the angel of the Lord passed through the land of Egypt, and smote all the first-born in Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh upon his throne to the first-born of the captive in the dungeon; and there arose a great cry in Egypt, for there was not a house in which there was not one dead. A terrible and heart-rending calamity in any case, enough to break the heart of all Egypt; and it did break the heart of Egypt, and the proud heart of Pharaoh himself, and they let the people go.

But this was a religious affliction too. Most of these first-born children, probably all the firstborn of the priests and nobles, and of Pharaoh himself, were consecrated to some god. They bore the name of the god to whom they belonged; that god was to prosper and protect them, and behold he could not. The Lord Jehovah, the God of the Hebrews, was stronger than all the gods of Egypt; none of them could deliver their servants out of his hand. He was the only Lord of life and death; he had given them life, and he could take it away, in spite of all and every one of the gods of the Egyptians.

So the Lord God showed himself to be the Master and Lord of all things. The Lord of the sacred river Nile; the Lord of the meanest vermin which crept on the earth; the Lord of the

weather-able to bring thunder and hail into a land where thunder and hail was never seen before; the Lord of the locust swarms-able to bring them over the desert, and over the sea, to devour up every green thing in the land; and then to send a wind off the Mediterranean Sea, and drive the locusts away to the eastward; the Lord of light, who could darken even in that cloudless land the very sun, whom Pharaoh worshipped as his god and his ancestor; and lastly, the Lord of human life and death, able to kill whom he chose, when he chose, and as he chose. The Lord of the

earth, and all that therein is;

before whom all

men, even proud Pharaoh, must bow and confess, 'Is anything too hard for the Lord ?'

And now, I always tell you that each fresh portion of the Old Testament reveals to men something fresh concerning the character of God. You may say These plagues of Egypt reveal God's mighty power, but what do they reveal of his character? They reveal this: that there is in God that which, for want of a better word, we must call anger; a quite awful sternness, and severity; not only a power to punish, but a determination to punish, if men will not take his warnings—if men will not obey his will.

There is no use trying to hide from ourselves that awful truth-God is not weakly indulgent,

Our God can be, if he will, a consuming fire. Upon the sinner he will surely rain fire and brimstone, storm and tempest, of some kind or other. This shall be their portion too surely. Vengeance is his, and vengeance he will take. But upon whom? On the proud and the tyrannical, on the cruel, the false, the unjust. So say the Psalms again and again, and so says the history of these plagues of Egypt. Therefore his anger is a loving anger, a just anger, a merciful anger, a useful anger, an anger exercised for the good of mankind. See in this case why did God destroy the crops of Egypt—even the first-born of Egypt? Merely for the pleasure of destroying? God forbid. It was to deliver the poor Israelites from their cruel taskmasters; to force these Egyptians, by terrible lessons, since they were deaf to the voice of justice and humanity-to force them, I say-to have mercy on their fellow-creatures, and let the oppressed go free. Therefore God was, even in Egypt, a God of love, who desired the good of man, who would do justice for those who were unjustly treated, even though it cost his love a pang; for none can believe that God is pleased at having to punish, pleased at having to destroy the works of his own hands, or the creatures which he has made. No; the Lord was a God of love even when he sent his sore plagues on Egypt

and therefore we may believe what the Bible tells us, that that same Lord showed, as on this day, a still greater proof of his love, when, as on this day, he entered into Jerusalem, meek and lowly, sitting on an ass, and going, as he well knew, to certain death. Before the week was over he would be betrayed, mocked, scourged, crucified, by the very people whom he came to save; and yet he did it, he endured it. Instead of pouring out on them, as on the Egyptians of old, the cup of wrath and misery, he put out his hand, took the cup of wrath and misery to himself, and drank it to its very dregs. Was not that, too, a miracle? Ay, a greater miracle than all the plagues of Egypt. They were physical miracles; this a moral miracle. They were miracles of nature; this of grace. They were miracles of the Lord's power, these of the Lord's love. Think of that miracle of miracles which was worked in this Passion Week,-the miracle of the Lord Jehovah stooping to die for sinful man, and say after that there is anything too hard for the Lord.

SERMON XI.

THE GOD OF THE OLD TESTAMENT IS THE GOD

OF THE NEW.

(Palm Sunday.)

EXODUS ix. 14.

I will at this time send all my plagues upon thine heart, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people, that thou mayest know that there is none like me in all the earth.

WE

E are now beginning Passion Week, the week of the whole year which ought to teach us most theology; that is, most concerning God, his character and his spirit.

For in this Passion Week God did that which utterly and perfectly showed forth his glory, as it never has been shown forth before or since. In this week Jesus Christ, the incarnate God, died on the cross for man, and showed that his name, his character, his glory, was love-love without bound or end.

It was to teach us this that the special services, lessons, collects, epistles, and gospels of this week were chosen.