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Gradual and full of change as the growth of the mind of man from childhood to its full maturity, is the progress of the soul from the narrow views and the limited conceptions of the present state, to the high perfections of the future. The life of this world, it is the constant object of religion to assure us, is but the childhood of our exist ence, the dawn of our immortal being. Children as we are now in knowledge, we see only with a partial and distorted view, those eternal truths which the more expanded intelligence of a pere fected spirit shall discern with a clear and comprehensive glance. And, what is a still more essential part of the comparison, we are children too in our moral, as well as our mental inca pacity; children, in the weakness and fluctuation of our obedience; children, in the scanty meas sure of grace we are enabled to receive; children, in the strictness of that probationary discipline by which we require to be trained up unto the perfect man, that is, "unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."*

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This world then, with all its hopes and its fears, with all its pomps and pageantry, its covetousness and its ambition, sinks into cutter insignificance when contrasted with that greater one on which have been more abundantly lavished

* • Ephesians iv. 13.

A FUTURE WORLD? »

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the wonders of God's creative power ; andall our most favourite objects of present pursun. 11 COIL parison with these matured penerous of the future, seem but as a mass cf querie the heavens are higher that he a prophet," so are God's were ta ways, and his thoughts that

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the greater and nobler purposes for which it was originally framed. While the language of express revelation, not to mention the higher mysteries it has brought down to our comprehension, oraits instrumental value as a probationary discipline of the soul,-derives almost the whole of its esanctions and encouragements from the distinctness with which it points forward to the future, and the cheering prospects which it opens to our view of the better, that is, the heavenly country which we seek. So that, although we live in a world of sin and misery, yet, by the mercy ofs a benevolent God, our prospects are not confined to its narrow and contracted bounds. In the sys2 tems both of nature and of grace, provision is wisely made for advancing and extending our views from earth to heaven,-from time to eter nity. And, though God might have justly required of us a ready and unquestioned obedi ence to his will without the aid of any such addi tional encouragements, yet hath he graciously vouchsafed, in compassion to our infirmities, so to fill this life with notices of the next, that,

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as far as our feeble faculties can discern their meaning,- -we may ever be supplied with ade quate inducements to obedience, stimulants to hope, and antidotes to despair. 203) gowvsH

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sense the prelude, becomes also, in a scertain measure, the type of that which is to come. Great and manifold are the offences and infirmi ties of man, yet, amidst the oft-repeated tale of his miseries and his follies, some messages of God, some tidings of heaven are still to be heard. We have shadows amongst us now of those more substantial blessings which belong to another life; dim and emblematic outlines which can be only filled up and completed hereafter. The perfections of the Most High himself, as illus trated in his works and his dealings with man kind, break forth even now, and exhibit themselves in prominent relief amongst the wrecks and ruins of humanity. The rudiments of a more perfect harmony and order grow up to our view amidst the chaos of vice, and the anarchy of licentious passions which desolate and deform the very surface of society. And in the multitude of spiritual blessings which the gospel affords, the Christian is enabled already to ac quire, even amidst the evils of mortality, not only assistances for the present, and strong anticipa tions of the future, but many and actual foretastes of the higher joys and attainments which are reserved for the "spirits of the just "hereafter.

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Having thus, therefore, endeavoured briefly to explain the nature of the principle established

in the text, it will not, perhaps, be altogether unprofitable to enquire, in the remaining part of this discourse, from what sources, and in what manner we enjoy this knowledge,--partial as it is, and see these visions--dark as they are-of heavenly and eternal things. Reflections of this kind help to remind us how little,—with all God's merciful interpositions on our behalf,—we have yet advanced on our way to that high destiny for which we were originally made. They serve to teach us how much there is yet remaining to do before we can reach the perfection of our immortal nature. They help to raise our ambition from the trifling vanities of the earth to the pursuit of those spiritual attainments before which all sublunary possessions seem worthless and nugatory. They shew us that every thing in this world has only a relative and prospective value, proportioned according to the reference it may bear to the enduring and imperishable world which awaits us. They contribute to give animation to our prayers, and intensity to our hopes; to assert the triumph of the future over the present, of the things of faith over the things of sight. They enlarge the vision of the soul, bringing the distant object of heaven nearer to our view, and assisting us in "reaching forward to the

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