your daily bread, how refreshing are these Sabbath hours of quiet and repose. To those who have undergone the toils of a long and fatiguing journey, how sweet is the approach of home. Surely, then, to him who knows the burden of a wounded conscience, the torment of unforgiven sin, there can be no gift in the treasury of heaven so sweet, so comforting, as rest. "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you;""Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid,' were among the latest blessings bestowed by the departing Saviour upon his sorrowing disciples: a peace which flows, not merely from the conviction of his power to forgive sin, but from the sense that he has done so; that being justified freely by his blood, every sin is washed. away, every transgression is already pardoned, blotted for ever from the book of his remembrance, and to appear no more against us. Well may such a consciousness, when grounded on scriptural

authority, work in us that " peace of God which passeth all understanding," that temporary rest on earth, most blessed foretaste of an everlasting rest in heaven. That will be the consummation of the promise; we have now only a single beam of light to cheer us on our way, then will be the full shining of the Sun of Righteousness. "There remaineth, therefore," says the Apostle,

a

rest for the people of God" Earth cannot yield it you, for it does not possess it; its sun has never yet, in all his unwearied journeys, shone upon that region where lasting peace is found. There is not that spot upon the wide world's surface, on which you can set your foot with any hope of its stability, at the dreadful day when all shall slide from beneath your tread, except it be upon the rock of your salvation, and "that rock is Christ." There is not even now, whatever be your station and its advantages, whatever be your present domestic en

joyments, or your anticipation of approaching happiness, however bright, however well founded those hopes may be, believe me, there is not even now one resting place of which you can with certainty declare, Here will I enjoy days and years of tranquillity and repose; here will I find rest during the remainder of my pilgrimage, except it be, with the beloved Apostle, upon the bosom of your Saviour and your God. Hear then, again, my Christian brethren, his own most gracious, most affectionate invitation, and may His Holy Spirit write it upon the tablets of your hearts, enabling you to accept it, and to bring forth daily, more and more, the blessed and certain fruits which flow from it: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

SERMON II.

FORGIVENESS A PRESENT MERCY.

ISAIAH XLIV. 22.

"I HAVE BLOTTED OUT, AS A THICK CLOUD, THY TRANSGRESSIONS, AND, AS A CLOUD, THY SINS: RETURN UNTO ME; FOR I HAVE REDEEMED THEE."

No subject can be of greater importance to the babe in Christ, the young man in Christ, the father in Christ, than that which these words illustrate, "I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins;" more especially when viewed in the remarkable connexion in which they stand to those that follow them, "return unto me; for I have redeemed thee.' May God grant, that our consideration of

them be not without a blessing upon any soul by whom they are this day heard!

We shall first consider the beautiful propriety of the Prophet's simile, "I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins." The comparison is remarkable, but peculiarly just. Our sins may well be likened unto clouds, as to their number. Who can count the clouds which chase each other across the winter sky? And has not one of the holiest men who ever lived, left upon record the humiliating confession, that his sins were not less numerous?" They are more in number, than the hairs of my head."1 Then as to their nature: are not the clouds all exhalations from the land and sea, the earthly portion of the universe; and are not our sins, in like manner, the produce of our corrupt and earthly nature; do they not all ascend out of the soil of the natural heart, in

1 Psalm xl. 15.