Oh, let none of these precious occasions be lost! While we have time, let us do good. If wealth has dangers, and we allow that it has, it has also privileges: and the rich man's privilege is, that he may, by a wise use of his riches, secure to himself the respect, and affection, and good-will of his fellow-creatures. It is of a rich man that it is said, "When the ear heard him, then it blessed him: and when the eye saw him, it gave witness to him. Because he delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon him; and he caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. . . . He was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame. He was a father to the poor; and the cause which he knew not he searched out.”

But the parable has, further, a lesson for the poor and the afflicted. And what, my brethren, is this? It is, I think, one of great consolation. They are shown, by what happened to Lazarus, how it may be with themselves hereafter. They are shown, that poverty borne without complaint, afflictions suffered without blaming God's providence, evils of all kinds taken patiently and without repining, have their reward.

It is, I said, a lesson of consolation; but it may not be applied without a caution. It is not simply because we are poor, or in adversity, or in bodily

suffering, that we may reckon on a blessed change at death. But only when, with all our poverty and all our grief, we keep a meek and uncomplaining spirit; neither envying such as are in prosperity, nor calling into question God's dealing with ourselves.

Where such is the case- -where there is the bitter cup with the resigned and contented temper―there, we cannot doubt it, a way is being prepared, through much tribulation, into the kingdom of God—when that man dies, the trouble and the sorrow die with him; he is "carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom."

Lastly: let us take notice of one other thing. And that is, the light which this parable throws upon the future. Sick people, when they are in great pain, and generally men in affliction, are apt to say, "I trust I shall have my sufferings over here, and a better lot hereafter."

Now, it is not wise, nor safe so to speak. First, because the future reward is too great, too glorious, to be put into comparison with any present trouble: and further, because it will be bestowed out of God's free love for Jesus Christ's sake, and not for our own works or deservings.

Still there is a foundation of truth, for this very common mode of speech. Holy Scripture, no doubt, does describe the future as a time of com

pensation: "Blessed are ye that hunger now, for ye shall be filled." "Blessed are ye that weep now, for ye shall laugh." "But woe unto you that are rich, for ye have received your consolation." "Woe unto you that are full, for ye shall hunger." "Woe unto you that laugh now, for ye shall mourn and weep." Such passages—and, I may add, the one in my text- -seem to point to a day when God, who is all righteous, will make His way plain, and show that He "is no respecter of persons," but "a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him."

Let us often have them in our mind; and let us learn from them, not only the plain lessons that afflictions and trials, here endured patiently, "work for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;" but also let us learn from hence, to moderate our desires for earthly riches, and earthly distinctions. Let us not wish to have our "good things" all in our lifetime now, lest there only remain evil things afterwards.

Or rather, I should say, let us take wider and truer views of what "good things" really arenot station—not wealth-not what only ministers to bodily ease and comfort; but a chastened temper, and a heart set on God, and the inward man renewed day by day, and brotherly kindness and charity.

Let us seek-and we cannot too earnestly seek

these, the true riches—and then our happiness will rest upon a good foundation. These are things

which endure-which we do not leave behind us when we die. They are profitable for both worlds. He that chooses these, chooses the good part, and that part shall never be taken away from him.

Shiplake, 1857.

SERMON XVI.

HINDRANCES TO A GODLY LIFE.

GAL. V. 7.

"Ye did run well; who did hinder you?"

OUR Christian life, in Holy Scripture, is likened to a race. St. Paul, not only in the text, but frequently in his Epistles, makes use of this comparison. Thus, in 1 Cor. ix. 24,-" Know ye not that they which run in a race, run all; but one receiveth the prize?" So, again, in his Epistle to the Philippians (chap. ii.), when exhorting them to a blameless life he urges, as a motive, his own joy at their acceptance hereafter, he uses this same figure,—" That I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain." Writing to the Galatians (ii. 2), he expresses himself almost in the same words,-" Lest by any means I should run, or had run in vain.”

Now, this language was employed by the Apostle because of its fitness. He wished, we may think,