him who has not thus, by its previous influences, been fashioned for its possession? What will his unquestioning faith, but a faith as unfelt as undoubted; what will his unquestioned conduct, but a conduct as devoid of the heart and soul of goodness, as it is free from the world's imputation—what will these avail him there? He may not be the subject of suffering; but what can he know and taste of the higher kinds of spiritual enjoyment? He has not prepared himself for the true heaven of the Gospel; he has been expecting some external, and arbitrary, and positive sort of reward; and it is to him like the gift of a rich and ample library to a man who cannot read; or of Grecian statues and Italian paintings to one who has no taste for, or perception of, the beauties of form and colour, grace in the execution, or genius in the design. Why, let a man contemplate even a brief residence in a foreign land, and he endeavours to make some previous acquirement which may increase his pleasure therein; he trains himself into some previous fitness. Let him expect the possession of some station of emolument or influence, and he does something to qualify himself the more fully to inherit its advantages or the more ably to employ its powers; and yet the fool in religion thinks to go to glory without those qualities of head, heart, and character; the piety and purity, and dignity and beneficence, which alone are fitness for heaven-which are an

anticipated heaven while we are on earth, and without which there would be no heaven to all eternity. This hath the wise more than the fool;' in religion as in all things else, that he adapts the means to the end; prepares himself for the inheritance which is prepared for him, dies daily to live eternally, and retires from his good and faithful service, to enter into the everlasting joy of his approving Lord.

The question is answered, then ;–answered by Providence itself in a connected series of lessons, the instruction of which it is man's best wisdom to imbibe. Without common prudence, foresight, skill and industry, man cannot reasonably expect to gain wealth and competence: without the cultivation of intellect and taste, wealth cannot give more than a gross, unsatisfactory, and little better than animal enjoyment: without moral qualities, sympathies, social interests and efforts, the pleasures of intellect and fancy will satiate and pall: without reflection, judgment, solid principles rightly applied, those sympathies and interests will often run to waste and turn to bitterness; and that reflection and these principles conduct to pure religion for their completion, their strength, their crown; religion, which holds out the highest object and requires the noblest means : the one, happiness, infinite, and everlasting; the other, character, purified and elevated towards the utmost perfection of humanity.

There may be dejection in the wise man's course; but though cast down, he is not forsaken. Black clouds lower over the scene, may but upon them is the rainbow, and after them comes a brighter sunshine. With all his aberrations and depression, his life is still a progression; and so is his immortality. In some disappointed mood he may ask, What hath the wise more than the fool?' But his calmer meditation on the course of his existence will be like the vision of Jacob; it will be as a ladder, set up on earth, but its top reaching unto heaven. The patriarch was sleeping at its foot-sleeping a brief time, while his frame was weary and his vision was blissful; but early in the morning he rose, the strength of his body and the piety of his heart alike invigorated; offered his vows to God, and went forwards on his way, trusting and rejoicing.

87

SERMON VI.

HUMAN BROTHERHOOD.

ACTS xvii. 26.

"And hath made of one blood all nations of men."

HAD the fact that Paul preached at Athens been mentioned without particulars, how great would have been our curiosity to know how he conducted himself who eminently ranks as a philosopher among the apostles, when he stood alone, an apostle among philosophers! This was the noblest arena on which he had ever struggled; he had fought with beasts at Ephesus, but at Athens he contended with the master spirits of mankind. He was at once in the very palace of intellect, and the sanctuary of idolatry. All that his writings and recorded actions have unfolded of his character rush upon our minds, and deepen our interest, and exalt our expectations, as we behold him, impelled by the fervour of zeal, and armed only in the sim