regard to future events.

What is there more hostile to the enjoyment of the present life, or more unfriendly to the interests of the life to come, than 'solicitous and corroding care? How it disquiets the mind, how it impairs the health, how it unfits for the vigorous exercise of thought on things Divine, and for the elevation of the heart to the concerns of the world above! All this being distinctly known to our Father who is in heaven, he has most kindly consulted our happiness, by giving us assurances directly adapted to effect our emancipation from the bondage of care. He has even authorized us to cast all our care upon him, declaring that "he careth for us." 1 Pet. v. 7. He has enjoined us to devolve all our burden upon him, engaging to sustain it. He has encouraged us to dismiss from our minds all perplex

ing anxiety respecting provision for the present life. The Redeemer of the soul has said, "Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?" Matt. vi. 25. Can you then suppose that he who sustains your life by his perpetual agency will leave you destitute of necessary food? "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself." Ver. 32-34. It is not the intention of our Divine Master to forbid all thought, or to reprehend all care; but he forbids that care which would disturb and absorb the mind; that care which would disqualify for spiritual duties and spiritual pleasures; that care which implies a distrust of the parental providence of God; that care which superadds to the labours of to-day the burden of to-morrow's anticipated troubles. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." Ver. 34. It is said to have been a proverb among the Arabians, "An affliction is but single to him who only suffers it; but to him who with fear expects it, the affliction is double." "If I am going to sail," said Epictetus, a heathen philosopher, "I choose the best ship and the best pilot, and I wait for the fairest weather that my circumstances and duty will

allow. Prudence and propriety, the principles which the gods have given me for the direction of my conduct, require this of me; but they require no more; and if, notwithstanding, a storm arises, which neither the strength of the vessel, nor the skill of the pilot are likely to withstand, I give myself no trouble about the consequence. All that I had to do is done already. The directors of my conduct never command me to be miserable, to be anxious, desponding or afraid." Could à pagan say this, and shall not we, my brethren, be prepared to say it, on better principles, and with firmer confidence? Then let us be anxiously "careful for nothing, but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let our reAnd the quests be made known unto God. peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." Phil. iv. 6, 7.

We have thus attempted an inquiry into the nature and extent of the doctrine of Divine providence, and into the pleasures which it is calculated to impart. But let us not satisfy ourselves with the mere contemplation of these pleasures; be it our concern to realize them as our own. Let a personal and practical application of the glorious doctrine be the concern of every day, of every hour. Let the doctrine which is so worthy of God, and so cheering to the hearts of his servants, be, this very day, the corrector and the cure of anxious care. Rejoice, Christians, and exult

in the thought, that all the circumstances of your future life are already arranged, with all the wisdom, and with all the kindness of paternal love, consulting your truest and your highest interests. And is there, in the approaching termination of your life on earth, any cause of alarm or dismay? It is he "who loved you, and gave himself for you," that says, "Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead, and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of the invisible world and of death." Rev.. i. 17, 18. Entrust then your immortal spirit, commit your earthly frame, to his secure and faithful custody; and say, in all the confidence of faith, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day." 2 Tim. i. 12.

And when that day arrives "for which all other days were made," what joyous developments will it produce! If light has already sprung up out of the darkness of many a mysterious dispensation, what will be the discoveries of the world in which there shall be no darkness at all? In the prospect of that light and glory, rejoice even now in the thought that "Jehovah reigneth," and in the assurance that although "clouds and darkness are round about him, justice and judgment are the habitation of his throne." Psa. xcvii. 2.

CHAPTER IX.

THE PLEASURES OF HOPE.

No subject connected with the feelings of the human mind has supplied more ample or more interesting materials of thought, either to the philosopher or the poet, than HOPE; yet it requires neither the aid of philosophy to explain its nature, nor the art of poetry to describe its pleasures. Its joys we have all tasted; its value we can all attest. It has soothed our sorrows; it has awakened our energies; it has animated our exertions. We were not strangers to its influence even in that early period of our life, when our desires and expectations seldom extended beyond a few days or a few hours. Its aspirings and its anticipations have at length disdained the utmost limits of earthly existence and earthly computations; and we are taught to yield ourselves to the pleasures of a hope which looks and aims "not at things which are seen, but at things which are not seen;" because "the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal." 2 Cor. iv. 18..

Let me invite your attention,

I. To the characteristics of the pleasures arising from the hope of immortality.

That they are at once the most exquisite and the most solid of all the pleasures which