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and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of

truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." But why cannot the world receive, know, and see the Spirit of God as well as the elect? Because the Spirit never comes to them; they are not the seed to whom he is promised. The promise, as hath been observed, runs thus: "A seed shall serve him, and it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation." "Neither because they are the seed of Abraham are they all children, but in Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed." These are called the seed that the Lord hath blessed, Isaiah lxi. 9; the holy seed, Isa. vi. 13.

As the children of the promise are counted for the seed, it will not be amiss to examine what the promises are that this seed are heirs to, and how the promises are fulfilled to these heirs. Christ hath a promise, and so hath the seed; "When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days; he shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied." "I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather them from the west." "I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine

offspring." Here is the Spirit of God, and the

blessing of God, promised as the portion of this seed. "As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the Lord, My Spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever," Isa. lix. 21. We have considered Christ the everlasting Father of this seed, and the promises made to him; we have also considered the seed, and the promises made to them in Christ their head; from which seed, or heirs of promise, the children of the flesh are excluded. These are not the children of God, whether they descend from Shem or Japheth, from Abraham or Nahor; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called; they shall be heirs of promise as Isaac was. And, for my part, I have no doubt but the promised blessing, the word of promise, and the Spirit of promise, will be applied by Christ, the testator and executor of the testament, to the proper heirs, according to the will of God; for the Saviour came not to do his own will, but the will of him that sent him, John vi. 38.

This seed is called the blessed of the Lord; and he sent his Son to bless them, Acts iii. 26. This seed is to receive the words that God put into the Saviour's mouth; and so they did: "Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee; for I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me, and they

have received them, and have known surely that I am came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me."

Now let us see what seed this is, whether the whole world be intended or not. "I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world; thine they were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word," John xvii. 6. This seed is a number given to Christ out of the world; these receive the word; and they are to receive the Spirit that was upon Christ also, which is never to depart from him nor his seed, according to the will and promise of God; which will, Christ the testator is to confirm and execute. If the world were included in the promise, they would have the Spirit sent unto them: but they are finally excluded. "The Father shall give you another Comforter; even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him; but ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." Thus the blessing of God, the promise of God, and the Spirit of God, are promised to this seed, exclusive of all others. Let us see how these things are applied to this chosen seed, called heirs of promise; and whether free-thinkers are intrusted with the division and application of these promised blessings. Paul tells us the blessing is to believers: “Know ye, therefore, that they which are of faith, the same are children of Abraham : so then, they which be of faith, are blessed with faithful Abraham." The blessing we find is promised to the

believer. The next inquiry is, how we come by faith? The answer is, God hath concluded all men in unbelief.

Some inform us, that it is the duty of every man to believe; they must also prove that it is the duty of every man to beget himself to a lively hope with the word of truth; that it is the duty of every man to quicken his own soul, though God declares none can do it; that it his duty to produce a spiritual birth in himself, though man be born again, not of the will of man, nor of the flesh, nor of blood; and that it is the duty of every man to transform himself; for God says, that such as he forms shall show forth his praise: and that it is the duty of every man to create himself anew in Christ Jesus, without the aid of him that sits upon the throne and says, "I create all things new." This is a system that has lately appeared in the world, and agrees in substance with our present system of free thoughts. And surely the man that can do these things is a freethinker indeed, a free agent with a witness: he is his own father, his own maker, the father of his own spirit, the life of his own soul, and the God of his own existence. These men may well say, "We are lords," Jer. ii. 31; "Who is lord over us?" Psal. xii. 4. All these things must be done before faith can be produced; faith is the active hand of the new creature: "Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith."

I should like to hear how this motley monster, partly carnal, and partly spiritual, as it has been lately exhibited to the world, I mean a living faith, produced by human power—I should like, I say, to hear such a believer describe the glorious object that he believes in, which the world never saw, and the hidden mystery that he builds his faith on, which none of the princes of this world ever knew: for I am inclined to think, that his description of the Saviour, and of the mystery of the gospel, would be of the same nature as his faish, that is, earthly, sensual, and devilish. And for my part, I should think that if a carnal man, destitute of the grace of God, could be prevailed on by the force of human reason, to give a fleshly assent to the gospel of Christ, according to the command of the same, that he would deceive himself, unless the Spirit of God applied it to him, and endanger his own soul, by his carnal application. No man can call Jesus his Lord but by the Holy Ghost: no man can call God his Father but by the Spirit of adoption, which is the manifestation of the poor sinner's predestination to the adoption of sons, and therefore enables the soul to cry Abba, Father. To call Christ Lord, or God Father, without the Holy Ghost, is no less than presumption; such cannot be upright before God, nor innocent from the great transgression, Psalm xix. 13. The Jews told the Saviour that they had one Father, even God: but he reproved their presumption, and told them they were of their fa