racterized as " fiery darts V which suddenly pierce and inflame the soul. We may judge in a measure how terrible his assaults are, when we see the Apostle, who was unmoved by all that man could do against hint% crying out with such agony and distress under the buffetings of iSatan*". We shall have a yet more formidable idea of them, if we consider that the Lord of Glory himself, when conflicting with the powers of darkness, sweat great drops of blood from every pore of his body, through the agony of his soul. Can we wonder then if the saints are sometimes dejected through the agency of that subtle enemy?]
3. The hidings of God's face —
[We do not think that God often hides his face from men without some immediate provocation : but we dare not to say that he never does ; because he is sovereign in the disposal of his gifts ; and because he withdrew the light of his countenance from Job without any flagrant transgression on the part of his servant to deserve it. It is scarcely needful to observe, liow painful that must be to those who love God : our blessed Lord, who bore the cruelties of men without a complaint, was con- strained to cry out bitterly under his dereliction from his heavenly Father, " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" And certainly this is the most distressing of all events : " the spirit of a man, when strengthened from above, may sustain any infir- mity ; but a wounded spirit, wounded too by such a hand, who can bear'?"]
Havmg traced out the sources of dejection, let us inquire after,
II. The remedy —
The great remedy for every temporal or spiritual affliction is faith. This, and this alone, is adequate to our necessities. The efficacy of this principle for the space of three thousand six hundred years is declared in the 1 ith chapter to tlie Hebrews ; toward the close of which, we are told what it enabled them to do^, and what to siiffer\ It was that which the Psalmist pre- scribed to himself as the cure of his disquietude :
1. '' Hope in God"—
[We are too apt in our troubles to flee unto the creature for help™. But it is God who sends our troubles ; (" they spring not out of the dust",") and he only can remove them. We should therefore look unto him, and put our trust in him. This