the accession of daily strength, the fragile infant form to the stature of manhood. Just so with our spiritual life. It is the power of the Divine Word which gives it; and, this life being once breathed into us, its yearnings lead us back again to the same Word for further nourishment, for more enlarged power. Thus, is each individual believer built up in the faith and fear of God; and thus, does the whole mystical body of believers " grow up into Him in all things, which is the head, even Christ: from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." It is the good pleasure of God, teaching them both "to will and to do." Of that good pleasure, my brethren, you have been made partakers. The prayers which you have offered up to God this day through Christ, the praises which you have repeated, the confessions which you have made, are all evidences of this truth. His Word, which hath revealed it, "is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, who shall go over the sea for us,

and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But it is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it 1." Seeing, therefore, that, in the contemplation of these mercies, you "all with open face behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord," pray that you may be " changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord"."

Deut. xxx. 11-15.

2

2 Cor. iii. 18.

THE CHRISTIAN PATRIOT.

A

SERMON

PREACHED ON TRINITY MONDAY, JUNE 3, 1833,

BEFORE THE

CORPORATION OF THE TRINITY HOUSE,

IN THE

PARISH CHURCH OF ST. NICHOLAS, DEPTFORD.

ΤΟ

HIS MOST GRACIOUS MAJESTY

KING WILLIAM THE FOURTH;

TO THE MOST NOBLE

JOHN JEFFREYS, MARQUESS CAMDEN, K.G. MASTER;

ΤΟ

JOHN WOOLMORE, Esq. DEPUTY-MASTER;

AND TO THE OTHER

ELDER BRETHREN

OF

THE TRINITY-HOUSE;

THIS DISCOURSE

IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED

BY THEIR MOST DEVOTED AND VERY GRATEFUL SERVANT,

THE AUTHOR.

SERMON III.

THE CHRISTIAN PATRIOT.

PSALM CXxii. 6-9.

O pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee. Peace be within thy walls, and plenteousness within thy palaces. For my brethren and companions' sakes, I will wish thee prosperity. Yea, because of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek to do thee good.

THE Psalm from which these words are taken opens with the expression of David's joy in being permitted to go up with his brethren "into the house of the Lord." It sets forth, in the next place, the blessings which Jerusalem enjoyed in her release from thraldom, and the establishment of righteous laws. She was no longer distracted by the foreign power of the Jebusites, which, in spite of the united efforts of Benjamin and Judah, had been maintained throughout four centuries "in the stronghold of Zion," but was now "built as a city that is at unity

1

Compare Joshua xv. 63, and Judges i. 21, with 2 Sam. v. 7.