waters cover the sea. Our present attainments are nothing, in comparison with the time when the laws of God shall be in every heart, and written on every mind; when all shall know the Lord, from the least to the greatest; when there shall be one Lord throughout all the earth, and His Name one. The church is nothing worthy of comparing with the mountain of the Lord's house which shall be established on the top of the mountains and exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow into it. Nor is any adequate portion of its beneficial effects yet experienced, though the sure word of prophecy has declared that men shall beat their swords into plough-shares and their spears into pruning-hooks, and cease from war; has declared that the wolf shall lie down with the lamb, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and the child shall play on the hole of the cockatrice den, and none shall hurt nor destroy in all the holy mountain of the Lord, when the latter-day glory shall come.

But these, and all the other unaccomplished triumphs of the Gospel, are but the consequences of Christ's glorification. He, the Leader and Captain of our salvation, hath conquered in that warfare which he calleth his soldiers to fight; and hath not only led the way for them, but given them the whole armour of God, to withstand in the evil day: not only to wrestle against flesh and blood, but that they may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil, and principalities and powers, and the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places (Eph. vi. 12).

Except in the mount of transfiguration, to Peter, James, and John; except in the momentary vision of glory above the brightness of the sun, as Paul journeyed to Damascus ; except to John in Patmos, walking in the midst of the golden lamps and holding the stars in his right hand; the glory of Christ hath not appeared. He came in lowliness, as the Man of Sorrows, the Root out of a dry ground, without form and comeliness, to suffer and to die. Our present calling is to bear his earthly image, to be conformed to his humiliation, to be counted the offscouring of all things for his sake, to pray for our enemies, and to bless when they persecute and despitefully use us; and thus to be perfected through sufferings, and wait for his appearing. Till the revelation of Christ's glory, all his people must wait for theirs. He must first be revealed from heaven, in the glorious incorruptible form which he now wears, and then his people shall be changed into the same image, from glory to glory; then this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and death be swallowed up in victory. Not till he shall appear shall we become like him, and see him as he is; not till he cometh shall he be glorified in his saints and admired in all them that believe; not till the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, shall the dead in Christ rise,

and the living be changed; not till Christ shall come again, will he receive us into the mansions he hath prepared; not till he taketh to himself his great power and reigneth, shall be give reward to his saints, small and great; not till he leaves the throne of the Father where he now sitteth (Ps. cx.), and shall have mounted his own throne (Ps. ii. Ezek. xliii.) will his people become kings and priests, and reign with him for ever and ever.

As Christ's first advent shot a ray of light across this world's gloom, by the faith it implanted, the spiritual darkness it dispelled, the lively hope it gave by the resurrection of Christ from the dead, and the momentary glimpses of future glory seen by a favoured few; so the second advent, when he cometh as the bright and morning Star, shall be the harbinger of an eternal day, when the Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing on his wings for all the earth; when the sun of Zion shall no more go down, and the Lord shall be unto her an everlasting light, and the days of her mourning shall be ended; and when the heavenly Jerusalem shall have no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it; for the glory of God shall lighten it, and the Lamb be the light thereof.

To be told of a deliverance which is only visionary, which is figurative and not real, is no gospel; to be told of a Saviour who is never to appear, never to claim his rights, is not telling of the Saviour of the Bible. The long-suffering of God is salvation, not in the falsification of his word, but in presenting to the faith of successive generations the same glorious truths with equal and instant urgency upon them all. In the lively faith of these truths our fathers overcame, and we laid them in the grave in sure and certain hope of a joyful resurrection; and in the strength of that one and the same faith we follow their footsteps, clinging stedfastly and immoveably to the word of our God, with whom a thousand years are but as yesterday, or as a watch in the night; and our watch-word during the night is the promise of our Lord and Saviour," Behold, I come quickly blessed is he that watcheth."

The Gospel would be no good news, and the Saviour would be no deliverer, if the calling of Christ and his members were only to suffering; if their warfare were an impotent and fruitless struggle, in which complete victory and full deliverance are impossible, and not to be expected. The character of the Saviour is but half told out in his work in the flesh and upon the cross: his glory began when he ascended up on high, leading captivity captive, and receiving gifts for men: and his glory, which then began, waiteth yet for its manifestation, both in Him the head, in his body the church, and in the whole creation, which "waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God." (Rom. viii.)

It were no glory to the Saviour to tell that "he was despised

and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief," if we tell not also that "the Lord will divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong." It were no good news to us, that "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel of God, have men taken, and by wicked hands. crucified and slain," if we are not also told that "This Jesus bath God raised up; and, being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth the Comforter from the throne of the Father, where Christ now sits, waiting until his foes are by the Father made his footstool." It were no comfort to the groaning and travailing creation to shew that "That those things which God before had shewed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled," unless there were also declared that "The times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and he shall send Jesus, which before was preached, whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began."

The "times of refreshing" are the things spoken of by all the prophets, the "restitution" is the Gospel of good news to creation : the power of the risen and exalted Saviour is the word of promise to us and to our children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call the "inheritance reserved in heaven....to be revealed in the last time," is the end of faith, the salvation of souls. "Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently....what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow;" the perfected hope, the fulness of grace, that is to be brought unto us at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1 Pet. i. 4-13; Acts ii. 23-47, iii. 18-21).

The Gospel is good tidings of great joy to all people, in the birth of a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. Of him the angel declared He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his Father David: and he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end (Luke i. 32, ii. 10). Jesus continually makes it imperative upon his followers to give up all that man holds dear in this life, that they may enter the kingdom of God. Peter said unto him, “Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee: what shall we have therefore? And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, that ye, which have followed me; in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel" (Matt. xix. 28). The regeneration and throne of glory, here spoken of,

manifestly refer to the world to come, so called expressly in the parallel Gospels (Mark x. 30; Luke xviii. 30), and put in contrast with this present time, of which persecutions, not reigning, is the inevitable and constant characteristic. But, to set it beyond doubt or cavil, it is immediately afterwards declared that James and John, fondly or ambitiously, desired the seats nearest to Jesus when he should come in the glory of his kingdom: Christ does not reprove them as holding false notions therein, and therefore the doctrine they held is true, that, when Christ shall come in glory, there are thrones of glory for his followers. And he asserts, moreover, that these seats are prepared for certain of his followers (Mark x. 40); and further goes on to demonstrate the reality of that future kingdom of glory, by declaring that whosoever desires to be the chiefest in that future kingdom, must be the servant of all in this present time (ver. 44); even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister. But as surely as the time of our Lord's ministration came to an end, and he is exalted to the throne of God, to come forth at length as King of kings and Lord of lords," so surely shall the humiliation of his followers be exchanged for glory and honour at his coming. When he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection on such the second death hath no power; but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years. (Rev. xx.)

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Every prophecy of Christ concludes in a song of triumph and a vision of glory. It was the joy set before him for which he endured the shame; a joy in which all his followers shall share. "Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward; for yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry." By faith in the coming glory all the elders endured the trials of the present life, and the rage of all the powers of evil; not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. But, deprived of the glory in prospect, of the better country, of the city prepared for them by God, their faith would be without an object, they would have no promises to look to, and would not be declaring plainly that they seek a country. And we, in like manner, if deprived of the hope set before us in Scripture, the hope of deliverance from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God-we, deprived of this, have not any thing real and stable on which the mind can rest. "If in this life only we have hope, we are of all men the most miserable." And the popular objections to the doctrines of the Second Advent do in fact make the resurrection itself nugatory, by making it no necessary part of faith-by making it so vague that the mind rests upon it with

no satisfaction; or by making it a hindrance and an incumbrance, instead of a recompence and a joy,

This world is often represented as so fallen, and devil-possessed, as to be wholly beyond the power of God to reclaim; and the body of man, the most finished work of creation, formed to exercise dominion over all the other creatures of God, is consigned to corruption, without thought or inquiry of its future destiny, without considering what a large share it has in the world to come. The soul is but half the man, and it may be doubted whether the soul without the body can exercise any of the functions of a man. But we have often heard it said, and applauded as a proof of spirituality, that this sinful body, when laid in the grave, might be looked upon with abhorrence by the separated soul; and that this fallen world would be the aversion of an emancipated spirit.

This is false philosophy, and still worse theology; and is generally either the refuge of indolence, which shuns the trouble of accurate inquiry; or the shelter of lies for a troubled conscience, which dreads a coming scrutiny of the deeds done in the body, and the records of its sin impressed upon his companions and habitat. These fears are too often lulled by the opiate of unbelief; and many drink deep of the opiate without knowing it, and lull the care for the realities of futurity in the specious pretence of spirituality. The true spirituality consists in minding continually the things of the Spirit. Spirituality is not the negation of the corporeal and the local: there is a spiritual body, as well as a natural; there are bodies celestial and terrestrial; there is a heavenly city, as well as an earthly. Faith is a thing substantial and real, not visionary; the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

The Lord said to Abraham, "I am God all-sufficient: walk before me, and be thou perfect" (Gen. xvii.); and God required of him no impossible thing. Christ saith to his disciples, Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples; " and, " Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you." (John xv.) "As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world." (John xvii. 18.) This following the commandments of God is therefore the imperative duty of all; and strength to perform every duty required, is ever given by him (John xiv. 21): and Christ declares that the judgment shall be according to the deeds done in the body, whether they be good or bad: saying to the righteous, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat....inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren ye have done it