of God which are accompanied with so much pleasure.

The divine perfections are the immediate object of the mind in these contemplations. These are what make the Most High to be that glorious Being which he is, and which therefore so much engage and delight the renewed mind. Indeed it is only by knowing them as they are discovered to us in his works and by his word, that we know God at all. The perfections of God, I say, are the primary objects, but the relations in which he stands to us are necessarily included, inasmuch as they bring home and endear those perfections to us.

In enlarging on the perfections of God, I will notice the distinction between those which are NATURAL, and those which are MORAL.

1. By NATURAL perfections I mean,

(1.) Almighty Power. "I know," saith Job, "I know that thou canst do every thing;" and again, the Psalmist, "God hath spoken once, twice have I heard this, that power belongeth unto God;" and the full conviction, the deep veneration, with which these sentiments are uttered, could not, I am persuaded, be separated from very delightful impressions of mind. Again : "The works of the Lord are great: " "Come, behold the works of the Lord, his mighty and his terrible acts." The great Majesty of God is itself

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a subject of delightful meditation, and one in which the saints of old greatly exult. To comthe works of Him that sitteth in the heaven, high over all from the beginning, with the puny efforts of the mightiest of mortals: to think how he bringeth to nought the counsels of princes, disconcerting with a word or look all their profoundest plans,-while-though “the heathen rage and the kingdoms are moved "—yet "his counsel standeth fast, and he performeth all his pleasure: "the meditation is grand, and, connected with the other considerations we are to notice, sweet. How sweet, for instance, to remember amid the tempestuous reign of impiety and tyranny, which often threatens the very existence upon earth, of the church of God-how sweet to remember that "the Lord on high is mightier" than all his adversaries; and that his eye is ever upon his church; that he doth water it every moment,' and supplies it with hidden strength that "lest any hurt it, he will keep it night and day;" and. that the gates of hell shall never prevail against it."

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(2.) Again: The Omnipresence and Omniscience of the Almighty are equally sublime, and equally delightful subjects of thought. Observe that noble contemplation of them which we have in the hundred and thirty-ninth Psalm, and the happy

effects which it wrought upon the mind of David. Nothing can hide us from the eye of “Him with whom we have to do." No evil can befall us, and he knoweth it not. "His eyes did see our substance yet being imperfect, and in his book were all our members written, as in continuance they were formed." Every step of our lives has been noticed by him, and as he first "breathed into us the breath of life," so will he lead us down to the gates of the grave, and not till he wills shall they open unto us. "O how precious are thy thoughts concerning me! how great is the sum of them!" How passing all astonishment, that to His mind present themselves at once, and without any confusion, all things past, present, and to come: all the thoughts of the hearts of all rational beings, throughout universal creation. Well may we say, "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it; "-my mind can in no degree grasp it. O how wonderful is this Glorious Lord God Almighty!

(3.) Equally incomprehensible, and equally delightful to be contemplated, is the Eternity of God. Connected with it, we shall speak of his Immutability. We are but yesterday come into being, and to-morrow we shall be no more in this world. All the works of men, and even the world itself, may be traced back to a beginning: a little while

ago, and they were not a little while to come, and they shall not be. But, "from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God." All things here are in perpetual flux: all going to decay. But "thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail.”

To us creatures of a day, it seems long since the age of the Patriarchs: and there is something extremely pleasing to the mind to reflect,-after all the intervening generations which have passed away, this God to whom I am praying, is the same to whom Abraham the father of the faithful prayed, four thousand years ago: the same with whom Moses interceded, and Solomon, and Isaiah, and the Prophets. This God before whom I walk, is He with whom Enoch walked; to whom Abel sacrificed; with whom Noah found grace: He of whom I meditate, is He of whom David meditated: He is the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever: the same in mercy, the same in goodness, the same in power, the same in truth: He is so; he must be so; I find him so: Our fathers" looked to him-their faces were not ashamed:" and He who pardoned their offences, I trust pardoneth mine. He who blessed them, I trust blesseth me; and will bless my children after me: "Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations."

(4.) This great and glorious Being is also selfexistent and independent. He derives nothing from

any besides, nor can be influenced by any events. His motives for what he doeth are taken only from Himself; therefore he changeth not: "with him is no variableness neither shadow of turning: " He "blotteth out iniquity for his own sake." He is "GOD and not man," therefore the sons of Jacob are not consumed.

2. Let us pass now to the notice of what we term the MORAL PERFECTIONS of God, in which his glory especially consisteth. Those of which we have spoken rather define and mark out Him, to whom the character of unbounded excellence belongs, than themselves form that character. They must in themselves alone considered, be awful. Could they exist apart from holiness, they could never engage or demand our love. But in the character of the Lord our God, along with all that is awful in authority, is united all that is venerable in wisdom, and lovely in goodness. All those excellences which, from their never in any human character meeting so perfectly, as not in some degree to intrench upon one another, seem to be opposite excellences ;-all these blend, and harmonize, and mutually cast lustre each upon the other. In Almighty God, goodness never degenerates into weakness; justice into severity; nor wisdom into excessive caution. More than individual parental tenderness, consists along with