dren, and all that you have. And heaven has recorded that vow, to be brought up against you, if it be violated, in the day of retribution. It was wholly at your option, whether you would enter into that sweeping covenant, whether you would swear, but you have entered, you have sworn and cannot go back. You then relinquished forever your personal rights, and have had ever since, but a community of interest with God and his people. Now God is employed in doing good, and his people too if they are like him, How then will it correspond with your oath, to stand aloof from the calls of the church? and disregard the command of God? and let the waste places lie desolate? and let the heathen die in their pollu tions? and let the captives perish in their chains? and let almost the whole of that territory, purchased with the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, lie still under the usurped dominion of the prince of hell? and let a whole condemned world, go on to the judgment, with all this blood upon it, unsanctified? Oh, how will your broken vows, rise and haunt you, in that day when the wealth you have saved, shall be weighed in the balance with the souls it might have redeemed.

Once more, and I have done. As you hope you have been sanctified, through the truth, you have some experience of the value of that gospel, which we urge you to promulgate. Once you were ignorant of God, and were unhappy. You were in

some what the same forlorn condition, with those whose cause I plead; you had forsaken God the fountain of living waters, and had hewn out to yourselves broken cisterns, that could hold no water. And you remember that dark period. Your mind travelled from object to object, through all the round of created good, in search of enjoyment, and "found no end in wandering mazes lost."

And there is a world of intelligent immortal beings, seen panting and weary in the same fruitless chase. It was the blessed gospel that arrest

ed you, and saved you. Your heedless steps it

guided; your dark mind it enlightened; your erring conscience it rectified; your insensibility it aroused; your hard heart it softened; your selfishness it subdued; your pride it humbled; your wayward course it changed; your covenant with death, and your agreement with hell it disannulled. And here you stand, redeemed, regenerated; your whole character changed, and your final destiny altered, through the influence of the blessed gospel. The curse is removed, you are a child of God, and an heir of glory, and shall one day see the king in his beauty and the gospel has done it. It has givyou peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Ghost, a firm hope of heaven, and the soul-reviving assurance, that all things shall work together for your good, till you rise to be where Christ is, behold his beauty, and rejoice in his love forever.

Now the question is, whether you will contrib

ute of your wealth, to save those who are perishing as you so lately were. I now plead with you by all that religion has been worth to you; by all the joys it has brought you, by all the woes it has cured, by all the hopes it has raised, and by all the transformation it has wrought in your character, and your condition. For what price would you return into the darkened, and dreary, and hopeless condition in which the gospel found you? For what would you barter away all the delightful prospects that open before you? and calculate on no more precious sacramental seasons? no more communion of saints? no more delightful hours in your closet? nor Pisgahviews of the fields of promise? nor fellowship with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ? At no price would you part with these? Then know how great are the blessings which you have it in your power to confer, on those who are perishing for lack of vision.

Do you say, they can purchase the privileges of the gospel as you have? No, they will not. They know not their value, and will die in their sins, ere they will give a shilling for the light of the gospel. Not the whole of India, if it would save them all from hell, would support a single missionary.

Will God send them the gospel by miracle? No, he once did thus send it to the lost, blessed be his name! but he now commands us to send it to those who are perishing for lack of vision. We know our duty, and God will require it of us. Can we meet the heathen in the judgment, if we have done nothing to redeem them?

I will plead no longer, but let me tell you in parting, that when you shall see the world on fire, your wealth all melting down, and those who have perished through your neglect, calling upon the rocks and mountains, to fall on them, and hide them from the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, and shall know that you might have saved them, there will be strong sensations. If you are saved yourselves, and this is doubtful if you are not anxious to save others, you will wish a place to weep over your past neglects, before you begin your everlasting song ; and if lost yourselves, then indeed there will be weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth forever. May Jehovah bless you, and dispose you to do your duty now, that you may hereafter lay hold on eternal life. Amen.

SERMON 14.

NOTHING SAFE BUT THE CHURCH.

DEUTERONOMY XXXII. 9.

"The Lord's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance."

WHEN God exhibits himself, as the portion of his people, we feel no surprise. He can be to them all they need, can gratify all their wants, and all their hopes. But what can his people be or do for him? How can they so rise in his estimation, that he shall style them his portion, and his inheritance? The God who has built a thousand worlds, who thunders in the heavens, and holds the stars in his right hand; can he value his people above them all! And yet this precious truth is prominent in the text, and is demonstrated, by the whole course of providential events, since the creation of the world, If that is the dearest to God which cost him most, as is often the fact in our history, then indeed there is an obvious reason for the truth of the text. Worlds took being at his word, and will perish at his bidding, but he redeemed his people with the life of his Son; hence his high regard for them. And hence a reason for all he intends to do for them in futurity. He will guide them with his counsel, and afterward receive them to glory.

Hence to God's people the text contains a very