3. For what does the sinner sell the blessings of the gospel? Not for value received;-but for mere trifles-one morsel of meat-a momentary gratification, he parts with the joys of heaven. It may be for the sake of present ease-or for a title of worldly honor-a puff of noisy breath-or perhaps for the sake of obliging a companion, who is the enemy of Godor for the sake of indulging some beloved lust.

In the indulgence of these pleasures, the conduct of the sinner may be attended by the stings of conscience. It is true, no one expects to complete the bargain. But many do it. Temptation comes, and conviction gocs.

Now I would ask the sinner to consider well for what he is about to part with heaven. Count the cost. "Thus saith the Lord, ye have sold yourselves for nought." O, for what trifles sinners sell their souls. Lysimachus, king of Thrace, suffering under extreme thirst, offered his kingdom to the Getæ, for the means of quenching it. His exclamation, when he had drunk, is very striking. "Ah! wretched me, who for such a momentary gratification, have lost so great a kingdom." How applicable this to the case of him who, for the momentary pleasures of sin, parts with the kingdom of heaven.

4. The consequences. "Afterwards, when he would have inherited the blessing"-My hearers, there is an afterwards. O, if there was not, we would not trouble the sinner. Forty-five years afterwards when Esau would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected. How different now are his feelings. The story is related in the 27th chapter of Genesis. When he found that God in his providence had given the

blessing to Jacob, though it was in accordance with his own voluntary conduct, how did he then feel? When he heard the words of his father, he cried with a great

and exceeding bitter cry. O, how great, and exceeding bitter will the cry of the sinner be, when it is forever too late to retrieve his loss. He said to his father, "Bless me, even me also, O, my father." But he found no place of repentance. He could not induce his father to change his mind, though he sought it carefully with tears. So it will be with the sinner. On the judgment of the great day, he will cry, Lord, Lord, open unto me, but the door will be shut.

Reflections.

1. What great consequences are sometimes connected with little circumstances. For one morsel of meat for the indulgence of one sinful appetite or passion, under certain circumstances, heaven is bartered away.

When the sinner is anxious for his soul, one word of contempt dropped in his ear-one sneering look, may occasion the loss of his soul-his absence from one interesting meeting of inquiry, may terminate in the loss of his conviction, and the loss of salvation. How great the danger of the sinner! "If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?"

2. What a solemn thing it is to live. The sinner is on trial once for all.

"Let us not lose the living God,

For one short dream of joy,

With fond embrace cling to a clod,
And fling all heaven away."

SERMON XXXI.

The sinner slain by the law.

For I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.-ROMANS Vii: 9.

THE time to which Paul alludes in the text, is doubtless the time when he was on the way from Jerusalem to Damascus-when he was struck to the earth, and remained three days without sight.

We will consider

I. The life which Paul lived.

II. The death which he died.

I. He lived what many regard as a very moral life. 66 My manner of life from my youth, which was first among mine own nation at Jerusalem, know all the Jews, which knew me from the beginning, if they would testify, that after the straitest sect of our religion, I lived a pharisee." This was regarded very much to his credit.

He appears to have been very conscientious.

"And Paul earnestly beholding the council, said, men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience until this day."

He was also sincere. "I verily thought" he says, "that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth."

He was very zealous. "I am" he says, "verily a man who am a Jew-brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, and taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers, and was zealous toward God, as ye all are this day."

"I profited in the Jew's religion above many mine equals, being more exceeding zealous of the traditions of the fathers."

If any man could assert a claim to heaven on the ground of his own righteousness, Paul could do it. "If any man have whereof to glory, I more-as touching the righteousness of the law, blameless." So far as external conduct was concerned, he regarded himself, and was regarded by others as blameless.

But notwithstanding his zeal and activity in religion, he had no true knowledge of his own heart, and no right principle of action. He was alive without the law. The law of God reveals the great principles of right moral action. Of these, he was perfectly ignorant.

When he says that he was without the law, the meaning cannot be, that he had no Bible. He was doubtless better acquainted with the contents of the Bible than most of his brethren; for he was taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers. He had the best of advantages. But although he was acquainted with the letter of the law, and could probably repeat from memory much of the Bible; yet he was totally ignorant of the spirituality and extent of the law.

II. The death which he died.

Of course he did not mean that he died a natural death, for he was then alive.

men

guage implies that he found himself under of death; for he says, when the commandne, sin revived, and I died. He found himself under the curse of the law. "Cursed is every one who continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them.”

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Again-He found himself destitute of all spiritual life. To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." The language which he so often uses in his epistles on this subject, he knew to be true from his own experience. "Dead in trespasses and sins."

Again-All his self-righteous hopes were slain, and he felt that he was utterly lost.

Reflections.

1. Many think themselves to be Christians when they are not. They have not been under conviction. of sin. They have not seen and felt that they were condemned, and that they were dead in trespasses and sins.

2. We see the importance of preaching the law. No sinner can see and feel his need of pardon and salvation, until he sees that he is lost-none are convicted of sin without a knowledge of the law-"By the law is the knowledge of sin." "I had not known sin but by the law." None can feel their need of Christ, till they feel that they are condemned. It is true that sinners may be greatly distressed, and have great fears of hell without conviction. Hence the need of preaching the law that sinners may see their need of pardon and salvation.

3. Sinners that are under conviction, realize that they are waxing worse and worse. Thus it was with