back to the once peaceful dwellings from which they came out! How unlike the meeting of Jacob and Joseph have been their interviews with their parents! How incurable the sorrow they have occasioned to their families, who might have leaned on them for support! How sharp the thorns they have planted in the pillow of a pious father or mother! But all these earthly ills have their limit; while there is a bed of everlasting sorrow, spread for them that despise the counsel of wisdom and the day of God's merciful visitation!

Lastly; Let this subject persuade those who still enjoy the pious instruction and counsel of parents, to improve them with the utmost diligence. "Keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother: bind them continually upon thy heart; for they shall be an ornament of grace to thy head, and chains about thy neck. When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. For the commandment is a lamp, and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life." Happy, thrice happy the youth that findeth wisdom, while he is yet sheltered by the parental roof; for "the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold. She is more precious than rubies; and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared unto her. Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left hand riches and honor. She is a tree of life to them that lay hold on her; and happy is every one that retaineth her." Begin your morning with fervent prayer over all the affairs of the day, and "the Lord shall be your shade on your right-hand;" call yourself to a faithful review at evening, and lie down with grateful acknowledgment, and "the angel of the Lord shall encamp around you and keep you." To whatever city or country your path may lead, there seek out and know the men that fear the Lord; there make the acquaintance and friendship of the ministers of God; there let your Christian character be known and maintained. And should the mysterious providence of God lead you to heathen lands, to the courts or the dungeons of heathen princes, there let it appear by all your deportment that you serve the God of heaven," and love the Savior of the world: there, when you are tempted to sin, remember the history of Joseph; and let wisdom remain with you: and though you return not to bless the old age of pious parents, you shall meet them at length in the New Jerusalem on high. In that city there shall be no sin,--no more curse,—but the throne of God and the Lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him, and they shall

REIGN FOR EVER AND EVER.

66

SERMON CXLIV.

BY REV. WILLIAM NEVINS,

BALTIMORE.

THE SOLEMN QUESTION ANSWERED.

JEREMIAH viii. 6.-What have I done?

THE person now addressed, is supposed to ask, "What have I done?"—and it is designed to answer his question. Let no one refuse to consider the answer, on the ground that he knows already what he has done better than any one can tell him. It may appear, on examination, that you have yet much to learn in regard to what you have done. Nor let any one deny me a hearing on the plea, that it matters not what he has done. It matters much-you are a moral and accountable agent, answerable for your conduct to God. There is a rule by which it should be regulated. God is the author of that rule; and he is the avenger of its violations. There is a conduct which is pleasing to him, and a conduct which is displeasing: and whether he be pleased or displeased, whether he smile or frown, is certainly of some consequence.

The inquiry relates not merely to overt acts: what you have done, embraces what you have said, thought, and felt, as well as what you have acted; and for all you are equally accountable. "The law is spiritual-the commandment is exceeding broad-God will bring every work into judgment with every secret thing—all a man's ways are right in his own eyes, but the Lord pondereth the heart-the Lord weigheth the spirit."

This language, "What have I done?" sometimes bespeaks a mind utterly devoid of conviction. It asks in a spirit of self-justification, what evil the person has done. At other times it expresses the keenest sensibility to sin. A person having done something, the evil nature of which he did not at the time fully apprehend, and the sad consequences of which he did not foresee, when afterward he comes to perceive the evil and mischief of it, exclaims, in mingled alarm and grief, "What have I done !"

I shall consider it as the language of simple inquiry; as the serious interrogation of a person willing to know what he has done. And God grant that while I am answering the interrogation," What have I done?" may become the heart-felt exclamation of each impenitent hearer.

it

You ask what you have done. I will tell you; neither on the one hand extenuating, nor on the other exaggerating.

1. What if you had done nothing? You say, " What have I done?" meaning perhaps that you have done nothing, and supposing that this is a valid plea, a sufficient justification for you. But is it so? Can I not condemn you on your own admission, out of your own mouth? You have done nothing! But you are required to do something, ay much. You have done nothing! Then you have not loved God with all your heart, nor glorified him in your body and spirit, which are his. If you have done nothing, you have broken one half at least of the law of God. In so far as its positive requirements are concerned, you are guilty, according to your own confession. It was for not doing, that the inhabit ants of Meroz were cursed-" they came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty." They staid at home and minded their worldly business. And Christ will say, he informs us, to those on his left-hand in the final day, when he bids them depart from him, "Inasmuch as ye did it not, &c." And he says also, "Cast ye the unprofitable servant (the servant that does nothing), into outer darkness." You have done nothing! But to do nothing, when there is so much required to be done, is to do evil, to do wrong, to do that which must cast you away for ever. You need do no more than nothing to ensure and justify your condemnation. Strange that you should expect to be justified for the very reason for which Christ says he will condemn men!-But

2. This plea, though it would not sustain you, if you could offer it, you cannot offer, for you have done something. You have not been idle. You are no mere negative character. You have acted under law, and in view of law, as a moral and accountable agent. As such you have performed innumerable acts, and have been the subject of numberless exercises of thought and feeling; each of which acts and exercises has possessed a moral character; has or has not been conformed to the revealed rule of duty; and is worthy of praise or blame. It is impossible to compute the number of times you have acted and been exercised in the capacity of a moral agent and an accountable subject of the law of God; and all these have been acts of obedience or of disobedience. Each exercise has been right or wrong. They have met the approbation of God, or provoked his displeasure. If they have been worthy of reward, they will be rewarded; if of punishment, they will be punished. Of the one or the other they are worthy. All the while you have lived, God has been looking on your heart and life, and in view of each emotion, thought, and act, has smiled or frowned.

Yes, you have done something-you have formed a decided character. You have laid up a large store of something for the futureyou have done a great deal of good or of evil-you are very much in the right, or very far in the wrong-which is it? What have you done?

3. You have done wrong. You have acted unreasonably and unfitly. You have acted in opposition to those dictates of duty, which come to you from within. You have disobeyed conscience. You have transgressed the law written upon the heart.

You have done more-you have not only sinned against your own soul, but against God. You have disobeyed the Lord of conscience. You have acted contrary to his known will; broken his holy, just, and good law. You have done all this. You cannot deny it ;-wrong and thus wrong.

4. Now suppose you had done this but once-suppose that of your innumerable acts and exercises, only one was sinful. Even on that hypothesis, you are guilty, condemned, inexcusable, and undone. You cannot answer for that one sin. The divine law tolerates sin in no respect, and in no instance. "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them. He that offendeth in one point, is guilty of all." Gal. iii. 10. James ii. 10. The law of God is one, and he that breaks it in any part, breaks it all. The angels who kept not their first estate were consigned to the place they now occupy, in chains and utter darkness, for doing wrong ONCE. Did God wait for a second offence? Why should he? Does human law wait for the repetition of a crime? In like manner Adam, for one offence, incurred the sentence of death. Now if you have done wrong only once, you have done as much as dethroned the angels, and destroyed the father of the human race. If one offence ruined them, is not one enough to ruin you? But I need not speak on this supposition. For

5. You have done wrong more than once. How many times in your life do that you suppose you have acted, spoken, thought, and felt sinfully and wrong? So many times, that there is but one Being who can tell how many-and he will tell, when "the books are opened"-before assembled worlds.

Some appear to think that if their wrong doings, no matter how many they be, do not exceed their right doings; if their good deeds only outnumber by one their evil deeds, they have nothing to fear, and this is all that is required of them. For this opinion there is as little support derived from reason as from Scripture. There is none from either. It is absolute folly to think and talk thus. A man should be ashamed to entertain such an opinion. All analogy is against it. Is this all that the magistrate requires of the subject, or the parent of the child; viz. that they be careful to maintain a proper proportion between their acts of obedience and their acts of disobedience, never permitting the latter to outnumber the former? May the subject or the child break this law, provided only he obey that? Does not all law require universal obedience? Did any law ever allow or excuse its own trausgression in any respect or instance? There is not a government or society of any kind existing among men, having laws or rules for its regulation, which does. not require the strict observance of all its rules by its every member. It punishes every breach of each rule. It does not wait till more than half of them are broken; and yet men expect that the great and jealous God will allow them to treat his holy, just, and good law, as no other law was ever allowed to be treated! And all the hope which many

have, is built on this expectation! Standing on this foundation, they are looking forward to the prospect of meeting God, with a calmness and confidence that nothing seems capable of disturbing. They acknowledge they have sinned, and they do not pretend that they have repented and secured an interest in the atonement. They have not, they suppose, sinned enough for that. It is not every sin, according to their notion, that renders repentance and a satisfaction necessary; but only the surplusage of sin, if any there should be after their good doings are subtracted from their evil ones! Into what absurdity and folly, not to say aggravated guilt, will erring mortals plunge! Sin first infatuates, then destroys them. It begins with making fools of them, and ends with making them wretches!

You perceive then, that it would avail nothing, though you could maintain the ground, that your right doings outnumber your wrong doings. But even this ground, were it available, you cannot maintain. For,

6. You have not done more good than evil; more right than wrong. The facts are against you. I know it is an astounding and unpalatable sentiment that I am about to advance; but it has the recommendation of being true, if it is not popular. You may disbelieve it, but you cannot disprove it. It is this-instead of having done more good than evil, if you are not now a penitent, a believer in Christ, a new creature; you have, so far as your moral nature is concerned, done no good; you have done nothing right. Your moral acts and exercises have been all of one kind, and all evil, all wrong. When this is said, it is not meant that your acts have been evil and wrong in every sense of those words. Right and good, according to the subordinate signification of those words, it is not disputed that you have done; but in the most important sense of the words, their scriptural sense, that sense of them in which they will be explained by God, and understood in the day of judgment (and that is the true sense of them), you have done “ only evil," and that "continually." This assertion, though clothed with Divine authority, may give offence; but examine it carefully, remembering with whom you have to do.

Right is that which is conformable to the rule which God has given for the regulation of human conduct; that conformity having for its spring and principle the love of God, and for its object his glory. Now, though you have acted in some things agreeably to the revealed rule of God; yet has your motive been his love, and your aim his glory? It is quite possible to do things required by the law of God, and yet render no acceptable obedience to that law; for they may be done without any respect for the law; done for other reasons than that God requires them; or done rather from fear than love. To do right is to do what God requires, because he requires it, at the suggestion of love, and with a desire to glorify him. To do good is to do what is pleasing to God; but "without faith it is impossible to please him." There are no truly good works, according to the Scriptures, but those unto which we are "created in Christ Jesus." They that are in the flesh (i. e. in an