twofold: the evidence of statement, and the evidence of fact. Let us examine each of these separately, and then look at their combined impression.

1. The inspired and commissioned messengers of Heaven have delivered to us the most unequivocal assurance of the resurrection of man. They not only confirm and establish those hopes of the immortality of the soul which good men in every age had sought to cherish, but they assure us that the tabernacle of clay in which the soul is lodged shall be raised up in unfading life and activity. Hear their testimony. Daniel, in the land of the stranger, looked forward to this event, and pointed the view of the Church to the eventful day when many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. But it was reserved for Him who came forth from the bosom of the Father to unfold fully the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. At an early period in his ministry, this was the gracious announcement he delivered:-" As the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will. Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming in which the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live. I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." When we listen. to such clear statements, and remember the satisfactory evidence which he who uttered them gave that he was a Teacher sent from God, we can entertain no doubt of the fact which they foretell.

And consonant with these testimonies of the faithful and true Witness, are those of his servants the apostles. They describe, with a minuteness like that of actual vision, the circumstances which shall mark the resurrection of the dead. "The Lord himself," say they, "shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first." Can any man who believes that the words which I have now repeated form a part of a written communication from the God of Truth to the children of men, doubt for a moment the doctrine for which we are contending, or think it a thing incredible that God should raise the dead ?"

2. The Scriptural assurance of the resurrection rests not only on the statements and declarations of the commissioned servants of God, but is founded on the most important and the most authentic fact which human testimony ever was employed to certify. Jesus Christ rose from the dead, as the first fruits of them that sleep. On this great fact, transmitted and certified by the most powerful evidence that the human mind can demand, our faith in the resurrection rests as on a powerful and permanent basis. When we behold our Master rising from the tomb, we are taught that there is a power superior to death, that the captives of the grave shall yet be free, that the energy which raised Jesus from the dead shall be put forth in behalf of all his people. "For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also who sleep in Jesus will God

bring with him."-" Now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that sleep. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead; for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the first fruits, afterwards they that are Christ's at his coming." The tomb of Jesus is our place of hope; his resurrection is the pledge of ours. "Because I live," says our risen Master, " ye shall live also."

Let this gracious hope, which God has been pleased to certify in his blessed Word, and to establish by the resurrection of his beloved Son, and which every view we can take of the economy of nature and Providence so beautifully corroborates and illustrates, ever be our consolation and our stay. While it endears to us a revelation which unfolds such extensive views of the schemes of Providence and the happiness of man, it will prove the solace of our wearied spirits amid all the vicissitudes of our earthly pilgrimage. Holding fast this blessed promise of eternal life, which God, who cannot err, hath given us in Christ Jesus our Lord, it will be to us an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast amid the changing voyage of human life. From all that is lowering and depressing in our present condition, let us direct our thoughts to that glorious day when, with renovated vigour, we shall hail the happy millions of the blessed, and, in the joy with which we shall smile on death, forget all the toils of our terrestrial journey. When we see the friends

of our hearts consigned to corruption, let us rejoice that it is only for a season that their lovely or venerable forms are thus to be defaced and scattered: we shall yet behold them in renovated loveliness, and hear their voice retuned to sweeter melody in Immanuel's praise. And as we draw near to the house appointed to all living, as we hear the worm calling us to be his companion, and corruption waiting to make of us a prey,-let us rejoice that the voice of the Son of Man shall one day reach us in that dread abode, and, shaking off the fetters of the tomb, we shall rise to join the jubilee of the ransomed of the Lord. 66 Wherefore," fellow-pilgrims and fellow-sufferers in this vale of tears, let us "comfort one another with these words."

SERMON VII.

JAMES, i. 13.—" Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.”

IN the language of Scripture, the words tempt and temptation are employed in two very different senses. They are frequently used to denote the trial or proof of human virtue. Men are said to be tempted, or thrown into temptation, when their faith and virtue are tried and put to the proof by the circumstances in which they are placed, or by the peculiar dispensations of Providence towards them. It is in this sense that God is said to have tempted Abraham. By the circumstances into which he brought the patriarch, he exercised and confirmed those dispositions of mind,-that spirit of faith and readiness to obey and suffer,-which fitted him for being the subject of Divine communication, and the great progenitor of Him in whom all the families of the earth were to be blessed. It is in this sense also, that the term temptation is used by the Inspired Writer in the preceding part of this chapter. He employs it to denote the means by which a wise and gracious Providence exercises the graces and improves the character of the faithful. My brethren," says he, "count it all joy when

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