omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which was, and which is, and which is to come, the Almighty."

Though all the perfections of God be infinite, there are faint resemblances of some of them, such as his power, and wisdom, and goodness, in the creature: but the attributes of eternity and immutability belong to him exclusively. The souls of men are by the appointment of God immortal, but neither they, nor angels, nor any created being, can be either eternal or immutable. As they have been brought from nothing into being, so may they again be brought from being into nothing. The whole creation, with all the orders of intelligences which it contains, may as easily be annihilated as upheld in existence. But He who is the cause of all things, whose being is underived, whose attributes are all perfect, is without beginning and without end, necessarily the same always, and everywhere, from everlasting to everlasting, God.

How glorious is the character of that ever-blessed God, to whom these perfections belong! Is he not entitled to our worship and confidence, who has in himself all excellencies, and whose excellencies are all immutable and eternal? Millions of years before there was any thing in space or in duration but himself, before the mountains were brought forth, or ever he had formed the earth and the world, was his happiness infinite in the possession of all perfection, of all sufficiency, of all excellency. His character and perfections he unfolded to the intelligent beings whom, in succession, and in countless numbers, he has called into being. The measureless void of space in which there was nothing, his hand has filled with innumerable worlds. These he has adorned with beauty, has furnished with a rich variety of blessings, has fitted up as the abodes of countless myriads of creatures, and diffuses from the suns which he has lighted up amongst them, life, and warmth, and comfort. But the eternal God himself sits enthroned, without change, or the possibility of change, over this universe. He cannot be affected by any of its movements; the annihilation of suns and of systems can no more alter his plans, than the falling of a sparrow, or of a hair from our head. In himself, in his happiness and purposes, he is independent of all creatures, inhabiting eternity, and filling immensity, as if these worlds and their inhabitants were not. Amid the changes that are continually taking place throughout his dominions, amid the growth and the decay of life, nothing can happen to frustrate his designs, nothing to disappoint him, nothing to change his purpose. His counsel as himself is the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever.

I. The eternity and immutability of God suggest to us a train of the most consolatory reflections. These are the attributes of his nature which render his other attributes of goodness, and wisdom, and faithfulness, a source of comfort to us. For, what were his mercy and his goodness, if the God, whose perfections they are, were capable of change? Where is the foundation of our hope of eternal life, if the God who promises it were mutable? After surveying the emptiness of all human grandeur-the perishable nature of all earthly glory-the number of those generations of living beings, who, like ourselves, have thought, and

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feared, and felt, and hoped, but who have passed away in succession over the stage of life-after reviewing these changes, while surrounded by the wrecks of time, and the desolations of the world, how - pleasing is it to raise our thoughts to the uncreated glories of Him, who, because he is eternal, has everlasting strength! Even amid these desolations, the nature of man, in virtue of the immortality to which it is destined, is still, in its ruins, sublime; it is the nature of a being, who, amidst guilt and darkness, retains traces of former greatness, and to whom hopes are given of renovated glory; and the change and the death which surround him, like the storms of winter before the life and beauty of spring, are ordained to usher in a new heaven and a new earth, from which the present scene of sorrow and of agitation shall have passed away. But viewed apart from these high purposes, the changes and the tumults to which man is now subject, when contemplated in contrast with the stable and unchanging purposes of God, are of a character the most melancholy. The immutability of these purposes is seen in the permanency of those varying evils to which man is born, as well as in the fixed order of that world in which those evils are endured. Amid the unvaried regularity of nature, the memory of man is as perishable as his existence, and of the millions who take their turn in living their short hour on the surface of this earth, how few of even those who employ every art to have their names emblazoned and transmitted to future times, can survive that dark oblivion in which all are at length mingled,

and in which all are buried. Our fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live for ever?.

From this scene of change and of vanity, let us turn away to the eternity and immutability of God. If God be eternal, the portion of his people must be independent of all the revolutions of time. "This God is our God for ever and ever, and he will be our guide even unto death." Ours is a life of change, and the most appalling of all changes is the dissolution of the body; but as He, whose years are throughout all gene rations, is the fountain of our blessedness, and the foundation of our hopes, our real inheritance, that alone which meets the desires of immortal beings, cannot be impaired by time or eternity. Happiness cannot perish so long as God lives. He is the first and the last, the first of all delights, nothing before him; the last of all pleasures, nothing beyond him. In his presence is fulness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore. The God of perfect goodness and wisdom will have variety to increase our enjoyments, and eternity to perpetuate them.

Hence, the stability and permanency of the covenant of grace, the covenant which is well ordered in all things and sure, and which is all our salvation and all our desire. It rests, together with all the promises it contains, on the eternity and immutability of God. He has pledged those awful attributes of his nature for its fulfilment. Willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, he confirmed it by an oath: that by two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us. It is for this reason that the grace conveyed in this covenant is termed the everlasting Gospel the eternal life which God promised before the world began. Its stability is denoted by what is most fixed and permanent in nature, by the ordinances of heaven, by the strength of hills, and by the rainbow in the clouds. "God said unto Noah, the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth." He afterwards expressed, by the prophet, the immutability of this covenant arising from his own unalterable purpose. "As I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee." All the promises of the Gospel, therefore, because their foundation is not in the infirmity of nature, but in the grace of the eternal and unchangeable God, shall surely be fulfilled-fulfilled in securing peace, and life, and joy, to the soulfulfilled in preserving all who are interested in them by the power of God through faith unto salvation. He who has begun the good work will carry it on; nor will he suffer the spiritual life which he has communicated to become extinct; for his gifts and calling are without repentance. "I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from