from theory, from conjecture, from the plainest contradictions to common sense, from reasonings out of our reach and beyond our capacities. Christianity calls on us to obey her Revelation, as the remedy of our maladies, and a stupendous salvation from eternal death; and makes all her discoveries and mysteries intelligible and simple in respect to our duties and wants: Infidelity calls us to speculation and presumption; denies the malady; concerns herself with finding fault with the mysteries which she will not apply aright, and leaves man without salvation, without guidance, without consolation, without hope-a wanderer in the wilderness of the world.

Such is the real character of Infidel objections, or rather, such are the arguments in favour of Christianity, which objections so weak and unreasonable furnish.

What, then, practically, is the hold which such objections have of men? How is it that they still prevail with so many? Whence is it that infidelity, with such a miserable destitution of argument, still triumphs so widely amongst the young? The answer is, that the objections fix themselves in unfurnished and vain minds; that they follow upon vicious habits; that they are the judicial infliction of the provoked Spirit of God; that they carry off those who have no real hold of Christianity; that they are the great stratagem of the spiritual adversary; that they are the most fatal product of the corrupt and proud reason of a fallen creature.

Let us, in conclusion, touch on these topics.

I. I say these wretched sophisms of infidelity FIX

THEMSELVES IN UNFURNISHED AND VAIN MINDS.

Curiosity, admiration of mere talents, the love of novelty, the prurient desire to know what unbelievers have to say, open the mind to the arts of the scoffer. Men are unfurnished with the full knowledge of the

grounds of their faith, and are unequal for a contest with subtle disputants. There is no saying what havoc objections make when young people are not called to consider them; when they presumptuously, and from mere curiosity, allow them to dwell in the mind; when they begin on the side of these speculations, instead of the side of the positive evidences of Christianity. Avoid, therefore, playing with the snare. Dread exposing yourselves to "the pestilence which walketh in darkness." Tamper not with temptation. This is my first caution.

II. Shun, in the next place, THOSE VICES WHICH PREPARE FOR INFIDEL OBJECTIONS. Sensuality is the mother and nurse of unbelief. The proud, profligate youth finds Christianity stand in his way. He says, "Give me reasons against the Bible; and if there are none, I will invent some." His unbelief is the fruit of his passions and of his intellectual and moral rebellion against God. It is not the conviction of satisfied research, but the haste and presumption of an uninformed and vicious mind. We need not wonder that profligate persons of great natural talents fall into infidelity; for the main objection is antecedent to the production of any evidence; and it is not to be expected that they should have made themselves masters of the merits of the case.20 A natural consequence of the continued violation or disregard of any law, is a doubt or denial of its authority. Shun, therefore, O young man, the vices which would make you desire to find some hold against Christianity. Reverence conscience-imitate the examples of your virtuous Christian friends-follow your Bible as the guide of life; and your objections will presently vanish.

III. PROVOKE not, in the third place, I would intreat you-provoke not the GOOD SPIRIT OF GOD 20 Shuttleworth's Sermons.

TO DEPART FROM YOU, and give you up to judicial blindness and obduracy of heart. If you go on in vain curiosity and idle intercourse with the scoffer; if you live in vice and moral evils contrary to known duty-fear lest the blessed guide and sanctifier of man should be grieved, and should depart from you. I address you as the disciple of the Christian religion; I address you as one who knows the divine agent and author of grace; I address you as one who knows the ordinary dealings of the Almighty, whose " Spirit doth not always strive with man;' "21 but who left Pharaoh to his impenitent heart; who consigned the Jews to obduracy and unbelief; and who threatens all who "love not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness, with being given up to a strong delusion, to believe a lie." 22 If once given up of God, any objections will avail to turn you from Christianity; the weakest sophisms will be too strong for you; the mightiest host of facts and historical evidences will appear of no force in your view; you will go on from worse to worse-from negligence to scorn; from speculative to practical unbelief; from the trifling and indevout, to the daring and presumptuous temper, which defies God, disowns the Saviour, and rushes madly upon eternity.

IV. In order to avoid any approach to this fatal end, SEE THAT YOU HAVE A REAL HOLD OF CHRISTIANITY IN ITS SUBSTANTIAL BLESSINGS-in its actual efficacy upon your heart and life. Speculative objections have little force to perplex the practical and spiritually-minded Christian. He has the shield of faith, which quenches all the fiery darts of the wicked one. On the other hand, he who has never felt religion, and known its power, has a great disadvantage in coping with an ingenious disputant. His heart hav

21 Gen. vi. 3.

22 2 Thess. ii, 11, 12.

ing never been affected and blessed with Christianity, he holds by it slightly; he rather hangs upon it, than embraces it; he retains it merely by an hereditary prejudice: he sees no reason why opinions and sentiments should be thought of so great consequence; he thinks, perhaps, all opinions immaterial. Christianity has never given him an actual power against his passions; Christianity has never raised, and blessed, and consoled his heart in affliction; Christianity has never brought him to pardon, peace, and a new and heavenly life; Christianity is to him little more than a code of restraints, with certain religious ceremonies attached to them. Thus sitting loose to all that is vital in his religion, what wonder is it, if, when infidelity spreads its snares, he is taken? Let the young, then, seek for the practical influences of Christianity; let them make a trial of its promised grace; let them know it as THE POWER OF GOD UNTO SALVATION-and scientific reasonings will never overthrow their strong and well-grounded faith. For,

V. They will soon discover that the objections of infidelity are, in truth, ONE OF THE GREAT strataGEMS OF SATAN, THE SPIRITUAL ADVERSARY. They learn from Revelation the power, the malice, the artifice of that apostate spirit. They know that, from the period of his successful temptation of our first parents, he has been systematically opposing THE SEED OF THE WOMAN, who was so long promised, and who, at length, appeared to destroy the works of the devil. They know that this deadly adversary has instigated, in different ages, various instruments for hardening the heart of man, and defeating the purposes of redemption. He worked by heathen idolatry, so long as that could be sustained; he worked by superstition and spiritual bondage, during the dark ages; he works now by SPECULATIVE OBJECTIONS, the abuse of literature, a confidence in talents, education, and the reasoning

powers of man. Behold, then, in this one consideration, the whole web of infidel speculations unravelled. No wonder these vain and futile fabrications, though possessing little force in themselves against positive facts, though directed to a wrong point and inadmissible, though inconsistent and contradictory and frivolous, the manifest product of human pride and ignorance; no wonder they still deceive so many-for the secret is now laid open. The whole system is a part of Satan's agency with the intent to ruin man. They are temptations, not reasons; the shafts of the wicked one, not the armour of truth.

Resist, then, these assaults of your spiritual adversary; cherish not the imaginations which subserve your own destruction; treat them as you would the robber who should enter your dwelling, to spoil it of your most valuable possessions; quench the suggestions of the arch-deceiver, and open your hearts to the fair and manly operations of conscience and truth.

VI. Finally, consider these vain objections as The

MOST DEADLY PRODUCT OF THE CORRUPT AND PROUD REASON OF A FALLEN CREATURE. This is the sum of the present Lecture, which I must hasten to conclude. Objections are the offspring of man's corrupt and depraved nature, where all the faculties of body and soul are disturbed and weakened. They form an unhealthy atmosphere around this lower world. Christianity comes to remedy the evil. It calls for the humiliation of the understanding before the revealed will of God, and the subjection of the passions and appetites to the revealed precepts of God. It is as much a branch of moral duty to believe, when God grants such evidences as he has done in the case of Christianity, as it is to restrain the inferior appetites, when the same almighty Lord has issued his prohibitions against vice and immorality. To re