first reduces them to use a paultry, improbable, self-destroying fiction, to invalidate the evidence of the fact, which sober enquirers have ever considered as constituting, through their over-abundant anxiety and zeal, one of its strongest pillars. Finding they were not able to discredit it, finding it daily gained ground with the people, and grieved at the progress and success of a doctrine which they hated, they turn loose their fury upon the harmless propagators of it. Can there be a more amazing or more affecting picture of the enmity of the human heart against God? and did we not know by experience many woful instances of the same kind, this were perhaps the most wonderful thing in the whole gospel history-that men, without any provocation, without the prospect of interest, alarmed by no danger, attacked by no violence, on the contrary, allured by the most attractive charms of goodness, solicited by all the arguments of disinterested benevolence and love, and overpowered by all the weight of evidence, should vilify and -oppose the character and doctrine of Jesus Christ, this is such unmixed, unaccountable, disinterested malignity, as must sufficiently evince the corruption of the heart, were the knowledge of it conveyed through no other channel.

But, blessed be God, we can contrast these with as wonderful effects of an opposite kind, namely, those which in every age have been produced in the hearts and consciences of them that believe in a risen Saviour. While some retained their prejudices, others deposited theirs in the tomb where the Lord lay. By Peter's preaching this doctrine at the feast of Pentecost immediately after the resurrection, in one day there were added to the disciples and to the Lord three thousand souls; by and by we find them increased to five thousand-since that time, myriads in every age have, by the same means, been brought to "the knowledge and love of the truth "as it is in Jesus" and when "the general as"sembly and church of the first-born" shall be completed, it shall be "a great multitude, which "no man can number, of all nations, and kindreds, "and people, and tongues." I would retire within these walls, and look for the same glorious effects in many blessed instances. Christian communicant, believest thou that Jesus is risen? I know that thou believest, and that thou art ready, in whatever manner providence calls upon thee, to seal that faith-at the Lord's table to-day, on the scaffold or at the stake to-morrow, if it be thy Master's will. All praise be to our exalted head, that while so many slight his gos

pel, there is found such a goodly number who are not ashamed of it, who glory in it, and who are in some measure conformed to it.

And now may the Spirit of him who raised up Christ from the dead, give us to be filled with peace and joy in believing, and make this holy ordinance spirit and life to our souls—and grant that henceforth "bearing about in the body "the dying of the Lord Jesus, the life also "of Christ may be made manifest in us. And now "unto him who is the faithful witness, and the "first begotten of the dead, and the prince of "the kings of the earth, unto him that loved us " and washed us from our sins in his own blood, "and hath made us kings and priests unto God " and his Father; to him be glory and dominion "for ever and ever. Amen *"

* Rev. i. 5, 6.

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SERMON XII.

LUKE Xxiv. 30, 31.

And it came to pass, as he sat at meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them.

And their eyes were opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of their sight.

FOR A COMMUNION SABBATH.

CHRIST WITH THE DISCIPLES AT EMMAUS.

THESE words carry us back to the evening of

that ever memorable day, whose dawning beheld the Lord of life triumphantly burst asunder the bars of the grave-and they contain the conclusion of a very affecting interview between the risen Saviour and two of his disciples. The matter was this: On the same day that Christ arose from the dead, these two disciples, who appear no where in the gospel history but on this occasion, ignorant of the great event which had taken place, at least doubting the truth of it, retire betimes from Jerusalem, which, besides the usual bustle and confusion of great.

cities, was at that time filled with the noise of the recent interesting transactions, that in the retirement and silence of the country they might enjoy the benefit of contemplation, and converse one with another-probably to withdraw themselves from the insults to which their attachment to the crucified Jesus exposed them in the city. They bend their course toward Emmaus, a small village at the distance of about eight miles from the capital, and upon the road their conversation turns, how could it do otherwise? upon the things which had so lately happened, and in which they were so deeply concerned-their fears preponderate, and their countenances assume a correspondent sadness. In the mean time Jesus himself, now clothed with a spiritual body, which is no more subject to the laws of matter, and time, and space, approaches to them in the form of a stranger, joins their company, and observing the sorrow which was visible in their looks, kindly enquires into the cause of it From their lips he hears a repetition of the sad tale of his own sufferings and their despondency. This leads him, still in the character of a stranger, to open up to them the truth of God in scripture concerning himself, and to evince the necessity of Christ's sufferings, and the glory which should follow, and from thence to reprove their folly and