able to Him. The offering of CHR great expression of praise which fills al offerings with Divine harmony.

And surely it is when we realize th CHRIST as setting forth the praise of we learn the blessedness of sacrifice-t of abiding in conscious subjection to King. Life is worth living when we the world-consumed by the love Let us so feed upon CHRIST in our he when we draw near to His holy altar, of His divine love may indeed kindle after His own likeness.

It is a mockery to set forth the deat as the worthy praise of GOD, unless w to be offered in union with Him. therefore, be the worldly difficulty b faith is tried, let us seek for the adorable sacrifice whereon we have forth within our hearts, and enabl particular to be a pure and accepta setting forth the praise of Him Wh serve. Let us feed at GOD's holy alta prayer that the Divine love may kin frame, so as to perform whatever ad GOD may require of us. We should

buffeting of the world—in the pains of sickness— aye, even in the sterner assaults of Satan, if we could realize every such particular of life as an opportunity for setting forth GOD's praise in the strength of the sacrifice of the death of CHRIST. So may we learn with the Apostle to say "Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but CHRIST liveth in me."* Let each one of us say, Blessed be Thy Name, O LORD, Who makest every sorrow to be a means of glory in that Thou callest me, a sinner, to offer up my sorrow as an acceptable sacrifice unto Thyself in the fellowship of Thine Only-begotten SON.

Gal. ii. 20.

SACRIFICE, AN ACT OF THANKSGIVING. Preached at S. Thomas, M. in Oxford, 4th Sunday in Lent, 1860.

PSALM CXvi., 15.

"I will offer to Thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the Name of the LORD."

THE duty of sacrifice is incumbent upon us,

not merely in order to set forth the general expressions of that praise and adoration which belongs to GOD, but also for the more particular expression of thanksgiving because of His special mercies. We are too apt to regard the providential interpositions of divine love, as if they were mere matters of course. Our whole lives are due to GOD, and if they were lives of unbroken sorrow, it would be our duty still to worship Him. The homage of the creature is due to GOD. It is due, and it is a debt which cannot be withheld. All must pay it sooner or later, willingly or unwillingly, in glory or in shame. Yes! it is

SACRIFICE, AN ACT OF THANKSGIVING

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even exacted from "those who are under the earth."* For a while we can choose whether or no we will praise the LORD, but when the mysteries of the hidden world are unfolded, the difference will be apparent between those who have realized the end of their creation, and those who have come short of it. In the one case there will be a preparedness of the trained will, which will make the continuous oblation of praise to be the perfection of blessedness; in the other case, the very punishment of the damned will consist, as we may well believe, in the very fact of having no longer an escape from that work of adoration, in which on earth they were unwilling to join. We must worship GOD as our Creator, by reason of His dominion, irrespective of the consideration of those qualities by which we are able to apprehend Him. GOD however has not chosen that we should yield Him merely a cold and slavish honor; He manifests Himself to us in various attributes, calculated to elicit corresponding acts of devotion. His goodness awakens our thanksgiving; his power, ever ready to execute the designs of His goodness, invites us to prayer. His justice, which claims

* Phil. ii., 10,

a return correspondent to His goodness, and exacts it with the irresistible arm of His power, makes the soul to tremble with that sense of sin, which must shake it to destruction, unless the goodness of GOD had operated also in wisdom, to provide for the penitent, a means of propitiation. Along with our general worship of GOD, there must, therefore, be one or other of these qualifying acts, thanksgiving, prayer and penitence: the two latter belong to the dispensations of fallen man. Thanksgiving is a duty, as eternal as the bounty of GOD. When GOD ceases to be beneficent, then let His creatures cease to give Him thanks.

We are, for the most part, too prone to merge this special duty of thanksgiving in the more elementary idea of worship. Worship, however, is the mere acknowledgment of power. Thanksgiving is an offering of love: the one belongs to those who know not what they worship; the other bespeaks, if nothing more, at least an appreciation of personal fatherly love. The abstract sense of a power controlling nature, fills the mind with awe, and the heart makes an acknowledgment which it cannot help of the majesty of the Supreme Being. But oh! we are too apt, even in the full light of the Christian dispensations, to rest in such