truth of a future state. Let us then see what effect it would have upon his life. He goes into company. He tells the story of the apparition to his companions. They hear it with derision and ridicule, and consider him as a visionary enthusiast, disturbed in his imagination. As the experience of all mankind is against him, and the laws appear to be fixed for ever, of no intercourse between this world and the next, in whatever companies he tells it, it meets with the same treatment; and all the effect of the apparition is, that it makes every one to conclude him to be beside himself. You all know how difficult it is to remain single in opinion against the whole world. It is still harder to become the object of laughter and ridicule; so that with these difficulties in his way, it is ten to one but he falls in with the opinion of the world, and believes the apparition to have been the phantom of his own fancy. That this is not a mere conjecture, but what would really happen, appears from undoubted matter of fact, that did really happen. You remember the history of SaulWhen the Lord would not answer him by his prophets, he went in quest of a woman who had a familiar spirit. She raised up to him an apparition, which he believed to be the ghost of Samuel the prophet. The apparition as sured him that his kingdom was departing from him, and that he had only one day longer to live. What effect had this upon the king? Did he repent of his sins? At first he was sore afraid. and was melancholy; but through the persuasion of his attendants, he soon resumed his joy; and, on the morrow after the battle was lost, in order to fulfil the prophecy of the devil, he proceeded to commit the most deliberate crime that can be perpetrated by man: -He raised impious hands against his life, and plunged his sword in his own breast.

The fact is, my brethren, mankind are not always in a mood to be convinced. In spite of speculative opinion, men act from their passions, and bad passions will always produce bad actions, to the end of the world. The reluctance of mankind to assent to evidence, when it makes against their preconceived opinion, is remarkably apparent in the reception the Jews gave to our Saviour. All the prophecies concerning the Messiah were fulfilled in him. He appeared in the world in the precise time predicted for the coming of the Messiah: he was descended of the lineage of David: he was born in the city of Beth

lehem. A prophet went before him in the spirit and power of Elias. He performed miracles and mighty works, which no man could perform. But, after all these proofs, after all these miracles, the Jews who expected their Messiah to be a temporal Prince, still demanded more evidence. "Shew us," said they "a sign from heaven." A sign from heaven they obtained. Now, in the presence of multitudes, a voice came from heaven, the voice of the Eternal, piercing the clouds, and proclaiming aloud, "This is my beloved Son!" Were they then Convinced? No: They persecuted him with reproaches in his life. and at last brought him to an ignominious death. And when they had nailed him to the accursed tree, they still affirmed they would believe on him on proper evidence. "Let him come down from the cross, and we will believe on him." If he had come down from the cross, the redemption of mankind would have been defeated, as it was to be accomplished by his death; but he did more than come down from the cross. He rose from the dead. Did they then believe on him? No: They charged the soldiers who brought them the news of his resurrection, to give out that his disciples stole him away while they slept. Well then may we adopt the maxim of the Patriarch Abraham, and affirm, that if ye believe not Moses and the Prophets; if ye believe not Christ and his Apostles; ye will not be persuaded "though one rose from the dead."

Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten vir gins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: But the wise took oil in their ves". sels with their lamps. When the bridgroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a ory made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolisk said unto the wise, Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out. But the wise answered, saying, Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you; but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves. And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready, went in with him to the marriage; and the door was shut.

IN

a former lecture, I explained to you the nature, the origin, and the use of parables. They were the commou vehicles of instruction among the oriental nations. The wisdom of the east loved to go adorned with flowers and with figures, and, by means of the imagination, to make its way to the heart. This mode of instruction was frequently honoured by our Lord's adopting it. Accommodating himself to the practice of the east, and to the manners of the Jews, he wrapt up his wisdom in this veil, and delivered his doctrines to the people in parables. As men are much under the guidance of the external senses and strongly impressed by the material objects around them, he, who knew what was in man, who laid hold of every avenue to the human heart, frequently addressed himself to this part of our frame. He spiritualises the whole system of nature; he turns the most common and familiar occurrences of life into vehicles of Divine truth:

and in the gentlest and most insinuating manner, leads us from earth to heaven.

In the parable which I have now read, the kingdom of Heaven, or dispensation of the Gospel, is likened to a marriage solemnity. On such occasions it was a custom among the Jews, that the bridegroom, in company with his friends, came late in the night to the house of the bride, where, upon a signal given, she and her bridemaids went out in procession to light him into the house, with great ceremony and splendour. It is said that "five of these virgins were wise, and that five of them were foolish." I explained to you, on a former occasion, that, in a parable, we are not to apply particular expressions, but to consider the intention and design upon the whole. If we understood and applied this expression literally, we would be led to conclude, that, under the New Testament, the number of the good and of the bad are equal. But to settle this point, to ascertain the number of those who are to be saved, and of those who are to be damned, was not the intention of our Lord in the parable. For by the same way of arguing, we might infer from the parable of the talents, which immediately follows this, that the number of the good was double the number of the wicked, as there were two faithful servants who improved the talents committed to them, for one slothful servant who wrapt up his in a napkin; and, in the parable of the marriage supper, in the foregoing chapter, amongst all the number of the guests who were called to the feast, there was only one who wanted the wedding garment. Only, from this general scheme of thought which runs through all our Lord's parables, from their being always framed with a view to the charitable side, we may safely draw two conclusions.

In the first place, Let us always form a favourable judgment concerning the character and conduct of those who are externally decent, whether they agree or differ from us in opinion; and, if we do err, let us err on the side of charity. There are a set of men to be found in the world, who are remarkably fond of passing sentence and judgment upon the external state of their neighbours, and in passing this judgment, they attend not so much to the general tenor of life, and integrity of conduct, as to the system of doctrines a man believes, and the sect or party in which he arranges himself. Unless you believe in every point precisely as they do, down you go in their estima tion.

Rash and profane mortal, who gave thee a commission to fix the mark of election and reprobation upon men?Did Almighty God depute thee to draw the line betwixt the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light, to fill the heavens, and to people hell? We are astonished, and stand aghast at the boldness and impiety of the Roman Pontiff, who pretends to open and to shut the gate of mercy, and who arrogates to himself the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And yet thou who accusest him, art thyself equally guilty. Thou rushest unto the throne of the Eternal, and darest to direct the thunder of the Divine vengeance. Thou prescribest bounds to the mercy of the Omnipotent, and sayest to his saving grace, "Hitherto shalt thou come, and no farther." Vile worm! dost thou not tremble at thine own impiety? Fall prostrate in the dust. Shrink into thine own insignificance. Let thy time be employed in working out thine own salvation, ra ther than in dealing of damnation to thy neighbours.

At the same time, though I condemn this rage which some men discover to condemn their neighbours, as in my opinion entirely inconsistent with the genius of the Gospel, and the spirit of Christianity, nevertheless I would not go into their extreme, and pass the same sentence on them which they pass upon others. To pass a judgment upon characters is a difficult task, and requires a very delicate hand. We ought to distinguish what flows from a narrowness of mind, from what flows from a badness of heart. We ought to make great allowances for the prejudices of education. If a man be educated in the belief, that none are to be saved but those who believe every article of that system which he embraces; if his judgment concerning the characters of men rest not upon the goodness of their lives, but upon the soundness of their belief, such a man's charity must be narrow and constrained, And this may sometimes be owing, not to the badness of his nature, but to the badness of his religious principles. And I have sometimes seen such persons, though I must acknowledge very rarely, striving and struggling to get the better of their system; the heart and the affections true to Christianity, whilst the mind was enslaved by the prejudices of education.

Verse 3. "They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them." The foolish virgins seemed at first to resemble the wise, and shone out for a while with