If we consider for a moment, this would entirely meet the want of which I have been speaking.  It is possible, certainly, to look upon the face of nature without being reminded of God; yet it is surely true, that in the outward creation, in the order of the seasons, the laws of the heavenly bodies, the wonderful wisdom and goodness displayed in the constitution of every living thing in its order, there is a tendency at least to impress us with, the thought of God, if nothing else obstructed it.  But there is a constant obstruction in the state of man.  Looking at men, hearing them, considering them, it is not only possible not to be reminded of God; but their very tendency is to exclude him from our minds, because the moral workmanship which is so predominant in them has assuredly not had God for its author.  We all in our dealings with one another, lead each other away from God.  We present to each other’s view what seems to be a complete world of our own, in which God is not.  We see a beginning, a middle, and an end; we see faculties for acquiring knowledge, and for receiving enjoyment; and earth furnishes knowledge to the one and enjoyment to the other.  We see desires, and we see the objects to which they are limited; we see that death removes men from all these objects, and consistently with this, we observe, that death is generally regarded as the greatest of all evils.  Man’s witness, then, as far as it goes, is against the reality of God and of eternity.  His life, his language, his desires, his understanding appear, when we look over the world, to refer to no being higher than himself, to no other state of things than that of which sight testifies.

Now, Christ’s Church, the living temple of the Holy Ghost, puts in the place of this natural and corrupt man, whose witness is against God, another sort of man, redeemed and regenerate, whose whole being breathes a perpetual witness of God.  Consider, again, what we should see in such a Church.  We should see a beginning, a middle, but the end is not yet visible; we should see, besides the faculties for knowledge and enjoyment which were receiving their gratification daily, other faculties of both kinds, whose gratification was as yet withheld; we should see desires not limited to any object now visible or attainable.  We should see death looked to as the gate by which these hitherto unobtained objects were to be sought for; and we should hear it spoken of, not as the greatest of evils, but as an event solemn, indeed, and painful to nature, but full of blessing and of happiness.  We should see love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance; a constitution of nature as manifestly proclaiming its author to be the God of all holiness and loving-kindness, as the wonderful structure of our eyes or hands declares them to be the work of the God of all wisdom and power.  We should thus see in all our fellow-men, not only as much, but far more than in the constitution of the lower animals,