Each man that dares to curse JEHOVAH on his throne; each victim of intemperance and lust; each wretch on which the eye fastens in the lowest form of humanity, has an immortal nature that shall live beyond the stars, and that shall survive when "the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll!" The shadowy vale of death will soon be past, and the thoughtless and guilty throngs will be found amid the severe and awful scenes of eternal justice! Christian, pray, pray, O pray for a REVIVAL OF PURE RELIGION IN THE GUILTY CITIES OF OUR LAND!

SERMON VI.

THE DUTIES OF CHRISTIANS IN REGARD TO

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REVIVALS.

NOW WHILE PAUL WAITED FOR THEM AT ATHENS, HIS SPIRIT WAS STIRRED WITHIN HIM WHEN HE SAW THE CITY WHOLLY GIVEN TO IDOLATRY." Acts xvii. 16.

Two very opposite effects are produced on different minds by difficulties and embarrassments. One is to dispirit and dishearten, the other is to animate with augmented ardour and zeal. The former is the effect produced on the mass of mind; the latter is that produced on the few. The multitude become intimidated, and give over effort as hopeless; the few who are bold and resolute, who act from convictions of principle and conscience, or who see a prize worth exertion, are stimulated to greater efforts by every new difficulty, and develope resources of invention and talent before unknown to themselves, and surprising to their friends. This it is to be great; and this constitutes the real greatness of the few who have deserved and received the name.

The record of the visit of the Apostle Paul at Athens, furnishes an illustration of this principle; and I know not that a better one can be found. It was the first time when he had been there; but not the time when he first learned its fame. He himself had been born in a city whose schools rivalled those of Athens; and there is reason to think that at some period of his life he had been familiar with the more distinguished classic productions in the Greek language; and he was certainly not disqualified for appreciating the eloquence, and the elegant arts of that city.-Longinus thus speaks of Paul: "The following men are the boasts of all eloquence, and of Grecian genius, viz. Demosthenes, Lysias, Eschines, Hyperides, Isæus, Anarchus, Isocrates, and Antiphon, to whom may be added Paul of Tarsus," certainly qualified to appreciate what to a classic mind must have been interesting, nay, almost entrancing, in Athens. Her schools, her academic groves, her wonders of art, it might have been supposed, would have attracted the attention of such a mind. What an opportunity of examining for the first, and perhaps the last time, the immortal works of Phidias and Praxiteles! What an opportunity for mingling in the circles of the most refined society in the world! How vain

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would it appear to be for such a stranger, a solitary and unknown man, to attempt to produce a change in the religious condition of that city, or to produce there a revival of religion!

The effect on his mind of a survey of the state of things there is described in my text. "His spirit was stirred within him, when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry." The spirit of Paul was roused here, as it was every where, by the prevalence of sin, and he was led to put forth augmented efforts, in view of the very difficulties before him.

In this instance we have an illustration of the feelings which a Christian should cherish in the midst of a great city. They were feelings such as Paul himself cherished in the midst of gay and voluptuous Corinth, when he resolved that he would know nothing there save Jesus Christ, and him crucified; which he had in Ephesus, where he laboured so assiduously for the overthrow of idolatry, and for the conversion of its multitudes to God; and which he had in Antioch, in Philippi, and in Rome. I wish at this time, from the feelings thus manifested by Paul, to offer some remarks on the duties of Christians in cities and large towns, particularly with reference to revivals of religion; and I shall set my

views before you in a series of observations all bearing on this point, to show what Christians ought to do to promote revivals of religion in such places.

I. My first observation is, that religion first showed its power, and especially in revivals of religion, in cities and large towns. There the Gospel met every form of human wickedness, and showed its power to triumph over all. In Jerusalem, the seat of pharisaical pride and hypocrisy, and of dependence on the mere forms of religion; in Antioch, the rich and commercial emporium of Syria, and the seat of all the affluence and luxury that commerce produces; in Ephesus, the strongest hold of idolatry, and the place to which tens of thousands resorted to pay their worship at the shrine of the most splendid temple in the heathen world; in Philippi, long the capital of Macedonia, and filled with all the sins that usually pertain to court; in Corinth, the most gay, and voluptuous, and sensual, and dissipated city of the age-the Paris of antiquity; and in Rome itself, the capital of the world, and, like London, the common sewer of the nations; in all these places the Gospel showed its power, and achieved its earliest triumphs. In each of these, flourishing churches were established, and