and the maimed, and the blind, a curse be upon you." He looks at you
afar off. Be honest. Repentance is not mere sorrow for sin. You may
be ever so sorry, and all the way down to death be hugging on to some
forbidden possession, as was the young ruler. _That_ is not repentance.

Neither is repentance a promise that you will forsake sin in the
future. Oh! if it were, there would be many penitents here to-night.
There is scarcely a poor drunkard that does not promise, in his own
mind, or to his poor wife, or somebody, that he will forsake his
cups. There is scarcely any kind of a sinner that does not
continually promise that he will give up his sin, and serve God, but
he does _not do it_.

Then what is _repentance_? _Repentance is simply renouncing
sin_--turning round from darkness to light--from the power of Satan
unto God. This is giving up sin in your heart, in purpose, in
intention, in desire, resolving that you will give up every evil
thing, and DO IT NOW. Of course, this involves sorrow, for how will
any sane man turn himself round from a given course into another, if
he does not repent having taken that course? It implies, also, hatred
of, sin. He hates the course he formerly took, and turns round from
it. He is like the prodigal, when he sat in the swine-yard amongst
the husks and the filth, he fully resolved, and at last he acts. He
went, and that was the test of his penitence! He might have sat
resolving and promising till now, if he had lived as long, and he
would never have got the father's kiss, the father's welcome, if he
had not started; but he went. He left the filth, the swine-yard, the
husks--he trampled them under his feet; he left the citizen of that
country, and gave up all his subterfuges and excuses, and went to his
father honestly, and said, "I have sinned!" which implied a great