see the Christian, not on any lofty platform, but by the table of his Lord, and thinking on his crown; when I see him, not proudly, but humbly looking up to the skies, and saying my Lord is there—there among all worlds: or when he looks abroad on the footstool, and still beholds his glorious King, I see him in possession of a truth, which, more than all the laws of the material world, harmonizes the universe, and brings light, and peace, and joy to his soul. With this assurance he is satisfied; yea, he is comforted and refreshed. Christ assumes his proper place. Around him all events, whether in heaven above, or on earth beneath, are seen to move. He is the centre in which all the lines of nature and providence meet. He touches the cord, and angels keep their place; and devils keep their place; and wicked men keep their place. They cannot break from their sphere. Hell is naked before him, and destruction has no covering. Heaven is the great metropolis, and Christ is there-there with his sceptre and his throne. This earth is his footstool, and it is not for the worms of the dust to contravene, or oppose his will.

In the third place, you will observe the special purpose for which Christ exercises all this dominion. It is said that he is Head over all to the Church, or for the Church, as the margin bears. The Church's good is the great object contemplated in Christ's providential administration; and in saying so, we of course do not employ the word in any sectarian sense. It were wrong to do so. That kingdom which has Christ for its Head, and all believers for its mem

bers, is not this or that particular denomination of ChrisIt is the Church of the living God, for which

tians.

the Redeemer died; it is the Catholic Church, in its scriptural sense, and as such it must ever remain the one great monument on which are inscribed the praises of the true and the living God. And this it is necessary to take with us in explaining our text. For it will not do in our interpretation of Providence to say, that for that particular section of the Christian community to which we belong all the arrangements of the world are to be made subservient. This were delusion not less dangerous than that of those who would seek to monopolize Providence, as though theirs were the sphere wherein peculiarly God holds empire for the accomplishment of his special purposes. It is not for this or that man that the Governor of the world draws with unfathomable skill the materials of his dispensations; and it is not for this or that body of Christians, but too often frowning defiance on each other, that Christ has been raised to the throne of universal dominion. It is for the Church Universal-the incorporate company of all Christians-and it is when we escape from the low ground of a narrow and sectarian bigotry, and survey the body of which Christ is the Head, that the scheme of Providence appears in all its magnitude and interest. Indeed, it is only in this way that the truth of our text can have its consistent meaning in the Gospel scheme. If it be assumed, that the Eternal Word was made flesh-that He who was before all things, and in whom all things consist, humbled himself, and passing by the nature of angels, took upon him the nature of man-then does the Church ransomed by his blood, and constituting his body, assume its proper place in the administration of heaven.

If it be true that Christ died for it, and for it hath gone into the holy of holies, there to appear in the presence of God-it were only to be expected, that rescued from the usurped dominion of the God of this world, it should not be overlooked in the councils of Him who is its great deliverer. They who were rescued on the cross cannot be forgotten on the throne— and accordingly it is the doctrine of Scripture on this subject, that though in the progress of this world's history, there is many an evolution of the bright and prosperous, as well as of the dark and mysterious— they are travelling onward to the same point. There is an ocean which engulphs all-every thing is tributary to the Church. After the crucifixion, for instance, the Jews had imagined, that if the name of Christ was mentioned in future ages, it would only be as that of an impostor whom vengeance suffered not to live, and the zeal of whose followers had expired at the cross of their master. And yet before many days had elapsed, the Apostles were no sooner visited by the influences of the Spirit, than they appeared openly in the midst of Jerusalem, publishing the resurrection of Jesus to those priests and elders who had condemned him, and manifesting a boldness and intrepidity which shook the councils of the Jewish State. At the death of Stephen too, the energies of the nation were wasted in the despairing effort of destroying the Church-the fires of martyrdom were kindled far and wide in the land-Saul had girt himself for the unholy task, and long after, when Christ laid him, a trembling suppliant, at his feet, and sent him through. the world to labour and suffer and die for his sake, do

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we see in every land the persecuted followers of the Lamb subjected to fury the most relentless, and sufferings the most intense. They had trials of cruel mockings and scourgings; yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonments. They were stoned, were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword; they wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, (of whom this world was not worthy). They wandered in deserts and in mountains, and in dens and in caves of the earth." And yet even then, can we forget that the blood of the martyrs became the seed of the Church? It was at that very season when the Church of the Redeemer was covered with the signals of distress-when the roll of the Prophet was seen flying through the heavens, inscribed within and without with mourning, and lamentation, and woe, that the cause of the Redeemer was awaiting its triumph. Through the darkness of affliction, the light which had shone in Pentecost was struggling to break upon distant lands. Jerusalem and its temple receded in the distance, and strangers welcomed the joyful sound. The first beams of the Sun of Righteousness broke over the nations, uniting the inhabitants of the globe in one family, and in the bonds of a common salvation. And still did the Church out-last it all. The prediction was fulfilled-"Why doth the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall have them in derision."

Such is the doctrine of our text, and it leads us at once into an interior world. We are apt to be detained on the surface of things, and to go no further. If so, it is not the fault of our text. It dismisses all of us to

a consideration of the secrets of Christ's empire. It leads us up and down among his works, and tells us the reason of them all. "For the Church" is the end of Providence-and though you and I, by reason of the darkness which besets us, may not always be able to read it—let us believe it still. How this good is to be subserved, may not always be plain to us-but neither is it so in the history of the solitary member of Christ's mystical body. No doubt he hath the assurance that all things shall work together for good to them who love God-but how that is to be accomplished, whether by prosperity or adversity, he cannot tell. The sunshine of heaven may follow him all the way to the grave— or health may be exchanged for sickness-riches for poverty-friends for foes-and after the brightness of morning, the noon, or the evening of life, may set in with dark waters and thick clouds of the sky. But he does not repine. Having graciously assumed the paternal character, Jehovah has engaged to fulfil the paternal functions. And this he does with a wisdom that never errs-a fidelity that never fluctuates—an affection, that like himself, is without variableness or shadow of turning. His Providence may change its aspect, but his mercy is still the same. Every trouble that grieves, and every comfort that gladdens, is the boon of the same hand-the arrangement of a Father's wisdom, and the appointment of a Father's love-and when earth has given place to heaven, he will praise him there—not merely for the Saviour who redeemed, and the Spirit who sanctified, and the consolations that refreshed, but for the very sorrows which once converted the garment of praise into the spirit of