that the righteous shun you, because your example would contaminate them? Have you discovered that your character is not held to be estimable among honest and respectable men? Let me assure you, that you have good reason to be afraid, for if you cannot stand the trial of an honest fellow creature — if the law of your country condemns you — if the very laws of society exclude you — if the imperfect judgments of earth pronounce you too vile for its association, how fearful must be your condemnation when you are put into the far more rigid scale of God’s justice, and terrible must be your fate when the perfect community of the firstborn in heaven shall rise as one man, and demand that you shall never behold their society? When a man is so bad that his fellow creatures themselves, imperfect though they are, are able to see in him, not the mere seeds, but the very flower, the full bloom of iniquity, he should tremble. If you cannot pass that test, if human opinion condemns you — if your own conscience declares that opinion to be just, you have good reason to tremble indeed, for you are put into the balances and are found wanting.
8. I have thought it proper to mention this balance. There may be some present to whom it may be pertinent, but at the same time, there are far better tests for men, tests which are not so easily misunderstood. And I wish to go through some of these. One of the scales into which I would have every man put himself, at least once in his life — I say at least once, because, if not, heaven is to him a place, the gates of which are shut for ever — I would have every man put himself into the scales of the divine law. There stands the law of God. This law is a balance which will turn, even if there was only a grain of sand in it. It is true to a hair. It moves upon the diamond of God’s eternal, immutable truth. I put only one weight into the scale; it is this: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, and with all your strength,” and I invite any man who thinks himself to be of the right mettle, and flatters himself that he has no need of mercy, no need of washing in the blood of Jesus Christ, no need of any atonement — I invite him to put himself into the scales, and see whether he is full weight, when there is only as much as this one commandment in the other scale. Oh, my friends, if we only tested ourselves by the very first commandment of the law, we must acknowledge that we are guilty. But when we drop in weight after weight, until the whole sacred ten are there, there is not a man under heaven who has one grain of merit left, but must confess that he is short of the mark, — that he falls below the standard which the law of God requires. Mrs. Too-Good has often declared that she herself has done all her duty, and perhaps a little more; that she has been even more kind to the poor than there was any occasion for; that she has gone to church more frequently than even her religion requires; that she has been more attentive to the sacraments then the best of her neighbours, and if she does not enter heaven she does not know who will. “If I have not a portion among the saints, who can possibly hope to see God’s face in light?” No, madam, but I am sorry for you; you are light as a feather when you go into the scales. In these wooden balances of your own ceremonies you may, perhaps, be found heavy enough; but in those eternal scales, with those tremendous weights — the ten commandments of the law — the declaration is suspended over your poor foolish head. “You are weighed in the balances and are found wanting.”
9. There may, perhaps, in congregations like this, be some extremely respectable person who has from his youth up, as he imagines, kept God’s law; his country, family, or associates can bring no charge against him, and so he wraps himself up and considers that really he is the man, and that when he appears at the gate of heaven, he will be received as a rightful owner and proprietor of the reward of the righteous. Ah, my friend if you would take the trouble just to sit down and weigh yourself in the scales of the law — if you would take only one command, the one in which you think yourself to be the least guilty, the one that you imagine you have kept best, and really look at its intent, and spirit, and view it in all its length and breadth, in truth I know you would keep out of the scale and say, “Alas, when I hoped to have gone down with a sound of congratulation, I find myself hurled up, light as the dust of the balance, while the tremendous law of God comes sounding down and shakes the house.” Let each man do this, and every one of us must retire from this place saying, “I am weighed in the balances and I am found wanting.”
10. And now the true believer comes forward and he claims to be weighed in another balance, for he says, according to this balance, if I am what I profess to be, I am not found wanting, for I can bring with me the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ, and that is full weight, even though the ten commandments of the law are weighed against it. I bring with me the full atonement, the perfect satisfaction of Jesus’ blood, and the perfect righteousness of a divine being, the spotless righteousness of Jesus the Son of God. I can be weighed against the law, and yet sit securely, knowing that now and for ever, I am equal to the law. It has nothing against me since Christ is mine. Its terrors have no power to frighten me, and as for its demands they can exact nothing from me for they are fulfilled to the utmost in Christ. Well, I propose now to take professors and put them into the scales and try them. Let each of us put ourselves into the scale of conscience. Many make a profession of religion in this age. It is the time of shams. There were never so many liars in the world since the days of Adam, as there are now. The Father of Lies has had more children at this time than at any other period. There is such an abundance of newspapers, and of talkers, and of readers: and consequently lying reports, wrong news, and evil tales, are far more numerous than ever. So, too, there is a great deal of vain show with religion. I sometimes fear we have not a grain more religion in England now than we had in the time of the Puritans. Then, though the stream in which it ran was narrow, it did run very deep indeed; now, the banks have been burst; a great extent of country is covered with religious profession; but I tremble lest we should find at last, that the flood was not deep enough to float our souls to heaven. Will each one now, in this congregation, put himself into the scale of conscience, sit down and ask, “Is my profession true? Do I feel that before God I am an heir of the promises? When I sit at my Saviour’s table, have I any right to be a guest? Can I truly say, that when I profess to be converted, I only profess what I have actually proven? When I speak from experience about the things of the kingdom of God, is that experience a borrowed tale, or have I felt what I say in my own heart? When I stand up to preach, do I preach what I have really tasted and handled, or do I only repeat what I have learned to utter with the lip, though it has never been fused in the crucible of my own heart?” Conscience is not very readily cheated. There are some men whose consciences are not a safe balance; they have by degrees become so hardened in sin that conscience refuses to work; but still I will hope that most of us may abide by the test of our own conscience, if we let it freely work. Dear friends, I wish that you would often retire to your rooms alone; shut the door and shut out all the world, and then sit and review your past life; scan carefully your present character and your present position; and do, I beseech you, try to get an honest answer from your own conscience. Bring up everything that you can think of that might lead you to doubt. You need be under no difficulty here; for are there not enough sins committed by us every day, to warrant our suspicions that we are not God’s children? Well, let all these black accusers for death, let them all have their say. Do not cloak your sins. Read your diary through, let all your iniquities come up before you; (this is the pith of confession) and then, ask conscience whether you can truly say, “I have repented of all these; God is my witness, I hate these things with a perfect hatred. God also bears me witness, that my trust is fixed alone in him who is the Saviour of sinners, for salvation and justification. If I am not awfully deceived, I am a partaker of divine grace, having been regenerated and begotten again to a lively hope.” Oh that conscience may help each of us to say, “I am not a mere painted image of life, but I trust I have ‘the life of Jesus revealed in my body.’ My profession is not the pompous pageantry with which dead souls are carried respectably to perdition; but it is the joy, the hope, the confidence of one who is being borne along in the chariot of mercy, to his Father’s home above.” Ah! how many people are really afraid to look their religion in the face! They know it to be so bad, they dare not examine it. They are like bankrupts that keep no books. They would be very glad for a fire to consume their books, if they ever kept any, for they know the balance is all on the wrong side. They are losing, breaking up, and they would not wish to keep an account of their losses or villainies. A man who is afraid to examine himself, may rest assured that his ship is rotten, and that it will not be long before it founders