Have any of you already attained such a degree of blindness and perversity, as to persuade yourselves that the doctrines of the cross are really irrational and absurd, and that you are doing right in opposing and deriding them? Recollect, I pray you, with whose word you are contending;--whose wisdom you are despising! Let the chaff contend with the tempest, and the stubble with the devouring flame; let the glow-worm despise all the lamps of heaven;--but Oh, let not a worm contend with Omnipotence; let not dim reason reject all the splendours of the Sun of righteousness. _The redemption of the soul is precious_--Its rescue from perdition, and elevation to God's right hand, are objects too momentous, to be sacrificed to the pride of intellect, or to the fashion of a world which passeth away. _Receive_, then, _with meekness the ingrafted word, which is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves_. SERMON XXVII. BY ELIHU W. BALDWIN, A.M. NEW-YORK. THE FINAL JUDGMENT. HEBREWS, IX. 29.--_After this the Judgment_. Whilst another year is ending, and time itself, as it respects us, is fast hastening to its close, the question very naturally arises, _What shall come after death_? The voice of inspiration replies, _After this the Judgment_. There is no need of entering upon a laboured proof of the doctrine so plainly declared, _That there will be a day of Judgment for mankind_. It is what seems written by the finger of God himself upon the consciences of men. The impression is nearly universal, with Pagans and Mahomedans, as well as Jews and Christians, that _every one of us shall give account of himself to God_. This impression is strengthened by a view of the very unequal and indiscriminate allotments of the present life. Here the virtuous are often the objects of hatred and relentless persecution. Here the man of ambition and dark intrigue, circumvents and treads down his more honest rivals. Here Providence often afflicts even the most pious; while the licentious, and proud, and oppressive, are, perhaps, suffered to enjoy uninterrupted prosperity. Now we believe, assuredly, that "God is just;" and we infer, that he will so exhibit himself by another and more equal distribution of his favours and frowns. We conclude with the wise man, "that God shall judge both the righteous and the wicked." Conscience and reason, then, unite with revelation, in saying, that "God hath appointed a day, in which he will judge the world in righteousness." No language can be plainer, and no event more reasonably anticipated. With this absolute certainty before us, then, of a judgment for all mankind, it would be unnatural--it would betray awful insensibility to eternal concerns, not to inquire with all seriousness--When will this universal judgment take place? What objects is it designed to accomplish? What connexion will it have with our future and eternal condition? We inquire then,