may not unnaturally exclaim, I am a worm, and no man: when he reviews his services, he may pronounce them too worthless to be remembered of God: when he reviews his sins, he may believe them so great, as to cut him off from every reasonable hope of a share in the divine attention. But, notwithstanding his insignificance, fears, and doubts, he is not forgotten here; and will not be forgotten in the day, when God makes up his jewels. The tears, which he has shed; the prayers, which he has offered up; the two mites, which he has consecrated to God; the cup of cold water, which he has given to a fellow disciple; were neither unnoticed nor unregarded. God was present, when each act of humble and sincere obedience was performed; marked it with his eye; recorded it in his book; and will acknowledge it at the final day.

From this constant, kind, and merciful regard of his Maker, no situation, no circumstances, will preclude him, even for a moment. However lowly, however solitary, however forgotten of mankind, his course through life may be; himself and his interests, his wants and his woes, are tenderly, as well as continually, regarded by his God.

In seasons of sorrow, of sickness, bereavement, or desertion; when he has lost his parents, or his children; or is forsaken by his former friends and companions: when the world begins to seem to him a desert, and life to be a burden: God is then at hand, his Father, and everlasting Friend; and will be better to him than sons and daughters. The Physician of the body, as well as of the soul, will administer healing to his diseased frame; pour the balm of consolation into his wounded spirit; and enable him to say, Why art thou cast down, O my soul! and why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.

When those around him become hostile to his character, and to his religion; when he himself is hated, despised, and persecuted: when for help he looks through the world in vain, and is ready to sink in the gulf of despair: let him remember, that God has been present, to behold all his sufferings; and will effectually guard him from every fatal evil. He may indeed be persecuted, but he will not be forsaken; he may be cast down, but he will not be destroyed. Let him also remember, that his afflictions, though they may seem heavy, are but for a moment, and are, therefore, really light; and that they will work for him an exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

In seasons of temptation, when his resolution to resist, his fortitude to endure, his patience to suffer, his wisdom to devise means of escape, and his diligence and faithfulness to use them, fail and decline or even when, immersed in sloth and security, he ceases to watch over himself, and to guard against impending evil: God still is present, to supply all his wants; to renew his vigour; to support his yielding constancy; to awaken in him new vigilance; to quicken in him a contrite sense of his backsliding; to deliver him from the

unequal contest; and to bless him with returning hope, peace, and safety.

When self-confidence, self-flattery, and self-righteousness, inflate, deform, and betray him, when no Christian friend is near, to know, to pity, or to rescue him: God, even then, is present, to humble, to guide, and to restore him: and to enable him to find a safe path over the otherwise insurmountable obstacles to his continuance in the way of life.

Does he, with other humble followers of the Redeemer, mourn in Zion the hidings of God's face, his own backslidings, or the depression and sufferings of his fellow-christians; and feel, as if both himself and the Church were deserted and forgotten? Let him remember, that, although his heavenly Father hath smitten him for his sins with a rod, and for his iniquities with stripes; yet his covenant he will not take away, nor forget his mercy; that the walls of Zion are continually before him; and that she is graven on the palms of his hands; that, although a woman may forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb; yet will her Redeemer not forget his Church; and that He will keep her in the hollow of his hand, and preserve her as the apple of his eye. Let him remember, that JEHOVAH will soon lift upon him, and his fellow-saints, the light of his countenance; and will soon appoint, unto them all, beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.

Is he come to a dying bed? Is Eternity, with all its amazing scenes, beginning to be unveiled? Is his final trial ready to commence? Is his account even now to be given; his sentence to be pronounced; and his endless allotment to be fixed? Behold on the throne of Judgment that glorious person, who has promised, that he will never leave him, nor forsake him. He is the Judge, by whom he is to be tried; the Rewarder, by whom his destiny is to be fixed for ever. This divine Redeemer will now remember him as one of those, for whom he died; as one of those, for whom he has made unceasing intercession before the throne of the Majesty in the Hea

vens.

8thly. What an affecting and amazing display will be made of the Omniscience of God, at the last Judgment!

On this solemn day, all mankind will be judged according to the deeds done in the body. That these may be the foundation of the righteous judgment of God, it is indispensable, that they should be known clearly and certainly: the sins, together with all their aggravations and palliations; the virtues, with all their diminutions and enhancements. To the same end it is equally necessary, that the system of retribution should also be perfectly comprehended; so that every administration of reward, both to the righteous and the wicked, should, throughout Eternity, be measured out to each individual exactly as his whole character demands. Of course, the knowledge, which will here be indispensable, will be a perfect

comprehension of this system, together with all the moral conduct, and all the circumstances, of the innumerable beings, who will be judged. The display of this knowledge, it is evident, will be the greatest display announced by the Scriptures, and infinitely greater than any other, conceivable by the human mind. This display will be, also, far more affecting than any other: for on it will depend all the immortal concerns of the innumerable children of Adam. Yet such a display will certainly be made, to such an extent, as to exhibit God in the character of an upright judge, an impartial dispenser of good and evil to his creatures; as to stop every mouth, and force every heart to confess, that he is just when he judgeth, and clear when he condemneth.

What manifestations of the human character will then be made! How different will be the appearance, which pride, ambition, and avarice, sloth, lust, and intemperance, will wear in the sight of God, in the sight of the assembled universe, and in the sight of those, who have yielded themselves up to these evil passions, from that, which they have customarily worn in the present world. How low will the haughty man be bowed down! How will the splendour of power and conquest set in darkness! How will the golden mountains of opulence melt away, and leave the dreaming possessor poor, and naked, and miserable, and in want of all things. How will the sensualist awake out of his momentary vision of pleasure, and find it all changed to vanity and vexation of spirit! How little, in innumerable instances, will the worldly great then appear! How contemptible the renowned! How weak the powerful! How foolish the wise men, and disputers, of this world! On the contrary, with what confidence and joy will the poor, despised, humble Christian lift up his head, and take his proper place in the great scale of being, because he beholds his redemption arrived! Here, first, his character will be openly acknowledged, and his worth confessed. Last in the present world, he will be numbered among the first in the world to come. A feeble, faded, half extinguished lamp on this side of the grave, he will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of his Father.

How differently will our own characters appear from what we imagine them to be, during our present life. Here most of our sins are forgotten; there they are all recorded in the book of God's remembrance. Here vast multitudes of them are concealed; there they will all be displayed in the open day. Here they are often mistaken by self-flattery for virtues; there they will be irresistibly seen in all their native deformity. How delightful will it then be to find, that they have been blotted out by the divine mercy as a thick cloud; that they have been expiated by the blood of the Redeemer! What a consolation, what transport, will it be to find, that, numerous and great as our iniquities have been, yet our whole character was such in the eye of the heart-searching God, as to entitle us, through the merits of Christ, to a reward of endless life and glory!

SERMON VII.

OMNIPOTENCE AND INDEPENDENCE OF GOD.

GENESIS XVII. 1.-I am the Almighty God.

IN my last discourse, I considered the Omnipresence and Omniscience of God. The next subject in the natural order of discussion is his Almighty Power.

In the text, this attribute is asserted directly by God himself to Abraham, when he renewed with him the covenant of grace, and instituted the sacrament of circumcision. In a manner equally explicit, are similar declarations made throughout every part of the Scriptures.

The Omnipotence of God is, also, easily demonstrated by Reason; so easily, that no divine attribute has, perhaps, been so strongly realized, or generally acknowledged. So general is this acknowledgment, that a sober attempt to persuade a Christian audience of the truth of this doctrine, would be scarcely considered as serious, or as compatible with the dictates of good sense. An attempt to impress this doctrine on the mind is not, however, liable to the same objections, nor indeed to any objection. It cannot but be a profitable employment to examine, briefly, several things, in which we find the most striking displays of this perfection. To such an examination I shall, therefore, proceed; and observe,

1. That the power of God is gloriously manifested in the work of Creation.

Creation may be defined, the production of existence where nothing was before. The power, displayed in the act of creating, not only exceeds all finite comprehension, but is plainly so great, as to exclude every rational limitation. It is impossible to believe, that the power, which originally gives existence, cannot do any thing, and every thing, which in its own nature is capable of being done; or, in other words, every thing, the doing of which involves not a contradiction. When we contemplate creative power; we neither attempt, nor pretend, to form any estimate of its extent; but are lost in wonder and amazement at the character of him, who gives being wherever he pleases.

On the simple act of creating, however, it is not easy for such minds, as ours, to dwell. A single glance of the mind makes us possessed of all, which we know concerning this effort of Omnipotence, as it is in itself. But there are several things, relative to the effects which it produces, capable of mightily enhancing our ideas concerning this astonishing exertion of power. Of this nature is, in the

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1st. place, The vastness and multitude of the things which were created.

The world, which we inhabit, is itself a vast and amazing work. The great divisions of Land and Water; the Continents and Oceans, into which it is distributed; nay, the Mountains and Plains, the Lakes and Rivers, with which it is magnificently adorned; are, severally, sufficiently wonderful and affecting to fill our minds, and to engross all the power of Contemplation. Nor are our thoughts less deeply interested by the vast multitude of plants, trees, and animals, with which every part of the Globe is stored at every period of time. All these, also, rise and fall in an uninterrupted succession. When one perishes, another immediately succeeds. No blank is permitted, and no vacuity found: but creating energy, always operating, produces a continual renovation of that which is lost.

When we lift up our eyes to the Heavens, we are still more amazed at the sight of many such worlds, composing the planetary system. The Comets, which surround our Sun, greatly increase our amazement by their numbers, the velocity of their motions, and the inconceivable extent of their circuits. It is still more enhanced by the union of these numerous worlds in one vast system, connected by a common centre, and revolving round that centre with a harmony, and splendour, worthy of a God.

But this system, great and wonderful as it is, is a mere speck, compared with the real extent of the Creation. Satisfactory evidence exists, that every star, which twinkles in the firmament, is no other than a Sun, a world of light, surrounded by its own attendant planets, formed into a system similar to ours. Forty-five thousand such stars have been counted, by the aid of the Herschellian Telescope, in so small a part of the Heavens, that, supposing this part to be sown no thicker than the rest, the same Telescope would reach at least seventy-five millions in the whole sphere. By means of new improvements in the same optical instrument, they have been found to be numerous to a degree still more astonishing. Every one of these is, in my view, rationally concluded to be the Sun, and Centre, of a system of planetary and cometary worlds. Beyond this, I think it not at all improbable, that, were we transported to the most distant of the visible stars, we should find there a firmament expanding over our heads, studded in the same manner with stars innumerable. Nay, were we to repeat the same flight, and be again wafted through the same distance, it is not improbable, that we should behold a new repetition of the same sublimity and glory. In this manner immensity appears, in a sense, to be peopled with worlds innumerable, constituting the boundless empire of Jehovah. How amazing, then, must be the power and greatness of Him, who not only telleth the number of the stars, and calleth them all by their names, but with a word spoke them all into being.

2dly. The peculiar nature and splendour of many of these works strongly impress on our minds the greatness of creating power.