work upon your gratitude. And know ye not that ye are not your own? God requires your services on earth, this is your reasonable service, your duty.

And what is your life? It is but for a moment! And what are ye on earth? Strangers and pilgrims! And what is before you? Death and judgment and an awful eternity; bliss everlasting, or, oh terrible reverse! expulsion from the gates of Paradise, and an eternal dwelling in darkness with demons and hypocrites.

Oh let fear and hope, and gratitude and duty, and common-sense, all conspire to induce, in families and in churches, a ceaseless spirit of devotedness and personal sacrifice for the promotion of Zion's kingdom on earth, as it is in heaven.

Ye fathers and mothers, and sons and daughters, love King Jesus; give him your hearts! cheerfully obey him! in your families sing his praises, devote to him your dearest relatives, your fortunes, and your lives.

If there be any truth in the Bible, if our Christianity be not all selfishness and hypocrisy, this devotedness were a chivalry at once rational and glorious. Away with those shameful complainings, which insinuate that too much is done for the King's cause. Away with those unbelieving anxieties, which belie the divine promises, and which virtually deny that those who honour God he will honour; and which assert that the seed of them who serve Him may be neglected by Providence.

O spirit of God, that convincest of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment, convince the families and the churches of this land of their past neglect; and breathe into their souls a spirit of holy zeal and entire devotion to the Saviour's cause among men !

DISCOURSE XXIV.

COMPOSED FOR AN EVENING lecture at st. THOMAS'S SQUARE, HACKNEY, JANUARY 1, 1826.

MAN IN THIS WORLD IS NOT BY RIGHT, BUT BY DIVINE PERMISSION, A TEMPORARY RESIDENT.

1 CHRON. XXIX. 15.

“For we are strangers before thee, and sojourners, as were all our fathers: our days on earth are as a shadow, and there is none abiding." (Heb. (Heb. expectation.) No hope of abiding. (Boothroyd.)

In order to a right understanding of these words, it will be proper for us to review briefly the circumstances under which they were uttered. It is common to man in every country to feel occasionally disatisfied with life, and to give utterance to complaints concerning its troubles and its brevity. Such views of human nature are not peculiar to those who possess a divine revelation. Under the pressure of poverty, or amidst the pains of sickness, when the fond hopes of prosperity are blighted, when reverses take place in the evening of life, and the winter of old age comes upon a man, and his summer friends forsake him; and when, for by-gone kindness, he receives ungrateful returns; or, perhaps, his own kindred, or his own children rise up against him, or neglect and despise him-under any or all of these, I say, it is a common thing for man, in every part of the world, and in all ages, to utter querulous complaints

about the vanity and the shortness of life. Ancient and modern Pagans, Jews, Turks, and Infidels, as well as Christians, have uttered such lamentations. But there is no reason to believe that these bewailings indicate a spirit of piety; for they may exist where there is no knowledge of God, no desire to be acquainted with his ways, no submission, no resignation, no repentance, no obedience, no worship; they do indeed more frequently indicate obduracy of heart, impenitence, and discontentedness. I shall not then merely moralize about the hardships attendant on man in his journey through life, the uncertainty of prosperous circumstances, the inevitable ills to which he is liable, and the manifold difficulties and disgusts which he must often experience in his passage to the grave. These topics are true and important, but they come not up to the Scriptural and Christian view of the case. We will then at once advert to the meaning of our text. There is a passage in the Book of Leviticus, (xxv. 23.) which throws much light on the phrase "strangers and sojourners." It is there said of the possessions of the several Jewish tribes, "The land shall not be sold for ever, for the land is mine, (saith Jehovah.) Ye are strangers and sojourners with me." Here the allusion is not to the difficulties of a journey, or to the discomfort of a lodging, but to the right of possession. The whole earth belongs to Jehovah; man is a stranger and a sojourner on it, and resident but for a short period, and has no just cause to assign why he should be allowed to remain. This is the sense which best suits the scope of the paragraph in which the words of our text are found.

The connexion is this. King David, having attained "a good old age," chose to settle two very important affairs before his death-the succession to the throne, and the erection of a temple to Jehovah. For these purposes the Jewish Monarch "assembled all the princes of Israel, the princes of the tribes, and the captains of the companies, and the captains over thousands and over hundreds; and the officers and mighty men, and valiant men at Jerusalem."

In the presence of this large assembly of the chiefs and

states of Judea, the aged monarch" stood up upon his feet," (Chron. xxviii. 2.) and addressed them as his "brethren" and his "people ;" first concerning the house which was to be a resting-place for the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and next concerning his son, whom Jehovah had chosen to sit upon the throne of the kingdom.

As the temple, or "palace," to be built, "was not for man, but for the Lord God," King David made provision from the national resources of gold, and silver, and brass, and iron, and precious stones, and marble; and from his own proper good, or private fortune, he gave of gold and silver to the amount of twenty millions of pounds sterling; and the princes, or chiefs of tribes, contributed nearly as much.

On that high day of liberal donation the people rejoiced that their hearts were disposed to offer willingly to this good work of the Lord; and David the king also rejoiced with great joy. To which joyous sentiments and feelings his lips gave utterance in a devout solemn prayer, or humble address to the Divine Being, of which the words of our text form a part. The topics of that prayer are these:first, in the style of adoration, an allusion is made to the Divine Sovereignty; the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty belong to God. Heaven and earth are his: His is the universal kingdom; and He is exalted head above all.

In the second place, God is acknowledged to be the giver of every good. Riches and honour come of him; it is his hand that makes great, and gives strength unto all.

Then, in the third place, are ascriptions of praise and of blessing to God's glorious name, who liveth for ever and ever.

Next are confessions of obligation for all the riches and the store that were possessed; for the givers of all this wealth were only "strangers and sojourners on earth”— their days were few and transitory, ever onward moving as a fleeting shadow-their property and possessions were not their own-from God it was that all their treasure came, and to his service, as was most meet, they resigned it.

King David closed his prayer by interceding for his son; and desiring that these sentiments might be kept for ever fixed on the imaginations of the thoughts of the hearts of his people.

From this analysis of the context, it appears to me, that God's people being called "strangers and sojourners," has not, in this instance, a reference to trials or difficulties by the way; but is intended to intimate, that man in this life has no right to assume a lordship over what is granted, nor any ground to hope for a permanent possession. Our dwelling on earth, with all its accommodations or comforts, whether many or few, are held by the merciful grant of a higher authority, and we have no just cause to claim here a lasting inheritance; for we are "strangers and sojourners, as all our fathers were." In this acknowledgment there is religion and piety, and a feeling totally different from the cynical murmurings and infidel complainings of a discontented rebellious mind. This Scriptural view of the subject brings us into contact with the Divine Being as a great, and glorious, and rightful sovereign; and leads us onward to the awfully sublime realities of the eternity which lies beyond this shadowy fleeting life. As the sun moves onward in his daily course, the dark shadow of intervening opaque bodies flung across the plain also moves -constantly, although imperceptibly, till the cause of sunshine and of shadow is lost in the undistinguishing blackness of night. The Jewish Commentators say, "Man's life resembles the shadow of a bird flying." But, perhaps, the allusion is not so much to denote the rapidity with which our days flee away, as their certain, although slow progression, gliding onward irresistibly to a close. Man's sojourn on earth is not by right, but by permission; and only for a limited period, which no earthly power can protract, any more than it could arrest the sun in its course, or stop the constantly-moving shadow, caused by the light's rays being intercepted.

In prosecuting this discourse, I shall assert two general principles, and draw some practical inferences from them as we proceed.