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who among you can calculate the riches of the divine treasury, opened up to him who calleth on the Lord in truth,-to him who wrestleth with him, and will not let him go till he hath blessed him? Be not surprised if the blessing come with some sharp accompanying trial. God sees this needful to prevent the abuse of grace itself. Be not surprised, if ye have prevailed in wrestling with the Lord for a blessing, that you halt in some respect to the day your death. Be not surprised, if ye have been caught up into the third heaven in your communion with God, that you receive a thorn in the flesh, not to be removed on your repeated and earnest supplications. Be contented, in these circumstances, with your Lord's assurance, my grace is sufficient for you, my strength shall be made perfect in your weakness." And O forget not any of the Lord's benefits,-especially any of those bestowed in answer to your prayers. How sweet and precious is the answer of prayer, which enlisteth some in aid of faith! In the languor of affection, awake and animate love by the record of blessings received in answer to prayer. In the depths of spiritual distress, imbittering outward afflictions, remember the works and deliverances of his almighty arm, guided by love that is sovereign, and faithfulness that faileth never; and be not dismayed, but still hope in the Lord, the health of your countenance and your God. Set up your Eben-ezer, and look to it often, that you may render unto God the glory due to the

answerer of prayer; set up your Eben-ezer, and point to it in the midst of the social circle, that they too may help you to make God's praise glorious. But who is sufficient for any of these things? No one of himself; and yet every one, the most illiterate, the most limited in intellectual endowments, who is taught of the Spirit of God. The Lord the Spirit is good, and he commendeth his goodness to us, by revealing himself as "the Spirit of grace and supplications." Let us render unto him the honour due to him, in his peculiar office in the covenant of grace; let us continually supplicate his influence as the source of every thing good found in any renewed creature, and this especially, that he may help our infirmities in prayer, that we may know what we should pray for as we ought, and that he may make for us intercessions, with groanings which cannot be uttered.

SERMON XI.

LUKE XVii. 32.-" Remember Lot's wife."

THERE is a time when the cry of a nation's sins ascendeth unto the Lord, when he waits not for the more slow destruction of a people effected by universal depravity of manners, when he sends destruction as a whirlwind, and makes them "an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolation." This time was at hand, in respect to the inhabitants of Judea, when our Lord uttered the words of the text. They had forgotten both "the goodness and the severity of God" towards their nation. They had slain his prophets, they had made his law of none effect by their vain tradition; and, to crown their wickedness, they were despising, rejecting, persecuting, and about to crucify, his own Son. A destruction the most awful was preparing for them. In the prospect of this event, our Lord gives to his followers the instructions necessary to their escape from the impending evils. He forewarns them of the rapid and unexpected approach of the judgment, ver. 24. He guards them against being lulled into security by the peace and prosperity, the mirth and worldly-mindedness, of the

nation. Instead of promising safety, these proclaimed ruin to a country. Such carelessness and avarice, such dissoluteness and hardness of heart, preceded the perdition of the old world, and of the cities of the plain, ver. 26-29 ; and such would precede the just indignation of God, to be poured out on the land of Judea. Having thus prepared his disciples to expect this national punishment, our Lord directs them how to avoid the calamities of it when begun, by immediately abandoning their goods and their companions who would not accompany them, and fleeing without delay to some remote place. And, as example is fitted to make the most deep and lasting impressions on the human mind, Jesus sums up, embodies and enforces his admonitions in the words of the text,-" Remember Lot's wife;"-avoid her sin, that ye may avoid her punishment, in circumstances which are strikingly similar.

Lot was nephew to Abraham, and probably brother to Sarah. He had removed with his uncle, on the call of God, from his native country Chaldea, to the land of Canaan. Increasing prosperity, in course of time, required more room for their flocks and their herds, and obliged them to separate their families. Lot rashly availed himself of the condescension of Abraham, in permitting him to choose the place of his residence; and with the taste and discernment of a young man, fixed on the district near Sodom. This was a great plain, rich in beauty and fertility, and containing five considerable towns, in

habited by a people, idle, luxurious, and proud, through the abused advantages of their situation. At last their crimes became gross and shocking, so shameless and so universal, that five righteous persons could not be found in these five cities. Lot resided in Sodom, with his family, and was daily grieved with the abominations which he witnessed. At length the cry of these abominations pierced the ear of God, and drew down vengeance on the perpetrators. Jehovah appeared to Abraham, acquainted him with his design to destroy the cities of the plain, and, at his intercession, promised the safety of Lot and his family. Angels appeared to Lot also, and, by striking some of the vile inhabitants blind, as a punishment of their lust and bloody intentions, convinced him of their divine commission. They warned him of the desolation at hand, they commanded him and his family to flee to the mountains, without looking behind them, and at last they led them out of the devoted city. Before they had proceeded far, Lot's wife, in the face of the divine prohibition, "looked back," and was immediately turned into a pillar of salt,-a fit warning to the first Christians to flee from the destruction of Jerusalem without turning back,-a warning no less fit for us who "have named the name of Christ ;" who have professedly fled from Sodom-from the world lying in wickedness, daily and hourly exposed to the eternal judgments of God; and who are still in danger of looking back to the region of sensual