exsistence of a better spirit in the church, if, while there should be no diminution in zealously "working the works of God," there should be a very large increse of more fervent and agonizing prayer for the coming of his kingdom. Such a course while it would honor God more, would, according to the divine plan, make the means used by his servants efficacious in the conversion of a greater number of souls. The united, fervent and effectual prayers of his people, in connection with other divinely recognized and appointed instrumentalities, are destined ultimately to achieve a complete and glorious triumph over sin. I would that we all might feel how little worth, in the sight of God, are our professions of interest and acts of benevolence, and our labors in the cause of missions, unless they are accompanied by appropriate and importunate supplication for the success of that cause. O that all who love God, and take delight in the spread of the Gospel among the heathen, might realize the indispensable importance of sincere and earnest prayer as the only effectual way of bringing down the blessing of the Holy Spirit on the efforts made for their conversion.

The petition, Thy Kingdom Come, addressed to Jehovah as a memorial expressive of the earnest wishes of his loyal subject on the earth, will ever be in order in the court of heaven. The Advocate, Christ Jesus, takes it all covered with tears, and presents it to Him, and intercedes for its acceptance and approval, pleading the merits of the propitiatory sacrifice he made of himself for the sins of the world. As his only begotten and dearly beloved Son, Jesus reminds the Father of the promise made in the councils of eternity, and asks for the bestowal of the heathen upon him for his inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession. The united prayer of the petitioners, congenial to the feelings of Jehovah, in accordance with his eternal purposes, will be granted, and the kingdoms of this world will speedily become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever.

Christian hearer-in view of the considerations which have been urged, will you not, when you daily visit the closet, plead in greater earnest, and in the exercise of a more active faith, in behalf of a lost race, than you have ever yet done? When you bow in the social circle, and in the weekly prayer meetings of the church, will you not supplicate, with a becoming importunity, for the prevalence of God's spiritual reign among all the nations of the earth? At your evening and morning family devotions, will you not remember the heathen in their deep degradation and sinfulness, and offer a sincere and fervent petition for their rescue? In the sleepless watches of the silent night, and often while engaged in your usual pursuits, abroad or at home, will you not elevate your soul in a voiceless prayer to God, in the short, but comprehensive request, "Thy Kingdom Come?" and especially will you not regularly attend the monthly concert of prayer for the conversion of the world? How can yon better manifest your desires for the salvation of the heathen.than by uniting monthly in concerted prayer with your brethren throughout the world to Almighty God for his blessing to rest on all the means employed for their conversion? I invite you to attend the monthly Concert in the name of 800,000,000 of dying men. Consider well the unspeakable importance of such prayer, and the immense number of those for whom you should offer it. Contemplate the approaching judgment when you will be called upon by Jesus himself to give an account for your principles and your practice in relation to this duty. Let not any consideration of little moment have an unfavorable influence on your decision. Let your practice be such as an enlightened conscience will approve, and a Holy God will justify. The spiritual condition of many a deathless and priceless soul in pagan lands, may in the providence of God, be intimately connected with the reply you now make in your hearts, and the course you will hereafter pursue, in relation to this question; and will you not then regularly attend the monthly concert of prayer for the conversion of the world?

THE JUDGMENT OF CONSCIENCE COMPARED WITH THE JUDGMENT OF GOD.

"For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God."-1 JOHN iii. 20, 21.

GOD being perfectly just and good, it cannot be otherwise than that in any world every intelligent creature that is unconscious of guilt, may look up to Him with cheerful filial confidence. Such beings can have nothing to fear from Him. As they have deserved no evil, they have no occasion to fear any. God's judgment of them must be according to truth.

It is equally evident that moral beings who are conscious of guilt, always expect God to be displeased with them; and this apprehension of God's displeasure, is always in proportion to the correctness of their views respecting His character. The more perfectly He is known as a God of holiness, the deeper will be the impression of His abhorrence of sin, and the stronger the dread of evil from His hand, on the part of the consciously guilty.

This testimony of sinful beings against themselves, is a true and faithful testimony. It is a revelation of God's judgment concerning His accountable creatures, through the working of that moral nature which He has given them.

These principles are clearly and concisely stated in the text. "If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. If our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God."

I propose that we meditate, at this time, upon the severer condemnation which God pronounces upon those whose consciences condemn them.

I. Such is the constitution of our moral nature, that we necessarily feel self-condemnation for sin.

II. When thus self-condemned, we have reason to expect a severer condemnation from God.

I. The first of these propositions I suppose to be evident to every person from his own experience. It has been learned by us all, in that most effectual way of learning any fact concerning our mental or moral constitution-by direct self-inspection. All the faculties of our minds become known to us by the exercise of them. Each of us knows that he has a capacity for reasoning, because he actually reasons-for choosing, because he actually chooses-for loving and hating, desiring and fearing, because he has felt those emotions in actual exercise. No description of these exercises or faculties could give a correct idea of them to one who knew nothing of them by experience, any more than we could make a blind man understand the nature of light and of colors, or give an intelligible account of the nature and laws of sound to one who has never possessed the faculty of hearing. We speak to you of these mental faculties and exercises, with the same confident expectation that you will understand us, as when we speak of the bodily senses, and the various uses and exercises of them— and for the same reason- we speak, in both cases, to your own consciousness; we describe that which exists, and exhibits its reality in your own experience. So it is in respect to that which the text presents to our consideration. We are so made that we cannot help forming opinions concerning the moral character of our own conduct, and we always experience a feeling of self-appropation or of self-condemnation, according as we have judged our conduct to be right or wrong. The faculty of our nature, whereby we are capable of these exercises, is ordinarily called CONSCIENCE! You will observe that in the text, these exercises are attributed to the heart, and it may be proper to remark, that generally in the Scriptures, there is no attempt at such technical precision in the use of terms as is commonly (though not always successfully) aimed at, in scientific treatises upon the same subject.

In our theological discussions, we ordinarily employ the term heart to denote the affections, but in Scripture it has a wider and more various signification. It is applied to different parts of our intellectual and moral nature, and sometimes, I think, it includes the whole of what we include in the term mind, in its most unrestricted sense. I suppose the fact to be, that the sacred writers did not have much reference to any scientific classification of the mental faculties, but treated of men as a rational, accountable being, and in popular phraseology, set forth to view the great facts of his moral nature and history. The language which they employel is not therefore to be understood by simply subjecting its terms and phrases to the technical definitions of modern science; but there must always be suitable regard to the connection and scope of their writing, Nor is there any great difficulty in this. When we read that "the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil," we readily perceive that the disposition or inclination of men is the subject of discourse; and when (as in the text) our heart is spoken of as condemning us, we see as clearly, that is the faculty whereby we form judgments concerning our own moral character that is brought to view. This we are accustom

ed to call conscience and we do no violence to Scripture, if we employ this word, in place of the word heart. The important thing is, that we recognize the great fact, which the Scripture here and elsewhere assume, that we have a capacity for thus judging ourselves, and are under a necessity of either approving or condemning our own actions. This does not need to be proved. Every one knows it to be true, as certainly as he knows that grasping a hot iron with his naked hand would give him pain. If there were any one who did not know it, it would be in vain to attempt to prove it, for he could have no conception of what was meant.

I offer, then, no proof; but simply ask you to consider this fact, which you all perfectly know, concerning yourselves. Meditate upon this high distinction which God has conferred upon you-this glorious endowment of your moral nature. By this, more than anything else, are we distinguished from the brutes beneath us. In this, more than in anything else, do we trace the lineaments of God's image upon us. The form erect, the face turned heavenward and beaming with intelligence, the noble faculty of speech, the cunning organs fitted for various and wonderful labors, the intelligence penetrating the secrets of nature, and gathering rich stores of knowledge; the energetic will subduing inferior creatures, and subjecting inanimate forces to its dominion-all these do not so ennoble man, as this capacity for moral character-this capability of doing right and wrong, of deserving praise or censure-this necessity of blaming or approving hinself, and knowing himself to be worthy of blame or approbation from God.

Man has a nature which he shares with the brutes, endowed with the same faculties though generally in greater perfection. In bodily organs and senses, even in the capacity for knowledge, man is only superior to the brutes. But that capacity which we, have been considering, is not only superior in degree of excellence, but it is wholly different in kind from any that the brute possesses. No instruction or discipline can give the brutes ability to make moral distinctions-to know the difference between right and wrong-to feel the dignity of virtue-or to suffer the anguish of remorse. Herein it is given to man, to rise to immeasurable heights above, or sink to unfathomable depths below all other earthly

creatures.

II. The text teaches us that when our consciences condemn us, wre have reason to expect a severer condemnation from God.

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The reasons of this may be seen :1. In his infinite knowledge. God is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things." By as much as His knowledge is greater than ours, by so much He is able more adequately to estimate the evil of our sins. It must be admitted that our views upon this subject are greatly restricted. We know that sin is an evil aud bitter thing. We know that its results are exceedingly disasterous to the true interests of moral beings. We are conscious, to some degree of its debasing effect upon ourselves, and we have witnessed something of the disorder and misery which it has brought into the world. But do we estimate these things as God estimates them? Are we able to understand, as He understands, how dreadful is the enor* In acuteness and power of the senses, man is even inferior to some brutes.

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mity of that which is oppossd to Him and His law? Or to measure as He measures, the evil results which it has occasioned? Do we know how greatly sin has debased us? Can we tell how far above our present position is that which we should now be occupying, if we had never sinned? Or can we conceive of the beauty which would be covering the earth, and the happiness which would be blessing its inhabitants, if the race had not fallen from holiness? Doubtless in all these respects, our views are exceeding inadequate. "We see through a glass darkly." We catch slight glimpses only of the truth.

Now is evident, that our general estimate of the evil of sin will go far to determine our particular estimate of our own guilt, in committing sin. God's judgment of our personal unworthiness will be as much more severe than our own, as He estimates more highly than we the evil and demerit of sin in general. The child knows that he ought to obey his parents, and he feels guilty and miserable when he has disobeyed them; but ordinarily his estimate of his guilt is much lower than theirs, because they have so much more just apprehension concerning the tendencies and results of disobedience; because they knew so much better than the child, what evils it will be likely to occasion, how ruinous it will be to the child, and how destructive of all the precious interests of the entire family.

The ignorant men and boys whom you may find in a jail, know that the thefts, and the quarrels, and the frauds which they have committed, are crimes, and that they deserve blame and punishment on account of them; but how much more highly is their guilt estimated by the intelligent magistrates and juries who have directed them to be shut up in prison, and by all intelligent people, who can appreciate the injury to society of such offences. What a contrast must there be between our estimate of our own guilt, and that of Him who "knoweth all things”— who sees the whole endless future as clearly as the present, and can distinctly trace all the eternal consequences of every human action.

Ah! my hearers, we do not know how excellent and glorious a being He is against whom we have sinned; how perfect a law it is that we have broken; how equitable are all its principles; how just and good all its requirements; how necessary to the true welfare of all moral beings (including ourselves) that they should be strictly enforced. Inasmuch as God can take a broader view of these great interests, and has a better appreciation of these important principles, so much more highly must He blame us for them.

2. Another reason why God estimates our guilt more highly than we, is, that He is disinterested. You will readily see the importance of this consideration. You know how interest sways the judgment of men. It is a righteous principle of human law, which forbids those to be judges and jurors in any cause, who have themselves a personal interest in the decision: and, although it is found impossible perfectly to carry out this principle in practice, we still insist upon it so far as it can be carried out, and we feel that just so far as we fail of securing it a complete application, so far is the administration of justice defective. Who would have trusted the family of Prof. Webster, to determine the question of his guilt or innocence? Could their minds have weighed the evidence impartially,