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.'

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 66 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

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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 in the two great commandments of loving God with all our hearts, and our neighbour as ourselves; and is explained and enlarged upon in a great variety of particular precepts throughout the whole scripture. This law, besides what 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 circum. stances, 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 circumstancedthrough 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, inatten

tion, 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 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 selfrighteous 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 66 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