But taking all this for granted, our enquiry is, In what does the Christian's trial consist?" What are those peculiar troubles which make his salvation so difficult? For it would be endless to enumerate all those things which, in a world like this, give him pain, and make him sigh for deliverance. For you will observe, that his religion, so far from taking off the edge of his feelings, serves but to make it more sharp, and to pierce more acutely his sensitive mind. He knows that "by the sadness of the countenance, the heart is made better," and that "it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting."

But I am speaking now of those peculiar trials which threaten the hopes of the Christian, cloud his prospect, and seem, at least, to endanger his salvation. These are summed up by the Apostle to the Ephesians, and may well make the stoutest heart tremble, lest any or all of them should take him off his guard, and prove too much for his strength to bear. "We wrestle not," says he, "against flesh and blood alone, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." The carnal principle is not subdued. "The infection of man's nature doth remain, yea in

them that are regenerated,”—(Art. ix.) whereby the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh and this is the frequent occasion of such painful struggles, as force the Christian to cry out with St. Paul, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death!' In addition to this, every Christian has that besetting sin, whatever it be, which constantly gives him the most painful exercise: which costs him many a bitter conflict, many a defeat: which at times seems utterly subdued to have taken its departure-but soon gives him to understand that it is only waiting for a fresh occasion, a fresh exciting cause, to give him pain and to renew its attack. The lion only sleepeth. True it is, the grace of God is sufficient for him, and will, if he endure patiently, make him more than conqueror. But still he must be he is every day striving against this sin gaining, if possible, new strength from every lapse and recovery, and acquiring fresh ground. His sin is every day more or less vexing and troubling him. His ascent to heaven is constantly checked by earth, and its remaining ties and attractions. His enemies are daily at hand to swallow him up. And as long as he is in the world, so long fresh fuel is administered to the fiery trial that is appointed to

exercise his faith and patience. If he retires altogether from the world, and tries to shut out troubles and vexations, they still gain admission. His sight and all his other senses are still so many inlets to objects which have power to vex and harass him. Whether in the world, therefore, or out of the world, his enemy, his besetting sin, pursues him; for it is within, and can never be entirely ejected. We, my brethren, see only the Christian's exterior: we think him happy; and so indeed he is, beyond all that this world can either give or imagine. But the struggle is within. The heart knoweth its own bitterness. How is he buffeted by sin and Satan! When in view of the haven, and just about to enter, how is he driven again out to sea, and has his Christian course apparently to begin anew, and beat up a-fresh. How often is he tempted, when his faith is low, and grace apparently weak, to exclaim with David, "Then have cleansed my heart in vain!" Where are the joys I once felt: the peace in believing, the full assurance of hope; the sense of pardoned sin; and of grace reigning victorious within me! All, all are fled as a dream, and as the morning cloud. Hence a thousand times he is tempted to give over the struggle in despair of ever being able to attain that perfect and full-blown peace

of God which passeth all understanding: that ripeness and maturity of faith, without which he feels that he cannot please God: that habitual, if not complete holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.

Such are some of the difficulties which threaten the salvation of the Christian, and which he who is an entire stranger to, may reasonably doubt whether he be in the safe path.

But it is in the near views of death and eternity, that Satan lets fly at the Christian his last fiery dart; but which also the grace of God is sufficient to quench, and to convert to his great salvation. Then it is that his faith is put to the utmost possible stretch: and he is tempted to despair entirely of salvation. Then his eye takes a fearful glance into the unseen world, and death and hell present themselves before him in all their horrors and hideous deformity. Then sin appears more exceeding sinful on the one hand; and God's most holy, but violated law, open, on the other, presents to him, as in a glass, the sins of his whole life-his most secret sins, with all their long forgotten and minutest circumstances and aggravations. Well may he cry, with his Lord and Master, when in the same circumstances, and bowed down under the load, not of his own sins (for He had none)

but of those of the whole human race-" My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death!” "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me! My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me!" This is indeed that fiery trial with which Sovereign Wisdom sometimes permits his most chosen vessels of grace and mercy to be assailed; and, my brethren, when we see or hear of men of irreproachable lives, meek and innocent conversation, great faith, and of tried patience, thus apparently given up of God, in order to enhance the glory and brightness of their crown, we may well be filled with trembling and dismay at the fiery trial which may be assigned to ourselves: we may well fear for our own truth and sincerity: at the same time that we should rather seek beforehand than wish to decline, our share in those trials of the saints through life, which are designed to make us perfect through suffering. We may well ask with the Apostle, "If the righteous be thus scarcely saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?" Which leads to the second particular, viz: the impossibility of salvation to the sinner; which is rather a conclusion from what has been said, than a distinct branch of enquiry.