of their faith or their obedience. He prayed as fervently and unweariedly, as if all depended on prayer alone-he laboured to keep his body under subjection with as unceasing vigilance as if all depended on his own watchfulness—he trusted in divine grace, as entirely as if he could do nothing himself-he strained every nerve and faculty as energetically, as if he could do all things. He prayedpreached-toiled-suffered-obeyed-as zealously and perseveringly, as if he believed heaven was to be the purchase of his own obedience and sufferings. He looked away from all these for acceptance and salvation to the obedience and sufferings of Him, who alone is worthy-with the exclusive and adoring regards of one, who knew that heaven was the purchase only of His precious blood! Oh! who can behold without the deepest admiration and awe, such a devoted and holy life of the greatest of saints, accompanied with such a simple undivided trust in the merits of the Saviour of sinners.

Happy had it been for the Church of Christ, if the life of St. Paul had always been contemplated as affording the safest and most satisfactory commentary on his doctrines, and a portion of his spirit had always rested on the expositors of his creed.

How many an absurd, and many an angry controversy about faith and good works might have been prevented, if the exalted character and conduct of the Apostle, had been allowed to bear testimony to the sanctifying nature of that faith, to which he has annexed such glorious promises and privileges-then would it have been discovered, that in the mind, as in the preaching, of this great champion of the Gospel, there was no separation between faith and obedience, but a hallowed and indissoluble union, ordained by God himself; and what God had joined together, he did not dare to put asunder. His whole life indeed, from his conversion to its close, was one beautifully consistent exhibition of the hallowed influence of that pure and powerful principle, which he has himself declared to be the sum and substance of Christianity," faith working by love." Yes, my friends, the faith of St. Paul, (and ours must be like his, if ever we desire such a crown of glory as he now wears) was no floating speculation of the head, or frenzied dream of the imagination; but an enlightened and influential conviction of the understanding; an indwelling, and ever-animating affection of the heart-calm, but not cold-fervent, but not feverish: it was reverential love towards the best of Parents-confiding ten

derness towards the kindest of friends—the fidelity of an attached servant to the most generous of Masters-inspiring the most profound veneration for His character-the most cheerful obedience to His commands-the most affectionate zeal for His glory: it was a firm trust in Almighty power and divine promises, a realizing anticipation of expected glories, which triumphed alike over this world's fascination and its fear: it was gratitude for love that passeth knowledge, and blessings that transcend all praise; a gratitude too deep and too intense to be satisfied with the language of thanks, however cordial, or the songs of adoration, however rapturous; a gratitude that struggled to express its overpowering and unutterable feelings by the only means within its reach, the devotion of the whole soul to the great Father of Spirits-the consecration of the whole life to the God of his salvation.

With him, indeed, in all the comprehensive fulness of that phrase, so brief in expression, but so boundless in spirit, to live was Christ; and who may estimate the constraining influence unceasingly exercised over the heart and life of St. Paul, by that one reflection, He died for me! He seems never for an instant to have lost sight of Him, who met him on the way to Damascus-the glory of that great

light from heaven, appears for ever shining round about him; the accents of that divine voice for ever sounding in his ears; like the prophet's servant, he beholds himself, in his high warfare against sin and Satan, encompassed with a glorious array of more than mortal strength, the armies of the living God, followed, wherever he went in his heavenappointed journies, by hosts of angels, rejoicing over the sinners that repented at his preaching; and this flings an air of unspeakable grandeur around him; he stands forth so clearly accredited as the ambassador of Jehovah, commissioned with a message of mercy to a lost world; there is stamped on his character such a visible impress of the divine image; there breathes in his language such inspiration from on high-the voice of the spirit of God; so much of the simple majesty of truth; the sublime rapture of devotion; and when in his addresses to his beloved converts, the inmost recesses of his soul are thrown open to our view, we behold a peace so profound a hope so triumphant-a joy so unspeakable and full of glory-an eye so fixed on God-a heart so resting in heaven -a spirit so wrapt in eternity; that while we gaze in ardent admiration on his heavenly cha

racter, encircled with such a bright halo of celestial splendour, we are too apt to forget, that instead of merely looking on it for a moment as a lovely picture, giving it the heartless tribute of our praise, and then hurrying past to lose all recollection of its divine features, amid the business and amusements of an ensnaring and polluting world, we are bound by the most solemn obligations, and invited by the most persuasive motives to study it attentively, and copy it faithfully—to be followers of him, as he also was of Christ. Yes, my friends, we are not to admire St. Paul as some brilliant object of a system with which we have no connection; but as the brightest of those luminaries which move round the centre of all spiritual attraction, the source of all spiritual light and life-the Sun of Righteousness; and it should be our most, indeed our only intense solicitude to know, that we ourselves belong to the same glorious system; surrounded by the same pure and peaceful atmosphere, brightened with the same reflected splendours, and preserved in our heavenly course by the same attractive influence: for we may rest assured, that all, not thus attracted, and enlightened, however they may sparkle for a time, and