alarming address to the corrupt natural heart, than was the first
edition of it delivered amidst the lightnings of Sinai. The Sermon on the
Mount is called the Sermon of the Beatitudes, and many have the
impression that it is a very lovely song to the sinful soul of man. They
forget that the blessing upon obedience implies a _curse_ upon
disobedience, and that every mortal man has disobeyed the Sermon on the
Mount. "God save me,"--said a thoughtful person who knew what is in the
Sermon on the Mount, and what is in the human heart,--"God save me from
the Sermon on the Mount when I am judged in the last day." When Christ
preached this discourse, He preached the law, principally. "Think
not,"--He says,--"that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I am
not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven
and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law
till all be fulfilled." John the Baptist describes his own preaching,
which was confessedly severe and legal, as being far less searching than
that of the Messiah whose near advent he announced. "I indeed baptize you
with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than
I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the
Holy Ghost and with _fire_; whose _fan_ is in his hand, and he will
_thoroughly purge_ his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but
he will _burn up the chaff_ with unquenchable fire."

The general burden and strain of the Discourse with which the Redeemer
opened His ministry is preceptive and mandatory. Its keynote is: "Thou
shalt do this," and, "Thou shalt not do that;" "Thou shalt be thus, in
thine heart," and, "Thou shalt not be thus, in thine heart." So little is
said in it, comparatively, concerning what are called the doctrines of
grace, that it has often been cited to prove that the creed of the Church
has been expanded unduly, and made to contain more than the Founder of
Christianity really intended it should. The absence, for example, of any