a wreck; but gallantly, with sails expanded, pennants flying, music sounding, and the shouts of applauding spectators greeting our arrival.

This progressive course of holiness, in which every grace helps to the practice of another, and is helped by it, produces a reduplication of virtues. Every successive step, like that of a racer, brings us nearer to the prize of our high calling or, rather it resembles the river seeking the ocean, widening and deepening as it goes, every tributary stream enlarging its volume. So are we gathering strength as we advance towards the fulness of God. But this progress in holiness contrasts, we may observe, most affectingly with that of sin. The same effect, in an inverse proportion, follows the practice of vices as that of virtues. They are like trees which, having long grown in the soil, enlarge themselves in every direction. You are now, it may be, sinful, worldly, licentious, unbelieving. You cannot remain in that state while life goes on, without degenerating more and more. You are like a ball descending a hill. Its velocity increases as it falls. It is impossible to say to what depths of wickedness you may descend. Could the sinner, while his perceptions are not blunted, nor his moral sense disordered, contemplate the picture of his future self, he would start with horror. The progress of sin is much more rapid than that of holiness. Every day increases the distance between such a

sinner and the advancing saint, until at last he is beheld by the latter in a plight from which he is glad to avert his eye;

"More struck with grief or wonder, who can tell ?"

But blessed is the man in whose breast the seeds of all christian virtues are sown, and who is careful to secure for them the moisture of heavenly influences. The changing aspects of life witness no other change in him than the exhibition of different virtues, or the same virtues in an advanced stage of improvement. All things are made tributary to his growth in goodnessthe sunshine of prosperity, and the clouds of adversity, conspire to effect his improvement. Adverse winds are made to accelerate his voyage no less than favourable breezes. The whole of life, in short, becomes to him a school of virtue, a discipline of goodness. Time, as it rolls along, discloses new beauties in his character, and lays accumulated treasure at his feet. His life even now shows something of the glories of that which is to come; as we see in the glassy lake before us the images of the sylvan beauties on the opposite bank.

O Spirit of Grace! descend and pervade our bosoms with thy purifying influence! Bid every thing that is offensive to thine own immaculate purity, retire into the shade, and wither and die: call up every virtue in its place, that our graces may appear in harmonious assemblage, and in a

completed circle. Sanctify us wholly, in spirit, soul, and body, and preserve us blameless, from turning aside or stopping short, unto the coming of our Lord and Saviour, to terminate the period of our probation, and to set upon our renewed nature the seal of perfection and immortality!

"Now unto him that is able to keep us from falling, and to present us faultless, before the presence of his glory, with exceeding joy;—to the only wise God, our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever."— Amen.

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DISCOURSE VII.

THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT.

"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God."-Rom. 8, 16.

THE account of the divine method of our salvation, which is given us in this chapter, is here brought to a point, in the experience of those by whom it is consciously enjoyed. They found the law of God too weak to justify them, through the inability of their flesh to perform its injunctions, and atone for past deficiencies. They were left by it, therefore, under condemnation, and unable to extricate themselves out of their perilous condition. But they discovered that God, in the exuberance of his mercy, had contrived a way for the escape of sinners shut up in this hopeless condition; and they gladly availed themselves of

it. By the atonement of his Son's death, and the renewing grace of his Holy Spirit, they were brought, through faith, into his favour, and placed under a restorative process for the re-possession of the image of God, in which man had been created. Their walk thenceforth was, not after the flesh, but after the spirit: seeking "to be filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God."

Such, we are here and elsewhere informed, are brought into a relation to the Almighty the most endearing, that of children; and cherish the emotions and confidence towards him of children to a beloved and venerated parent. They have a filial disposition, recognizing and claiming this divine relationship; which claim is corroborated by the Spirit of grace, sent into their hearts for that purpose. "The Spirit itself," says the Apostle, "beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God."

It is of this witnessing or testifying office of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers, that we have now to speak, being guided in our remarks by the information concerning it contained in the sacred scriptures, and explained and illustrated in the recorded experience of eminent christians in different ages.

I. But the relation itself, to which the testimony is thus borne, must first be considered.

Let us glance at what is here said concerning

Y