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unconcerned about it? If such blessedness as I have described awaits the children of God, let me assure you that a corresponding wretchedness will be the lot of those among you who are of your father the devil. Those among you who from time to time have heard the invitation of God, but have treated it lightly, I would address: "Behold what manner of wrath the Almighty will lay upon you for having neglected his great salvation."

And those among you who have embraced his salvation, I would most earnestly exhort to a contemplation of the marvellous love of God. Consider, beloved, what ye are called; not the servants, but the sons of God. To you belongs "the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." It does not, indeed, yet appear what ye shall be; but know of a truth, when Christ shall appear, ye shall be like him. Ye shall then awake up in his likeness. Would to God that we possessed more of his image here below, that we possessed more of his spirit, his purity, and holiness, and that we walked even as he walked. Indeed, let me assure you, that in proportion as you possess this realizing faith, this substantial hope, ye will become purified even as he is pure. The purifying nature of this blessed hope increases in proportion as it is lively. If this hope be not as "an anchor which entereth in within the rail, whither our forerunner Jesus is for us entered," it

will never be sufficient to enable you to withstand the waves of this troublesome world, which continually agitate your unstable bark. Without this anchor of the soul, you will be perpetually buffeted with every wind and tempest which is agitating the ocean of life on which you are sailing to the haven where you hope to arrive. Without this hope you can never become like the pure and holy Jesus, and be made meet for the inheritance of the saints. Let me then exhort you to cultivate this hope, to contemplate this great love of the Almighty, in making you the sons of God. May Almighty God draw off your attention from the vanities and baubles of the world, which will afford but a temporary gratification, and direct your souls to the contemplation of this great love of God for Christ's sake!

SERMON XII.

EXOD. XXXIV. 35.

And the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses' face shone: and Moses put the veil upon his face again, until he went in to speak with him.

ALL the circumstances attending the giving of the law to the children of Israel, were calculated to impress the minds of the Jews with a sense of the majesty of God, and the holiness, dignity, importance, and authenticity of the commandments which Moses gave to Israel. We learn the awful majesty of God by the manner in which he bowed the heavens, and came down, and descended upon mount Sinai. We read in chapter xix., 18th verse, "that Mount Sinai was altogether in a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in a fire; and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly." We, at the same time, learn how far man had departed from God by transgression; and what an infinite distance man as a transgressor is from his Creator.

We here see the awful consequence of sin, which has caused a separation between the Creator and the creature, as wide as the east is from the west. We learn this from the account given by Moses of the delivery of the law, when the Lord charged Moses, saying, "Take heed to yourselves that ye go not up into the mount, or touch the border of it; whosoever toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death there shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned or shot through; whether it be man or beast it shall not live."

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The perverseness and wickedness of the human heart are farther shewn by the fact, that after all the mercies of God to the Jews, after their deliverance from Egypt, the destruction of their enemies, the miraculous sweetness of the waters of Mara, the raining of manna, the defeat of Amalek, and this stupendous and awful visitation of the Almighty; yet after all this, my brethren, we learn that, when the Israelites found that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, "Up, make us gods which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him."

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We likewise learn from my text, the honour which Almighty God puts upon his servants. serve in what an especial manner Moses was ho

noured by the Almighty. He was allowed not only to touch, but to ascend the mount, and to have the most intimate communion with God. We read that the Lord talked with Moses face to face, while Israel was allowed only to worship afar off. In chapter xxiv. 2d verse, we read, "Moses alone shall come near the Lord; they shall not come nigh, neither shall the people go up with him.” Consider also how Abraham, and all the patriarchs as well as Job, Daniel, and others, were in an especial manner honoured by God; so it is even now that the Almighty of his infinite mercy and free love, honours some individuals with an especial measure of grace, and more secret communion and intercourse with him.

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But is this all which can be learnt from my text? is nothing else to be deduced from it? St. Paul in 2 Cor. iii. from 7-18 verses, makes the following comment upon the passage before us: "If the ministration of death written and engraven in stones was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance, which glory was to be done away; how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious? for if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory; for even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by reason of the glory that excelleth

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