And tell Him that if He will take you back that you are to-night at His feet.
4.

'We seldom overcome any one vice perfectly,' complains A Kempis.

And, again, 'If only every new year we would root out but one vice.' Well, now, what do you say to that, my true and very brethren?
What do you say to that?
Here we are, by God's grace and long-suffering to usward, near the end of another year, another vicious year; and why have we been borne with through so many vicious years but that we should now cease from vice and begin to learn virtue?
Why are we here over Ill-pause this Sabbath night?
Why, but that we should shake off that varlet liar before another new year.

That is the whole reason why we have been spared to see this Sabbath night.

God decreed it for us that we should have this text and this discourse here to-night, and that is the reason why you and I have been so unaccountably spared so long.