going on in ignorance of yourself and of your first and most momentous duties-this is one discovery; you had been living as without God in the world. The other is, that when you attempt to do good, your heart does not follow the dictates of the understanding, but breaks like a deceitful bow-falls short, turns aside, and betrays you.

These are the very things the Bible tells you. Go on, then, in the further study of this wonderful book-it will lay open the secrets of your heart more and more. You cannot now be satisfied without a full acquaintance with the truth of things. You say to those around you, as the Samaritan woman, Come, see a that told me all that ever I did; is not this the Christ? Yes, he is the Christ: the book which reveals this, is the word of God-the religion which proceeds on the knowledge of the human heart, is the true religion. Your general impression of awe and confidence, produced by the perusal of the Bible, is now deepened into some personal conviction of sinfulness. The single part of it which you have taken and verified by your own state and character, gives you an assurance that it is the word of God, more practical and of another kind from that which sprung from the general comparison of the parts of the Revelation with each other, and your discovery of its

unity, harmony, and high end. You have now found out your disease, and are in a way to a cure. You now see how unreasonable was your former state of mind, when you had only an educational prejudice in favour of Christianity, when you cherished doubts, and rested satisfied in ignorance of the Bible and of yourself. You see also the unreasonableness of the conduct of others, who are acting now as you yourself once acted. You see how entirely their aversion from the holy character of God, and the humiliating doctrine of man's apostacy from him, springs from that very depravity which they deny, and accounts to you for their negligence and unbelief. You see, in a word, that this one truth of man's corruption, opens the whole state of the world, of the heart, of the scheme of redemption, of the necessities and the miseries of man, of the ends and importance of Revelation.

But I hasten

III. To offer another direction. PRAY FERVENTLY TO GOD FOR HIS GRACE TO ACCOMPANY YOUR ENDEAVOURS.

Careless and profane people never pray; the proud and thoughtless never pray; the supercilious inquirer never prays. Formerly you never prayed. You may have admitted generally, on the footing of natural conscience, the

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obligation of prayer to God, the Creator and Preserver of all men. You could not help in theory admitting this, especially with the reflex light of Christianity cast about you. But you never prayed. You may have addressed the supreme Being in a form of devotion; but you never prayed. You may have uttered a sigh of anguish, a bitter complaint, an insulated application for some temporal deliverance; but you never prayed—that is, you never besought Almighty God in earnest for spiritual benefits. You never fervently and humbly begged of God, as the Father of mercies, for the blessings of instruction, spiritual strength, the forgiveness of sins, salvation.

But now you are prepared and disposed to this duty. You want to make the trial of the sacred influences of Christianity. You want to get rid of doubt and hesitation, and to feel the obligations of revealed religion. You are struck with the general impression of the Bible. You are penetrated with the view which it presents of your own heart. There is a sympathy now created, or rather beginning to be created, between the truths of Revelation and your state of mind.

Study then, in the next place, what the Bible says on the subject of prayer. Make the prayers found there your own. Turn to the

Book of Psalms, and say from your own heart, Lord, open thou mine eyes, that I may see wondrous things in thy law. Teach me to do thy will, for thou art my God; thy Spirit is good, lead me into the land of uprightness.*

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Open the Prophets. Pray with Isaiah, Let me come and go up to thy mountain, O Lord, to thy house, O God of Jacob; and do thou teach me of thy ways, that I may walk in thy paths. Pray according to the promise in Ezekiel, Give me, O Lord, a new heart, and put a new spirit within me, and take away the stony heart out of my flesh, and give me a heart of flesh.*

Go to the gospels. Read the blessed Saviour's promises made to prayer; especially of the gift of the Holy Spirit-Ask and ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you. For if ye, being evil, know how to give good things to your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven, give HIS HOLY SPIRIT TO THEM THAT ASK HIM. Approach, then, and make your prayer; ask, seek, knock. Pray especially for the Holy Spirit to assist, to illuminate, to renew you; to produce in you all those effects which in your reading of the Bible, you observed were produced in the first Christian converts.

From the gospels, proceed to the Acts of the Apostles; read the inquiries, the prayers of the true penitents. Make those inquiries and those prayers your own. Say with the hearers of St. Peter and the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do? Say with the Philippian jailor, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?2 Fall prostrate before the Almighty with Saul of Tarsus, and say, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?3

Then open the epistles, and pray, as St. Paul does for the Ephesians, That the eyes of your understanding may be enlightened :a or as the same apostle for the Colossians, That you may be filled with the knowledge of God's will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding."

Proceed thus in tracing the spirit of prayer diffused throughout the Bible, and adopt the forms there left for your direction. Prayer is the attitude in which revelation would place you. All its blessings are granted to prayer. Approach God thus, though it be with feebleness, with conscious demerit. You must depend upon his grace in your religious inquiries, as you must depend upon his providence in the natural duties and concerns of life. If you desire to make an experiment of the promises of Christianity, you must do it in the prescribed