do this, let him live as though it were true; and he will cease to cavil against its doctrines; he will soon believe it to be so. Let him visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and keep himself unspotted from the world, and he will carry in his own bosom such a comfortable earnest of the truth of the Gospel, as he will not seek to extinguish by speculatively deny. ing it.

For, I would enquire, in the words of a pious and acute writer," "Whether it is in the moment of victory over passion and sensual indulgence that men dispute the existence of that power which enabled them to achieve itwhether it is in the act of relieving the distresses of their afflicted brethren, that they despise the love of that Saviour, who has identified himself with them? Let a man but obey the morals of the Gospel (which are the morals of a purified and exalted reason) and he will never cavil against its doctrines. Let him that is inclined to be sceptical upon the subject of the soul's immortality, always act as if it really existed, and he will soon abandon every objection to its existence."

Let us then submit ourselves to the righteousness of God. Let us receive this last revelation

*Rennell on Scepticism.

of his will to fallen man with all humility and thankfulness. Deeply sensible in ourselves that we have understandings which require to be enlightened, hearts to be renewed and purified, wills to be sanctified, prejudices to be removed, let us come to Him in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; let us sit at the feet of Christ, and submit all our boasted powers to his heavenly teaching; let us "become fools that we may be wise," and we shall make rapid advances in that knowledge which, while it humbles, reproves and corrects, exalts, purifies, edifies, and consoles. Whilst, on the other hand, the man who exalts himself against the knowledge of God, and measures the wisdom of God by his own finite understanding, "knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know," must ere long with shame take the lowest seat, and confess himself to be "wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”

Sermon XVIII.

AUTUMNAL REFLECTIONS.

ISAIAH lxiv., 6.

We all do fade as a leaf.

To a serious and devout mind every object of the natural world is full of instruction, pregnant with moral. The world, in fact, is a vast school, into which we are sent for a time to learn wisdom. And happy is every man that findeth her. Here are lessons for the young and volatile, and lessons for the old and obdurate. He who is ready to receive instruction, and to incline his heart to understanding, may every day become wiser and better: whilst the fool, the heedless, and self-conceited, departs therefrom as he came.

The frailty and mortality of our fallen nature, is one of those lessons which a wise Providence intended we should learn in this world. And, because, it should seem, we are so backward to learn it, he has written it in legible characters upon almost every object of created nature; upon the blade of grass we tread under our feet; upon the leaves of trees; in the succession of day and night, months, and years; spring-time and summer, harvest and winter. Yea, we carry the lesson about with us in our own frame, so fearfully and wonderfully made. We are forced in a manner oftentimes to learn it by pain and sickness. It is written in the departure of the living-on the tombs of the dead. But although ever learning, we are ever forgetting what we have learned. Although dying daily, we neglect the moral this truth would teach us, which is, to "learn to die "to be dead to a world of sin and vanity, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ: not to be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

Let us, therefore, endeavour to learn this truth once again. In the fading, falling leaf, let us contemplate our own decay; habitually anticipate our own certain dissolution. And may the meditation, by God's grace, arrest the

careless, fix the volatile, and make us all "wise unto salvation:" yea, "so teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom."

I shall first dwell a little on the resemblance set forth in the text: secondly, assign the true cause of human frailty and lastly, expatiate upon the rich compensation which is made us by the revelation of Jesus Christ.

I. We all do fade as a leaf, if we reflect but for a moment upon the quick and constant succession of our species; "For as the leaves, so springs the race of man," was the remark of a great author of antiquity many ages ago. "One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh." Turn over the records of all history, ancient and modern. What is the thread which runs through all? What the great fundamental truth on which all the various events and vicissitudes therein contained depend? Even on this-we all do fade as a leaf. In those most ancient and most authentic of all records relating to the human species, the scriptures of the old Testament, we constantly meet with some such observation as this-'so all that generation, (whether kings or subjects,) died and were gathered to their fathers.' Where are now the tribes by whom the whole earth