remembrance the days of illumination, cannot fail to furnish cogent excitements for the improvement of your baptism; and to stimulate you to maintain your profession, notwithstanding your past or present afflictions. With these reflections, combine the words of my text, and they will produce a still stronger obligation to improve your baptism. You then did put on the Lord Jesus. He is still your Captain, Lord, and King. He is worthy of your strongest attachment his cause and warfare are holy and glorious; and, eventually, you shall be more than conquerors through him that loved you. Therefore my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

IV. You cannot recollect your baptism without possessing a warm desire to improve it as a special incitement to HOLINESS OF LIFE. Indeed, this is the design of all the precepts and institutions of Jesus Christ; and it is eminently so of baptism. We are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. (Rom. vi. 4.) No one can read this chapter without perceiving with what force of arguments the apostle vindicates the truth and ordinances of God, from the charge of licentious. ness and immorality; and, at the same time, states their uses in promoting godliness. Christ was raised from the dead by the glory, or the exceeding greatness of the power, and Spirit of the Father, and which was anticipated at his baptism. When John raised up Jesus from the water of Jordan, the Saviour immediately entered into the new life of his ministry, though surrounded with enemies; and, when he arose from the dead, as our Redeemer and Forerunner, he entered into the new life of glory in the highest heavens amidst the shouts of angels. From the same pattern, and the baptism of believers, Paul immediately draws one of the strongest arguments and incitements to holiness of life. Even so, or in like manner, we also should walk in newness of life; maintaining a course of temper and conduct, the very reverse to what it

had been in our former ignorance and unbelief. But, it intends more than this. Walk in newness of life! I wish I possessed an adequate ability to explain to you this charming and most animating part of the sentence. It enters into the very essence of personal and practical religion, and the purpose for which you are especially to improve your baptism. This spiritual life in you is capable of being renewed, day by day. Its graces and its virtues, as celestial fruit will progressively grow to maturity. Your union with Christ, and your communion with your God and Father will be more intimate and delightful; and will produce the most amiable tempers and firm confidence while passing through this world of sorrow.* We have old habits to mortify; new resolutions to form; increasing aspirations after God to be cultivated; new duties to be performed, or new trials to be endured. Indeed you must be very young in religion, not to know, that every new duty, and every fresh trial, requires an increase of knowledge, faith, and strength, to enable you to persevere, and to gain the victory. Christ is the fountain from whence you first derived your new life; and it is by the influence of his Spirit, that you are to receive more abundantly, so as to walk in newness of life, whether in the experience of your soul, or in your profession and conduct. For this purpose Paul reminded the believing Romans of their baptism, and the same is obligatory upon you. God has appointed means equally suited to the proper use of our rational faculties and our faith; and these are evident, both in Baptism and the Lord's Supper. The figures, or signs, address our understanding, while our faith conducts us through them to the Lord

Arise to newness of life. Christian; let this charming sentiment powerfully pervade your breast every morning you arise; for, while you are in the arms of slee, you are in the image of death. I have no authority from the scripture to say, that your going into, and arising from your bed, is an emblem of your baptism. But, it may remind you of your submission to the authority of Christ in that institution, as well as to familiarize to your mind your going to the bed of death, and your looking for the morning of the resurrection to everlasting life. It cannot but produce a more happy temper, a conscientious walk, and a more sacred discharge of your duties; and, of course, you will enjoy more of that felicity which is to be attained in walking humbly and closely with your God.

Jesus, and the ends thereby to be answered. Now, reflect on your baptism, and these observations will appear to be of utility. When by the hands of your minister you were raised out of the water, your heart then did resolve to walk before your God in newness of life. Every time you reflect on your bap tism; and whenever you attend the baptism of others, remember your obligations to die unto sin, and to live unto righteousness. And you will also find that by considering the time since, the paths which you have trodden, and the multiplied favours you have received from your God; the stronger will be the exercise of your resolution anew to devote yourselves to your Lord, and live to his glory. Thus may you have your fruit upto holiness, and, in the end, everlasting life.

V. The last recommendation I shall offer you as individuals, for the improvement of your baptism is, to invigorate your HOPE, in prospect of a glorious resurrection from the dead. Whatever may contribute to this important object, must be to you of the greatest importance. Sufficient has already been said, in this discourse, to instruct you, that the baptism of Christ, was an emblem both of his death and his resurrection, and also of his people in union with him. The believer too, in following the example of his Lord, not only testifies by his baptism, a death unto sin, and a new life unto righteousness: but in it he views the emblem of his own expected natural. death, and certain hope in Christ, to attain the resurrection of the just. Paul reasons so clear and forcibly upon this delightful subject, that we cannot but perceive the justness of his deductions. If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection. Now, if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. That the institution of baptism, is intended to describe the death and burial of the body, is easy to be perceived. Immersed in water, the person is buried, enters another element, and, for the period of time, is, as it were, out of the world. And, while the person is within the water, the functions, which produce active life, are, in a manner, suspended. These, combined, give us the strongest

C

emblem possible, of the death of the body.-Of course, emerging, or being raised out of the watery grave, is a most lively representation of a resurrection from the dead. With these views, and with such hope, you approached the water of baptism. It was not death you beheld, but its likeness; it was not its substance, but its shadow. Christ, by his death and burial, disarmed death of his envenomed sting, and reduced, what I may with certainty call, his penal substance, so that the shadow only remains for his believing children to pass through. And is it possible for any thing more charmingly to realize to you the shadow of death, than the water of baptism? Cheerfully, by faith in Christ, you committed yourselves into the hands, of your minister; he immersed you within the liquid element, and your person arose with an animating glow! Let the frequent remembrance of your performing that solemn service, sensibly impress your minds. Plead more ardently in the language of the apostle, That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death, if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. (Phil. iii. 10, 11.) Soon will you arrive to the waters of death. Then, you will commit yourselves, not into the hands of a man, but into the arms of your Divine Saviour, who will safely bear you through, and make you partakers of a glorious resurrection to everlasting life.

Having attempted to assist you, as INDIVIDUALS, to improve your baptism for the purposes of increasing your HUMILITY— enlivening your AFFECTIONS-maintaining your PROfession -promoting your HOLINESS OF LIFE-and to invigorate your HOPE of a glorious RESURRECTION from the dead: I shall claim your attention a few more minutes to show you, that a CHURCH, as such, may likewise improve the ordinance of baptism, for the purposes of maintaining and enlivening their UNION in the faith and fellowship of the gospel.

On this subject Paul wrote an animated epistle to the church at Ephesus, beseeching them to walk worthy of the vocation

are ONE.

wherewith they were called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. And, to stimulate them to this holy union, and to these important practices, he named SEVEN UNITS as so many reasons, comprising the chief doctrines of the Gospel. There is, said he, ONE body, and ONE Spirit, even as ye are called in ONE hope of your calling; ONE Lord, ONE faith, ONE baptism, ONE God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. (Eph. iv. 1-6.) To the church at Corinth, he wrote with the same design. As the body is ONE, and hath many members, and all the members of that ONE body, being many, are ONE body: so also is Christ. For by ONE Spirit are we all baptized into ONE body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into ONE Spirit. For the body is not ONE member, but many. (1 Cor. xii. 12-14.) The sum of these addresses, may be thus stated: Christ in his person, and with the Father, The church IN Christ, though of many members, are ONE. And although its various members have their dif ferent faculties and offices, analogous to the human body, as the eye, the ear, the hand, the feet, the head: yet all have their proper places and uses in the ONE body, as God, to the pleasure of his grace hath set them for the beauty and benefit of the whole. The unity of this body, is admirably expressed by ONE baptism. ONE element of water; ONE Christ; ONE profession of the Gospel; consequently, the solemn and frequent recollection and improvement of this ONE baptism, is, in the highest degree, calculated to promote unity, peace, order, and happiness among the respective members of a Gospel church.-In addition to these reflections for the use of churches, I am disposed to say, that MINISTERS too, besides their Christian character, may, and ought to improve their baptism. What obligations are they under to their Lord for putting them into his service, and granting them his supports, and success in their labours! Paul could not forget the memorable time when he was baptized by Ananias, and straightway preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of