before? And who but he could have so surely brought them to pass? The Jews are at this very moment a living attestation to the truth of the divine word, and they will hereafter bring a yet more powerful testimony to it. Their conversion to the Christian faith and re-establishment in their own land will afford such a demonstration of the truth of the gospel as none shall be able to resist, but those who would not believe even if one should rise from the dead before their eyes, or God should speak to them with his own voice from heaven.

How great is the Lord's indignation against sin! Oh! my beloved hearers, if God did thus to his people of old, a people so honoured and so cherished, because they cast off his law and departed from his worship, and finally rejected his gospel, what past or present mercies or privileges shall secure you from the same, or a greater condemnation, if you in like manner are disobedient to his word, and receive not his Son? "If he spared not the natural

branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee."

Notice how evidently the Lord is the governor of all the earth. Through all the revolutions of various nations and dynasties, he has been accomplishing his will and his prophecies respecting the Jews. His providence has so ordered all events, and his power has so influenced all minds, as that his people have been in all places and through all ages just what he foretold they should be. Kings and people have done his will and served his pleasure. Kings and people have scorned and persecuted them, but have never been able to destroy them, or to assimilate them to their own religion or manners. Kings and people shall assist to restore them, and join together to do them honour.

Notice, finally, my beloved brethren, the exceeding efficacy of the blood of Christ. It can expiate the sin and cleanse the guilt of even these. It did so with several individuals of his immediate murderers. It does so still in the case of numbers who from time to time are turning to the Lord. It will do

so eventually in the whole of their nation, according to the prophecies quoted. Oh! beloved brethren, it can also expiate the sin and cleanse the guilt of you and me. And it will do so, if with a penitent heart and lively faith we come unto him who shed it for us. Yes, they, and we, and all, may have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins.

SERMON XXIV.

GOD'S FAVOUR TO HIS PEOPLE.

DEUT. XXXII. 9.

The Lord's portion is his people, Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

WE are fast approaching to the close of the life and writings of Moses. The sun of this eminent leader of the Israelites is now descending to the horizon, and it sets in a splendid scene of beauty and glory. No portion of all the word which he delivered to his people is gilded with a brighter hue than this song which we are now about to consider. In the sublimity of its conceptions, the beauty of its imagery, the sweetness of its numbers, and above all, in the fervour of its piety, it is as distinguished among all other ancient poetry, as the Israelites were among the nations of the earth. It breathes a portion of the divinity which inspired it, and very

cold must that heart be, which even at this distance of time does not feel itself warmed by it, and lifted up towards heaven, as on the wings of that noble bird, the sovereign of the tenants of the air, who in an early part of it, is made so beautifully emblematical of the love, care, and protection of God for his people.

There is one leading point in the song; that is, the Lord's favour to his people. Yet this is set before us in a rich variety of the strongest and most interesting lights. Not that every part of it can be made minutely and directly applicable to the case of the general church of God, for some things are necessarily confined to the peculiar circumstances of Israel; but the Lord God here speaking as a man, and representing heavenly things by earthly, thus impresses upon our minds the vast extent and minute observation of his love and care, and demeans himself, if I may so speak, by the use of earthly images, to impress us with a deeper sense of them. I do not intend to expound to you all the particular parts of this song.