the mercy of God to do all this for you, then do you not see that you have not been trusting to it for those very things which above all others you need? What have you been trusting for, if not for the pardon of your sins, the acquittance and acceptance of your person, and the purification of your soul? If you cannot now tell that your trust is available for all this, what is it worth? But if you say that these are the very things for which you have been trusting, then say how, and on what ground do you expect the mercy of God to be thus gracious to you? Reader, you must tell how the mercy to which you are trusting can do all this-all this your case demands; and it, therefore, behoves you to see not only that that to which you are trusting can, but that it will meet in every respect your desperate emergencies. Now, reader, say, would God be just if he were to allow his mercy, without any satisfaction being rendered to his broken law, or without that satisfaction being acknowledged by you, to pass over all your sins, to treat you as righteous, when you are, in truth, altogether unrighteous-and thus to introduce your sin-contaminated and contaminating spirit among his sinless myriads? Do you not see that any such procedure would be most unwise and unrighteous, and that it is consequently a thing which God, merciful as he is, cannot possibly do. Again, then, we ask, how is that mercy to which you are trusting to do for you what your case imperatively requires?

Do you not see, dear reader, that your views of the divine mercy are utterly defective. You have been trusting to God's mercy as if it were the only attribute of his character as if he had neither holiness nor justice—as if he had no law to administer, and no government to maintain. You cannot tell how God can be a just God and a Saviour.' You are expecting him to save you at the sacrifice of his justice.

Then, are you to give up the thought that God is merciful? No; but you are to receive his mercy as it flows to you through the Redeemer. It is only in the Gospel that you can learn how God can be just, and justify the sinner. And how can you trust to the mercy of God, unless you

know this? Turn, then, to Rom. iii. 25, 26, where you learn, that Jesus God hath set forth a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God: to declare, I say, at this time, his righteousness, that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus.' See, then, O sinner, the mercy of God streaming out to you through the Lamb of God! See God setting him forth a propitiation—a sacrifice-a satisfaction for your sins-that he might maintain his righteousness and yet pass over your transgressions-that he might justly justify you by your believing in Jesus. O, then, reader, see that your trust in the mercy of God arises solely from your faith in that blood which 'cleanseth from all sin.'

TRYING TO FEEL RIGHT.

Ir is not enough, dear reader, to feel right. Many who are miserably wrong manage to feel right. What you should aim at is to be right. Be right, and then by consequence you shall feel right. Many, because they get to feel right, imagine that they really are right, while they are on the verge of eternal ruin. It is infinitely better not to feel right, than falsely to feel so. Let us affectionately warn you, dear reader, against a mere attempt at feeling right. Let your feelings alone. To be right, you must go deeper than the feelings. The understanding must be righted first. Get right there, and you shall very speedily feel right. Get to know that you are right, and then you shall with confidence feel so. There can be no solid feeling of rightness until there is certain knowledge of being right. Infinitely better is it to cross the passage of the disturbed, awakened, and anxious conscience, though more terrific than the fiercest billows, than to sail smoothly along the calm surface of the unbroken peace that characterizes the careless soul. You cannot enter the tranquil

haven of peace with God but through the sea of conviction. It is the course of wisdom, therefore, to launch at once and brave the storm.

Do not then, fellow-sinner, attempt to dismiss the unwelcome thoughts of your sins, of God, of judgment, or of eternity. Let conscience do her work. As God's vicegerent, it is hers to convict, and the sooner she is permitted to do it the better. What although you do not feel right under her revealings. The exposure must be made, sooner or later. Would you feel right if at this moment an angel were sent from heaven with the indictment of all your crimes? How, then, can you feel right under the certainty that that indictment must be served upon you before the assembled universe, unless by faith in Jesus you get it cancelled in his sin-effacing blood? Ah! poor sinner, how dare you try to feel right while the load of your sins is unremoved from off your conscience? How can you feel right so long as they are unforgiven? How can you feel right while you are liable every breath you draw to sink into the depths of hell? Do you not perceive, that to have undisturbed feelings in an unpardoned state is the very reverse of right feeling? Be not satisfied, O sinner, till you know that your sins are blotted out-till you enjoy that repose which can alone be found in the peace-speaking blood of the crucified Jesus-till you can say with heartfelt feeling, Being justified by faith, I have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

TRYING TO PLEASE GOD.

THE thought which appears to occupy your mind, dear reader, under the idea of trying to please God is, that he is not favourably inclined toward you, but would be so under other circumstances. You suppose that if you were somewhat different from what you are at present, then God would look favourably upon you, but that as you are,

he does not do so. Under the influence of some such thoughts as these, your aim is to bring yourself up to what appears to you the given point at which God will be propitious toward you. You thus endeavour to please him with your own doings. You seek to avert his displeasure by an increase of your own good deeds. You expect to make him propitious by your own merits. Now, observe, dear reader, that we do not say that the works you may be offering to God as the price of his favour, are wrong. They may be, so far as they are in themselves concerned, right and proper; so much so, that it would be highly wrong in you to neglect them. That they are works of righteousness' we do not dispute. All that we now wish you to observe in regard to them is, that you expect to make God favourable or propitious toward you by them. You do not look upon him as favourable toward you now, but you hope he will become so by and by through the inducements which your works present to him. Do you see this? because it is of the first importance that you do. Mark your position-you say you are trying to please God. Now this implies two things-first, that you do not look upon God as already pleased, but as requiring yet to be pleased; and second, that it is by something in yourselfit matters not what it is, whether thoughts, or feelings, or words, or actions, it is by something of your own doing that you expect God to be rendered favourable. Now, dear reader, in both of these points you are completely

wrong.

God is at this moment a well-pleased God: He is perfectly, infinitely propitious toward you, and that just as you are. That is he knows you to be just such a sinner as you are yet he is satisfied-so satisfied, for all your sins, that he requires no farther satisfaction for them whatever. Here mark expressly that he is thus propitious toward you, not on account of any thing in you, but simply and exclusively on account of the work which his dear Son has wrought ont for you. God is not pleased with you in yourself; but he is well-pleased with Jesuswell-pleased with him as your Saviour-well-pleased with him for his righteousness' sake. God is satisfied with him

as the propitiation, as the satisfaction for your sins, and therefore at this very moment feels favourably toward you. It was to bring about this very state of matters that God, in the infinitude of his love, sent his Son into the world. Mark the following testimonies regarding the Lord Jesus: 1 John ii. 2, 'He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.' 2 Pet. i. 17, 'He received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.' Isa. xlii. 21, 'The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness' sake.'

Now, my dear friend, let us put it to you, If God really set his Son forth for the very purpose of being a satisfaction, and if God expressly declares him to be the satisfaction for your sins-and, moreover, declares himself well pleased, perfectly satisfied with the Lord Jesus as such-why do you suppose that you have to try and propitiate him? If he regards Jesus as the satisfaction for your sin, why should you not do so also? If God is satisfied with Jesus, why should you not be satisfied with him too? Mark you, this is the point to which you must come-this is the point at which you meet God in peace-all difference between you and God centres here. God looks upon his Son, and says, I am well-pleased with him—I am well-pleased with him for his righteousness' sake-I am satisfied with him as the propitiation for your every sin, O sinner. But here you are entirely passing by the work of Jesus, and saying, I will try and please God with something of my own doing. Now, when will God be pleased with you on these terms? Not certainly so long as he is pleased with his dear Son, and satisfied with his saving work. Surely, then, you see that you have nothing to do to please God, further than to be satisfied with Jesus as your Saviour, just as God is satisfied with him—that just as God declares himself satisfied with the work of Jesus, you declare yourself satisfied also; and so doing, God and you are agreed, reconciled, and at peace. The whole controversy, dear reader, which God has with you, is about Jesus-it is not about your sins-not about their number or their aggrava