There is to our mind something inexpressibly striking in the witness which prayer gives to the omnipresence of God. You ask me for the practical evidence of my consciousness that God is every where, that the great First Cause pervades all space, as well as inhabits all time. I may have declared this consciousness, and I may have heaped together all the epithets which language affords, in order to convey an idea so august and overwhelming : but now you ask a simple demonstration of my belief; a practical demonstration that I know that God is always at my side; and I say, I give you this: we may be on the mountain when you make the demand; we may be in the crowded street, in the retired desert, or on the waters of the great deep; but wheresoever we are, or whatsoever the surrounding scene, if I do but breathe out the words, "God be merciful to me a sinner," I have given you the most emphatical demonstration that you need. Yes, that I can pray with the firm persuasion that my prayer will be heard in any place or at any moment-there is my testimony to the omnipresence of Deity. It is not when you have left your imagination to travel throughout boundless space, and have caused line upon line and system upon system to pass before it, and have declared to you, that each speck in this immensity is equally the habitation of our Maker, it is not then that I set before you, most fervently and most touchingly, my conviction, that that God is every where; it is rather when I prostrate myself before God, in full assurance that he sees me, and address myself to God, in full assurance that he hears me. And if it be indeed true that prayer is what we have described, an act of singular obedience, an act of homage, a testimony to those incommunicable properties which belong to the divine nature, who shall marvel at its prevalence with God? The prayer of Elijah shut and opened heaven; the prayer of Joshua caused the sun and moon to stand still: and we wonder not at these stupendous effects. Prayer fulfils the end of our creation; which is, that we might commune with God, and yield him the glory due unto his name. Prayer is the acknowledgment and adoration of those perfections in which God himself takes infinite delight. Prayer is the clearest recognition of the divine sovereignty, and our holding every thing at the will and the pleasure of our Maker. And therefore might it be expected that prayer would be acceptable to God; and therefore may we quite understand why, when Cornelius had been fervent and unwearied in supplication, and an angel was at length sent charged with the gracious communication that the petitions of the Centurion were referred to as the procuring cause of the celestial visitation, so that the first words of the messenger were, 66 Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God."

But the alms are joined with the prayers of Cornelius, and we have, therefore, in the last place, to inquire, why alms-giving should be acceptable to God. There is an equal danger of zeal in shunning one extreme leading us into the opposite: and in no respect is this danger greater than in regard to good works. In our eagerness to disclaim the possibility of our works being meritorious, we may easily assume a lofty and over-bold tone, until we may convey the impression, that our works cannot gain acceptance with God. Now this is altogether an erroneous impression, not warranted by the statements of Scripture: indeed these statements must produce just the opposite impression; for the Bible abounds with declarations which prove that God observes and wil reward our liberality to the suffering: "He that hath pity to the poor

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lendeth to the Lord, and that which he hath given shall be paid him again.' "Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness." But when Christ declares, that our visiting the sick, clothing the naked, and feeding the hungry, shall be reckoned and recompensed at the judgment, as though done to himself, he undoubtedly attaches a worth to works of benevolence, and asserts that they find favour in God's sight. We are sure, indeed, that with alms, as with prayers, there can be nothing in the work itself to deserve at God's hand: but of his mere mercy God may be, and is pleased to accept our alms and oblations when given from love to himself; and thus it becomes our inducement, by making it our interest, to be ready to give and glad to distribute.

We are sure, then, from the testimony of Scripture, that alms-giving as well as prayer has prevalence with the Almighty to the procurement of blessings. And why should this be so? What is the reason which gives our alms their acceptableness with God? Why, we reply, that alms are our tribute of acknowledgment that we are only God's tenants, holding as his stewards whatsoever we possess; they may be said to be the rents which we pay him for our estates, and by which we own that our estates are his property, and as acknowledging and confessing that all things come from him; that the silver and the gold are his; so that however he may be pleased to entrust his gifts with others, he still remains the Sovereign Proprietor.

We affirm, moreover, of alms-giving, that it is the best and truest thanks giving. Grateful for the mercies bestowed upon ourselves, we shall be eager to evince such gratitude by endeavours to impart it to those around. It is not possible we should view God's goodness in the blessings we enjoy, and be conscious of no emotion of love towards the Giver: neither is it possible that we should feel love towards God, and not towards man; for "he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" So that where there is a thankful heart, there will necessarily be a desire to lighten the distresses, and increase the happiness of our fellow-men, formed like ourselves in the image of God, and redeemed like ourselves by the blood of the Mediator; and to such desire, alms-giving will be the visible expression. And if it be true, according to the declaration of the Psalmist, that "whoso offereth God praise, glorifieth him," then must it be true, that by the bestowment of alms we do God honour. Where then is the cause of surprise, that alms should find acceptance, and go up, as in the case of Cornelius, as a quemorial before God?

Besides, if we could not exaggerate the power of prayer, we may appeal to all we have advanced in regard to that power, and adduce it as demonstrative of the power of alms. I give money in furtherance of the favourite objects of benevolence; but that money may come up before God in the petitions of those whom I have been instrumental in relieving, and who may be supplicating blessings on their benefactor. I contribute towards the support of an hospital; and then I lose sight of the donation, and know not the precise good which it helps to accomplish: but there is an emaciated thing in one of the wards of that hospital, of whom I know nothing and care nothing, but whose admission, it may be, can be traced to my bounty, and who, during the languishment of sickness, is praying God to bless those who provided the asylum: and thus have alms procured supplication in my behalf, and supplication has wonderfu!

prevalence with the Almighty. I give what I can spare to the cause of missions, and the great work of distributing the Bible: my money is deposited in the plate at the church door, or paid to the collector, and I have no power of tracing its exact course, as operating in the evangelization of the world: but in a while that money, of which I have lost sight, re-appears on some far-off shore, in the shape of a copy of God's Word, or in the self-denying teacher, and it thus becomes effectual to the conversion of unbelievers; and thus there may be worshippers of Christ within the foreign shore, whose names never reached me, but who, in their morning and evening devotion, besiege the mercy-seat with petitions, that the richest gifts may descend on those who have sent them the blessed light of the Gospel, and thus our alms-giving is going up as a memorial before God, rising in the form of the intercession of those whom he loves.

The case is just the same in regard to schools for the education of the poor. You are asked for your money, and you give your money, and you have a present reward in the well-founded persuasion, that you have contributed to the most powerful of all methods for promoting the moral culture of a neighbourhood. You know nothing of the child who is to receive education through your liberality, and you have no means of ascertaining the precise instance in which your bounty is effective of permanent good. But it is quite possible there may be one poor child who must have been excluded from the school, had you refused your contribution: and this child grows up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord: so that your alms, of which you lost sight so soon as they were paid over to the managers of the institution, have produced a virtuous and God-fearing character; and though you may never know the individual thus benefited, and that individual may never know you as his benefactor, yet will there be through a long life, the sound of entreaty on behalf of the generous one, who provided that infancy and childhood should be plied with the lessons of the Bible. And thus is your money appearing in the form of invocation of blessing; it prevails with God, because coined, as it were, into that effectual fervent prayer of the righteous man that availeth much.

O, there is something very beautiful in the thought, that we may be thus making friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; and that much of our domestic peace, and much of our consolation in seasons of trouble, and much of growth in grace, and much of our meetness for the kingdom of heaven, may be given in answer to the petition which is going up in our behalf, from parties to whom we have been unconsciously useful; and that our alms, like those of Cornelius, may so be had in remembrance with God, as to move him to the continually sending us fresh tokens of his favour.

We have no space to enlarge further; though it was in regard particularly to this last portion of our subject, we have passed hastily over much that deserves a closer examination. We have spoken of alms-giving, when the education of the poor is the object that solicits support; and we have now to ask your annual contribution towards the maintenance of the schools connected with this chapel. These schools, I can assure you, are as deserving as ever they were of being liberally upheld by all who feel it their duty to give sound and scriptural instruction to the children of the poor. For our own part, we strengthen daily in the persuasion, that in the diffusion of the fear of God lies our whole security against the worst ills which can overtake a nation. The

politician and the philosopher may have their several specifics, but the Christian knows but of one remedy with which to counteract the disorders of the state; and he is a traitor to his principles, if he substitute any thing for the Gospel of Christ, and if he labour not to disseminate that Gospel among the ignorant. We ask, then, your support to schools whose great object it is to educate the children of your poor neighbours in the principles of the Bible. I make it a rule, in this case, simply to ask you, not to press you, for your contribution. If I have preached to you faithfully and profitably, I shall find the evidence in your answer to these annual appeals. If the evidence be denied me, it is myself rather than you I would blame. I would receive the message as an intimation to which I am bound to attend. We simply ask you for your alms, that the work may continue: we ask for your prayers, that the work may be successful. You should pray that God would bless the institution to whose maintenance you contribute. We have abundant reason for believing, that these joined prayers and alms go up as a memorial before him, and procure, if not the visit of an angel, yet the gift of his Holy Spirit, who can alone open the young heart, and make instruction efficacious.

THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD.

"If a man be a statesman, and the arrangement of a vast empire be delivered into his hand, we can scarcely expect that, amidst the multiplied and mighty affairs that solicit his attention, he should find time for the more ordinary duties of life. We feel that, engrossed with occupations of overwhelming importance, it is hardly possible that he should be assiduous in the instruction of his children, or the inspection of his servants, or the visiting and relieving his distressed fellow-men. But we never feel that his greatness

would be diminished if he were so assiduous: we are ready to admit, that we should give him, in a higher degree than ever, our respect and admiration, if we knew, that while he had an eye on every wheel of the machinery of government, and his comprehensive mind included all that had a bearing on the well-being of the empire, he discharged with exemplary fidelity every relative duty, and attended with as much assiduousness to all that concerned his own immediate dependants and neighbours, as though he had not to extend his carefulness over the thousand departments of a complicated government. We should like to know what would be thought of that man's estimate of greatness, who should reckon it derogatory to the statesman, that he thus combined attention to the inconsiderable with attention to the vast, and who should consider it compatible with the loftiness of his station that, amid duties as arduous as they were faithfully discharged, he had nevertheless an ear for the prattle of childhood, an eye for the interests of the friendless, and a heart for the suffering and the destitute. We put it to yourselves to decide, whether there would not be a feeling amounting almost to veneration, towards that man who should prove himself equal to the superintendence and guidance of every concern of the empire, and yet who could give a consideration and personal attention to the wants of the poorest of its families; and who, while gathering within the compass of a mighty intelligence every combination of foreign and home policy, protecting the commerce, and maintaining the honour, and fostering the institutions of society, should yet minister tenderly at the bed-side of sickness, hearken patiently to the tale of affliction, and be as active to the widow and the orphan, as though his whole business were to lighten the pressure of domestic calamity.

"We are not, then, afraid to apply to you our notions of true greatness, for a refutation of the common argument against the providence of God. We know not why that should be derogatory to the majesty of the Ruler of the Universe, which, by the general confession, would add immeasurably to one of earth's potentates. But if we should rise in our admiration and applause of the statesman or sovereign, in proportion as he shewed himself capable of attending to things comparatively insignificant and petty, without neglecting the grand and momentous, certainly we are bound to apply the same principle to our Maker, who, whilst he marshals the stars, and orders the motions of all worlds throughout the theatre of immensity, yet feedeth the young ravens, heareth the cries of the creatures that call upon him, and numbereth the very hairs of our heads. It is a fine position we are able to take, that of its being indispensable to the greatness of the Creator, that he should be acquainted with, and give heed to, the every concern of the meanest of his creatures, and