Yet God knows <>very dark thought and guilty memory; we can hide nothing from him. He regards all sinful thoughts ~nd feeli~gs ~vith unutterable hatred; yet he knows them every one. But while hatrng our sm with unappeasable hatred, he loves us with unspeakable love. He looks at our thoughts and weighs them, because they are ours, and he would save us from the vain :md sinful ones, and inspire and strengthen ,rithin us the wise and good ones. Bis love for us is as great as his knowledcre0 of us and leads him to interest himself in all that concerns us. ' III. MosT ADMO:ls'lTORY. 1. No thoughts are unimportant. Since the Lord takes knowledge of, and is so deeply interested in, all that arises in our mind, nothing there can be trivial. You think that your foolish or vain thoughts are of no importance, that they are not like words or actions which affect others; that thoughts influence n~ one so long as they remain unexpressed. But your thoughts give tone and colour to your mind and character. To a great extent they arise out of your character, and they react upon your character according to your treatment of them. If you foster the impure thought, it will make you more impure; if you entertain the trivial thought, it 'll"ill increase your triviality. Your mind is God's temple. Should you not take heed bow you treat it? 2. .All our thoughts should be such as he approves. They should be: (1) True. He exhorts us to "buy the truth, and sell it not;" to "prove all things; hold fast that which is good." He is himself the" God of truth." Jesus Christ is" the Truth." We should cultivate the true in thought in every department of knowledge and of life. Endeavour to think only those thoughts which accord 'll"ith the reality of things. Be true. (2) Pure. Shun with loathing the unchaste desire or impure feeling.~ Yon cannot prevent the low or foul suggestion; but you are free to welcome such suggestion, or to shrink from it with repugnance. Welcome it, and it will corrupt you. Resist it, and it cannot contaminate you. If you would be free from impure thoughts, you will gain your end most swiftly and surely by cultivating pure and beautiful ones. If your thoughts be true and pure, God will smile approval, etc. Be pure. (3) Earnest. Let not your true and holy thoughts be dreamy, visionary, impractical. We are in a world of toil and trial, sin and sorrow, sickness and death, a world that cries for help; and God demands earnest thought with a view to noble life and work. CONCLUSION. 1. Here is warning to the wickerl. God knows all your life and thought. You cannot hide anything from him (cf. Job xxxiv. 21, 22; Ps. cx.x.xix. 1-6; Heb. iv. 13). And be who knows us will also judge us. "Cleanse thou me from secret faults." "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin." 2. Here is encouragement to the good. God knows your thoughts, devices, purposes, motives. He never misunderstands yo1L If, like Job, you are misjudged by man, you may say , with him, "But he knoweth the way that I take." Therefore be encouraged.-W. J.
Vera. 14-20.-.A suffering people scorned by man and comforted by Gorl. "Again the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, thy brethren," etc. 1 A BUFFERING PEOPLE SCORNED BY THEm BRETHREN WHO THOUGHT THEMSELVES SEClIBE. (Ver. 15.) A considerable number of the fellow-countrymen of Ezekiel were, like him, suffering the privations and sorrows of exile; and the people that still remained in Jerusalem, instead of pitying the exiles, despised and insulted them. They spake of them: 1. .As refected of God. "Unto whom the inhabitants of Jeru- salem have said, Get you far from the Lord; " or, "Be ye far from Jehovah." 'l'hese proud dwellers in Jerusalem thought that the presence of the Lord Jehovah was confined to the temple in that city, that the captives in Babylon were cut off from his presence, and rejected by him. '!'hey judged from outward appearances, and concluded that, because they were still in their own land and in the sacred city, while their brethren were in exile, they were the favoured people of God, and their brethren were cast off by him. And they came to this conclusion not sorrowfully because or the p1ivations of their brethren, but with Pharisaic self-complacency and cruel disdain. 2. As having no portion in the l,a,nd of Israel. The inhabitants of Jerusalem assumed that they who had gone into captivity had forfeited their estates, and that those estates should become the property of those who remained in the country. They said, "Unto us is this land given in possession." That which they unjustly denied to their exiled brethren the;y claimed for themselves. They arrogated to themselves an exclusive OH, XI, 1-25.] THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL. 209