Ver. 2.-Delight in God. "Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways." Religion is little if it is not. delight in God. This is its true touchstone. It is what we lot•e that- constitutes an abiding test. If we do not feel at heart the blessedness of reJ;gion, we may discover that we are only seeking it for selfish safety, or for the world's approval of a respectable name. I. THE DAILY ORISON. We seek that which we desire; and how ingenious is love in finding word..s of communication and opportunities of intercourse of heart with he:i.rt ! A look 111ay carry witn it prosperity and hope. Prayer is not in words, nor, let us remember, is it in thoughts; it is what we desire that we really pray for. Our wishes are our supplications. What yonr heart is eager after is the devotion that God scl's. "Search me, 0 God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts." "'l'hey seek me daily." Communion with God is not a. cry in danger, or a beseechrnent in hours of special anxiety and necessity; it is an Enoch-like life-a. "walk with God.'' II. 'JHE DELIGHTFUL KNOWLEDGE. "Delight to know my ways." 1. That they may follow God. 2. That tl,ey may see God in everything. 3. That they may please God. 4. That t!,ey may be prepared to live in him and with him/or ever.-W. M. S. Ver. 2.-Practical godliness. "As a nation that did righteousness." No word occurs oftener in the Bible than this word "righteousness." It is the granite founda- tions of God's government. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" And it i:a this which is the salt of a nation. "Righteousness cxalteth a nation." There may be much sentimentality in human beings without the cardinal virtues; but, wanting these, all else is meretricious and hollow. I. THE GLORY OF ISRAEL. They were not a large nation, nor were they in tho sirict sense a military people. But they had this high vantage-ground of influence-the God-given laws of Sinai, and the prophets of the Lord of hosts to counsel and reprove thnn. But tucir glory was not simply that they had the Law, or knew the Law, but that they did rigliteonsness. And this was their true guerdon. Whilst they so lived they were safe, honoured, and happy. 'l'heir fall was from within. The armies of Rorue only ov1Jrthrew them because the nation's heart was corrupt. The rotten fruit drops-the storm only expeditts its fall. II. THE GLORY OF ANY NATION. This, and this a.lone, is glory. Not vast ileete and imposing armies, not a full exchequer and extensive colonies, but righteousness. 1. Equity in jurisprud-ence. 2. Honour in trade. 3. Justice to all anrl for all. 4. Purity in moral,, Of' a right government of the paBBi<>nl. 6. :l'aimeas to all otht!r tu1,tioaa.-W. M. S. on, LVm. 1-14.] THE BoOK OF TBE PROPHET ISAIAH. 379
Ver. 6.-.A religious fast. "Is not this the fast that I have chosen?" Which? The contrast is seen in the inclusive words from the fourth to the ninth verses. God docs not delight in outw!\rdness. The mere mannerism of religion, or the head bowed as a bulrush, with sackcloth and ashes beneath, is hateful to the Most High. I. FASTING 18 TO DE REALLY RELIGIOUS. It is to "loose the bands of wickedness" -to free one's own soul from the la3t shackles of lust and selfishness, and to aid in liberating the souls of others. Religious effort is to deal directly with character, and not with the countenance; with the habits of evil, and not the ritual of ceremonies. II. FASTING IS TO BE DEEPLY BUMAN. It is to care for our brethren in the world. 1. Many are heavily burdened. Care writes its lines on the anxious brow, and often the heart is grey while the hair is yet black. 2. Many are oppressed. Justice is the subject of bribery, and wealth lords it over poverty; moreover, slavery existed then, and has done till recent years, and the war against slavery has come from religious men. 3. Many are under varied yolces. Yokes of intemperance and pernicious habit-of selfishness in its worst forms of cruelty to others. 4. Many are helplessly poor. Not through crime, or faults of their own, such as indolence and inebriety, but through sudden calamities and severe illnesses. We must feed the hungry and cover the naked. 6. Many are neglected by their own. The workhouse has received to its dull shelter those connected with the well-to-do and the well-born; or "relatives" have never been inquired after, sympathized with, or succoured. "And that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh." 'rhese words in Isaiah teach us that the ancient Law was not simply legal and cere- monial, and outwardly sacrificial, but social, moral, an<l religious in the highest degree. Such Law Christ came not to destroy, but to fulfil.-W. M. S.
Ver. 8.-2'7ie break of day. "Then shall thy light break forth as the morning." The hindrances to progress in God's Church are not in Divine limitations, but in human perversions. I. THE LIGHT IS THERE. We hide it under the bushel of our formalism and world- liness. Divine revelation gives it-yea, keeps it alive; an<l if we remove the obstacles to its glory, it will burst forth. Many blame religion for the faults and formalities of nominally religious men. II. THE BEVEJ,ATION OF THIS LIGHT 18 A MOBNmG. Mornings have often come alike in Jewish and Christia11 history. Isaiah awakened the Hebrew nation to e. new life. Medimvalism with its dark superstitions, the inquisition with its abhorrent cruelties, did not destroy Christianity. What has been well called the " morning of the Refor- mation" came. Look back now to Savonarola, and you will see what one man can do to herald a better day in darkest times. Then I Not by an accident in history, nor by an arbitrary decree of God; but by obedience to his Word and by the baptism of bis Spirit. And beautiful as are all mornings, when the sun touches the clouds with gold, and fills the earth with splendour, and makes dancing sunshine on the sapphire sea, none are so beautiful as the mornings of new moral life for the world.-W. M. S.