out him. But for his unremitting care and mysterious energy, the wheel would be broken at the cistern,' and the perennial stream of life would congeal in an hour, through all its channels. The vital impulse of this living machine, so fearfully and wonderfully made,' would cease, and death would come in to take it rudely down, and lay it away out of sight. It is God who prevents it; who keeps every chord in tune; every valve in repair; every wheel in motion.

And as we are at this moment dependent upon Him for life and breath and all things, so we always have been. Why died we not in the cradle? It was because God sustained us. He cherished the spark, which his own breath had kindled, while as yet it had scarcely begun to warm our infant bosoms. In childhood, so beset with dangers, in youth so reckless of evil, in the noon of life, and in its winter eventide so bleak; in every slippery path, in all our toils, adversities, perils, and escapes, God has been our preserver. Having obtained help of Him we continue unto this day.' But for this, the last fever would have dried up all the fountains of life within us ; the last ague would have shaken us to pieces.

If we have not like many others yielded in the hour of temptation, so as to break, or sadden every heart that cared for us--if we have not become drunkards, and vagabonds, and are not 'cast out an abhorring to all flesh,' it is because the Lord hath prevented us. Who maketh thee to differ from another, or what hast thou which thou hast not received?'

Art thou, my beloved hearer, a disciple of Christ? Once thou wast led captive by Satan at his will, and we saw thee ignominiously 'grinding in his prison-house.' Blind and in chains as thou wast, why didst thou not die

there? Who unbarred the gate, and struck off thy fetters, and brought thee out? Could any finite arm have done it? And since that great spiritual deliverance, who hath sustained thee in the hour of trial, and kept thee 'back from presumptuous sins?' Why have not all thy vows been broken, and all thy best resolutions been given to the winds? Why hast thou not utterly departed from God, and 'crucified his Son afresh?' I know what answer thou wilt give:- Hitherto the Lord hath helped me.'

Is thine eye beaming with hope and faith, lifted to heaven as thine eternal home, and shouldst thou a moment after death find thyself in the temple of God, with the 'general assembly and church of the first born, and an innumerable company of angels,' to whom wilt thou give the glory of 'so great salvation?' Certainly to him that 'sitteth upon the throne and to the Lamb forever.'

If now, from individual christians we turn to the church, and find her strong in weakness, safe in the sea and the fire, gathering her daily harvest of manna in the wilderness, fording Jordan without wetting the sole of her foot, walking unhurt in the furnace, singing in prison, quenching the fiercest flames of persecution with her blood, coming out of great tribulation with her strength renewed, and her garments white, and surviving all her oppressors ;-if we find her thus, and listen to her song, the swelling, thrilling strain will ever be, Hitherto hath the Lord helped me.' For what is yet to come in her militant state, she relies not on herself, but the power of her King; and when she shall finally come up out of the wilderness, she will still be seen 'leaning upon her beloved.' At the gate of heaven she will shout,' Hitherto hath the Lord helped me,' and then the echo will be lost in her eternal song.

But is the church more dependent on God for help, than those are who associate for any important purpose ? Who can go forward without him? Who can say 6 mine own arm hath gotten me the victory?' Who in carrying forward any enterprise of great public utility can, without robbing God,' take the glory to himself?

Secondly. It is the prerogative of God to afford help in his own appointed way, and in his own good time.

He does it in his own way. And he has not seen fit to bind himself to any invariable method of operation. Sometimes his agency appears in one form and sometimes in another. During more than four thousand years from the creation, many of the deliverances which he wrought for his people were miraculous; and his immediate agency was scarcely less obvious in others. Thus, for their sakes, Egypt was desolated by his plagues; the waters of the sea stood up in walls to give them a dry passage; the Philistines were chased by his thunders; and the Assyrians were smitten by his angel. At one time we see Daniel coming unhurt out of a den of hungry lions; at another, his three friends emerging safe from Nebuchadnezzar's fiery furnace; and at another, the doors of a prison opened by an earthquake. Moses smites the rock, and the waters gush out; Joshua speaks to the sun and moon, and they stand still in the heavens. Elijah prays, and the hostile captains with their fifties are burnt up by fire from heaven,-again he prays, and the sacrifice and the wood, and the stones of the altar, are miraculously consumed together. Elisha also prays, and a whole army is smitten with blindness--he prays again, and their eyes are opened. Moses lives forty days and nights without food; the persecuted Tishbite is fed by ravens, and girded with more than mortal strength, the

son of Manoah snaps the Philistines' new ropes and withes, and crushes them by thousands beneath the ruins of their temple.

But miracles having answered the end for which they were designed, are not now to be expected or prayed for. We look not for manna from heaven, nor for water from a flint, nor for the gifts of tongues and of healing. Nor do we stop to inquire why these gifts have been withdrawn.

It is worthy of remark, however, that it never was God's usual method to help, or deliver his people by miracles. It was only on great and worthy occasions, that he came forth from the secret of his pavilion, and put aside those second causes in which ordinarily was the hiding of his power.' Thus when the Tabernacle was to be erected, he assigned the work to Bezaleel and Aholiab, and prepared them for it by endowing them with 'wisdom and knowledge in all manner of workmanship, -to devise cunning works, to work in gold and silver and brass; in cutting of stones to set, and in carving of timber.' So when the Temple was to be built, Hiram was endowed with extraordinary skill for the work, and was secretly influenced to lend his assistance. In like manner, when after the Babylonish captivity, the holy city and temple were to be rebuilt, and the poor captives had not the means even of returning to their own land, instead of carrying them back by a miracle, or taking the great work out of their hands, God disposed Cyrus to give them the most efficient aid and encouragement; and strengthened them according to the magnitude of the undertaking.

In all this, so far as I am able to judge, there was nothing materially different from what takes place in our own

times. If God now draws the veil a little closer over his mighty efficiency, there is no diminution of power, no deficiency of help, no want of qualified instruments, nor of instances in which the minds of men are swayed by a secret and divine impulse.

It should always be kept in mind, however, that in the aid which he affords, God interferes not with the physical laws of the Universe, nor with the fundamental laws of mind. He does nothing to render human forethought needless, nothing to encourage idleness, nothing to interfere with voluntary and accountable agency. Certain is it that God made man to act, and to act freely while he is acted upon-to help himself at the same moment that he is receiving aid from his Maker. How different this exercise of divine power upon a rational mind from that which plumes the insect, heaves the billows, and rolls the heavens.

Whether, as some eminent theologians have believed and taught, the subjects of a saving change by the Spirit of God are active in the very moment of regeneration, as well as before and after, we have not time to inquire, nor is the decision of this question, at all essential to the present argument. The simple question now before us is, how, or in what way does God aid mankind in the duties of their respective callings; but more especially, in devising and executing plans for the puplic good? Is it by taking the work out of their hands? Is it by furnishing them with plans already matured, so as to excuse them from thought and invention ? Or is it by enlightening their minds, by endowing them with skill to contrive, strength to execute, and courage to go forwardby removing obstacles and securing to them all needful co-operation? I need not wait a moment for your an