SERMON VII.

THE CONTAGION OF EVIL.

HAGGAI II. 11-14.

Thus saith the Lord of Hosts: Ask now the priests concerning the law, saying, If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy? And the priests answered and said, No. Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean. Then answered Haggai and said: So is this people, and so is this nation before Me, saith the Lord; and so is every work of their hands; and that which they offer there is unclean.

IN our last sermon we were led to consider what is the only Source of all glory and blessing. We have seen that, according to the common course of Nature, as it manifests itself, whether in individuals or in nations and the world at large, man is prone to degenerate and become worse, to depart further and further from that shadow of innocence which still floats around his childhood, to lose more and more of the very semblance of purity, to cramp and warp his mind, to narrow and harden his heart, and thus to wane and decay, until he becomes as nothing in comparison with his first glory. At the same time we saw that there is one way, and only one, in which this proneness to degenerate may be subdued,-that there is one way, and only one, in which man may be enabled to wax, instead of waning, nay, to wax even when he is waning, so that the glory of his latter state shall be greater than that of

the former. We saw how it is only by the power of Christ, by the coming of Him whom the prophet calls the Desire of all nations, that man's natural proneness to degenerate can be overcome,-how it is solely through the coming of Christ that the world has been rescued from the moral plague which was about to destroy it, and how, whenever He comes to any individual soul, He in like manner redeems it from the clutches of sin, and enables it, unless His work be thwarted and baffled, to mount from grace to grace, and from glory to glory.

Christ, through the working of His Spirit, can do this; and none else can. It is very needful that we should be thoroughly convinced of both these truths, of the latter no less than of the former. We need to be convinced of the former truth, of Christ's power to purify and lift up our hearts, in order that we may go in His name to the Father boldly and confidently, whatever our infirmities, whatever our pollutions may be,-that we may not be withheld from seeking His aid by fear or doubt or mistrust, but may beseech Him earnestly and trustfully, though with all humility and patience, to purge our hearts from their defilements, and to heal their corruptions, and to deliver them from their bondage, and to raise them up to the heavenly places, where He Himself is sitting at the right hand of God. Nor do we less need to be convinced of the other truth, that no power, except the Spirit of Christ, can work this great work in us, or any part of it; because there is no commoner errour, none to which men listen more readily, or which is more hurtful to the better portion of mankind,-to those who, being conscious of the evil within them, desire to struggle against it, than the deceitful notion that there are other powers, beside that of

Christ, whereby this change may be wrought in us.

Now

a complete refutation of this errour is contained in the passage I have just read to you, which in the book of the prophet stands immediately after the cheering declaration that the glory of the latter House shall surpass that of the former; and which therefore, with God's help, we will proceed to consider, looking first at the great necessity that we should have this truth set strongly before us, in consequence of the universal, almost unconquerable proneness of our natural heart to believe the contrary.

For, slow as we are to believe that Christ can and will purify our hearts and souls, and lift them up to heaven,― a slowness arising from our practical unbelief, which is too often found where there is a verbal confession, of His divine, ever-present power, and confirmed by our utter inability to comprehend or believe in His divine, all-embracing love,―slow as we are to believe this, we are ever too ready to believe that we can work a like change in ourselves. We cling to this notion, and will not let it go; and, though it be torn time after time from our grasp, we still try to lay hold on it again. Thus is self our neverceasing, never-flagging enemy, that follows us about, and dogs all our steps, and crosses us whithersoever we turn. It is the love of self, that unfits us for loving God. It is self-seeking, that hinders us from seeking God. It is the trust in self, that will not let us trust in God. It is the belief in self, that makes it impossible for us to believe in God. We turn the whole world, the world of thought as well as the outward world, into a huge mirror; and instead of seeing God, and His ways, and His thoughts, and His purposes therein, we merely see ourselves. Our heart sees nothing to love, except self. Our mind sees nothing to

know, except self. Our soul sees nothing to believe in, except self. Hence we continue without love,-for selflove poisons all other love,-without knowledge, inasmuch as we view all things out of their right relation and proportion, without faith, which cannot exist, unless it has something out of ourselves to rest on. As we cannot get quit of the notion, that our business in life is to work for ourselves, to pursue our own interest, our own pleasure, our own comfort, our own happiness,-so that, even when the highest truths are set before us, this falsehood intrudes and perverts them, and makes us fancy that the only motives for our being religious and godly are the rewards promist to godliness; in like manner we are ever hampered and fettered by the notion that we are our own lords and masters, and that we have the power of shaping and moulding our thoughts and feelings, and of fixing them on whatever objects we please. We think we can do this in our own way, through our own strength, by following our own devices.

From the beginning of the world until now, every child of man has been blinded by this delusive errour. Such was the case with our first parents, when they deemed they could make themselves like God by an act of their own, and that too an act of disobedience and defiance to Him. Although the slightest reflexion should have taught them that He who is All-wise can never be deceived or outwitted, and that He who is All-powerful can never be foiled or resisted, they had more confidence in their own understanding than in God's word; and they felt no doubt that, when they increast in knowledge, they should be able to accomplish whatever they wanted. In spite too of the fatal lesson which they taught us, a like

vain trust in knowledge is almost universal at this day. They who call themselves philosophers, are constantly asserting that, if men were more educated, they would become honester and better; notwithstanding the experience of all ages attesting that bad feelings, bad practices, bad habits, are quite as common among the learned as among the ignorant. Other forms of the same mistaken belief, that our understanding has the power of regulating and determining our whole character and conduct, are to be found in all classes. Or else we imagine that

and our lives by the ex

we shall improve our hearts ertion of our own will, some by penances and mortifications, others by grand, heroic deeds. Some try to do this, and fail time after time. Others put off the day of trial, cheating themselves with the dream that they shall try hereafter. Yet, often as we must needs witness in ourselves and in others how powerless the understanding is to controll the will, and to keep the feelings and appetites in subjection, often too as we must have found the resolutions of others, and our own, give way, often as, if we have watcht our hearts, we must have seen how, according to the sad picture of human nature given by St Paul, that which we would we do not, and that which we hate we do,-still we persist in trusting to ourselves, to our own understanding and will, for the amendment of our hearts and lives. There are certain parts of the earth, which, as many of you will have heard, are laid waste every now and then by earthquakes, or by the eruptions of volcanoes. Now in several of the places which are exposed to these terrible ravages, man has taken up his abode; and cities have been built there, which the earthquake or the volcano after a time has destroyed.