not only adore the divine nature, but are in some degree partakers of it; not only "behold in a glass the glory of the Lord, but are changed into the same image from glory to glory."* Their character makes a very distant, it is confessed, but yet a real, approach to the absolute rectitude of the Divine, which they [constantly] study and imitate, [until] they are presented before him unblameable in holiness. In regeneration some traces of the paternal image are impressed; and with that strange, that more than natural affection it becomes them to feel towards such a parent, they become "followers of God, as dear children." If they profess to have fellowship with God, they evince that profession to be no empty boast, by walking in the light as he who is in the light. If they profess to know Christ, to have a sacred intimacy with him, they justify the pretension in some good degree by walking as he also walked, by doing righteousness as he also did.

To feel an attachment to Christians on this account is an unequivocal proof of a love of rectitude, a love of God, an attachment to those great moral properties in which the true beauty of the Divine character consists.

Close with three remarks.

I. The criterion supplied in the text may be inverted. If we do not love Christ, other love will discover itself by the choice of our society. II. It is not only a safe, but a useful criterion suggested in the text, which may be applied to great advantage. We may see the sun through the water when we cannot look upon it in its place in the heavens.

III. It should be our care to improve in this part of the Christian character, to abound therein more and more.

Love is the characteristic of the Christian.

XXXVII.

ON THE DUTY OF INTERCESSION.

1 TIM. ii. 1.—I exhort, therefore, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men.

I. DUTY.

1. The reasons and obligations of prayer arise out of the fundamental principles of religion-the belief that there is a God, and that he is "the rewarder of such as diligently seek him." The duty of intercession, or praying for others, springs from the relation we stand in to our fellow-creatures. As the former is an essential part of piety, so the latter is a branch of benevolence, not less essential. To love our neighbour as ourselves is the fulfilment of the second table of the law. Unless we believe in the efficacy of prayer we have no pretensions to the

character of Christians; but if we are convinced that the prayer of the righteous avails, we have no right to withhold from those we ourselves are bound to love this advantage, especially as it is a benefit which it is always in our power to confer without loss or detriment to ourselves. In almost every other instance, the favour we confer seems at least to come into competition with the claims of self-interest; but in this there is no possible interference or intrusion.

Here only are we able fitly to imitate the Supreme Being, who imparts to all without diminishing his own store. The duty of intercession is also recommended and enforced by this important consideration, that it opens a channel in which the benevolence of every individual may flow. To afford pecuniary relief is the privilege of the rich; to guide the councils of a nation, of the wise; to ensure victory by arms, of the powerful: but the most obscure person may intercede, and by this means promote the welfare of millions, and affect the destiny of

nations.

2. That we are [led] to infer this duty from the general principles of reason and religion. It is implied in the social form of the prayer taught by our Lord, where we are commanded to address God as our Father. It is expressly enjoined by apostolic authority, in the passage now under consideration. It is also a duty exemplified by the practice of the most eminent saints. Abraham interceded for Sodom, Job for his friends, Moses for the people of Israel, Samuel for Saul, &c. Intercession formed a principal branch of the priestly function of the law. Our great High-priest spent some of the most precious moments near the end of his earthly course in interceding with his Father, not only on behalf of his disciples, but of all who should "afterward believe on his name."

The apostle assures us, it is by virtue of his continued intercession in heaven that he is "able to save to the uttermost all that come to God by him;" so that in his hands it is the refuge of the guilty, the hope of the perishing, a mysterious chain fastened to the throne of God, the stay and support of a sinking world.

II. The benefits of intercession; which may be considered in two lights, as they respect ourselves, and as they regard others.

1. As they respect ourselves.

(1.) It will have a happy tendency to increase our benevolence. As the love of God and of man make up the whole of religion, so there is nothing more likely to promote the love of our fellow-creatures than the bearing them in our minds before the throne of Grace. How can we fail to feel concern for the happiness of those for whom we pray? Either our petitions must be full of hypocrisy, or our good wishes to them must be hearty and sincere. To pray for their welfare, and yet be indifferent, would constitute the grossest dissimulation. In venturing to address the Supreme Being in their behalf, we assume the character of advocates. To be indifferent to their welfare is to belie the character and betray our trust. That criminal self-love which is the great reproach of our nature is grown to such a height principally in consequence of our habitual inattention to the situation of others.

We contemplate ourselves and our own circumstances, till we almost forget there are any other beings in the world. When we can be prevailed upon to step out of this narrow circle, and look at the distresses and anxieties which those around us have to encounter, a generous compassion is excited, the tenderness of nature is touched, and our own troubles appear light and inconsiderable. Most of our vices, my brethren, may be traced to a want of reflection. And what is the best remedy for this thoughtlessness and vanity, as far as it respects our duty to others? Intercession.

In solemn intercession with God the misery, the helplessness, and dependence of our fellow-mortals, or rather of our fellow-immortals, rise in view with all their affecting peculiarities; at those moments, when the mind is the most calm, tender, and elevated—at those moments when none but God can enter-when we feel our own nothingness before Him who is all in all. When we have been "spreading before the Lord" the circumstances of an orphan who has no friend, of a widow who has no protector, of an unhappy man who is under the dominion of lusts which are hurrying him fast to eternal destruction; is it possible to rise from our knees without feeling sentiments the most noble, tender, and disinterested; without feeling in some measure what Paul felt when he said, "Who is weak and I am not weak; who is offended and I burn not?" Is it possible to return immediately into ourselves, and to behave with unfeeling insolence, as though the world were made for us; instead of remembering that we are a small part of an immense whole, an inconsiderable member of a vast family?

As we are concerned to employ prayer and intercession for all men, that narrowness of mind which confines our solicitude to a small circle instead of all within our reach, universal good or ill, will be the most effectually promoted or remedied.

If we comply in any tolerable measure with this apostolic injunction, by offering solemn prayer for the happiness of the world and the prosperity of the church, for the conversion of the heathen and the salvation of the whole earth, in proportion as our thoughts diffuse themselves, our hearts will necessarily become enlarged.

(2.) It will be the best antidote against all angry and malignant passions.

:

66

We may consider the benefit of intercession as it respects others. There is a remarkable passage in Ezekiel xiv. 14: Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, saith the Lord God."

From this passage we may infer two things:-First, that there are seasons when even the intercession of the most eminent will not avail; seasons in which it is unalterably determined to inflict punishment. Secondly, we may infer that these are so rare and so extraordinary, that to declare he will not turn away for intercession is the strongest token of his fierce indignation.

(1.) If God delights to hear prayer, it is most reasonable to believe

he will favourably regard intercessory prayer; for then the supplicant is exercising two most important virtues at once,-piety and benevolence. He is then employed in fulfilling the whole law, and makes the nearest approach to the Divine nature.

(2.) Examples of its success;-Abraham, Moses, and Job.

III. General objects of intercession.

1. Our civil governors. We are under the strongest obligations to this, on account of the inestimable benefits involved in good government, which, like the natural health of the body, is indispensably necessary to our happiness, yet is scarcely perceived till it be interrupted. We of this country are under peculiar obligations to this duty.

2. The church, "the mother of us all," from whom we are born, at whose breasts we have been nourished with the "sincere milk of the word." "For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth. And the gentiles shall see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory: and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord shall name."* Let us pray for its extension, for its peace, for its purity, for the accomplishment of all the promises made to it.

3. The distressed of every description have peculiar claims to our prayers. Indigent Christians, who ever appear to be in a peculiar manner the objects of compassion, will share in our petitions to a throne of Grace. To pray for others is the best salve and relief of powerless benevolence. For where can we turn our eyes without seeing persons misled by error and delusion which we wish in vain to arrest, made wretched by vices which we cannot reform, or oppressed with misery it is out of our power to avert? Must it not, in such circumstances, furnish the greatest incitement to go into the presence of that Being to whom it is infinite mercy to heal the maladies of mind and body, and to do "for us, and for all men, above all we can ask or think?" When we have thus commended the case of our distressed fellow-creatures to the Divine notice-when we have thus committed them, as it were, into the arms of our heavenly Father-we feel calm: our compassion grows softer, while it loses its anxiety, and our benevolence, like his, becomes strong and glowing, without solicitude. 4. Our friends and relatives.

Application.

• Isaiah lxii. 1, 2.

XXXVIII.

GOD'S ETERNITY CONSIDERED, IN REFERENCE TO THE SUSPENSION OF HIS PROMISED PURPOSES.

2 PET. iii. 8.—But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.*

THAT spirit of prophecy with which the holy apostles were endowed enabled them to foretel the principal defections from the Christian faith which should distinguish the last days, the papal superstition and infidel impiety.

We have long witnessed the fulfilment of both these predictions: the gross idolatry, cruel edicts, and tyrannical claims of the Church of Rome have been for ages promulgated; and now that superstition appears to be in its dotage, and falling fast into decay, a new progeny has arisen a scoffing, infidel spirit.

They founded their disbelief of Christ's coming to destroy the world, to judge the wicked, and to reward his servants, on the pretended uniformity of the course of nature. No event which bears any resemblance to that which the gospel foretels, they pretend, has ever taken place. In affirming this, the apostle charges them with "wilful ignorance" [of the destruction of the world by water.]

He then proceeds to declare that the heavens, which at present subsist, are reserved for a similar catastrophe, and are doomed to undergo a more signal overthrow. Nor can any argument be deduced against the certain accomplishment of the divine declarations, from the seeming length of the time during which their execution is delayed: since "one day is with God as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."

In attempting to improve these words, we shall,

I. Endeavour to illustrate their import, and establish the truth of the proposition which they contain.

II. Show to what particular uses the truth which they exhibit may be applied.

I. Let us attempt to illustrate the assertion, "One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."

It is necessary, in order to enter into the sense and meaning of the apostle in these words, to consider on what occasion they were introduced.

They are designed as an answer to the objections which irreligious scoffers advance against the certainty of the accomplishment of the divine declarations, founded on its long delay. Impatient and shortsighted mortals are apt to suppose that what is delayed long will never

• Preached at Leicester, Sunday, January 6th, 1811; the first Sunday in the new year.