speculative delusions. But being of God, their consistency establishes our faith. Christ being the Son of God became man, to atone for man's sin, and to save man from endless ruin, to which the Scriptures bear unanimous testimony which cannot be denied. This, then, is our chart, by this we steer our course, by this we must form our creed.

2. The Bereans were intent in their enquiry. "They searched the Scriptures!" It was not a mere cursory glance, they turned leaf after leaf, scanned page after page, examined line after line, weighed word after word. Nothing necessary for enquiry escaped their notice. The prophecies respecting the birth, life, work, sufferings, death, resurrection, and ascension of the expected Messiah were carefully entered into, and, comparing them with the history of Paul's Christ, they found a perfect correspondence. It is the lack of this diligent search that causes all the scepticisms and infidelity which exists in the world. A superficial reading of Scripture is like skimming the surface of the ocean to seek for the pearls. You may thus swim for ages and find nothing but water, but if you dive into the depth you will be rewarded for the effort.

3. The Bereans persevered in their search. "They searched the Scriptures daily." To them the subject involved too serious consequences to come to a hasty conclusion. Day after day with untiring patience they plied themselves to the task. The result was so satisfactory that we are told in the succeeding verse that "therefore many of them believed; also of honourable women which were Greeks, and of men, not a few." We may not find what we seek at once, but we are commanded to persevere and faint not. This holds good in enquiry, it holds good in prayer, it holds good in expecting the fulfilment of promises, it holds good in the exercise of all Christian graces. Success is certain if we persevere. It is worthy of trial, not only in ascertaining the reality of what we profess, but also in possessing a personal interest in the benefits which are guaranteed to those who believe. Let us, therefore, imitate the example of those noble Bereans, and search until we find, seek until we receive, knock until it be opened unto us.

194

The Twelfth Sunday after Trinity.

EVENING SERVICE.- First Lesson: 2 Kings xviii.

Verse 32.-" Until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of oil olive and of honey, that ye may live, and not die: and hearken not unto Hezekiah, when he persuadeth you, saying, The Lord will deliver us."

NATIONS as well as individuals are raised up by the Almighty for especial purposes. Some are raised up for the purposes of mercy, others for the purpose of judgment. Some to bless the world, others to punish the world. Those nations seem to be endowed with superior power during the period of their mission, and when that mission is accomplished the power is withdrawn and transferred to other hands. This we find to be the case with the Egyptians, with the Assyrians, with the Persians, with the Greeks, and with the Romans. Each nation had its day of supreme rule; during that day it accomplished ends which no other nation was in a position to accomplish; but the work having been done it sunk into insignificance and ruin. Happy is that nation which has been raised up as the honourable instrument of good, destined to advance the glory of God, to further the extension of the Church, and to promote the best interests of man. Such, we trust, is England in the present day; being invested with unparalleled power, not for the aggrandisement of her own Sovereign and people, but for the honour of Him who holds the reins of government in His own hands. We believe that as long as England continues to defend the truth and discountenance error, to exalt virtue, and to subjugate vice, to disseminate the gospel, and dissipate heathenism, she will retain her pre-eminence amongst

the nations; but as soon as she will manifest an indifference to those great objects, her sun will set, and like her predecessors she also shall fall into decay.

The Assyrians at the time when the circumstances recorded in this and the adjoining chapters occurred, were evidently in great power; but they were stewards unworthy of the trust. They abused the power by pampering their own pride. They were allowed to conquer and enslave the ten tribes of Israel because they had forsaken the God of their fathers, and sunk into idolatry and sin. Encouraged by success the Assyrians invaded Judah, positively boasting that they would take the people into captivity, and reduce their city to ashes. The insulting and blasphemous language of Rabshakeh is an evidence of the haughty and vile disposition of the nation. The impudent blasphemy of this man's speech is without parallel; he not only attempted to excite the Jews to sedition and revolt, but also defied the God in whom Hezekiah trusted. The King of Judah treated this speech as he ought: it was not properly directed against him, but against the Lord; therefore he referred the matter to God himself, who was able to defend His own cause, and who in proof of the power of His indignation punished that blasphemy in the most signal manner. The text is a part of the hireling's speech which was well calculated to stir up a seditious spirit, trying to impress the people with the vanity of listening to the persuasions of their king to trust in the Lord, and to induce them to surrender to him with the promise that they should be well rewarded by being placed to dwell in a country as rich and fertile as their own. "Until I come and take you away to a land like your own land," &c.

There are two useful Christian morals to be deduced from this passage. First, that there are always seducers like Rabshakeh to dissuade people from trusting in the Lord. Secondly, that those seducers always back up their dissuasions by plausible promises. May God's Spirit enlighten our mind to see the fallacy of these seductions.

I. There are always seducers like Rabshakeh to dissuade people from trusting in the Lord.

1. We may regard the devil as the chief agent in those dissuasions. He was a seducer from the beginning, and always will be as long as man will be in a state of sinful corruption to present fuel to feed the flame. We cannot tell in what manner an evil spirit can act upon mind, but we know that as one mind possesses power to operate upon another, so an invisible spirit can influence spirit. It may be by tacit suggestions, so that thoughts unaccountably arise without any apparent outward inducement. Most generally external means are employed by way of temptation. Satan understands well the peculiar disposition of every mind, he suits the temptation to the disposition, thus influencing every person by "the sin which doth so easily beset" him. The temptation is first presented, then the craving is excited, until every responsibility is discarded, every tendency to good is crushed, every obligation is ejected, every thought of God is banished from the mind. In referring to Scripture we find that the devil is a "spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience"that his wiles are sagacious-that his power is great to deceive-and that he goeth about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. His power is employed to encourage the evil and to destroy the good. The desire to do what is right, to trust in God, and to receive the Saviour, he attempts to crush in the bud. His language is in effect, "Hearken not unto Hezekiah, when he persuadeth you, saying, The Lord will deliver us."

2. Infidelity and its votaries dissuade people from trusting in the Lord. We are told by some that God is a myth, that religion is a delusion, that the world to come is a phantom, that heaven is a creation of disordered imagination, that hell is a bugbear to frighten silly people, that there is no reality except in the present, that man lives by chance and dies by fatality, that he is intended only for the gratification of his senses, and that he should enjoy all the pleasures he can

obtain during the term of his existence, for there is no hereafter of either pleasure or pain.

"Live whilst you live, the Epicure will say,

And drink the pleasures of the passing day."

And what is this infidelity which is so dishonourable to God and so degrading to man? It is a tissue of gross inconsistencies that corrupt the mind and vitiate the practice. The plea of reason is advanced to support the soul-destroying system. Are you an infidel? Pause and think again. Reason! that which is the glory of our race, that which constitutes our birthright as moral agents, that which exalts man to the highest pinnacle in God's creation of mortals, to be prostituted and abused for such an infamous end! Impossible. Is it consistent with reason that a house should be built without a builder, that machinery should be constructed without an inventor, that a steam engine should work without a guiding hand? Is it consistent with reason that the physical world should observe the regularity of clockwork in the revolutions of bodies, and the succession of seasons without an intelligent conductor? Is it consistent with reason that man's body should take twenty years to grow into maturity merely for the existence of "threescore years and ten," then to fall into endless ruin? Is it consistent with reason that a mind capable of grasping creation, making every element subservient to its own will, measuring accurately the dimensions of a star and the distance of a planet, finding its way to the antipodes without a single landmark, digging into the bowels of the earth to find fossils which supply it with volumes of ancient history that have been consigned for centuries to the shelves of subterranean libraries-being able to predict the future from comparison with the past, and after all that mind to be annihilated at death without any further consciousness? Oh! brethren, let not such a senseless system rob you of your birthright, making you to die like brutes after living like men for a few years upon earth, casting you into the midnight of eternal nothingness after enjoying