tion of all your hopes, and the completion of all your joys * : and by adding virtue to virtue, and grace to grace, ensure to your- selves an entrance, not like that of a mere wreck, but like a ship in full sail, even " an abundant entrance into the kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ"."]
* 2 Pet. iii. 12. " 2 Pet. i. 5, 10, 1 1.
Ps. XXV. 1 1 . For thy vames sake, 0 Lord, pardon m'me ini- qiiltij ! for it is great.
GOD is a mighty Sovereign, " who doth according to his own will," " neither giveth account to us of any of his matters." We may indeed mark the traces of wisdom and goodness in every thing which he does ; but " his ways and his thoughts are very different from ours, and far above them." In the dispensations of his providence he pays no regard to the moral characters of men, but " makes the sun to shine equally upon the evil and the good." In the dispensations of his grace too he is far from pre- ferring those whom we should think he would select. He often inclines the hearts of " publicans and har- lots to enter into his kingdom," while he leaves less abandoned Pharisees and Formalists to perish in their sins. This, if it be an humiliating truth, is also re- plete with comfort. If it take aAvay all grounds of boasting, it cuts off at the same time all occasion for despondency. If he " have a right to do what he will with his own," the vilest person in the universe may approach him with a comfortable hope of acceptance, and may address him in the language of the text.
In these words of the Psalmist we may notice,
I. His Confession —
David was not ashamed to confess that his sins were exceeding great —
[There is no reason to think that David in this psalm ad- verts to his transgression with Bathsheba. It is probable that the psalm was penned many years before that event. The Royal Penitent speaks rather of his in-dwelling corruptions. He had long been accustomed to observe the workings of his own
heart.