Jesus to recommend ostentation and display. But they must press upon all Christians their bounden duty to shine as lights in the worldc. They must press on them the necessity of looking well that the light that is in them, the principle that guides their steps, be not darkness, be not any selfish seeking of honour, profit, or pleasure; but that they walk in the lighte, that is, in love to God and man, which has nothing to hide, save some of the tenderer branches of charity, and them only from the rude breath of the world, not from the light of conscience.

If we are not witnesses for God on earth, if we will not obey His Spirit that strives in us to make us so, we are like salt that hath lost its flavour, and shall be cast out and trodden under foot. But He will raise up His witnesses in His own good time. Let us be content with the little works He has assigned to us, and not leave them undone because they seem but small matters, remembering that he that is faithful in a few things shall one day be set over many things". And so shall that sin which we now see but witnessed against, be one day seen naked and

c Phil. ii. 15.

e John i. 7.

g Matt. xxv. 21.

d Matt. vi. 23.

f Matt. v. 13.

condemned in the eyes of men and Angels; that righteousness which we now see but feebly proclaimed, and set forth in a few and faint examples, shall shine forth in the royal and priestly glory of Christ our King and Saviour; and that judgment which men hear of and forget, shall be seen and felt in the fulness of eternal joy, and the terrors of eternal fire.

SERMON XXIV.

PREACHED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY ON THE SECOND SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY, 1838.

HABAKKUK ii. 4.

Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him but the just shall live by faith.

:

THE Word of God is full of wisdom and instruction. Every text has its own truth to imprint on the soul, and sometimes in a few words many rays of heavenly light shine forth at once. Every part is to be heard and read with the prayer and the humble hope that we may win from it eternal gain. But next to the very words of our Blessed Lord, those passages challenge our especial attention, which are common to the Old and New Testaments. Chosen, not in vain, from the rich treasury of ancient Revelation, they are polished and set, and placed where they may best reflect the glory of Him, Who is set forth as the Eternal Light of Life in the Old and New Testaments. And the attentive and reverent reader will learn much

from this combination. He will not only see the particular text before him in clearer light, but he will learn how to interpret the rest. Many lessons of this kind may be learned, but one that will be very manifest in the examination of the present text, is the correction of a common rule, good in itself, and useful when not misapplied, and to which the human understanding is led, both by the consideration of general laws, and by the bitter experience of error. We have seen single texts torn from their context, and fastened on the banners of heresy. We have felt the difficulty of apprehending their true meaning, after hearing them repeatedly quoted even in defence of truth. The natural resource in this case is a careful study of the whole context, and a comparison of it with the history of the period in which it was written. And the rule of interpreting according to these, though too often neglected, is both right and obvious enough.

But men who have proudly imagined that they could sound the depth of sacred knowledge with their own line, have made this rule too much their only guide. And the humble and faithful enquirer needs some authority to support him against the high

pretensions of critical exegesis, when he ventures to search, beyond its results, for a hidden depth of meaning, an abyss of Divine Truth, which lies open where Reason's plummet stayed.

And this authority he has in the New Testament, where what seem but secondary meanings and indirect implications in the Old, are shewn to be no less certain and no less precious, nay, rather to be more full of the highest principles of sacred truth, than the first and general meaning. For it is absurd to suppose that no texts, besides those which are quoted and explained, have any such force. And as we are sure that many have it, we may lawfully seek for it, as the Church has ever done-if indeed it may not be said that some such expositions have been received in other ways from the Apostles. But in the present instance both the primary meaning and the implied truth are clearly brought out in the New Testament.

Let us first view this text with its context, and briefly consider its reading and translations; and then view it as thrice quoted in the New Testament, with the lessons there drawn from it, and apply those lessons to ourselves.

With regard to the reading of the Hebrew,