'makes God a liar.' What is it that distinguishes a Christian from a Jew, a Turk, or a Heathen? It is his faith, his knowledge of Christ and the Gospel, his belief in all that has been revealed. When he no longer retains this belief, he ceases to be a Christian, he ceases to have any share or interest in Christ; he becomes an apostate from his religion." The fact is, both faith and practice are necessary. But faith is the primary duty, it is that without which the practice of all other duties is vain. This appears throughout both Testaments; witness the faith of Abraham and that of Noah; and the blessings which Jehovah conferred upon them for that very virtue. How often does Christ pronounce "thy faith hath saved thee," "thy faith hath made thee whole?" What was the answer given by the Apostle to the jailor, who asked, "What shall I do to be saved?" "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." It would be impossible that this

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positive truth could be misunderstood, if it were even slightly attended to. But as Archdeacon Paley, in his peculiarly plain and clear language, says, that *"there are many who never suffer any thing of the kind to enter into their thoughts. There are grown men and women, nay, even middle aged persons, who have not thought seriously about religion an hour, nor a quarter of an hour, in the whole course of their lives. great object of human solicitude affects not them in any manner whatever:" they find mysterious circumstances and doctrines revealed, which though indisputably true as to fact, yet are difficult to our comprehension, and far above human explanation: others see various evils occur in the world, for which they cannot account, (nor is it necessary they should,) and are driven by these manifold disorders into doubt and sceptisism. But be it told to these unhappy sceptics,

* Sermon 1.

that the greatest evil that can happen to themselves or others, is the evil of infidelity. This life has often been compared to a journey. As then the traveller, who has a great and distant object which he is anxious finally to reach, pursues his road amidst rain and sunshine, disregarding the briars, the brambles, and other impediments, pleased, but not detained, by the flowers, the shrubs, and occasional beautiful scenery on his way, he strives, with firm resolution, to proceed to his destined mark, the hope of which cheers his spirits, and renders him almost forgetful of the unavoidable fatigue. Thus does the Christian, looking forward with lively hope to the blessed end of his pilgrimage, proceed without complaining of the evils which he is sure to see, and the impediments he is sure to meet with; enlivened, but not fascinated, by frequent comforts and innocent pleasures, till he reaches the end of his journey, and enters into "the joy of his Lord."

We know that the vast mountains of the earth have no more effect in counteracting its general rotundity, than the little protuberances on the surface of an orange prevent the roundness of its appearance; so to an eye, that was capable of comprehending the whole of the great system of the Almighty, no defects nor inequalities would appear in the great circle of eternity. A fly crawling on a pillar, feels occasionally trifling impediments from the roughness of the material, but to the eye of taste, which embraces the whole structure, the perfection of its architecture is apparent and striking. What are all the wisest of the earth but insects creeping on the great column of Providence!

Some persons are induced to think, that were Christianity so pre-eminent in excellence, and indeed the only true religion, its effects would be greater, and the universality of its acceptance would have been sooner effected; whereas, a vast

portion of the world has not yet been visited by its heavenly beams.

Objectors on this ground can have paid little attention to the nature of prophecy, nor to the usual mode of the proceedings of God. They must be blind to the proved fact of numerous prophecies being actually and already fulfilled, or they could not doubt that the great prophecy will, in God's good time, be also fulfilled,* "When the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea."

With respect to the mode of God's proceedings, it is always gradual. Prophecy was declared first obscurely, and by degrees in a clearer manner; knowledge and civilization have, at one period, prevailed in one part of the world, and then gradually spread, by means unforeseen by man, by the operation (under Divine Providence) of natural causes,

* Isaiah xi. 9.

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