It

mercy, I would address some brief exhortation. Fear not from me the language of severity. becomes my office to feel for you as a father feels for his children, and it becomes me, as one who has had much forgiven, to have compassion on my fellow-servants, even as God had pity on me. You are highly favoured in being admitted here. For you have heard me this day plead for those, who seek, but cannot find, a shelter in this place. Avail yourselves then of so distinguishing a mercy. Let

your repentance be sincere and lasting. Exercise a lively faith upon that pure and spotless victim who offered himself upon the cross for your sins. Be obedient, mild, and grateful, to all who are engaged in the care and superintendence of this house. Devote what time you can command to prayer; and when you pray, remember those who would gladly be where you are, but who are still buffeting with the waves of trial and temptation. Pray also for the benefactors who support you here. Pray for the parents and friends upon whose heads your misconduct has brought down shame and sorrow. Pray for those -for they most need your prayers who robbed you of your innocence, and then left you to perish.

So believe, so live, and so pray, and all will be well at last. For a time you may have lost your earthly parents; but you have a Father in

heaven. For a time you may be banished from your earthly home; but you have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. The bright prospects of your early youth may have been involved in clouds, and lost in the darkness of that storm which cast you upon the world. But lo! to the true penitent the dawn of eternity begins; the morning star of a better day appears; and the sun of a new heaven arises above the everlasting hills.

And now, to this assembled congregation, let me say :-These, my brethren, are the consolations which cheer the returning sinner in this House of Mercy. To perpetuate these blessings depends on you. May God inspire your hearts to give plenteously; and may he plenteously reward you.

471

SERMON XII.*

ROMANS, xiv. 17.

"THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS NOT MEAT AND DRINK; BUT RIGHTEOUSNESS, AND PEACE, AND JOY, IN THE HOLY GHOST."

In this passage, the Apostle has been speaking of those distinctions between different kinds of meat, for which many contended, who wished to adhere to the law of Moses. For his own part, though bred a Jew, he was persuaded, from the very nature of the Christian religion, that narrow scruples about such matters could not form a necessary part of so enlarged and rational a dispensation. But still he respected the well-meant scruples of weaker brethren. He wished that

each man should be left, in this respect, to satisfy his own conscience. And provided that he who had strength of mind to throw off former prejudices, and to eat all things alike, despised not him that ate not; and, on the other hand, that the

* Preached for the Magdalen Asylum, in 1834.

brother who used the stricter discipline of a more timid conscience, did not view with narrow scruple, and condemn the liberty of stronger minds; provided, in a word, that these slight variations of opinion on lesser matters, did not violate the great rule of charity in this case, he was of opinion that the point in dispute might be fairly waived, and left without the interference of his apostolic authority. The reason for this latitude and indulgence he assigns in my text: "The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost."

Would to God that many of the disputes which have divided Christians had been treated in the same manner; and that there had been less amongst us of that litigious spirit, which, in temporal matters, often dissipates, in protracted law-suits, far more than the whole of what was originally in dispute.

But such a spirit has been, in Christianity, unhappily in exercise. difficult to account for its existence.

all ages of

Nor is it

The truth

is, that religion, though a word in common use, is little thought of, and still less understood. I mean religion itself, in its real and intrinsic nature: that system of divine truth, that principle which has its seat and habitation in men's hearts, that connecting link between the mind and heaven,

and between the spirit and its parent source, which the Apostle here calls "the kingdom of God;" because it is God's Holy Spirit reigning and shedding its influence abroad, throughout all the regions of the soul. About religion, so understood, there are no disputes: indeed there could be none because true religion can be known only by its becoming our own. Whoever sees it, must love it and embrace it. When we really know what the thing is, we know that it is not, in its nature, a subject of argument at all. It is a state of the mind-a frame of soul-an experience of the heart. If any one feel this in common with us, we must, as far as we mutually explain ourselves, agree about it. But if he does not, we can no more argue him into it than we can persuade a man to feel bodily pain or pleasure contrary to the information of his senses. We can only tell him what we feel, and advise him to practise all known duties, and to pray to God that he may be taught it. "We may thus speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen.” But this is not argument; it is only bearing witness to facts.

There are, however, many circumstances belonging to religion, such as its outward forms, and positive institutions, which are level to every capacity, and which may be matter of controversy