receptive and retentive of heavenly impressions." Grow in grace every day, and then you will get good by all God's dealings.

There are several graces which dispose the soul to spiritual proficiency; such as sensibility of conscience, tenderness and brokenness of heart, which prepare the mind to receive divine culture, and mellow it for "the seed of the kingdom." A similar effect is produced by a clear perception of spiritual wants, a conscious feeling of the guilt and burden of sin, earnest breathing after God, with intense and longing desires for the assurance of His favor. These capacitate the soul for both sanctifying and satisfying incomes. Strength of grace is usually attended by sweet manifestations of the Divine presence and blessing. "I write unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you." Strong and well furnished Christians have many precious epistles from heaven.

4. Treasure up persevering graces. Store your hearts with such elements of steadfastness, constancy, and progress, as may carry you through the world, and through death, and land you safe on the shore of eternity. Of this kind are sincerity, humility, faith, hope, love, the fear of God, delight in Him, resignation to Him, unwavering decision for Him, contempt of the world, and

desire of heaven. If you have these, you shall never fail. Unsound professors may and will fall away; but such as are thus rooted shall grow up as high as heaven. Hypocrites may seem to climb up many steps towards heaven, and yet come short of it. But he, who ascends by a ladder that has sincerity at the bottom, and perseverance at the top, shall not miss of glory. O see to the uprightness of your hearts, and the genuineness of your graces! Be not mistaken in regard to your state. Build high, by laying the foundation low. If the root of the matter be in you, it shall not be eradicated; saving grace will end in eternal blessedness. The girdle of truth, "the breast-plate of righteousness," "the shield of faith," the shoes of heroic resolution, "the helmet of hope," the sword of the Spirit, and constant, fervent prayer, will help the struggling believer to a glorious victory; and God himself will, at the last, place on his head an imperishable crown. If you possess and cultivate these graces, you will hold on, and hold out. If "your love abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment," you will "be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ." Is it not your dearest hope to arrive safely in heaven? Then lay for yourselves a deep and stable foundation, in evangelical faith and repentance, and in all the princi

ples of vital godliness, and the superstructure shall surely be crowned with eternal life. Press forward, and aim ever at perfection. Heap up graces, of such kind, and in such number and measure, that "so an entrance may be administered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." The great direction, prescribed in the whole of the passage of which this citation forms the close, is, that the believer should successively add one degree and sort of grace to another. The original word, which is translated, "add," contains an allusion to the dances of virgins in the Grecian Chorus, who linked themselves hand in hand, and went through their part in a connected order. And it is observable, that in the clause which has been quoted, the same word is used to express the adding or ministering to the advanced Christian an entrance into the happiness of heaven; thus denoting the nearness and propinquity between the highest degrees of grace, and the state of glory. The chain of divine graces reaches from the first uniting grace of faith, to the crowning and God-enjoying grace of perfect love; and these virgin-graces, joined hand in hand in a believing soul, lead it higher and higher, till they bring it into the presence of the Prince-into the splendors of the Bridegroom's chamber. O how sweetly

will you move onward to heaven, led by these concatenated graces; the Lord himself still holding the end of the golden chain, and drawing your souls every day nearer to glory! We" are kept by the power of God, through faith, unto salvation." The Lord, by preserving and strengthening the grace of faith, will uphold us in all our conflicts, and conduct us in triumph to His everlasting kingdom. By His assistance, as the efficient cause, and in the exercise and increase of all graces, especially faith, as the means, we shall persevere unto the end. Thus should Christians treasure up sustaining graces, that they may not faint by the way; that their last may be more than their first; and that the fabric of their piety may be raised as high as heaven. Let this, how ever, be firmly fixed in your mind, that Christ, and Christ only, must be your foundation, and that you can build on Him aright only by deep self-abasement and renunciation of sin. You will never have a perfection of degrees, unless you have a perfection of parts in integrity of heart; nor will you ever reach final glory, unless Christ, by His merits and by His Spirit, draw you up with Him in His own ascension. Look well, then, to your interest in His atoning blood, and, having done this, then grow in grace till grace expand into the holiness and bliss of heaven.

CHAPTER XII.

EXPERIENCES TO BE TREASURED UP.

A FURTHER class of precious and useful things which the believer should lay up, is composed of those various experiences which meet him in all the passages of his life. By collecting and preserving these, he may secure much benefit; for to do so, is a plain duty, a mark of wisdom, and a means of more. Thus the Psalmist, after a glowing record of the varied operations of Divine Providence, says, "Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even they shall understand the loving kindness of the Lord." As if he had said, They, that set themselves to consider the Lord's works in the world, have wise and observant spirits, and shall grow still wiser, and see more of God in His dispensations than other men. God opens His secret cabinet to those who devoutly study the developments of His moral government. But, on the other hand, he views, with severe displeasure, those who are blind to His dealings, and threatens them with the heaviest punishment. "Because they regard not the works of the Lord, nor the