come to pass, that instead of sweet smell, there shall be stink; and instead of a girdle, a rent; and instead of well set hair, baldness; and burning instead of beauty." This leads me to mention another circumstance, by which the day referred to in my text is distinguished. It was a day of sore rebuke, as well as of abounding iniqui

ty. "Look away from me," said the prophet, ver. 4. of this chapter, "I will weep bitterly, labour not to comfort me, because of the spoiling of the daughter of my people; for it is a day of trouble, and of treading down, and of perplexity, by the Lord God of hosts in the valley of vision."

Such was the day in which the Lord God of hosts did call to weeping and mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth, i. e. to the deepest humiliation on account of their sins, to the most unfeigned repentance, and amendment of life. That this is the true import of the call, appears from a similar exhortation, Joel i, 12. where, after the Lord had given commandment to blow the trumpet in Zion, and to sound an alarm in his holy mountain, that all the inhabitants of the land might tremble in the prospect of that day of darkness and gloominess, which was soon to be spread over them; he addresses them in these words: "Turn ye even to me with all your heart, with weeping and with mourning, and rent your hearts and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God."

In every age, and in every climate, weeping and mourning are the natural expressions of inward sorrow. In the eastern countries, and especially among the Jews, when grief rose to a great height, tears of lamentations were usually accompanied with rending their clothes, plucking out their hair, and covering their bodies with sack-cloth. And though these outward signs are only the trappings of woe, which are no further acceptable than as they truly express the sorrow and contrition of the heart, yet, in the case before us, they are expressly required of that im

pudent and hard-hearted people, that as their tongue and their doings had been against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his glory, so their shame and sorrow might be proclaimed as openly as their sin, and their penitent return to God might be no less apparent than their proud and insolent revolt had been.

Having made these remarks upon the import of the call, and the state of the Jews in the day it was published to them, let me now,

II. Lead forward your attention to the account that is given us of the reception it met with, ver. 13. "And behold!" It is introduced, you see, with a note-what shall I call it ?-Whether doth it bespeak our admiration or astonishment? The object must surely be wonderful, either for beauty or deformity, to which the great God himself demands our attention with such solemnity.

Say then, my brethren, were you not already acquainted with what follows, would you not expect to see a multitude of humble penitents, prostrate on the ground, and covered with sack-cloth, while, with weeping and mourning, they say one to another, in the language of genuine repentance, "Come and let us return unto the Lord, for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up." But what do we really see? Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid, Instead of mourning and weeping, behold joy and gladness; instead of baldness and girding with sack-cloth, behold every kind of riotous excess, slaying oxen, and killing sheep, eating flesh, and drinking wine.

There is no room to suppose that they had given no at¬ tention to the message delivered by the prophet. It would rather appear that they had attended to it with accuracy, nay, studied its meaning, on purpose to counteract it; for a contrast so minutely exact, a scheme of contradiction so completely adjusted, could hardly have been stumbled upon by mere accident. And indeed the latter part

of the verse puts this beyond all doubt, "Let us eat and drink," said they, "for to-morrow we shall die.”

We are not to imagine that these words were spoken seriously, by one of those presumptuous and boasting rebels. The most daring amongst them must have been conscious, that the aspect of the king of terrors, at their most sumptuous entertainments, would leave them no appetite either for flesh or wine. They meant it as a scoff, a witty saying, for turning into ridicule the warning they had received, but which they did not believe. The prophet hath been telling us of desolating judgments just at hand, and with the same breath he calls us to weeping, and mourning, and girding with sack-cloth. How absurd, how unreasonably cruel is the demand! Will not the evil day come soon enough, though we should not anticipate the sorrows of it, by afflicting ourselves unnecessarily before its arrival? Nay, rather, if life is to be cut short, let us make the most of it while it lasts. If we must die to-morrow, let us eat and drink, and be merry to-day, and crowd into the few scanty hours that remain, as much festivity and pleasure as we can,

Surely it is not needful that I should lengthen out this picture of deformity in all its dimensions.. Its most distinguishing features are abundantly obvious; and I am confident, that the few sketches I have given you, will suffice to render the generation it represents the objects of contempt and abhorrence to all; those very persons not excepted, who, in the portrait drawn for them, may perhaps discover their own true likeness. For it is common enough to condemn with just, though partial severity, the same faults in others which we easily forgive, nay cherish in ourselves. At any rate, I suppose none of us will be surprised to hear the alarming denunciation of wrath against those perverse and obstinate transgressors, which is the

III. Particular contained in my text, ver. 14. "It was

revealed in mine ears by the Lord of hosts, surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye die, saith the Lord God of hosts."

We meet with another threatening of the same import, Ezek. xxiv. 13. "Because I have purged thee, and thou wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more, till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee. I the Lord have spoken it, and it shall come to pass, and I will do it. I will not go back, neither will I spare, neither will I repent, saith the Lord God."

These wicked men had not only resisted the means of conviction, but they had perverted those means, and extracted poison from the medicine intended for their cure. They drew iniquity with cords of vanity, and sinned as it were with a cart rope. By their scoffing reply to the call that was given them, in the name of the Lord God of hosts, they said in effect, with insolent contempt and proud defiance, "Let him make speed, and hasten his work, that we may see it; and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know it." The prophet therefore proclaims, as on the house top, what God had revealed in his ears, that from that time forward, vengeance should pursue those impious men, till, like their rebellious forefathers, whose carcases fell in the wilderness, they should be utterly consumed from off the face of the earth.

Thus have I endeavoured briefly to illustrate the seve ral parts of the passage before us.

But what concern have we in these things? and what improvement shall we make of them?

For an answer to these questions, I need only refer you to 1 Corinthians, chap. x. where, after reciting some of those awful judgments which God had inflicted upon his ancient church, the Apostle subjoins those memorable words, verse 11. "Now all these things happened unto

them for ensamples, and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come."

"The Lord is known by the judgments which he executes." God is always the same: with him there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. And therefore, in his past acts of government, as they are explained by his word, we behold a plan of righteous administration, from whence we may learn, with some degree of certainty, what kind of treatment, in similar circumstances, we ourselves have reason to expect.

They must know little of what passes in the world, who do not observe a very striking resemblance between the present state of our own nation, and that of the Jews, in the day to which my text refers.

Ingratitude to God, for the great things he hath done in our behalf, and for the distinguishing privileges we have long enjoyed, is too apparent to require any proof. Our deliverance from popery at the Reformation, and the full establishment of our civil and religious liberties at the Revolution; these marvellous doings of the Lord are either forgotten by many, as a dead man out of mind, or at least remembered with cold indifference; nay, treated with marks of disaffection by some, while the characters of those illustrious men, whom God honoured to be the instruments in bringing about these glorious events, have been canvassed with the utmost severity of criticism, and under the specious pretext of candour and impartiality, set forth to public view in the most unfavourable light.

Have not vice and immorality grown up among us to an amazing height? Do not multitudes proclaim their sins as Sodom; and, instead of hiding them, do they not rather glory in their shame, as if they accounted it an honour to excel in one species of wickedness or another? I do not aggravate the charge: every one's observation may convince him of the truth of it. Is there not a visible and growing contempt of the blessed gospel? Are not its ordinances despised by some, and profaned by