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scriptive than all which you admire, which yet you suffer to lie from day to day unopened, or read only with inattention and indifference. I speak not now of the pleasures attending the practice of religion, I speak only of those which accompany its study. These are pleasures pure, and rational; able to satisfy the soul of man, and adequate to its utmost capacity; pleasures which alone might induce men to exercise themselves in God's law day and night.

But far be it from any one to urge the study of the Bible only because it possesses unrivalled interest, and charms of diction. We stand upon higher ground. We search the Scriptures, because in them we think we have the words of eternal life. But, in so searching them, we receive the purest pleasure, as well as the most lasting advantage. We press forward with ardour for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus: and, by the goodness of our heavenly guide, every step, which we tread, leads us continually on through the ways of pleasantness and peace.

k Phil. iii. 14.

M

LECTURE IX.

THE WARNINGS AND PROMISES OF THE

SCRIPTURES.

Psalm XIX. 11.

Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.

The Psalmist, having before dwelt upon the benefits which revealed religion affords, and shewn that it is an object of pursuit more desirable, and more agreeable, than any worldly advantages, here declares two more peculiarities, by which it is characterized;

That it warns and teaches mankind:

That it promises, and will give, an exceeding great reward to those who keep it.

The two great instruments, by which all laws have been enforced, are the fear of punishment, and the hope of reward. But, in every human code of legislation, both these instruments are very imperfect in their operation. The fear of punishment has always proved

too weak for the hope of eventual impunity. And the expectation of reward has failed in its effect, from the actual impossibility that the legislator should appreciate merit, and his inability to requite it, even when discovered. But the punishments and rewards, with which religion is conversant, are subject to no such imperfection. The warnings are the most emphatic; because they proceed from a Being, who knows the origin and end of the most obscure event. The threatenings are most awful; because they are uttered by a Being, whose power knows no limits, either of extension or duration: by one, whose words are truth itself: by one, who will most assuredly perform what he declares. Similarly, the rewards, which are promised, are most sure. However secret an action may be, it is exposed to the eye of our Almighty Father: however complicated in its causes and consequences, He can distinguish the motives by which it was produced, and the events to which it gives rise. And although our very best actions can deserve no reward at his hands, yet we are assured, that they who through faith endeavour to lay hold of eternal life, shall, by the free grace and mercy of God, through the atonement of his Son, receive an exceeding great recompence.

I. David declares, with reference to the precepts and doctrines of revealed religion,

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By them is thy servant warned," or, as the same term signifies in other parts of Scripture, by them is thy servant enlightened." His assertion may be considered, therefore, to refer to the historical warnings, which the Scriptures deliver to mankind; to the full assurance of future judgment; and to the promised influence of God's Holy Spirit.

1. The warnings, which any history delivers, are always impressive, because they exhibit the natural course of events, similar to those in which we are all engaged. They display the origin, and progress, and consequences of transactions, modified by all the variety of circumstances to which they are subject. But the warnings of sacred history are peculiarly striking; since they shew the causes as well as the effects. They lay open frequently the very dealings of God with man: the internal dispensations, by which his counsels are directed.

If we open the word of God, we are presented with a series of historical warnings, which speak most forcibly the abhorrence in which all sin is held in the sight of God: and especially those sins which are directed against himself. The offences which are punished are

those of nations, and of individuals: and the punishment corresponds with the crime.

National offences are visited by national judgments. Scarcely was the earth peopled, after the fall of our first parents, when it was "corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence." All flesh turned from the worship of the Lord: the wickedness of man became great, and the imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. But the same narrative, which records the guiltiness of the world, relates also the judgment which came upon it. The Spirit of God would not always strive with man. While men were still in the midst of their wickedness, heedless of their danger, God sent a flood of waters upon the earth, and destroyed both man and beast, and the creeping things, and the fowls of the air. The patriarchal age is replete with warnings of a similar nature. The confusion of tongues, the destruction of the cities of the plain, offer subjects of very serious contemplation. When, again, we proceed to the history of the people, who were selected for God's peculiar care, we read scarcely any thing but a continued succession of warnings and punishments: warnings which, although they failed to effect their immediate

a Gen. vi. 5, 11.

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