2. From it he obtained all that his necessities re- quired—
[Did he desire the forgiveness of all his sins ? There he found " a fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness," a fountain capable of washing him from all the guilt he had contracted in the matter of Bathsheba and Uriah. In reference to those very transactions, and to the efficacy of the atoning blood of Christ, he cries, " Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean ; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow 1." Did he need direction in difficulty, support in trouble, and strength for an unreserved obedience ? There he found it all, and from thence derived it in the very hour of need, to the full extent of his necessities. Such were the refreshments which he found there, that corn and wine and oil, and all the delicacies of the universe, could but faintly shadow forth: and thence he derived such treasures as were absolutely unsearchable. Can we won- der, then, that the word of God was, in his estimation, sweeter
k Ps. cxxxviii. 2. ! Ps. li. 7.
than honey and the honey-comb, and infinitely more precious than the finest gold m ?]
3. By it he gained a foretaste of heaven itself —
[The word was to him as Jacob's ladder, by which he held intercourse with heaven itself. By it he ascended to Mount Pisgah, and surveyed the Promised Land in all its length and breadth. In it he beheld his Saviour, as it tvere, transfigured before his eyes, yea, and seated on his throne of glory, sur- rounded by myriads of saints and angels ; yea, and beheld the very throne reserved for himself, and the crown of glory prepared for him, and the golden harp already tuned for him to bear his part amongst the heavenly choir.
I forbear to speak more on this subject ; because, if what I have already spoken do not justify the language of my text, nothing that I can add can be of any weight. Only let any person read this psalm, in which no less than one hundred and seventy-six times the excellency of the sacred volume is set forth in every variety of expression that David could invent ; and he will see, that the language of my text was no other than what every child of man should both feel and utter.]
But from all this, who does not see —
1 . That religion is not a mere form, but a reality ?
[Religion, if it be genuine, occupies, not the head, but the heart and soul, every faculty of which it controls and regulates. Religion is in the soul, what the soul is in the
body O that we all felt it so! But indeed, Brethren,
so it is ; and so it must be, if ever we would enjoy the benefits it is intended to convey ]
2. That we all have very abundant occasion for shame in a review both of our past and present state ?
[We are not, like the unhappy papists, debarred from God's blessed word. The very least and meanest amongst us has free access to it, and may read it for himself; yea, and derive still greater advantage from it than ever David himself reaped ; by reason of the rich additions which have been made to it since his day, and the fuller discovery it gives us of God's mind and will. Yet how many of us read it not at all, or only in a formal cursory manner, without any such feeling as that which is expressed in my text ! My dear Brethren, we suffer loss, exceeding great loss, by our negligence in this respect. Did we but read the word, and meditate on it day and night, and pray over it, and converse with God by it, what might we not obtain, and what might we not enjoy ? "Well — I leave it, with " commending you to God and to the word of his grace,