always boundless. How little do men know of God! Some care not to know Him out of nature; they discard the search for God, as revealed in Christ; they are heedless about His glory, as it shines in the face of Christ. Others, again-and among them many true Christians-care not to know God in nature; the impress of His wisdom, goodness, and power, on every department of the material universe, has no attractions for them; beyond the glimpses which they get of God in providence, and in the redemption of sinners through Christ, they seldom go. Now, both are wrong. The Christian, to make thorough spiritual progress, must be an eclectic. He must seek God everywhere, in all His works. He must be on the alert to converse with God amidst all the display of His glory, in nature, providence, and grace. How grand, how stimulating this sphere of spiritual progress! To live for ever in the boundless glories of the infinite and eternal Father; to be appropriating for ever from an infinite fulness of life and bliss, how sublime! "Your heart shall live that seek God."

(4.) This idea of spiritual life supplies ample motive to induce this constant aspiration Godward.

All spiritual activity needs stimulus-such as is always commanding, always recurrent, always near. Seeking God and finding God will always awaken higher search.

(a.) It appeals to our inquisitive and acquisitive propensities. We have strong desires-mostly alive-both to know and to get. Only let the mind feel that God is condescending to unveil Himself, that the knowledge of God is the highest good, that it is the way to the possession of the highest moral and spiritual resemblance to God-and the spiritual mind is powerfully stimulated to the search. And every fresh acquisition of knowledge and likeness will increase the force of this stimulus, and this will go on for ever.

(b.) It appeals to our restless ambition. What Christian is always content with present attainments? Who does not desire to be something higher and better than he is at present? Who, that lives at all near to God-that dwells in the secret place of the Most High -that abides under the shadow of the Almighty-does not yearn to be more God-like? What an appeal to sacred ambition!

(c.) It appeals to our love of reward and success. Project an enterprise, and place it before men, and almost the first question they will ask is, "What are the prospects of success?" Let them feel that they are problematical and uncertain, and they will not move; assure them of success, and in proportion to their confidence will be their cordial co-operation. God will never say to the soul that seeks Him, "Seek ye Me in vain!" On the contrary, He "Seek ye Me, and ye shall live." No hazard! all is sure! "He will not alter the thing that is gone out of His mouth!"

says,

(d.) It appeals to our gratitude. What is implied in our being placed on this footing.-seeking God for ever under the certainty of finding our eternal all in God? Why, nothing less than that God has condescended to reveal Himself within our heart by His good Spirit, to make us " partakers of the Divine nature," to have made us "heirs of God and joint-heirs of Jesus Christ." And all this for one

deserving of His eternal displeasure: "for we have all sinned, and come short of His glory." Is not this a powerful motive? Who should we seek to know, if not God? Who seek to resemble, if not God? This idea of spiritual life supplies its own motive; every step of progress is a stimulus. "Your heart shall live that seek God."

(5.) This accords with the end of all spiritual communications.To create need for more. None of God's gifts are given merely to administer to present wants; but in the gratification of the present, to expand and employ our powers upon and for the infinite source of supply, to keep the soul perpetually yearning for God. If the too common notion that spiritual life is a satisfied possession be the right one, then the gift bestowed would soon become its own end, and our God. We should rest in it, and lose sight of God. Whereas we are commanded to "arise and depart" from every earthly possession, "for it is not our rest, for it is polluted." Not even the gifts of God will bear resting in, for this abuse of them will make their tendency polluting. The grandeur and variety of God's gifts teach the immensity of the Giver, and tend to stimulate our desire to know more of God. If those gifts fill a present want, they tend to create another, and God will be sure to be our sufficiency. He creates no cravings that He cannot supply, but He will awaken and fill desire for ever. "Your heart shall live that seek God."

(6.) This will nourish the divinest aspect of our spiritual lifeits humility and beneficence.

To think of our spiritual life as something already complete, or as something merely to keep, is not fitted to nourish us in modest, unassuming lowliness of mind. Possessions mostly generate pride. Spiritual possessions, when looked upon as possessions merely, are no exception to this rule. To look, however, upon our spiritual life and power as only at present the germ of what needs development, of what is given to us to be wrought out into endless forms of divine excellence, is at once to check pride, to induce modesty and selfrenunciation; for it proclaims with emphasis, "We have nothing that we have not received." By the grace of God we are what we are." In like manner it may be said that those who place life-even spiritually considered-in the abundance of their possessions, will not find in that idea a stimulus to giving, but to hoarding; whereas those who look upon their spiritual stores as exhaustless, as got and increased only by seeking them in God, will be encouraged to bestow help on the weary, light on the ignorant, pardon on the erring, and pity on the miserable. Such a conception of the life of religion favours the habit of giving love, even when it is not reciprocated; for our life will take a divine form, and rejoice in giving rather than in getting-will seek objects that need love, and the assiduities of love, rather than those that can repay us with "thirty, sixty, or a hundred-fold." Let our life of lowly and beneficent love show forth in the most telling manner that we have infinite resources-that we live, and live for ever, in seeking God.

(7.) This harmonizes the character of our present and eternal employment.

If there were a point in our endless existence when the

should cease to seek in God for heights and depths unsought for and unfound before, should content itself with its vast spiritual possessions, that mind would soon experience a paralysis of spiritual life. No greater evil could befall the glorified spirits above than to have completed their spiritual knowledge and bliss; they would soon find that pursuit, not possession, contest, not victory, was their life and their joy. Heaven would present the sad spectacle of myriads of the soldiers of the cross weeping that there were no more worlds of thought and of bliss to conquer. But there is no fear of this: in the immediate presence of the Infinite there is no standing still. With life supplied direct from the eternal Fountain, there will be corresponding thirst for more; and the soul that seeks most-as on earth, so in heaven-will be most bountifully supplied. Seeking God will be our heavenly occupation. Every power of our mental and moral nature will "find sweet employ" in the presence of God. There will be no diversion of our mind from a Triune God for a single moment. Our duty and our bliss combine together-as on earth, so in heavento show us that our hearts live in seeking God.

See to it then, beloved brethren-and you who are in the youth of your piety especially see to it that you do not forget that true religion exists only in the supreme direction of your whole mind toward God, and that its life is not the possession of this, but the unceasing search for God-for higher and ever higher knowledge of God, for closer and ever closer resemblance to God. This will afford you the best test of your progress, and the mightiest stimulus to it. Strive to be ever under the inspiration of this sublime truth. You have found God in Christ. You have laid your sins on Jesus. You are now in the favour of God. And you are commanded to seek endless progress in the knowledge and likeness of God. Seek it in filial spirit, and you will enrich and sanctify your whole spiritual nature. In this spiritual sphere no one can with right say to you, however vast may be your spiritual possessions, "You have enough. Stop now. Content yourself. Rest in your possessions. You are as high as mortal man ever attained." Your answer is suggested by the very life of your piety: "Why am I thus elevated? Is it to rest here, or to rise higher? I heard a voice saying to me, Come up hither; with Divine help I have come. High above me still, I hear the same voice, saying, Come up hither. With Divine help, I am struggling upward, upward, upward! I see, far above where I now stand, flowers of richer hue and sweeter fragrance than any in my possession. May I not climb and pluck them? Who has forbidden? I see, far above where I now stand, forms of spiritual beauty, of more celestial grace, of diviner excellence than any I can call my own; may I not hope to be changed into the same image from glory to glory by the Lord the Spirit'? Who has forbidden? Does it court my vision to tantalize or inspire me? I hear a voice which says, Upward-aspire and win! And when you are higher, and cull those flowers, and call that beauty your own, aspire still, and still win. Go on aspiring and winning, for ever; for 'your heart shall live that seek God.'”

The Thorn in the Flesh.

BY THE

REV. M. A. COLLISSON, M.A.,

INCUMBENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, HIGHBURY.

"And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."-2 Cor. xii. 7-9.

THESE words, and the events referred to, abound with the most invaluable and consolatory instruction for the child of God. The privileges conferred on the Apostle were indeed peculiar to himself; but the principles of God's dealings with him are just the same as those which govern His dealings with His people in general under similar circumstances. To set these before you in a clear light, I propose reviewing in succession the Apostle's privileges, trials, resource in trial, answer received, and triumphant satisfaction in that answer.

May that grace of Christ, which was sufficient for his deep necessities, now vouchsafe to supply ours; may His strength be manifested in making these events powerful for the strengthening of the faith and the patience of His believing people. Consider, then

I. The Apostle's privileges. It is evidently of himself he is speaking throughout the foregoing part of the chapter, though introducing the subject, with his accustomed humility, as if relating to some other person. His spirit was caught up into paradise, into the third heaven; "whether in the body, or out of the body, he could not tell ; and there he heard and saw such things as it is not lawful for man to utter, or (as the margin translates the word, and I think with more propriety), "as it is not possible for man to utter." Whether paradise and the third heaven mean the same place, or different places, we shall not now pause to inquire. The Jews were accustomed to speak of those heavens-the aërial heavens, or atmosphere which immediately surrounds us; the starry heaven, the region of those shining orbs that they believed revolved around the earth; and the third heaven, or heaven of heavens, the dwellingplace of God, and of His blessed angels and glorified saints. The Apostle, using the Jewish phraseology, means, no doubt, that into this dwelling-place of the Most High he was admitted; and I believe it to be the same place that, in the following verses, he calls "paradise." What those visions were which he saw, what those abundant revelations which were given to him, he does not tell us.

SERMON IX.

K

Language could not adequately convey to our minds anything like a just idea of them. Yet-if we may presume that the visions and revelations made to one apostle were at all similar to those made, at a later period, to another-we have good reason to suppose that he, like John, saw Him who walketh between the golden candlesticks, "whose eyes are as a flame of fire, and His feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters; even the first and the last, Him that liveth and was dead, and is alive for evermore, and hath the keys of hell and of death." We may presume that he beheld also that "white-robed, palm-bearing multitude, that no man could number, of every kindred, nation, tongue, and people, that had come out of great tribulation, and had washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb; and were therefore before the throne of God, where they should hunger no more, neither thirst any more, nor endure again the burning rays of tribulation or persecution, because the Lamb who was in the midst of the throne should feed them, and lead them unto living fountains of waters, and God wipe away all tears from their eyes."

And we may suppose, moreover, that he heard that new song re-echoed by angels, and elders, and all the company of heaven : "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing."

And as he heard and saw these, and many such-like glorious things, surely he must have thought as another disciple did, on a glorious, though far inferior occasion- "It is good for me to be here," and felt a longing desire for the termination of his pilgrimage, that he might "depart and be with Christ."

But this must not be yet. He has yet to learn, "how great things he must first suffer, for Christ's sake;" he must first become an able comforter of others, through "the comfort wherewith he himself," in his afflictions, is "comforted of Christ." The Lord has much for him to do; and scarcely does he descend from the abodes of bliss, and the dwelling-place of the holy, the happy, the blessed, when heavy affliction comes upon him, and he is visited with " a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan, sent to buffet him."

II. His trial. This is the second point of consideration.

1. As to the nature of that trial we know nothing positively. Some have thought that it consisted in the opposition of false teachers, such as he speaks of in the eleventh chapter of this epistle: "Such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers be transformed as the ministers of righteousness.”"

And there is certainly nothing more calculated to distress the faithful and affectionate minister of Christ, than the insidious and mischievous opposition of "wolves in sheep's clothing," and of wily serpents whose words do eat as doth a canker, and who endeavour to deceive the simple, and to betray the unwary.

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Yet the description of the trial, as a thorn in the flesh," leads rather to the supposition that it was something of a personal and physical kind; and not improbably, a paralytic attack, which affected the distinctness of his utterance, obscured the clearness of his vision,