time the attitude in which we should come before God is the attitude of sinners humbly seeking forgiveness. With no plea of self-righteousness, with no thought of any merit, with no complacency in view of our good lives or good intentions, with no expectation of favor on the ground of any right or claim, but remembering that all favor is of grace, that all notice is of condescension, that in God's sight we are guilty beings, and that our first want is that of forgiveness, we are to sue for it in humility, in deep self-abasement, "God be merciful to us who are sinners!"

This is acknowledging the true relation in which we stand. The relation is that of sinners. No self-delusion can prevent us from seeing this. So long as we know that there are duties which we have put by, opportunities which we have not improved, gifts for which we have not been thankful, invitations which we have unheeded, and clear, positive laws which we have not obeyed, how can we possibly conceal the fact that for all this we are guilty? There is no man liveth and sinneth not. Frailties and infirmities cleave to the best, so much as to make humble confession and earnest entreaty for forgiveness perpetually necessary. What, then, must be the case with all others, who live so easy and careless, who give so little of their hearts to Him to whom their whole heart is due, and whose rule of life is their gain, their pleasure, their reputation, their ease, and not the law and pleasure of Him whose they are, and whom they are bound to serve? Yes, we are indeed sinners, to an extent which we do not know. Angels and spirits above us, who see our capabilities and obligations, see our guilt, too, far more clearly than we see it; but no thoughtful survey of our condition

can fail to open our eyes to it, or to bring the conviction that we are like those servants who knew their Lord's will but did it not. The attitude, then, of penitents pleading for mercy is the attitude which becomes such beings as we, there is fitness and propriety in it, - there is a call and necessity for it, the prayer, "God be merciful to me a sinner! "" is the

our condition demands.

prayer which

This is the attitude and prayer, moreover, to which the Gospel endeavours to bring us. The very first word which the Saviour uttered in his preaching was Repent. In all his discourses he addresses man as a sinner, who has need of forgiveness. He came into the world on purpose to give repentance unto Israel, and forgiveness of sins. Everywhere he holds up a pure and holy standard, that by looking at that men might see their own short-comings and sins; and everywhere he presents the Father in the light of a placable and gracious being, who would never refuse forgiveness to repentant supplication. Thus he sought to bring us into that state of self-humiliation in which we shall cry to God for mercy. Prayer for forgiveness was one of the petitions included in the brief model which he gave to his disciples when he taught them to pray. The poor sinsick prodigal, returning in low self-abasement to his father's house, and the humble publican, smiting his breast, and saying, "God be merciful to me a sinner!" - for what were these pictures drawn, if not to show us the way of our approach to Him from whom we have wandered, and against whom we have sinned? When, then, we do approach Him in this way, we may be sure we are right; when we come renouncing all thought of our own merits and claims and rights, when we come

under a lively sense of our ill-deserts, and plead humbly for compassion and pardon, we come in the way which Jesus directs and the Gospel requires, we come in the spirit which the Bible, from one end of it to the other, enjoins, and without which we may seek and pray in

vain.

Still again the prayer of one who feels himself to be a sinner, and is humbly pleading for God's mercy,— that is the prayer which is most effectual with God. We may suppose that the same principles operate in the breast of the Divine Father which are so effectual in the breast of an earthly father. How it is with us who are parents we all well know. Never are the parental feelings so much moved as when the disobedient child returns, and says, "Father, I have done wrong; do forgive!" The greater have been his wanderings and the deeper has been his guilt, the more do our hearts yearn towards the supplicating penitent. Every evidence of his sense of self-abasement, and every imploring look for our mercy, touches fountains of pity and love in our hearts which have never before been so deeply moved. We know that we love all our children, but for this one we feel a depth of interest and affection which we are not conscious at the time that we entertain for the rest. Now it is certain that Jesus does authorize us to transfer these feelings of an earthly parent to the breast of the great Father in heaven. For observe what it is that he tells us : "There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth"; and then, recognizing the same fact in the feelings of God which I have just named as what we are conscious of ourselves, the Saviour adds, "more than over ninety-and-nine These are a

just persons who need no repentance."

father's feelings. Other children, good and obedient though they are, do not for the moment so move his heart as that one repenting child. How strongly is this brought out in the parable of the Prodigal Son! Coming back to excuse his delinquencies, to palliate his crimes, and to attempt to justify himself, the prodigal would not have been received; he would have been driven forth from the door, as unworthy of a father's forgiveness, unworthy of the companionship of that elder son who had never disobeyed. But coming in a different attitude, coming owning all, disclosing all, feeling all, coming self-abased, broken-hearted, asking only to be admitted as a servant, how could a father's heart resist this? The fatted calf must be killed, and more rejoicing made than ever the elder son saw, though he had never transgressed. These, I say it again, are a father's feelings, and they are the feelings of the great Father of all. He who seeks Him in low self-abasement, in earnest entreaty for mercy, will find God's ear open to hear him, though no other prayer be heard. Nothing is sooner heard in heaven, and nothing is more effectual there, than the simple words, coming from a contrite heart and from humble lips, "God be merciful to me a sinner!"

Neither, as I add in the fourth place, is any thing more effectual for our own deepest peace. Because, for this, a man must feel that he is in a true relation to God. We are accustomed to speak of the joys and satisfactions of worship, prayer, and a religious life. But suppose all this is outward and formal, standing in decencies, proprieties, and respectabilities, and covering up secret depths of guilt in the heart, which have never yet been probed and laid open to the light of God's eye, then there must be a perpetual consciousness of

hollowness and insufficiency, which will be fatal to all true enjoyment of religion. Much of what is called religion, in the world, is of this character, and can yield only unsatisfying fruit. Built upon the idea of a generally correct moral life, a fair compliance with virtuous precepts, and a bodily attendance upon ordinances of worship, it may minister to self-complacency and spiritual pride, but must be a stranger to the deepest and holiest peace. That can come only from a true relation to God, - from a conviction that we do know ourselves, that the deepest places of bosom-sins, and self-delusions, and secret faults we have laid open to the light, have confessed all and deplored all,

have dared to look upon the nakedness of our souls, concealing nothing, excusing nothing, and taking the lowest place of self-renunciation and abasement. It is from this point that all true peace begins. God enters that heart which has thus emptied itself of every self-reliance and every secret guile. No washing cleanses like the tears of penitence; no fire purifies like the loathing of all sin. If all spiritual experience be not a delusion, no emotion exceeds the thrilling joy of a consciousness of pardoned sin.

"Sweet was the time when first I felt

The Saviour's pardoning blood
Applied to cleanse my guilty soul,

And bring it home to God."

I am speaking of what we do know by our own experience if we are truly Christians. There have been times when we have searched ourselves, and have probed our hearts to the quick. We have felt naked, and helpless, and sinful, and have lifted up our voice for pardon, and have found the words of our text the fittest