It may indeed contradict, not unfrequently, your former opinions, as well as your present wishes. Should this be the fact, those wishes are wrong, and those opinions false. But false opinions and wrong wishes can never advance you a step towards heaven. The only effect of both will be your ruin. "To the law, then, and to the testimony." If Ministers do not speak, if you do not believe, this word; it is because there is no light in them, nor in you.

Were an Angel from heaven to bring you a message from your Creator; were he to come with the splendour, in which one of these glorious beings exhibited himself to the prophet Daniel; "his loins girded with the fine gold of Uphaz, his body like the beryl, his face as the appearance of lightning, his eyes as lamps of fire, his feet as polished brass, and the voice of his words as the voice of a multitude:" you would probably quake like the companions of Daniel, "and flee to hide yourselves;" or, like the prophet himself, would stand trembling; your strength vanished, and your comeliness turned into corruption." If you should be able to command yourselves sufficiently to hear his message; with what solemn attention, with what profound awe, with what eager solicitude, would you listen to the heavenly messenger, and catch every word which fell from his tongue." Which of you would dispute his doctrines? Which of you would question his precepts? Is there a man in this assembly, who would insult the divine herald by telling him, that his declarations did not harmonize with the decisions of human philosophy; that they were hard sayings, gloomy and discouraging in their nature, and terrible in their import? Is there an individual, who would reply, that great and learned men had thought differently from him; or who would satisfy even himself in refusing to obey the voice of this wonderful preacher by recollecting, that he was contradicted by Hume and Voltaire, by Arius and Socinus?

Is there a person present, who would feel himself justified in declining, or neglecting, to comply with the precepts brought by this illustrious being, until a future and more "convenient season?" Should he command you "now to repent, and believe the

Gospel;" would you not feel, that you were indispensably, bound to obey? should he require you now to "love the Lord, your God, with all the heart, and your neighbour as yourselves;" would you feel excused, in prolonging your impiety, or your injustice; your avarice, ambition, or sensuality? Should he announce the Messiah as your Saviour, as the only "propitiation for the sins" of men; and require you "with the heart to believe" in him "unto righteousness, and with the mouth" to make "confession" of him "unto salvation;" could you feel any longer safe in your unbelief, or your refusal to "confess Christ before men?" My brethren, Angels have actually declared, in substance, all these things to mankind. The "Law was given by the disposition of Angels ;" and Angels announced the Redeemer to Daniel and Zechariah, to Joseph, Mary, and the shepherds of Bethlehem.

Convey yourselves in imagination to yonder burying ground. Behold the earth heave beneath your feet, the grave unfold its secret chambers, and a white-robed inhabitant of the unseen world ascend before your eyes from its silent recesses. Hear him proclaim to you, alternately, awful and delightful tidings of heaven and hell; and inform you, that within a few years you will inhabit one or the other of these worlds of retribution, and spend your immortal being in unutterable happiness or misery. Listen, while he subjoins the most affecting admonitions concerning your guilt and your danger; and warns you to "flee from the wrath to come," and to "lay hold on eternal life." Can you be insensible to the persuasions of the awful stranger? Can you sport, or wander, or sleep, beneath the sound of a voice, which addresses you from the tomb? My Brethren, the Gospel was, in substance, all declared by one "who rose from the dead." These very tidings he brought from the invisible world. These very admonitions, these very exhortations, he now addresses to you from heaven; and repeats them every day you live.

Remember, my brethren, I intreat you to remember, that neither the glory and majesty of an Angel, nor the awful character, and alarming appendages, of a person rising from the grave, could change at all the nature or the importance of the message,

which either might bring to you. These beings, I acknowledge, would probably deeply effect and terrify you. Still, the message, which they would bring, and the GoD, by whom they were sent, would alone be the objects, supremely and finally interesting to you. This message you now have, sent by the same GOD, from whom they must both derive their commission. He has directed, that it shall be weekly delivered to you by your fellow men; men, not risen from the grave, but sharing the same life, and the same infirmities, with yourselves. Still, it is no less a message from him, no less clothed with his authority, no less interesting to your eternal welfare. Your Minister is obliged to deliver it exactly as he has received it, "whether you will hear, or whether you will forbear." You by the same authority are obliged to embrace and obey it; and can refuse, or neglect, it only at your peril. The terrible anathema, pronounced against him, or against an Angel, should either preach any other Gospel, will be pronounced against you, if you do not welcome it in your hearts, and fulfil its precepts in your lives.

There is a day approaching, in which you, and all other congregations, and their Ministers, will meet together before "the Judge of the quick and the dead!" How solemn, how affecting, must be this interview! How transcendantly important will then appear the connection, which, in this world, has existed between Ministers and their people! Every Minister is here constituted by Christ the shepherd of his flock, " to watch for their souls, as one that must give an account;" to feed them with the bread of life; and to conduct them through this wilderness to the regions of everlasting rest! They are committed to him by the same Divine Person; that, under his pastoral care and guidance, they may direct their path to the kingdom above! How important will it then appear, that these divine purposes should have been accomplished? No emotions will be more intense, than those, which this last, solemn meeting will produce. The day, the scene, the Judge, the assembly, the trial, the sentence, together with its affecting grounds, and amazing consequences, will lend it a force and distinction immensely great and awful! What

emotions must move the heart of that Minister, who, surrounded by his own flock, is compelled to declare to the Judge of all the earth, that he has preached another Gospel, than that which was preached by Paul; that he has neglected, withheld, and falsified, the Truth of God; that he has substituted, in its place, his own dogmas, speculations, and wishes; that he has deceived, misguided, and turned away from heaven, the feet of his flock; that he himself, assuming the office of guiding them to eternal life, has, with a faithless, unfeeling heart, and a treacherous hand, led them down to the chambers of death! With what emotions must his flock hear this terrible rehearsal ; and see themselves conducted to perdition by the very man, who ought to have gone before them to endless life!

On the contrary, with what views will the mind expand, with what transport will the heart throb, of that Minister, who, on this tremendous occasion, can look back, with the serene sunshine of the soul, upon a life, faithfully devoted to the service of God, and a Ministry, employed in proclaiming the Gospel of his Son to mankind? How must he glow, and exult, while with humble confidence he approaches the throne of Judgment, in the midst of his beloved Charge, and joyfully pronounces, “Behold here am I, and the Children whom thou hast given me ?" With what unspeakable delight will he read in their eyes, their gratitude, their affection, and their triumph! What a blessing will it then seem to them, to have been committed to his care? United to an assembly, so beloved on earth, he will regard the glory of immortal life as peculiarly endeared, and heaven itself as adorned with additional beauty, and more intense joy! Instead of trembling in expectation of the terrible anathema in the text, he, and they, will only draw near, to be pronounced "good and faithful servants;" declared to have "well done;" and commanded to "enter into the joy of their Lord." The gates of life will spontaneously unfold, to receive them; and the angelic host. will welcome their arrival with peculiar gratulation.

If a minister, and his people, wish for such a close of their accepted time; he must faithfully preach; and they must cordially embrace, the Gospel, preached by Paul.

A SERMON PREACHED APRIL 8, 1812, AT THE ORDINATION OF
REV. NATHANIEL W. TAYLOR.

I. PETER 1, 12.

—Which things angels desire to look into.

THE things, of which St. Peter speaks in this passage, are explained by him in the context. They are styled, The salvation of the soul; the reward of faith; the things testified by the Spirit of Christ concerning his sufferings, and the glory that should follow them; and the things, which had been reported, or announced, to the Christians of lesser Asia, by those who had preached the Gospel to them, with the Holy Ghost, sent down from heaven; that is, by those whose preaching had been accompanied by the inspiration, and miracles, of the Holy Ghost; in other words, by Paul and his immediate companions; the preachers, who principally carried the news of salvation into that country. To him, who is willing to bestow even the slightest attention upon this various phraseology, it will be evident, that these things can be no other than the sum, and substance, of the Gospel.

Into these things angels are here said to desire to look. The Cherubim in the tabernacle, whose wings overshadowed the mercy-seat, were formed in a bending posture; with their faces looking down on this divine symbol, as if earnestly desirous to pry into the wonders, which it represented. In the text, "angels," it is said, αγγελοι, (not δι αγγελοι, the angels,) desire to look into these things,” εις & επιθυμούσιν αγγελοι παρακύψαι : “ into which things angels earnestly desire to stoop ;" in other words, "into which VOL. II.

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