England. Thus much however is plain, that, if one man, through an evil-boding fancy, and from want of a right sympathy with the present order of things, may imagine dangers where they do not exist, motives, at least equally strong, may blind others to them where they do exist. And it should be borne in mind, that nations also, when they have begun to sink, have scarcely any power to check their descent; and that, unless some happy shock drives them upward, they commonly continue to fall with an ever increasing velocity. Most needful therefore is it that we should hold fast to that Faith, which alone can keep us from falling, inasmuch as through it we hold fast to Him who alone is able to do so. Yea, this is the more needful, in proportion as we have the greater weight to support, as there are mightier powers dragging us downward, powers only to be overcome by that which overcometh all things. And what a ghastly crash would it be, sounding to the uttermost shore of the universe, if England, with her thousand crowns of glory, and with the Church of God in her heart, were to fall down into hell! Let us not boast that our morality is purer than that of other nations, and that therefore we are safe. There is no stability for morality, except in Faith. The stern severity of the old Romans did not withhold their degenerate descendants, when the ancient Faith had been supplanted by Epicurean materialism and utilitarianism, from plunging into the lowest abyss of debauchery. A right understanding on the distinction between Faith and Reason, with the accompanying conviction that the separation and opposition usually establisht between them are utterly groundless, is not merely of importance as a speculative truth, but also because no errour on any great question bearing upon the moral nature of man has ever become dominant in the schools, without spreading abroad and producing much practical mischief. This twofold errour, that Faith is an operation of the Understanding, and that its sole dealings are with matters which transcend the range of the Understanding, — has been a main cause in propagating that disastrous notion, which has been so prevalent during the last century and a half, that Religion has no concern with the affairs of ordinary life, that it is a garb of mind which a good man will wear on a Sunday, but which every man of the world, every man of sense, how the very names on which they pride themselves condemn them! - will cast aside during the rest of the week, that it is the peculiar province of the clergy, into which the laity have no business to intrude, - that its rightful seat is in the church, but that it would be out of place in the market or the senate. In the Romish Church, one might have thought, these worldly tendencies, so natural to man, would have been kept in check by those ordinances of ancient wisdom, which had carefully provided that every important act of our human life should be consecrated by the express sanction of religion. But this beneficent purpose was counteracted by that narrowminded and most uncatholic jealousy, which made the clergy desirous to maintain a monopoly of religious knowledge: whereby, according to a righteous judgement, the monopolizers themselves were the sufferers, and, instead of Christianizing the world, became themselves secularized. With us, on the other hand, whatever tends to render us the children of this world has an ally of formidable power in our intense commercial and manufacturing energy; which not only furnishes the Prince of this world with endless stores of baits and snares to catch souls with; but which fosters and stimulates our lower intel - lectual faculties, faculties conversant with objects below man, and thus reminding us of our superiority, while it rather checks and stunts the higher faculties, designed to soar toward objects above man, and thereby awakening a consciousness of our inferiority; which withdraws us from that immediate intercourse with nature, where at each step we see marks of a power independent of man, and immeasurably surpassing his loftiest conceptions; and which places us where everything is stampt with the impress of man's intellect, and attests his triumphs. In this manner the Prince of this world contrives, even in a Christian country, to engross all but the whole of men's time and thoughts; being aided and abetted in so doing by that philosophy which excludes Faith from his domain. He is willing to allow, if you insist upon it, that there is a God far away, in some undiscovered corner of the universe. But he will not allow that God can be present amongst us. He will not allow that the kingdom of heaven can have begun already. No! he says: possibly it may come by and by, nobody knows when: but Here and Now is the kingdom of earth of that I am the soverain: therefore fall down and worship me. Thus the separation of Faith from Reason undermines the power of Faith, casts it out from its boundless empire, shuts it up in a remote island, and leaves it to perish there; as it needs must when it is not fed by the daily offerings of the heart. Whereas the rightful sphere of Faith is the whole invisible universe, as the ground and life and substance of the visible. In all the works of the creation, in the whole order and course of the world, it sees and feels and acknowledges the invisible things of God, even his eternal power and godhead. It feels that God compasseth its path, and its lying down, and spieth out all its ways. Hereby it gives substance to the things that are unseen. It beholds them and gazes upon them as the true living realities; while the things that are seen become the mere perishable garment in which God is pleased to clothe His laws, the signs and tokens of His creative Will. And when Faith performs its still higher office, of piercing through the dark vapours of sin and death, until it discerns the Cross rising out of them in heavenly peace,-when falling down at the foot of that Cross it lays hold on God's salvation and redemption, it becomes the assurance and conviction of the things that we hope for. May such Faith be granted to us! May we ever acknowledge with our minds, and feel in our hearts, that God is the only eternal reality, and that all things else are only real, so far as they are in Him! Then, when the pulse of Time has ceast to beat, we shall see Him in whom we have believed: we shall see that Sin is swallowed up in death, and that whatever is of God liveth for ever. 87 SERMON IV. POWER OF FAITH IN MAN'S NATURAL LIFE. 1 John v. 4. This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. AFTER the discussion concerning the nature of Faith into which we have entered in the former sermons, there will be little difficulty in answering the second question proposed at the outset of our argument,—namely, whether Faith is a totally new principle, peculiar to Christianity, altogether alien from every principle by which mankind had previously been actuated; or whether, like love and obedience, and most of the virtues enjoined in the Gospel, it be not rather the perfection and consummation of what had already existed, the conversion of it to its right object, and the consequent enlargement of its power and range. At first thought indeed it would seem as if there could hardly be a doubt upon this point. As Christianity appeals to our Faith, it would seem that there must needs be something in man, whereto that appeal is addrest; that there must be something in him like Faith, imperfectly developt, it may be, latent or dormant, waiting for the manifestation of Him in whom we are to believe. As he who believeth and is baptized shall be saved, and he who believeth not shall be condemned, it would seem as if there must be a |