But this language is not merely, nor, perhaps, chiefly retrospective. Those who fear God in all ages, participate the mercies dispensed to man through an incarnate Redeemer. Under the Christian dispensation in particular, they are fully communicated, and will enrich the people of God to the end of time. The thousands and myriads of the human race, that apply to "the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness," cannot diminish its efficacy or exhaust its fulness; but the last preacher that exists upon the earth previous to that final hour, when "the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible," will be able to proclaim the blood of Jesus Christ the Son of God, as cleansing "from all sin," with equal confidence to that which inspired the first herald of these "glad tidings to perishing sinners." HE HATH SHOWED STRENGTH WITH HIS ARM; HE HATH SCATTERED THE PROUD IN THE IMAGINATION OF THEIR HEARTS. The omnipotence of God has been manifested in many remarkable instances during past ages, but in no case so illustriously as in the birth of Christ. All the other mighty operations of Jehovah are surpassed in this unparelleled event. The haughty Jews, who fondly but foolishly cherished the expectation, that the Messiah would be born of some one of the most opulent families in Judea, and conduct them to conquest and dominion, will be inexpressibly disappointed to find him the child of an obscure virgin, betrothed to a carpenter, and an inhabitant of the contemptible town of Nazareth in Galilee. So wonderfully "are the ways of God above our ways, and his thoughts above our thoughts!" HE HATH PUT DOWN THE MIGHTY FROM THEIR SEATS, AND EXALTED THEM OF LOW DEGREE. HE HATH FILLED THE HUNGRY WITH GOOD THINGS, AND THE RICH HE HATH SENT EMPTY AWAY. The providence of God has been often displayed in the depression of the most distinguished from their temporal elevations, and in the advancement of the most despised to dignity and renown. The necessitous have been liberally supplied: while those who have been possessed of the most ample and enviable abundance, have sometimes, by unexpected reverses, become destitute. This sovereign disposal of human affairs has been apparent, both in temporal and spiritual concerns. The Virgin Mary was herself, as she intimates a remarkable exemplification of such an interposal; while those who in Israel were "hungering and thirsting after righteousness," beheld in her infant son, that child whose name was to be called "Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace," and whose manifestation in the flesh afforded the sublimest satisfaction to their waiting spirits. HE HATH HOLPEN HIS SERVANT ISRAEL, IN REMEMBRANCE OF HIS MERCY; AS HE SPAKE TO OUR FATHERS, TO ABRAHAM, AND TO HIS SEED FOR EVER.