that feeling which rejoices to escape from Christ's call. But others do not rejoice to escape from it, but dread to think that it will not force them to listen to it. Do we desire some stronger religious excitement than usual? some solemn occasion to oblige us to think and to pray? some event that may break through the unmoved current of our daily life, and not allow it to stagnate? It is a natural desire, but a vain one. Life will have its tranquil hours, its unvaried days, its ordinary and unexcited feelings. But what then? true it is that one will not come to us from the dead to make us repent; yet still we have the prophets and apostles: let us hear them. How precious are these quiet moments, when we may show our love for God's call by listening for and catching its softest sound! With the world all around us, with death, and sorrow, and care, seemingly at a distance; on the plain road of human life, so far from the edge of the hill that we can enjoy no prospect of the distant country, none of the far, off horizon where earth and heaven meet, have we not God's light to guide and cheer us, and God's air to refresh us, and God's work to do? No! God is not far from every one of us; never is the true Christian left alone. There are no especial solemnities calling our attention; is it not solemn enough to live and breathe in this world of wonders? There are no great changes in our life or condition awaiting us

to call forth extraordinary devotion; but what is our daily change from sleep to waking, and from waking to sleep? what is the flight of every day out of the limited number of the days of our existence? And then for opportunities; are they denied us? Does any day pass without Christ's name being presented to our ears, without prayers being offered up in our presence, reminding us of things so great; even life and death, and God and eternity; that if they will not rouse us, by what can we expect to be roused? If the period now before us is indeed to go on quietly, let us be awake ourselves, and then we may be sure that its quiet will have nothing of dullness; that God will be near enough, and the aid of his Spirit abundantly ready, and our progress in grace marked by no obscure or doubtful signs. And then, if so using these ordinary seasons and ordinary means of grace, there should arise any thing extraordinary, if aught of a public or private nature should bring with it an especial warning, how ready shall we be to receive it and to profit by it! How free from confusion and alarm should we receive God's unusual call, when his voice in its most ordinary language had been so long familiar and endeared to us! Then, whether its import was to strengthen us in all goodness, or to wean us from the world by fatherly correction, or to call us to a new and untried line of duty, still we should be ready to receive it for our good. Our hearts are ever wavering, and ever need God's strengthening hand; but we had not let them become hardened in sin by our neglect: they were weak, but not utterly cold or rebellious. The world wins us all too much; and who does not feel that chastening would be good for him? but even in the midst of the world we had lived with God, and his correction does but help our spirits to rise more freely to him whom they had sought, and had found to be their freedom even amidst their bonds. God may have new and different trials in store for us; but in those which he had given us before, we had found him faithful. So, having Moses and the Prophets, having the guidance of the Spirit of truth, and having daily followed it, we shall not need one to rise from the dead for the confirmation of our faith; but our spirits having been raised up already by Christ's Spirit, we can wait contentedly for God's good time, when the same Spirit shall quicken our mortal bodies also.

SERMON IX.

CHRIST'S ADVENT.

MATTHEW, xxi. 9.

And the multitudes that went before and that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna to the Son of David.

LUKE, xxiii. 20, 21.

Pilate, willing to release Jesus, spake again to them; but they cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him.

THESE two events took place within a week of one another. And although it would not be safe to assume that all those who cried "Crucify him," had been amongst those who had so lately cried, "Hosanna to the Son of David:" yet as each of these cries is described as having been the general voice, at the time when it was uttered, there must have been a great many persons who joined, and, most probably, with equal earnestness, in both. The cause, indeed, of the change of feeling is not difficult to understand. The people received Christ as their King, and expected Messiah; but finding that he did not answer to their expectations of him, that he made no attempt to rouse them against Cæsar, or to call on them to resist paying tribute to the Romans, they soon began to think that he must have deceived them; their old notion returned, that his signs and wonders had been done through the help of evil spirits, and their violence against him was exactly in proportion to the high-raised hopes which his conduct had disappointed.

But all this is but a matter of history: the feelings of the people of Jerusalem, and the causes which led to them, are, in themselves, only a subject of curiosity. The verses, however, which I have read as the text, are something more than historical. The change which they describe is felt by more than the people of Jerusalem: it is one which, within a time as short, is constantly experienced by ourselves. On the Sunday we may be joining, in all sincerity, in the cry of "Hosanna to the Son of David;" and before the end of the week, our hearts may be saying in effect, "Crucify him, crucify him!" A change even more sudden than this was felt by the Apostles, on the very night on which our Lord was betrayed. For after they had exclaimed, in the fullest earnestness, "We believe that thou camest forth from God;"