ity in the character of a public institution, as to the scheme it has devised, for offering pardon to the sentenced and perishing sinners. This it is to which the language of our text gives the emphatic name of light, and I, for one, am ready to lend my most cordial assent to the propriety of the appellation. I do so, because, when I have travelled my. self tired through the writings of Heathen philosophy, much as I see of genius, and eloquence, and learning, I find not the glimpse of well-founded consolation for the sinner. I do so, because, look where I will, beyond the pale of Christendom, I meet nothing, unless it be in the ablutions of the Ganges, or the agonies of the funeral pile, or under the dripping wheels of Juggernaut, nothing like a provision for the sinner. I do so, because the New Testament tells me, that Jesus Christ has expired on the Cross, and every page of it teems with the offers of pardon, and all this time I feel that I myself am a sinner, to be saved, if saved at all, by some such mighty and atoning substitute. These are the reasons that the Gospel is described to us under the simili. tude of light; and surely, we may look upon it in a spiritual sense, as we do upon the sun in a natural-the great foun. tain of warmth and splendor-sending animation through the works of God, and diffusing without diminishing its glory.

Thus much for the light that has "come into the world." I pass on to the main drift of the passage, which is, that men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil. To get hold of this language in its true practical import, we had better apply it at once upon a course of familiar illustration, for all of us must see, that the text, instead of imputing our sins to our ignorance, has ascribed our ignorance to our sins; or, in other words, has laid against us the charge of rejecting the truth, merely because it clashes with our impenitence. Suppose, then, we commence the illustration with that class of men who bear the name of Infidels. In the outset, however, I should like to ask, how it happens to be known that there are Infidels? Let Christianity come from what quarter it may, it certainly has done good enough to be treated with respect, and pushed forward in its attempts at a further reformation. Who, then, actuated by pure and honest feelings, would put on the armor of opposition to it, and aim to rob his fellow-creatures of its consolations and hopes, without even the decency of offering the least equivalent or substitute? If such " deeds" be not " evil," then nothing is evil. But I am willing to lay that consideration aside. We all know there are Infidels, and we have seen them encircling the Church with their trains laid, and their matches lighted, and clothed in the imposing panoply of war. What then? I put the question, if the most violent of all this hostility has not sprung from the most unworthy impulse? Where was the splendid genius of Voltaire when he sunk into a mere buffoon in assailing religion? Where was the comprehensive sagacity of Bolingbroke when he launched upon the chaotic extravagance of his "Essays?" Where was the strong and athletic mind of Paine, when he consigned himself to the everlasting infamy of writing the "Age of Reason?" Plainly, these men rejected Christianity, not because they could not, but because they dared not, believe it. They were driven to impiety of principle as a sort of palliation for their impurity of practice, and upon them it is that the sentiment of our text finds its most legitimate application. But move along further into the ranks of skepticism. We every day see, around us, individuals who intrench themselves in a profound opposition to the Bible. But come to get at the truth of the matter, we find them, much as they are informed on the subject, in a state of absolute ignorance about religion, Nine out of ten have taken up their infidelity from chance, without a single argument in its favor, and the secret of the whole is, that it gives a wider swing to their indulgencies, and relieves them from the inconsistency of believing one thing and practising another. They love the darkness, merely because their deeds are evil. Well, there is another exemplification of the text, more commonly to be met with than the one we have just left, and that is the rejection, not of Christianity itself, but of all the abasing and experimental doctrines which belong to it.

My hearers, when the question is up about the salvation of our never-dying souls, it is of little consequence what may turn out to be our opinions. The mere circumstance of yielding assent to the Bible on the strength and evidence as we would yield it to any other book, is never going to carry us to Heaven. If we ever reach Heaven, there must be the process of a personal and a thorough preparation, and this is gone through only by plying the doctrines of the New Testament, and bringing them to bear upon the actual state of the affections in the sight of God. Now, when the preacher endeavors to do so-when he presses home the spiritualities of religion-when he begins to move a step towards the conscience, with the intention of disturbing its repose, then it is, that his hearers throw up a shield of adamant against the attack, and hundreds, who receive the whole of Christianity in general, put away from them every word of it in particular. In vain does he urge the depravity of the heart-the importance of regeneration -the eternity of future punishment. In vain does he offer, as he goes along, the heavy sanction of "Thus saith the Lord," to every word he utters. It is all to no purpose. Some call it the language of mystery, and others the ex. citement of enthusiasm, and others still find fault with his preaching, for not being practical. Nothing takes effectThere remains, among his hearers, just about as much and as obdurate impenitence, as if he were reciting the illusions of a dream, or the fictions of a high-colored romance. And do you ask the explanation of this? Why, it is plain as the sun in the firmament. How are men to believe doc. trines which, when admitted, must ring in their ears one unceasing alarm? No, so long as their deeds are evil, they feel it necessary, in self-defence, to shape their course accordingly to fly from that sight which would show them to themselves, and unclench their death-like grasp on the world, and drive them up at once to the most irksome of all employments-the work of experimental Christianity.

Well, the thing does not stop here. There is another class of persons who not only receive religion, but they receive also the most strict and mortifying doctrines of it; and yet they keep completely away from the point of being real Christians. With all the rigor of their orthodoxy, they live along in the character of unpardoned sinners, and carry around with them, from day to day, the entire consciousness that they are unprepared for eternity. Approach them on the subject of their salvation, and they will tell you that the diversity of their engagements absorbs their time and unfits them for serious concerns but not an hour do they subtract fron their business to give to their souls; or, they will tell you, perhaps, that they are unable to work upon themselves that renovating change required by the Gospelbut never does this self-distrust put them upon an application to the all-sufficiency of Jesus Christ. Or, they will tell you, again, that they lament their own inactivity, and wonder that their hearts are so immoveably obdurate; but not a step do they take towards that atoning Cross beneath. which their stubbornness may be melted. No; none of this. Ready as they are to acknowledge that salvation is the gift of God, they continue entirely to forget that man is enjoined to work it out with fear and trembling.

Do you not know, my hearers, that a large portion of the Christian world belong to the very class I am attempting to describe? And what is the reason of it? Why, read over the text, and you will find the reason. I do not mean that their deeds are evil in any such sense as to fix upon them the charge of immorality; but this I do mean, that whatever flimsy excuses they may devise for their impenitence, the fault is exclusively their own. The single cause of their remaining in darkness is that they love it. They are too closely rivetted to their sins to exchange them for an interest in the Saviour. The truth is, they wish to be happy, but they do not wish to be holy; for, if they did, why not surrender their hearts at once to Christ, who stands ready to fill them with all the preciousness of his grace, and all the demonstrations of his glory ? No; they will give up one sin, or another sin, but the great principle of sin within them cannot be dislodged. They hold on to it like a drowning man to a strip of plank in his last convulsions-fixing his grasp with redoubled eagerness, at the very moment when he feels, if he feels at all, that it must inevitably go down with him for ever.

And now, my hearers, what I wish is to lay before you the remaining clause of our text, which affirms that the reason of our condemnation is that very choice of darkness rather than light about which we have been speaking. It matters little by whom this choice is made, whether by the rich or the poor-the accomplished or the illiterate; and it matters not much more to what particular aspect of the subject it refers-whether to open skepticism, or to mere general consent-or to what St. Paul calls " being almost a Christian." One thing is certain, that by just how much we stop short of experimental religion, by just so much will God keep in store for us the lash of a future punishment. I am well aware that apologies may be rallied on our side. We may trust to the light of Nature, or talk