hard, and a penitence which esteems no judgment severe; a gratitude which offers praise even in adversity; a holy trust unbroken by protracted suffering, and a hope triumphant over death. In one word, it enjoins, that, loving and confiding in Jesus Christ, we make his spotless character, his heavenly life, the model of our own. Such is the sublimity of character which the Gospel demands, and such the end to which our preaching should ever be directed.

I have dwelt on this end of preaching, because it is too often forgotten, and because a stronger conviction of it will give new force and elevation to our instructions. We need to feel more deeply, that we are intrusted with a religion which is designed to ennoble human nature; which recognises in man the capacities of all that is good, great, and excellent; and which offers every encouragement and aid to the pursuit of perfection. The Christian minister should often recollect, that man, though propense to evil, has yet powers and faculties which may be exalted and refined to angelic glory; that he is called by the Gospel to prepare for the community of angels; that he is formed for unlimited progress in intellectual and moral excellence and felicity. He should often recollect, that in Jesus Christ our nature has been intimately united with the divine, and that in Jesus it is already enthroned in heavFamiliarized to these generous conceptions, the Christian preacher, whilst he faithfully unfolds to men their guilt and danger, should also unfold their capacities of greatness; should reveal the splendor of that destiny to which they are called by Christ; should labor to awaken within them aspirations after a nobler character and a higher existence, and to inflame them

en.

with the love of all the graces and virtues with which Jesus came to enrich and adorn the human soul. In this way he will prove that he understands the true and great design of the Gospel and the ministry, which is nothing less than the perfection of the human char

acter.

May I be permitted to say, that perhaps one of the greatest defects in our preaching, is, that it is not suf ficiently directed to ennoble and elevate the minds of men. It does not breathe a sufficiently generous spirit. It appeals too constantly to the lowest principle of human nature; I mean the principle of fear, which under judicious excitement is indeed of great and undoubted use, but which, as every parent knows, when habitually awakened, is always found to debase the mind, to break the spirit, to give tameness to the character, and to chill the best affections. Perhaps one cause of the limited influence of Christianity, is, that, as it is too often exhibited, it seems adapted to form an abject, servile character, rather than to raise its disciples to true greatness and dignity. Perhaps, were Christianity more habitually regarded as a system, whose great design it is to infuse honorable sentiments, magnanimity, energy, an ingenuous love of God, a superiority to the senses, a spirit of self-sacrifice, a virtue akin to that of heaven, 'ts reception would be more cordial, and its influence more extensive, more happy, more accordant with its great end, the perfection of human nature.

III. Having thus considered the end of Christian preaching, I now come to offer, in the third place, a few remarks on the best method of accomplishing it; and here I find myself obliged to omit a great variety

of topics, and can only offer one or two of principal importance. That the Gospel may attain its end, may exert the most powerful and ennobling influence on the human character, it must be addressed at once to the understanding and to the heart. It must be so preached as to be firmly believed and deeply felt. To secure to Christianity this firm belief, I have only time to observe, that it should be preached in a rational manner. By this I mean, that a Christian minister should beware of offering interpretations of Scripture, which are repugnant to any clear discoveries of reason or dictates of conscience. This admonition is founded upon the very obvious principle, that a revelation from God must be adapted to the rational and moral nature which he has conferred on man; that God can never contradict in his Word what he has himself written on the human heart, or teaches in his works and providence. Every man who reads the Bible knows, that, like other books, it has many passages which admit a variety of interpretations. Human language does not admit entire precision. It has often been observed by philosophers, that the most familiar sentences owe their perspicuity, not so much to the definiteness of the language, as to an almost incredible activity of the mind, which selects from a variety of meanings that which each word demands, and assigns such limits to every phrase as the intention of the speaker, his character and situation, require. In addition to this source of obscurity, to which all writings are exposed, we must remember that the Scriptures were written in a distant age, in a foreign language, by men who were unaccustomed to the systematic arrangements of modern times, and who, although inspired, were left to communicate their thoughts

in the style most natural or habitual. Can we wonder, then, that they admit a variety of interpretations? Now, we owe it to a book, which records, as we believe, revelations from Heaven, and which is plainly designed for the moral improvement of the race, to favor those explications of obscure passages, which are seen to harmonize with the moral attributes of God, and with the acknowledged teachings of nature and conscience. All those interpretations of the Gospel, which strike the mind at once as inconsistent with a righteous government of the universe, which require of man what is disproportioned to his nature, or which shock any clear conviction which our experience has furnished, cannot be viewed with too jealous an eye by him, who, revering Christianity, desires to secure to it an intelligent belief.

It is in vain to say, that the first and most obvious meaning of Scripture is always to be followed, no matter where it leads. I answer, that the first and most obvious meaning of a passage, written in a foreign language, and in remote antiquity, is very often false, and such as farther inquiry compels us to abandon. I answer, too, that all sects of Christians agree, and are forced to agree, in frequently forsaking the literal sense, on account of its incongruity with acknowledged truth. There is, in fact, no book in the world, which requires us more frequently to restrain unlimited expressions, to qualify the letter by the spirit, and to seek the meaning in the state and customs of the writer and of his age, than the New Testament. No book is written in a more popular, figurative, and animated style, the very style which requires the most constant exercise of judgment in the reader. The Scriptures are not a frigid digest of Christianity, as if this religion were a mere code of civil laws.

They give us the Gospel warm from the hearts of .ts preachers. The language is not that of logicians, not the language of retired and inanimate speculation, but of affection, of zeal, of men who burned to convey deep and vivid impressions of the truth. In understanding such writers, moral feeling is often a better guide than a servile adherence to the literal and most obvious meaning of every word and phrase. It may be said of the New as well as the Old Testament, that sometimes the letter killeth whilst the spirit giveth life. Almost any system may be built on the New Testament by a commentator, who, forgetting the general scope of Christianity and the lessons of nature and experience, shall impose on every passage the literal signification which is first offered to the mind. The Christian minister should avail himself, in his exposition of the Divine Word, of the aids of learning and criticism, and also of the aids of reason and conscience. Those interpretations of difficult passages, which approve themselves to his clear and established conceptions of rectitude, and to his devout and benevolent affections, he should regard with a favorable eye; whilst those of an opposite character should be regarded with great distrust.

I have said, that this rational method of preaching Christianity is important, if we would secure a firm belief to Christianity. Some men may indeed be reconciled to an unreasonable religion; and terror, that passion which more than any other unsettles the intellect, may silence every objection to the most contradictory and degrading principles. But in general the understanding and conscience cannot be entirely subdued. They resist the violence which is done them. A lurking in credulity mingles with the attempt to believe what con