66 former though not forgotten transgressions, and those probably of ancient date, when he supplicated for himself and his people, "O remember not our old sins." However this be, the penal and lowering visitation from which we now solemnly commemorate our unexpected and undeserved deliverance, even before the sword of the Destroyer has swept away as many from our whole land as perished through David's guilt, in the city of Jerusalem alone, must be acknowledged to have been long and bitterly provoked by many sins-sins which would still cry up to heaven with the voice of Sodom and Gomorrah, and would perhaps draw down on Britain a no less signal vengeance, were there not many prayers of the righteous intermingled with them, for whose sakes our GOD, is and has been entreated for the land. For who shall number amidst us the swearers, the scoffers, the despisers and profaners of the Sabbath-the voluble and vaunting infidels, who proudly, despitefully, and disdainfully speak great swelling words against the people and the ordinances of the Most High-the bondslaves of covetousness, whose soul is in their gold-the unabashed and undisguised vassals of sensual appetite, whose GOD is their belly, and whose glory is their shame -who drink at their feasts till they are besotted and inflamed with wine, | and then seeking out the dark places of iniquity, the haunts of the harlot and the gamester, are scarcely ejected from their earthly hells by the light of the sunbeams which they alike profane and loathe? Still more who can number the formal ceremonious worshippers who flutter all the week in a gay and giddy round of dissipation, and set apart for the service of the Lord's house a shred and fragment of time, grudgingly given, which would be gladly withheld did they not still, from lingering misgivings and apprehensions, deprecate and dread a formal renunciation of their baptismal covenant, already virtually renounced by their willing bondage to the world and to the flesh? Who, I ask, shall number these? And supposing for an instant, (ah! would there were not so wide an interval between the supposition and the fact !)-supposing there were none such, could we look into our families -even we who bear the name of Christians, and therefore profess to depart from iniquity-could we look into our hearts, and say that there is not enough of the world, of the flesh, and sin, harboured therein to draw down upon us the righteous judgment of our GOD? Which of us had the blow fallen upon his own home, had the stroke descended upon his own head could have arraigned the justice of the avenger-could have confronted the commissioned destroyer with the bold appeal, "Thou hast exacted of me more than mine iniquity deserved?" No! brethren, looking even to the purest and the best, we must confess that He hath not dealt with us according to our deserts; he might have torn, but he has healed— he might have smitten, but he hath bound up—he hath revived and raised us up, and we are living in his sight. Oh, then, let the language of the heart be, “The living, the living, HE shall praise thee, as I do this day." We then, like the restored paralytic are now present in the temple, to acknowledge deliverance from the evil which we feared, even as he was present, to acknowledge restoration from the evil which he had experienced. He, though personally as yet he knew not Jesus, thus expressed his full persuasion that the power which had healed him was of GOD; and ought not we to realize the same conviction-we who were universally menaced and partially visited by an evil which proved itself doubly to be the blasting of the breath of God's displeasure—in that, defying all rule or calculation, it blew like the wind where it listed, or rather where he willed,—and that, for the most part, its ravages bade defiance to all human skill. Nay, again and again did those, who could command all the appliances of the healing art, and on whose skilful and seasonable assistance others depended for deliverance become themselves among the the earliest victims! Enough of horrors were displayed in every place over which the arm of the Lord was extended to smite, to indicate what would have been the fearfulness of the spreading desolation, had he not in mercy stayed his hand. The aged full of years, and the child which was just budding into youth, and the youth fast ripening into manhood, were smitten beneath the same roof, almost in the same hour; breathed their last, in agony, in the same apartment, and were buried in the same grave. The son or daughter, impelled by filial piety to attend a suffering parent, inhaled the contagious atmosphere, and preceded the parent to the tomb; male and female, old and young, vigorous and weakly, prepared and unprepared, mown down at one stroke, wrapt hastily in the coarse and pitchy shroud, were huddled together in the indiscriminate equality of death-man went to his long home, but the mourners no longer went about the streets-for in villages where half the population was swept away, and coffins could not be supplied with sufficient rapidity to bury men's dead out of their sight, how could the decencies of Christian interment be observed? And even when they were, again and again it is recorded that the mourner, who had paid the last office to some endeared relative or connection, dropped a hurried tear over the coffin, inhaled death from the atmosphere of the grave, and himself went home to die. Friends parted, though but for a few hours, as if they should never meet again; and even those whose life was in their merchandise, and who for some time had bought and sold, speculated and adventured in the very teeth of death, like the reckless inhabitants of Sodom, fled from the scene of traffic;-Mammon for a few days was ejected even from his strong hold, till the abatement of the disease brought returning confidence, and some, we hope, resumed their accustomed pursuits with new treasure and a new heart, no longer at least engrossed by the gold that perisheth-while to too many alas, it happened according to the true proverb, "The dog hath turned to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed, to her wallowing in the mire." But oh! what a glorious and transporting change would have been witnessed throughout our church and country, had the salutary impression in all instances remained, had all those who were panic-struck by a sense of imminent danger, fled permanently for refuge to the hope set before them in the Gospel-had all, who crowded to our temples on the day of the solemn fast, a day which proved, notwithstanding the frightful prevalence of national depravity, that the Lord had still a people among us— did all these now repair to his courts, willing and desirous to redeem the vows which their souls offered when in trouble-and proving, not only by their lips, but in their lives, that gratitude for mercies received can act as powerfully and as effectually as the terror of judgments deserved. But wherever others may be, we at least are in the temple, and O! that Jesus may find us here! O, that the words which are spoken may come home with power to our hearts | you who are such, should at least consider whether you allow sufficiently for the difference between our position and your own. We know from sad experience what are the bitter and too often unavailing regrets of those who would not, while they might, seek to the great Physician for the healing, the restoration of the souland who are left to make all their preparation for the final and decisive judgment when Death is thundering at the door-who have suffered the spiritual leprosy of Sin, or the paralysis of a covetous, selfish and worldly spirit to gain strength and virulence year after year, and find, at last, however they may lie in the porch that overarches the pool of salvationhowever they may seek in the end to the Minister of Christ, and to the word of GOD-no Angel descends to trouble the water, without which its healing virtue cannot be displayed ;—no influence of the Spirit is granted, without which there can be no change of heart. You know nothing of this, for you neither see not hear it for as the words of Jesus, our great Deliverer, our prevailing Intercessor, our only Advocate with the Father, our only Propitiator for sin. For be sure, brethren, if we have no living interest in the blood of the atoning sacrifice, life prolonged is at best but judgment deferred. As there was no power on earth save that of Jesus which could have restored to pristine health and vigour, this impotent sufferer of eight and thirty years, so to us, there is none other name under heaven, save His, whereby we must be saved, whether the venom of sin has been circulating unchecked in our veins through a long period of criminal and perilous indifference or whether we are still in the morning of life, anticipating many years of carnal enjoyment, and destined, it is at least possible, not to realize a single one. If during the last year, this congregation has been, it would seem, the object of special mercy-if instances of mortality have been very few and far between-if with scarcely an exception, those who tremblingly yourselves-and you lay the flatterobserved the fast are spared joyfullying unction to your soul, that because to celebrate the thanksgiving, who shall tell us what may be the events of another year—who shall unroll the mystic scroll of destiny, and say how many of ourselves may be mingled with their parent dust ere the Festival of the Resurrection, so solemnly kept by many among us, shall again recur? Oh, my brethren, I know that there are some of you-I have too much reason to know it-who shrink with a most perilous and mistaken sensitiveness from the plain truths which are here set before them-who evade and resist the application of them to the uttermost-and who perhaps declaim, in no measured terms, against the too faithful and searching admonitions which will not spare them one jot or tittle of the truth. But all professed ministers of the Gospel do not set before you the terrors of the Lord, there is no reason that any should. But will you really censure and depreciate us, because we would give you the benefit of the fatal experience of those, who have passed away and left no sign? Will you really account us your enemies because we tell you the truth-the truth of which we are doubly assured, inasmuch as we have received it of GOD, and witnessed it among men? Recollect, if at any time we appear to speak too earnestly, too vehemently, with too impassioned a desire, too fervent a longing for your salvation—that we are perhaps fresh from the death-bed and the gravethat we have just witnessed the end of all pefection, while you are exult-him-so that he lay among the living ing in its imagined possession, and confiding in its undisturbed continuance, though it is frail as the flower, and variable as the blast? Forgive us then, bear with us, if we desire to profit rather than to please you-if we prize your welfare beyond your approbation--if, with every legitimate desire to propitiate your regard and good opinion, we cannot purchase either at the price of your souls or our own. Only believe that we are in earnest, that we follow no cunningly devised fable, that we are actuated by simplicity and godly sinceritythat we say what we mean, and mean what we say, when we tell you, once | more, that even the deliverance you now commemorate will avail you nothing in the end, unless it stir you up afresh to dedicate yourselves to Christ. It would be easy for us to blind you to all consciousness of the disease of sin; to heal the wound slightly, and produce the semblance of a cure; but we would rather deliver our souls by declaring in the presence of GOD, and the prospect of the final judgment, that there is ONE thing, and only ONE, which is an effectual remedy for sin-and that is, to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. There is an admonition of terrible import couched in the concluding words of Jesus to the man whom he had restored-and it is one which bears most forcibly upon us all. "Sin no more, lest a worse thing come to thee." What, you may naturally ask, could be worse than a disease, suspending all the functions of the members, and exhausting all the vigour of the frame-attended, it is probable, with frequent or constant suffering, and connected most certainly with the painful consciousness of past misconduct-loathsome and disgusting too, for even his kinsfolk had failed, and his familiar friends had forgotten with all the attributes of death, excepting its happy unconsciousness of suffering-and this not for one, nor two, nor ten years, but for more than half man's allotted period of existence, rarely attained in Judea, of threescore years and ten-what, you ask, can there be worse than this? Yet if this were all; nay, if the same ten times told were multiplied from the very commencement to the close even of man's fourscore years-if labour and sorrow ran parallel with our course from the cradle to the grave, why should the Almighty have purchased our redemption from it at so dear a price? Why should an infinite ransom have been offered to avert a finite ill? Why should the Father of the everlasting age, undertake obedience even to death for a penalty endurable only through a limited time which his own volition could have blotted from the sum total of existence-for he could annihilate existence, though he cannot pardon sin? No, brethren, there is a worse thing, a thing far worse, which may come to those who live unbelieving, and must come to those who die so-a worse thing, which I will not now dilate upon, because this day is a day of joy-and I will at least hope that your hearts will be softened by the consciousness of God's mercies to receive and to retain the impression of his love. But Oh, let us all remember, that an ungrateful return, or even a cold and careless acknowledgement of divine goodness, if this be all, only converts the blessing into a curse-and that no benefit, public, domestic, or personal, of which we are made partakers has produced the proper and profitable effect, till it has led us to exclaim, "What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits unto me? How shall I here glorify the GoD of salvation." But I confidently trust, my beloved | all, with the few exceptions of the utterley godless and depraved, ALL obeyed the call, all turned to the Lord their GOD with mourning and with prayer,-one cry of supplication went up from all the land, and doubtless it found entrance into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth,-if the visitation were not removed, it was ameliorated and abated, so that we may almost apply the comparison here suggested, and say, "All were made whole." But how many now return to give glory to God? How many are as much softened by GOD'S mercies as they were startled by his terrors? How many remember their fears for themselves, for their families, for their dear friends in other parts, for that interruption of the order of society, and that stagnation of commercial intercourse, which would have deprived them of the means of living, even had life been spared? And how many, even of those who do not wholly forget, remember them with a love and gratitude at all proportioned to the extent of the deliverance, and the total absence of every thing in them that might disarm the destroyer or mitigate the blow.-How many? O rather would I ask among ourselves, how many that do not ;-for surely, surely, there can be none here so void of natural affection as not to feel the deliverance for others, however they may be insensible of it for themselves! Surely there is not one parent who will not acknowledge for his children, no children who would not confess for their parent, the unmerited mercy of our GOD-none who love, and are beloved, who will not be thankful, that the sweet and grateful bond of domestic ties was not thus violently torn asunder,-that they were spared the misery of parting with the objects of their love under circumstances of such intense suffering, that there was no power to utter brethren, that we shall not verify on this occasion the humiliating narrative of the appropriate Gospel of this day; that Jesus, who is now and ever present amidst the worshipping assemblies of his people, will not demand concerning us, "Were there not ten cleansed, but where are the nine?" It is an awful consideration, and opens to us whole volumes of fearful anticipation and reflection, that while TEN bodies were cleansed from the hideous and disgusting leprosy, only ONE soul was purified, and that by a special miracle, from the deeper pollution of sin—and that the nine who went heedless and thankless away were of the chosen seed of Abraham, while only the outcast Samaritan returned to give glory to GOD. Now it is evident that during the prevalence of their distress, there was no perceptible difference among these lepers-all laboured under the same malady—all sought the same deliverance-all united in the same petition-and therefore to the extent of mere belief, all realized the same faith,-for how could one who doubted Christ's ability to save, have united in the prayer, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us?" And thus when we were called to humble ourselves before GOD-when the Destroyer was already in the midst of us-when every day brought fresh intelligence of the extension of the disastrous visitation,-when we heard of more victims in every direction succumbing to the pestilence which destroyed even at noon-day-the business of large towns suspended, the dispensing even of justice delayed, the terrified population flying from infected places, where the poor remained to die, but from which the wealthy could not always fly to live, then, while the children trembled for the parent, and the parent for the children, and men's hearts were failing them from fear, then |