Greeks, or Gentiles of old, believed not in the truths of revelation-the things of God, because they could not comprehend them. And many such are there in the present age of the world. Many are there, resting upon their worldly wisdom alone, or rather upon their superfluity of ignorance and self-conceit, who deride the great truths of the gospel; many are there who believe as much of the Scriptures as they can comprehend; many are there who vainly assert that modern science, notwithstanding the success of one generation in detecting the errors of a preceding generation, has proved the falsehood and impossibility of many events which have been recorded in the sacred word of God. Such as these, whether cotemporaries of the Apostle or ourselves, evidently, though they may deny it, refuse to admit that the intelligence and comprehension of the Spirit of God are far superior to those of man; and the Unitarian of the present day, who professes to believe the Scriptures, mutilates and misinterprets those passages which assert the divinity of Christ, and the mysterious union of the Trinity, because the spirit of man which is in him, does not comprehend the things which God, indeed, hath revealed unto us by his Spirit, which no man knoweth or can know, but which are only known and understood by the Spirit of God. The argument, therefore, of the Apostle, very naturally and very properly resolves itself into this; that the great doctrine of the Redemption hath indeed been revealed unto man by God, who without such reve

lation never could have been made acquainted with its existence; though the mysterious nature, and essence or being of the Deity, who consists of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, three persons in one Godhead, co-equal, co-eternal, and co-instrumental in the work of man's salvation, never has been explained, and consequently never will be known to man as long as he continues in this state of mortality and imperfection. We know not how we were made; by what wonderful process the Almighty brought us into infantine existence, and then, by a gradual though wonderful expansion of those particles of which the diminutive body is composed, advanced it towards a state of mature dimensions: nevertheless we know that we were made. Neither

do we know how the blood of the Son of God, shed upon the cross, can reconcile us to our heavenly Father, whom we have offended, though we fully and implicitly believe that our reconciliation will be thus effected, because we have been undeniably assured of this by the word of God himself..

Such, brethren, is that to which St. Paul alludes when he expresses himself in the following words; "Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought: but we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory."

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The things of God, therefore, cannot be known; their existence, indeed, can be known, since it has been revealed to us, but they themselves cannot be known; they cannot be comprehended nor understood as long as we remain within this mortal tenement. Such knowledge is by far too excellent for us, we cannot attain unto it. Let us not, therefore, aspire to such things as are wisely placed beyond our reach. Let us not dare to ridicule and deny things which we cannot understand. The knowledge which we possess is indeed little, yet is this little abundantly sufficient to supply our necessities. In respect of this little, therefore, let us be faithful. Let us, for the knowledge which God hath imparted to us, endeavour to shew our sincere gratitude, by performing the will of God, and believing in the mediatorial and redeeming influence of Him who has instructed us in it. If we be now faithful in that which is little, we shall hereafter be faithful in that which is much. If, however, we use not this little, such as may be termed the riches of the world, aright, how can we expect that God will hereafter commit unto us the true riches of the kingdom of heaven? If we so dishonour the name and the goodness of God as to disbelieve his promises, because we cannot understand how they are to be performed, how can we expect that God will impart to us more abundant knowledge, by admitting us within the clear and unobstructed light of his kingdom in heaven? How, I say, can we suppose that God will bless us more abundantly with a gift, if a

small proportion of this same gift have been abused by enabling and inducing us to dishonour him? Be assured, brethren, that such an expectation as is here implied, never could be realized. God has made men different from the beasts of the field, and infinitely superior to them in understanding, that they might believe in him, fear him, and love him; and not disbelieve him and his gracious promises in a manner which must be equally incompatible with fear and love. If, therefore, this great gift of knowledge, of the spirit of man which assimilates man to his Creator, and renders him so superior to every other object of the creation, be applied to the dishonour of God, we may be assured that this gift will not hereafter be increased; the light of the world, where indeed we see as "through a glass darkly," will not be replaced by the light of heaven, where we shall see things and objects, "face to face,' of which we now see and know comparatively nothing; rather, brethren, shall we, in such a case, be consigned to the perpetual and impenetrable gloom of ignorance and of death, where "that which is perfect will" never "come," though "that which is" now "in part will" most assuredly "be done away." Let us not then, as many, very many, do who call themselves Christians, abuse that unspeakable gift with which we have been endowed, even the gift of knowledge, by presuming or pretending to disbelieve any portion of that book which is emphatically designated the Bible. If once we reject one portion of it as unworthy of our belief,

because it may be unintelligible to our understanding, we may reject the whole of those parts, and must indeed reject them, which either directly or indirectly point to our redemption by Jesus Christ. Though, therefore, we may not understand these, yet is it our duty implicitly to believe them; to believe, indeed, the Scriptures, the whole Scriptures, and nothing but the Scriptures; to regulate our actions by them; and establish our lives upon them.

The Scriptures therefore, brethren, as the undoubted word of God, are such as you are to believe, and such as you are bound to obey. They consist of various compositions, written at different periods, commencing with the time of Moses, who led the Israelites out of Egypt about fifteen hundred years before Christ, and ending with that of St. John, who wrote his Revelation-the last book in the sacred volume, nearly one hundred years after. The Jews, apart from all the other nations of the world, had possession of the Old Testament, which they carefully preserved, though their manifold sins were recorded in it, and though they frequently relapsed into idolatry in opposition to the explicit scriptural assurance, that "there is one God, and there is none other than He." They, therefore, must have believed the Scriptures to come from God, and their belief was grounded either on the miracles which their different authors performed, or on the fulfilment of prophecies which they uttered. These Scriptures foretold the advent of Christ, whose history has been, agreeably to them, recorded in the New Testament. The Old and New Testa