for nothing."* When we hear such language, we cannot help inquiring, What better work have you for your expected Messiah? Or in what better manner can you conceive of a redemption to be brought to men, than that which is exhibited in the New Testament? Is there any enemy worse than sin, or any better method of deliverance from it, than what we maintain? If motives are required, what can we desire, or even conceive of, more forcible and engaging? And that the Mediator of the new covenant does not authorize external force to procure uniformity of sentiments and worship, is so far from being a defect, that it must appear to every considerate mind perfectly consistent with all just views of human nature, man's designation, in this state of trial, and the Divine perfections. If men act a part unworthy of the best means, while they profess an adherence to them, this no more argues the deficiency of those means, than it would. argue the badnsss of the seventh command, and the Mosaic legislation, because a professed Jew commits adultery. As to the insinuation, that the New Testament recommends our going after other gods; because the divinity of Christ, as you justly contend, is taught by the apostles; or, that he is God manifest in the flesh; as if the apostles and their followers taught another God than the God of Abraham, is a calumny that must be answered for before him, who says, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neigh"bor."

You are pleased to say, that you are "a Jew by "choice, and not because you are born a Jew." And I am happy to say, that I am a Christian by choice, and not because I was born a Christian. But one of us must be certainly wrong with respect to the point of difference, which, if there be any truth in religion at all, is a point of infinite importance. While our views of religion are so directly opposite, both of us cannot have clear evidence that we are right. How dear your religion is to you I cannot tell; but this I can say, tha †Letters, p. 91.

*Second Letters, p. 12.

according to my habitual feelings, I would not exchange for ten thousand worlds, were they at my disposal. I would not exchange my present peace of mind, which is the pure effect of the religion I embrace, as held forth in the New Testament, independent of the eternal weight of glory it exhibits to be enjoyed hereafter, for all the advantages that your most sanguine hopes can imagine, as attending the appearance of another Messiah. And my satisfaction is derived as well from the Old Testament as from the New; the writings of Moses, as well as those of Paul; for the mercy of God, through the Mediator and his atoning sacrifice, explicit or implied, shines in every page; in both I find pardon, peace, righteousness, and life; grace reigning through righteousness, unto eternal life by Jesus Christ, whom God hath set forth a propitiation for sin, in order to declare his righteousness, that he might be just, and the justifier of him who believeth in Jesus. And Dr. Owen undertakes, in this performance, to demonstrate, that for any of Adam's race to be pardoned and made happy with God for ever, without such a provision, is utterly inconsistent (even taking the Old Testament only for our data) utterly inconsistent with all just apprehensions of the attributes of Jehovah; and we defy all the world fairly to disprove his conclusion. But alas! what a light and insignificant thing is the demonstration of a Christian in the scales of a Jew! I can easily conceive, that the human mind (such is the darkness and degeneracy of our fallen nature) is capable of admitting the bare opinions of friends to be of greater weight and authority than the demonstrations of others. Hence we may learn to adore the sovereignty of Divine grace in every instance of a cordial submission to the truth of God. If men hear not Moses and the prophets, in their testimony for Jesus, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead, as he has actually done.

Dear sir, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved; may the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, by his effectual grace, bring you to know his eternal truth! How differently

would you then judge of the evil and demerit of sin, and of the need of a real atoning sacrifice to secure the honor of the Divine government! How infinitely desirable would then appear, a Savior from the power and love of iniquity, and from a fatal security under its dominion and deceitfulness! With what concern would you then regard the folly of that interpretation of the lively oracles which confines the work of the promised Messiah to this short life, the life of a mere mortal, and a small spot of this globe! Seriously reflect, dear sir, how unworthy of God, how inadequate to the real wants of an immortal mind, and how inconsistent with the whole tenor of Divine revelation, as well as absolutely contrary to the clearest passages, must such an interpretation be.

I am, dear Sir,

Your sincere well wisher,

Oswestry, Feb. 1790.

EDWARD WILLIAMS.

END OF VOL. I.