that day." "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but to all them also that love his appearing." Not only does the apostle speak of the assurance of salvation as possessed by himself personally; he seems to represent it as the privilege of christians generally, if not universally. To the saints at Rome he says, "The spirit itself beareth witness with our spirits that we are the children of God. And if children, then heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." To the Corinthians he says, "We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." "Therefore we are always confident, knowing that whilst we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord." And to the believing Hebrews, "Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance." Such is a sample of the statements of the New Testament on this subject. And from these statements it would seem, that in the apostolic age the "full assurance of faith," or "the full assurance of hope" (call it which you will) was possessed not only by the apostles and their fellow labourers in the gospel, but very generally also by ordinary believers. But there is reason to apprehend that this assurance is now a rare attainment.

It is to be feared that there are comparatively few who can truly say that they possess it; and there are probably many, who it may be confessed, are genuine christians, but who, were they to disclose honestly their religious experience, would have to tell the melancholy tale, that they have little enjoyment in their religion; and that when they look forward to the final advent of the Son of God, it is with emotions of anxiety and terror, rather than of hope and joy. It is then not only a curious and interesting, but an important and instructive inquiry,-how happens it that, with regard to the privilege alluded to, we are so far inferior to the primitive christians? How happens it, that what with them was a common, should with us be a rare, attainment that while their hope of the heavenly inheritance burned with a vigorous and steady, a bright and glorious radiance, ours should be feeble and flickering, like the expiring taper, weak and dim, like "the smoking flax ?" To solve these questions will be the object of the present discourse. Let me then, in humble dependence on divine aid, request your attention to the following particulars.

I would state it as a general and preliminary remark, that for the want of the full assurance of hope, believers themselves are almost always less or more to blame. I say not always, but almost always; for there is at least one case in which believers may be destitute of that assurance, and yet may be but little to be blamed, if they are to be blamed at all. I refer to those unhappy persons who, from bodily weakness or disease, or from some infirmity in their mental constitution, are a constant prey to gloomy dejection, and to groundless apprehension and fears. Even in their worldly pursuits, such persons evince a lamentable deficiency of energy and courage. They dare not attempt any enterprise of great

pith and moment;" or if they attempt, it is almost sure to fail in their hands. They are perpetually tormenting themselves and others, by anticipating the most improbable calamities; and they spread their own melancholy, even over the gayest and loveliest scenes of external nature. To them the azure sky seems dark and lowering; and to them the green earth seems barren, and parched, and dreary. Religion purifies and improves all the powers and affections of the soul; but it does not absolutely obliterate our constitutional peculiarities or infirmities. It is therefore nothing more than might be expected, that the persons just described will view religion as they view other objects, not in their brighter and happier, but in their gloomier and sterner aspects; and that in their minds emotions of anxiety, and suspicion, and terror, will predominate over those of hope, and trust, and joy. Sometimes, indeed, they are to be blamed for their melancholy; for they indulge it as if it were in itself meritorious and praiseworthy, and as if it were criminal to be hopeful or cheerful. Like the fretful prophet, they seem to think that they do well to grieve,-to grieve even unto death; and that they will not be charmed out of their melancholy" by the voice of the charmer, charm he ever so wisely." To a great extent, however, their want of hope, and confidence, and joy, is involuntary and unavoidable; and, in as far as this is the case, it is a want for which they are to be pitied, not blamed,-to be sympathized with and soothed, not to be scolded or ridiculed.

Perhaps you will expect me to state that there is another case in which the believer, at particular seasons at least, may be without the full assurance, even without a single gleam of hope, while he himself is not to blame. It is generally supposed, that in the exercise

of mere sovereignty, God sometimes hides his face from his children; in other words, that he suspends the gracious communications of his Spirit: so that, though they seek him, and seek him with all their hearts, they cannot find him. As the necessary consequence, the saint "walks in darkness, and has no light," and is constrained, with the patriarch, to exclaim, "O that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me, when his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through the darkness."

That our Father in heaven should withdraw the light of his countenance from his children, as a chastisement for their iniquity, may easily be admitted; but that he ever hides himself from them merely, as it is said, to try their faith, and without any fault of their own, may well be doubted. Do not the scriptures intimate that the Holy Spirit dwells continually in the soul of the saint, and is ever ready to invigorate and comfort him; and, as the natural consequence, do not they command him to be at all times "strong in the Lord," and to "rejoice evermore?" But if, without any fault of his own, the supplies of spiritual strength and comfort were cut off, would it not be unreasonable to address to him that exhortation and injunction? Would not that be to order him to make brick without furnishing him with straw,-to say to him, "The Philistines be upon thee," and yet to withdraw from him the strength, without which he cannot resist them? On the whole, then, there seems good ground to conclude that this opinion on the subject is not well founded; that this case supposed is one which, if it ever occur at all, is of rare occurrence indeed; that, in almost every instance where the saint is either totally destitute of hope and joy, or where his hope is weak and his joy scanty, he himself is always less or more to blame; and, in a

word, that if ever he is straitened, it is in himself, not in his God and Saviour.

But if these things are so, and if the full assurance of hope is a practicable attainment, why is it so seldom attained? Why is it that a privilege which is "exceedingly great and precious," and which was generally possessed by believers in the primitive age, should now be enjoyed by comparatively few? To these questions, some may be disposed to reply, that, to signalize the triumph of the ascended Saviour, the Holy Spirit was then communicated in extraordinary abundance, both in his purifying and comforting influences, but that now he is scantily imparted; and the cause being discontinued, the effect has disappeared. In one view, this answer may be deemed satisfactory; but then another question immediately occurs: Why is it that the Spirit is not now imparted more copiously? Did not the Saviour intimate that your Father in heaven is as ready to give his Holy Spirit, and all other good things, to them that ask him, as any human parent can be to supply the wants of a child asking for bread? And do not the scriptures teach us that the fountains of spiritual hope and comfort, "the wells of salvation," are ever full and ever accessible; and that the believer has nothing to do but repair to them, and "draw water with joy?" Is he then ignorant of his privilege, or indifferent to it? In a word, since the full assurance of hope is not unattainable, why is it so rarely attained? Can we not penetrate somewhat deeper into this interesting subject, and detect, in the views, and temper, and conduct of professing christians, reasons for this melancholy destitution under which so many of the labour?

In answer to these questions, I would remark, in general, that if the hope of the christian is weak, it is