ligious system to which the edifice was appropriated. But how much stronger would be this conclusion if in addition he discovered, on standing at a height and distance such as should allow the whole to be seen at a glance, that the entire magnificent structure was itself built in the form of a cross; and not one structure alone, but several of those which he had the opportunity of examining. The design of the builder, he could say, might in the one case, however unlikely the supposition, be counterworked by the unauthorized insertions of subsequent architects; but no such intrusion, however audacious or extensive, could reach to changing the whole plan of the fabric; and if the proof be indeed unquestionable that the main walls and their foundations are the authentic work of antiquity, in that antiquity the idea that directed their plan must share. If, then, these edifices of immortal truth, this Gospel, this Epistle, this Book of Prophecy, be indeed ancient and inspired; the great predominating thought that fixed their plan and distribution must be ancient and inspired too.

I shall but add, that in thus making this threefold distinction the basis of His whole scheme of instruction, St. John has taught you not only its absolute truth but its relative importance. Learning from him "the proportion of the faith," we will safely value that most, which he thought most precious. If, under those brief but wondrous words-Father, Son, and Spirit-he was accustomed to classify all the bright treasures of his inspiration; if into this mould every narrative, every exhortation, naturally flowed; if he was wont to see, in the adoration that bowed before this mysterious

Triad of eternal powers, the last and loftiest act of religion, the sum and abstract of all the rest; we cannot be wrong in preserving the equilibrium that he has fixed. And if, too, to him this great belief was more than belief, this "light" was also "life;" if he could feel it blessed to acknowledge a Father who is our Father, a Son in whom we also "are called the sons of God," a Holy Spirit who "dwelleth with us and shall be in us;" may we also find in the TRINITY the ground of practical devotion, pure and deep, till, quickened by the power of this faith, the Three that bear record in heaven shall bear their witness in our hearts; and the Trinity shall have become, not the cold conclusion of the intellect, but the priceless treasure of the affections, the blessed foundation and the perpetual strength of the new and spiritual life!

SERMON VII.

MEETNESS FOR THE INHERITANCE OF THE SAINTS

IN LIGHT.

(EPISTLE, 24TH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.)

COL. i. 12.

Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.

IT

T is the special glory of the Gospel, the foundation or the perfection of all the rest, that it first truly and distinctly, in language beyond the uncertainties of conjecture, the refinements of allegory, or even the bright colouring of hope, enlarged the prospects of men into the depths of eternity. It first clearly and authoritatively taught us that the present existence is the least and meanest portion of our inheritance, and death to the undying spirit only the birth-day of immortal life. From the hour that this awful and glorious secret was revealed to the sons of men, the whole science of life was for ever changed; a new element entered into calculation that transformed all the rest. Had revelation never taught us so, surely this must be still self-evident. From the very nature of the case, a dying and a deathless being must move in different orbits, must revolve on different centres, must obey different

attractions. A dying body is adapted to the world of sense and time, a deathless spirit is meant and made for a world immortal as itself. Created eternal, it is intended, from the instant of its birth, to breathe the air of eternity. It is at home only in its own high sphere of being; connected by a visible frame with the present world, it is itself invisible, and lives by the Invisible. Through its own proper organs,-through Faith, and Hope, and Love divine,-it already commerces with that eternal scene, and the God of that eternal scene, where hereafter, disburdened of its earthly fetters, it is to dwell and to rejoice for everlasting.

This, then, is the great truth implied in the text, implied more or less directly in every part of the teaching of the New Testament. This, that the life for eternity is already begun; that we are at, and from the very hour of our regeneration, introduced into the spiritual world, a world which, though mysterious and invisible, is as real as the world of sense around us; that the Christian's life of heavenliness is the first stage of heaven itself! "The Father," saith the Apostle, "hath (already supernaturally) made us meet for the inheri tance of the saints." The doctrine of the New Testament is not that men, now wholly mortal, wholly perishable, shall hereafter, in reward of fidelity, be miraculously raised to die no more, but that Christian men are already, in a true though most mysterious sense, raised with Christ Jesus and set in heavenly places in Him; that they are now virtually in the very presence and kingdom of God; that they already possess the seed of immortality; that "he that hath the Son hath life;" that that life is now "hid with Christ in God," to

be-not created as out of nothing, but-manifested, when He "shall be manifested" in glory. Hear again the same Apostle: "If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead [now] dwell in you, He that raised up Christ shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His [now] indwelling Spirit." In other words, there is a power now within you in the germ, of which your celestial immortality shall be the proper fruit. The dawn of heaven hath already begun in all who are yet to rejoice in its noontide glory.

No thought surely can be more awakening than this; none of more urgent and immediate practical importance. Christianity is but half unfolded to us without this doctrine of the present indwelling of the powers of the world to come. That men shall, on the last day, be judged by divine justice, accepted by divine mercy, according to the deeds of their earthly life, is itself a great and impressive truth. But that this judgment should itself be blended with another equally certain principle of qualification; that the heaven which is to come must have already spiritually arisen within us, and the future glory be thus enclosed in the present grace;-that, therefore, men must not only win heaven as a reward, but be suited for heaven as a life; that the divine principle now within them must have fitted them for the avocations of that better world, moulded them to the tempers of angels, exercised them in the rudiments of that high profession of joyful obedience and adoring homage which is to make the occupation of their eternity, this is yet more impressive and alarming, because, whatever delusion may be possible in the former case, it is scarcely conceivable in this. Men