present they cannot keep all God's commandments: this or that they must be allowed to omit; and they will make up for it as best they can till some more convenient season comes, in which they hope to do better. Very few, even of the worst of men, have given up all thoughts of God and Christ, of their souls, and eternity. Yet they live as if they had. Let them be spoken to seriously and plainly on such subjects, they will acknowledge their importance; and yet they will go on to do violence to their consciences, to resist the Holy Spirit.

I conclude by drawing three general lessons. I. You cannot judge of men by their words, by the professions which they make. These were not the test to which Christ pointed, who knew what was in man. He said, By their fruits

ye

shall know them. Take these two expressions of Balaam by themselves, If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of the Lord my God, to do less or more: and again, Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his: there seems nothing more to be desired. He will resist the strongest temptation:-he is soberminded: he can bear to think of death,—and makes it his earnest prayer that he may die at

St. Matth. vii. 16, 20.

peace with God.

Yet after both these declarations, he could still go on in sin. He allowed himself to be led from the high places of Baal to the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and then again to the top of Peor, as though change of place could change God's purposes; and he ended in a sin far worse than cursing Israel by words; he, as far as in him lay, cursed them by his deeds. He counselled the throwing the temptation of the Midianitish women in the way of Israel, and thus plunged them in deadly sin, and brought down God's hot displeasure upon them. Balaam could explain man's duty to God admirably well, could shew that mere ceremony would not suffice, as Balak seems to have thought it would. You may read the remarkable dialogue between them preserved by the prophet Micah, vi. 5—8. O my people, remember now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal; that ye may know the righteousness of the Lord. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the High God? shall I come before Him with burnt-offerings, with calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for

the sin of my soul? These are Balak's questions. Let us hear Balaam's answer; a summary of patriarchal religion amid all his superstition and covetousness: He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? yet, after all, his name stands in the pages of the book of God branded by one Apostle as loving the wages of unrighteousness, and coupled by another with Cain and Korah, three types of the three great divisions of the sins of mankind.

II. What Balaam wished and prayed for did soon after happen to Moses. He did, near the same spot, soon after die the death of the righteous. He went up from the plains of Moab, unto the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah; and there Moses, the servant of the Lord, died, a death that came very near to leaving this world as Enoch and Elijah did.

My brethren, if you would die the death of the righteous, you must live their life. You must walk in the same narrow and uphill road which they tread, if you would have your journey end as theirs does. You must not hope to be saints in heaven if you are not saints on earth.

III. Lastly, the history of Balaam shews, what Christ has told you, Ye cannot serve God and

Mammon. There is no such thing as halting between Jehovah and Baal, no dividing your friendship between Moab and Israel. You may possess much religious light and knowledge: your conscience may check you; and yet you may be living as enemies to God through wicked works; and so you will miss your object every way: you cannot be happy in this world, you must be wretched in the world to come.

The end of the whole matter, the great lesson conveyed by Balaam's history from his first appearance to his fearful end, is this: He that, being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy."

t St. Luke xvi. 13.

u Prov. xxix. 1.

SERMON V.

PREACHED ON ASCENSION DAY, 1839.

PSALM lxviii. 18.

Thou hast gone up on high, Thou hast led captivity captive, and received gifts for men: yea, even for Thine enemies, that the Lord God might dwell among them.

WE are sure that in taking these words as a text for this holy day, we are giving to them a right application. For St. Paul himself has fixed their meaning for us in a passage which we shall read in the second lesson for the afternoon service. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore He saith, When He ascended up on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (Now, that He ascended, what is it but that He also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that