nay, infinitely more more even from the fact that he knows that it will be transient; but, besides and beyond this, to him it presents a deeper loveliness; he knows the laws of light, and the laws of the human soul which gave it being. He has linked it with the laws of the universe, and with the invisible mind of God; and it brings to him a thrill of awe, and the sense of a mysterious, nameless beauty, of which the child did not conceive. It is illusion still; but it has fulfilled the promise. In the realm of spirit, in the temple of the soul, it is the same. All is illusion; "but we look for a city which hath foundations;" and in this the promise is fulfilled.

And such was Canaan to the Israelites. To some, doubtless, it was delusion. They expected to find their reward in a land of milk and honey. They were bitterly disappointed, and expressed their disappointment loudly enough in their murmurs against Moses, and their rebellion against his successors. But, to others, as to Abraham, Canaan was the bright illusion which never deceived, but forever shone before as the type of something more real. And even taking the promise literally, though they dwelt in tents, and could not call a foot of land their own, was not its beauty theirs? Were not its trellised vines, and glorious pastures, and rich olive-fields, ministers to the enjoyment of those who had all in God, though its milk, and oil, and honey, could not be enjoyed with exclusiveness of appropriation? Yet over and above and beyond this, there was a more blessed fulfilment of the promise: there was a city which had founda tions built and made by God toward which the anticipation of this Canaan was leading them. The

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Kingdom of God was forming in their souls, forever disappointing them by the unreal, and teaching them what is spiritual, and belongs to mind and character, alone can be eternal. We will illustrate this principle from the common walks of life. The principle is, that the reward we get is not the reward for which we worked, but a different one-deeper and more perma nent. The merchant labors all his life, and the hope which leads him on is perhaps wealth. Well, at sixty years of age he attains wealth;-is that the reward of sixty years of toil? Ten years of enjoyment, when the senses can enjoy no longer, a country-seat, splendid plate, a noble establishment? O, no! a reward deeper than he dreamed of. Habits of perseverance, a character trained by industry- that is his reward. He was carried on from year to year by, if he were wise, illusion; if he were unwise, delusion; but he reaped a more enduring substance in himself.

Take another instance: the public man, warrior, or statesman, who has served his country, and complains at last, in bitter disappointment, that his country has not fulfilled his expectations in rewarding him, that is, it has not given him titles, honors, wealth. But titles, honors, wealth-are these the rewards of welldoing? can they reward it? would it be well-doing if they could? To be such a man, to have the power of doing such deeds, what could be added to that reward by having? This same apparent contradiction, which was found in Judaism, subsists too in Christianity. We will state it in the words of an apostle: "Godliness is profitable for all things; having the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come." Now for the fulfilment: "If in this life only we have

hope in Christ, then are we of all men most miserable.' Godliness is profitable; but its profit, it appears, consists in finding that all is loss; yet in this way you teach your son. You will tell him that if he will be good all men will love him. You say that "Honesty is the best policy," yet in your heart of hearts you know that you are leading him on by a delusion Christ was good. Was He loved by all? In propor tion as he, your son, is like Christ, he will be loved, not by the many, but by the few. Honesty is not the best policy; the commonplace honesty of the market-place may be, the vulgar honesty which goes no further than paying debts accurately; but that transparent Christian honesty of a life which in every act is bearing witness to the truth, that is not the way to get on in life, the reward of such a life is the Cross. Yet you were right in teaching your son this; you told him what was true-truer than he could comprehend. It is better to be honest and good; better than he can know or dream; better even in this life; better by so much as being good is better than having good. But, in a rude, coarse way, you must express the blessedness on a level with his capacity; you must state the truth in a way which he will inevitably interpret falsely. The true interpretation nothing but experience can teach.

And this is what God does. His promises are true, though illusive; far truer than we at first take them to be. We work for a mean, low, sensual happiness, all the while He is leading us on to a spiritual blessedness, unfathomably deep. This is the life of faith. We live by faith, and not by sight. We do not preach that all is disappointment- the dreary creed of senti

mentalism; but we preach that nothing here is disap pointment, if rightly understood. We do not comfort the poor man by saying that the riches that he has not now he will have hereafter, the difference between himself and the man of wealth being only this, that the one has for time what the other will have for eternity; but what we say is, that that which you have failed in reaping here, you never will reap, if you expected the harvest of Canaan. God has no Canaan for His own; no milk and honey for the luxury of the senses; for the city which hath foundations is built in the soul of man. He in whom Godlike character dwells has all the universe for his own. "All things," saith the apos tle, "are yours; whether life or death, or things pres ent, or things to come; if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise."

VII.

[Preached June 23, 1850.]

THE SACRIFICE OF CHRIST.

2 CORINTHIANS v. 14, 15.- "For the love of Christ constraineth us

because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead; and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again."

IT may be that in reading these verses some of us have understood them in a sense foreign to that of the apostle. It may have seemed that the arguments ran thus: Because Christ died upon the Cross for all, therefore all must have been in a state of spiritual death before; and if they were asked what doctrines are to be elicited from this passage they would reply, "The doctrine of universal depravity, and the constraining power of the gratitude due to Him who died to redeem us from it." There is, however, in the first place, this fatal objection to such an interpretation, that the death here spoken of is used in two diametrically opposite senses. In reference to Christ, death literal; in reference to all, death spiritual. Now, in the thought of St. Paul, the death of Christ was always viewed as liberation from the power of evil: "in that He died, He died unto sin once;" and again, "he that is dead is freed from sin." The literal death, then, in one clause, means freedom from sin; the spiritual death