sire, gratitude, and praise, which once appeared to him too rapturous, or even enthusiastic, become the genuine language of his most lively hours, and he knows that they are all far beneath his real excellency and glory: thus the love of Christ to him, and his reciprocal love to Christ, constrain him to live to his glory. And here we may observe, that in proportion as the doctrine of the Spirit is exploded or overlooked, the person and work of Christ are generally dishonoured; and whilst men plume themselves on a rational religion, they evidence, and sometimes must be conscious, that the language of Scripture does not suit their views, but far better accords to those of the enthusiasts, whom they so liberally vilify, and cordially despise. Is it not then evident, that the reason why Christ is no more glorified in the visible church, is simply this: men do not expect, depend on, or seek for the influences of the Holy Spirit in this respect; and therefore they are left to exalt themselves, or philosophy, or some favourite author, and to degrade the light of the world and the life of men?

Several of the apostle's prayers for his converts had respect, not to miraculous gifts, but to such things as are equally needful in every age. He desired, "that the Spirit of wisdom and revelation might enlighten their understandings to know God and the glory of his gospel, and cause them to experience the power of his grace," &c. (Eph. i. 17—19; iii. 16-21; 1 Cor. ii. 12; 2 Cor. iv. 3—6). Now, is it not necessary that all Christians should thus know God, understand the gospel and its privileges, and be inwardly strengthened in love and obedience to the Lord Jesus? Surely these are essentials to real Christianity in every age? And the state of the professing church of Christ, amidst all modern improvements, shows that they can no more be produced without the influences of the Spirit, than skill in agriculture can insure a crop of corn, without the influences of the sun and rain. The apostle says, "that the love of God is shed abroad by the Holy Ghost, who is given unto us;" and whether we understand this of our knowledge of God's love to us, or of our exercise of love to him, it is manifest that we cannot attain to it, except by the influences of the Spirit, preparing and pervading all the faculties of our souls, (Rom. v. 5); and indeed all fervent affections towards God, or joy in him, are deemed enthusiasm by those who deny these doctrines; and a decent conduct, with a form of godliness, constitutes the sum total of improved Christianity. The same apostle prays, that the Romans "may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Ghost," (Rom. xv. 17). Hope is one of those graces which abides in the church, (1 Cor. xiii. 13); and if this springs from, and abounds through the power of the Spirit, we must conclude, that all who are destitute of his influences are either "without hope," or buoyed up in presumptuous confidence. According to St. Peter, the believer's obedience results from "the sanctification of the Spirit." And he says, "Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit, unto unfeigned love of the brethren," &c. (1 Pet. i. 2, 22). Surely these are duties of Christianity peculiar to no age or place; and the influences of the Spirit must be as needful to the performance of them at present, as when inspired apostles were the teachers of the church. "The kingdom of God is-in righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." (Rom. xiv. 17): how then can we rejoice in the Lord always, without his blessed influences? But this subject is most copiously discussed in the eighth of Romans, which brevity forbids me to enlarge upon. Let it suffice in general to observe, that the apostle ascribes the believer's deliverance from "the law of sin and death," to "the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," (2 Cor. iii. 17, 18); and derives the spiritual mind, which "is life and peace," from the same source. They in whom "the Spirit of God dwells," "not in the flesh, but in the Spirit ;" but "if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his :" they, who " through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body, shall live;" they "that are led," or willingly guided and influenced by him, "are the children of God." He dwells in them, not as a "spirit of bondage," to induce them to obey God from servile motives,

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but as a Spirit of adoption, by whom they cry, "Abba, Father:" and thus, by producing filial dispositions and affections in their hearts, he witnesses with them, that they are the children and heirs of God. They have therefore, the first-fruits of the Spirit," called elsewhere, the "seal of the Spirit," being the renewal of the Divine image on their souls, and the earnest of the Spirit," or the beginning and sure pledge of heavenly felicity, (2 Cor. i. 22; Eph. i. 13, 14; iv. 30). But who can deny that these things are essential to genuine Christianity at all times, and in all places? In short, we are directed to pray "in," or by "the Holy Ghost," who " also helpeth our infirmities;" and whatever words we use, his influences alone can render our worship spiritual. Our holy tempers, affections, and actions are called "the fruits of the Spirit, (Gal. v. 22, 23; Eph. v. 9), to distinguish them from mere moral conduct, on worldly or legal principles. We are said to live, and to walk in, and to be filled with the Spirit;" and all our heavenly wisdom, knowledge, strength, holiness, joy; all things relative to our repentance, faith, hope, love, worship, obedience, meetness for heaven, and foretastes of it, are constantly ascribed to his influences; nor can we escape fatal delusions, resist temptations, overcome the world, or glorify God, except as we are taught, sanctified, strengthened, and comforted by the Holy Spirit, who dwells in believers, "as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life."

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We need not then wonder at the low ebb to which vital Christianity is fallen, when we consider how many nominal Christians utterly disclaim all dependence on the Spirit as enthusiasm; and how much this part of the gospel is overlooked by numbers who are zealous for other doctrines of it! The subject therefore suggests to us the vast importance of owning the divine person and whole work of the Spirit in all our services; of praying for, that we may pray by the Spirit, (Luke xi. 13); of applying for and depending on him in all things; of cautiously distinguishing his genuine influences from every counterfeit, by Scriptural rules; of avoiding those worldly cares, and that indolence, which "quench," and all those evil tempers, which "grieve the Spirit of God;" and of giving the glory of all the good wrought in or by us, to him, as the original source and author of it. Thus, depending on the mercy of the Father, the atonement of the Son, and the grace of the Spirit, we shall be prepared to give glory to the Triune God our Saviour, both now and for evermore.

ESSAY XV.

On the Uses of the Moral Law, in subserviency to the Gospel of Christ.

WHEN We have duly considered our situation as fallen creatures, and those things that relate to our recovery by the mercy of the Father, the redemption of the Son, and the sanctification of the Holy Spirit, we must perceive, that "we are saved by grace, through faith; and that not of ourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast,” (Eph. ii. 8—10). And we shall next be led to inquire, "wherefore, then, serveth the law?" (Gal. iii. 19). Indeed, the apostle introduces this question as the objection of a Judaizing teacher to the doctrines of grace. But, in stating the uses of the law as coincident with the doctrines before-mentioned, it is obvious, that neither the ritual law nor the legal dispensation are intended; the former typified, and the latter introduced, the clear revelation of the gospel, and they were both superseded and antiquated by the coming of Christ. The moral law alone is intended, which was originally written in the heart of man, as created in the image of God; was afterwards delivered with awful solemnity from Mount Sinai in ten commandments; is elsewhere summed up

two great commandments of loving God with all our hearts, and our bour as ourselves: and is explained and enlarged upon in a great vaof particular precepts throughout the whole Scripture. This law, bewhat it more directly enjoins, implicitly requires us to love, admire, and adore every discovery that God shall please at any time to make to us of his glorious perfections; cordially to believe every truth he shall reveal and authenticate; and willingly to obey every positive appointment which he shall at any time be pleased to institute.

This law is immutable in its own nature; for it could not be abrogated, or altered, without an apparent intimation, that God was not so glorious, lovely, and excellent; or so worthy of all possible honour, admiration, gratitude, credit, adoration, submission, and obedience, as the law had represented him to be; or without seeming to allow, that man had at length ceased to be under those obligations to God, or to stand in those relations to him, and to his neighbour, whence the requirements of the law at first resulted. The moral law, I say, could not be changed in any essential point, unless we could cease to be under infinite obligations to our great Creator; unless he could allow us in some degree to be alienated from, and become despisers of him; or to love worldly objects and our own temporal advantage or pleasure, more than his infinite excellency, and to prefer them to his glory, and the enjoyment of his favour; unless he could allow us to be ungrateful for his benefits, to discredit his veracity, to dispute his authority, to reject the appointments of his wisdom; and to injure, neglect, corrupt, or hate one another, to the confusion and ruin of his fair creation. Such absurd and dreadful consequences may unanswerably be deduced, from the supposition of the moral law of God being repealed or altered; and they are the bane of every Antinomian or Neonomian invention, however ingeniously stated or diversified. The Lord may, consistent with the immutable perfections of his nature and righteousness of his government, reveal truths before unknown to his creatures; he may abrogate positive institutions, or appoint others; he may arrange various circumstances relative to the law, in a new manner, according to the different situations in which rational agents are placed: but the love of God with all the powers of the soul and the equal love of each other, must continue the indispensable duty of all reasonable creatures, however circumstanced, through all the ages of eternity.

This law is the foundation of the covenant of works; and it is the wisdom and duty of every holy creature to seek justification by obeying it: but for fallen men who are continually transgressing, to seek to be justified by their obedience to it, is absurd and arrogant in the greatest degree that can be conceived. This attempt is generally called self-righteousness; and all the preachers of Christianity are bound most decidedly to warn men against it as a fatal rock on which multitudes are continually perishing.

But what purposes then does the law answer, under a dispensation of mercy, and in subserviency to the doctrines and the covenant of grace? And what use should the ministers of the New Testament make of it? The following statement may perhaps contain a sufficient reply to these questions; and make way for some observations on the bad effects which follow from ignorance, inattention, or confused apprehensions respecting the moral law in the ministers and professors of the gospel.

I. The apostle says, I, through the law, am dead to the law, that I might live unto God," (Gal. ii. 19.) He doubtless meant (by "being dead to the law,") that he had entirely given up all hope and every thought of justification by the law, or of obtaining eternal life as the reward of his own obedience to it: and having fled to Christ for justification, he was delivered also from the fear of final condemnation by it. He had therefore no more to hope or fear from the law, than a man after his death hath to hope or fear from his friends or enemies. When he was a proud Pharisee," he was alive without the law: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and he died," (Rom. vii. 9). And every impartial reader must see, that the apostle

there spoke of the moral law, which he called, spiritual, holy, just, and good, in which he "delighted after the inner man, and which he served with his mind," &c. And thus will every self-righteous Pharisee become dead to the law, in proportion as he knows and understands the nature of its requirements and sanction. When the sinner becomes well acquainted with the strictness, extensive demands, and awful denunciations of the law, his hope of being justified according to it must expire: for he will perceive, that it requires a perfectly holy heart, and a perfectly holy life; that it respects every imagination, intention, affection, disposition, motive, word, and work; that it demands absolute, uninterrupted, and perfect obedience from the first dawn of reason to the moment of death; and that it denounces an awful curse on every one who continueth not in all things, written in its precepts, to do them.' But unless the goodness or excellency of the law be also perceived, the sinner will not be brought to genuine self-abasement. A man may be clearly convicted of high treason according to the letter of the law; but if he thinks the law itself to be iniquitous, he will persist in justifying his conduct; and his sullen enmity to the prince, the government, and his judges, will probably increase in proportion as he sees the execution of the sentence denounced against him to be inevitable. If men only consider the strictness of the precept and the severity of the sanction of the divine law; hard thoughts of God will be excited, they will deem themselves justified in desponding inactivity, or they will take refuge in Antinomianism, or infidelity. But when every precept is shown to the conscience to be "holy, just, and good," requiring nothing but what is reasonable, equitable, and beneficial; namely, that we should resemble and imitate the Holy God, love supremely his infinite excellency, seek our happiness and liberty in his favour and service, be filled with gratitude for all his unspeakable goodness, employ all his gifts to his glory, love and do good to others for his sake, and thus share and aid the common felicity of all his obedient creatures: these views of the law strike at the root of man's self-admiration; the convinced sinner is thus constrained to take part with God, as it were, against himself, and can no longer withhold his approbation from the law, even whilst he knows himself liable to be condemned by it. For the more clearly the excellency of the precept is perceived, the more evidently do the odiousness, unreasonableness, and desert of sin appear. The law should, therefore, be very fully stated, explained and applied to the consciences of men for these purposes: for this constitutes the grand means which the Lord blesses, to show sinners in what the divine image consisted, after which Adam was created; and what they ought to have been, and to have done during the whole of their past lives; and to convince them that their sins have been exceedingly numerous and heinous in thought, word, and deed, by "leaving undone what they ought to have done, and doing what they ought not to have done;" that their present dispositions and supposed duties are vile and unworthy of God's acceptance, yea, deserving of his wrath and abhorrence; and in short, that their case is hopeless and helpless if they be left to themselves, under the old covenant, and dealt with according to the merit or demerit of their works. In this way the pride of mens' hearts is abased, their mouths are stopped, their false and legal confidence is destroyed, and they are prepared by the knowledge of, and humiliation for their sins, to understand and welcome the salvation of the gospel. Thus the law was delivered from Mount Sinai, to the nation of Israel to prepare their minds for the promises and types of good things to come; and it should thus be delivered from every pulpit, as a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith." II. The law is useful to illustrate the necessity, nature, and glory of redemption. The Lord is rich "in mercy," and "he delighted in mercy;" why then does he not pardon all sinners by a mere act of sovereign grace? What need was there of a Surety, a Redeemer, or an atonement? Why must God be manifest in the flesh? Why must Emmanuel agonize and die on the cross? Did ever an earthly prince require his beloved, his only, his

dutiful Son to endure the most intense tortures, previous to his pardoning any number of criminals? This could not be necessary in order to prevail with God to love and save us: for it is everywhere spoken of in Scripture as the most emphatical evidence and richest fruit of his love to us. But the Lord is infinitely holy in his nature, and righteous in his moral government; and he is determined "to magnify his law, and make it honourable." We had by our sins despised and dishonoured the holy law, and rendered ourselves obnoxious to the just vengeance of our Creator: if then he spared us, his holiness, justice and law would be disgraced, or at least the glory of them obscured; unless some other decisive method were taken of magnifying his law, displaying his justice, and filling the world with awful astonishment at his holy hatred of sin. Whilst he, therefore, makes these things known by the final misery of some transgressors, he pardons others, to the praise of his glorious grace; but in such a way as still more effectually secures the honour of his law and government. "He hath set forth his own Son to be a propitiation for sin, that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth." They who really believe and understand the Scriptural account of this surprising transaction, see the necessity of this redemption, perceive somewhat of its nature, and discover the glory of God as peculiarly displayed in it: to others, the "preaching of the cross is foolishness." But the more fully men are acquainted with the strictness and excellency of the requirements, and the justice of the sanction of the Divine law; the more easily and clearly will they apprehend the necessity, nature, and glory of this wonderful expedient "to magnify it, and make it honourable."

III. The law is useful as a rule of conduct to believers. When we flee for refuge to Christ by faith, we are delivered from the curse of the law, and from the legal covenant; but we remain subjects of God's moral government, and are bound to obedience by new and most endearing obligations. God forbid, that "we should sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace:" yet there is no other rule of duty and sin, but the moral law as above defined, and "where no law is, there is no transgression." Christ says to his disciples, "If ye love me, keep my commandments ;" and having expounded, in the most strict and spiritual manner, the precepts of the moral law, he says, "he that breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called the least in the kingdom of God," &c. (Matt. v. 19); and his apostles continually refer to the law, as the rule of the believer's conduct, (Rom., xiii. 8-10: Gal. v. 13, 14; Eph. vi. 2; Jam. ii. 8-13; iv. 11, 12; 1 John iii. 4); for "we are not without law to God, but under the law to Christ," (1 Cor. ix. 21): and as the precepts given by our Lord are the same in substance with those of the moral law, (though enforced by new motives and encouragements); so the believer receives the law, deprived of its condemning power from the hand of the Redeemer, as the rule by which to regulate his conduct, to the honour of the gospel, and the glory of God. "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law." He who greatly loves the Divine Saviour, will not only be ready to show that love in his whole conduct; but he will also desire to know what his Lord would have him to do, that "his love may abound in knowledge and in all judgment," and that he may be wise in understanding "what the will of the Lord is:" and as there can be no authorized standard and rule of the Lord's will, except his commandments, so that Christian who best understands them will be most completely furnished for every good work, provided his knowledge of the truths and promises of Scripture be equally clear and comprehensive.

IV. The law is very useful to believers, as the test or touchstone of their sincerity. It is written in the heart of all true Christians by the Holy Spirit, (Jer. xxxi. 33; Heb. viii. 10); they all" delight in it after the inner man,' "consent to it that it is good,' "count all God's commandments in all things to be right," " love and choose all his precepts," repent of, and mourn for every sin as a transgression of the law, are grieved and burdened