performed by them that are dead in trespasses and fins; nor can he glory but in dead works. And, if he be a profeffor of the gospel, even one of the firft magnitude, it alters not the cafe; for, if he be in a fiate of nature, he loves death, and nothing else; for man is alienated from the life of God, Ephef. iv. 18. He hates, divine life, he fhuns it, it is a strange thing to him, and he is averse to it; his appetite is vitiated, and he cannot favour the things of God, but those that be of men. He hates God, and loves death: no preaching fuits him but legal difcourfes upon the law, which is the ministration of death; or, if his head be at all enlightened and evangelized, yet not the spirit, but the letter, does he love. No profeffors, are dear to him but thofe that have a name to live while dead; no ambaffadors charm him but the fons of death, who are minifters of the letter; nor is he in his element but when in the congregation of the dead, Prov. xxi. 16. If this be the love of fallen man, and death the object of it, where is that morality to be found which is fo much cried up in the prefent day?

Adam by his fall loft the Holy Spirit, that formed his foul and quickened him; he lost the love of God, which is God's image; and he loft the life of God, which always goes with love: nor fhall man find the life of God again until the heart be circumcifed to love God with all the heart and all the foul, Deut. xxx. 6. It was

when the Spirit left him that he became carnal, fold under sin; when love left him his carnal mind became enmity to God, and could no more be fubject to the law, because it requires love; and when divine life departed from him death feized him, and every thing that he loves hath death in it; "All they that hate me love death." This is our morality; this is our obedience to the fpiritual law of God; and this is all the obedience that our corrupt nature has to boast ofenmity and hatred to God; "They have seen Father," fays Chrift; and hated both me and my and they are" hateful, and hating one another," fays Paul, Titus iii. 3.

From the fall of Adam our corruption takes its title, the old man, being derived to us from the first man, and to distinguish it from the grace of Chrift, which we receive from the fulness of the laft Adam, the Lord from heaven. His incarnation being called a new thing, Jerem. xxxi. 22; and his covenant a new covenant; fo his grace is called the new man; though in one sense the new man is much older than the old one, for the mercy of God difplayed in our regeneration "is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him," Pfalm ciii. 17. But, in order of time, fin is the old man, for we were the fervants of fin before we were made partakers of grace.

Corrupt affections, and nothing elfe, compose this law in Paul's members, which warred against

the law of his mind. "Put off the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lufts," Ephef. iv. 22. Here is this corrupt love, affecting, craving, defiring, and lufting; filling the carnal mind with imaginaryentertainments, much pleasure and fatisfaction in fin, and promifing the utmoft fecurity and fecrefy; and all as deceitful as the devil himself, exposing fouls to God's fore displeasure, to nakedness, fhame, difgrace and contempt.

These corrupt affections led fome of Paul's friends to covet wealth, promifing much happiness and honour therein, till they erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many forrows, 1 Tim. vi. 10. Thefe deceitful lufts prompted David to imagine that fending for Uriah, and making him drunk, would be an inducement to him to go and fleep with his wife, and that would cover both the fin and the shame of David; but thefe deceitful lufts deceived him. The devil is the artful fowler, and our corrupt affections are his fnares, traps, nets and lines; "But they that are Chrift's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lufts," Gal. v. 24. This is the law in the members-fleshly affections, affecting, loving, admiring, and being charmed and enamoured with fleshly gratifications; and then lufting, craving, and defiring, the enjoyment of them; which are what Paul calls the affections and lufts of the flesh. Vari ous and innumerable are the objects of man's

corrupt affections; but this I know, that they feldom run in a right channel; but when kept within bounds they are called natural affections, which is the best name they bear. And, if God was to manifeft even thefe to men, they might fee that they themselves are beafts, Ecclef. iii. 18, for the fame appears in the brute creation. And even natural affections often prove a fnare, as in Lot's wife, who looked after her children behind till the loft herfelf; and this was the cafe of one man invited to the gospel feaft, who had married a wife and could not come, and fo failed of the marriage fupper.

Sometimes these corrupt affections exceed the bounds of all the brute creation, as was the cafe d. many inhabiting the cities of the plain, and many others, as Paul relates; "For this caufe God gave them up to vile affections: for even their women did change the natural ufe into that which is against nature; and likewife alfo the men," &c. &c. Rom. i. 26, 27.

Many are the objects on which corrupt affections dote, but death is fure to be in every object they admire." All they that hate me love death, fays God, and we know that the world loves its

own.

Sometimes they affect nothing but imaginary pleafure; "Lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God," 2 Tim. iii. 4. Sometimes they turn a finner to felf-admiration; felf is the grand idol;

and fo we read; "Men fhall be lovers of their own felves," 2 Tim. iii. 2. In others they are fet upon money, which fuch will use the bafeft means to accumulate; "The love of money is the root of all evil," 1 Tim. vi. 10. The Jewish pharifees doted on human applaufe; and these men were led to act against light, knowledge, judgment, and the fullest convictions: for, although in their confcience they believed Chrift to be the Meffiah, they acted quite contrarily; "Among the chief rulers alfo many believed on him; but, because of the pharifees, they did not confefs him, left they should be put out of the fynagogue; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God," John xii. 42, 4S. "Whofoever fhall confess me before men," fays Chrift, "him will I confefs alfo before the angels of God;" and the faith of fuch confeffors fhall be found unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Chrift, 1 Pet. i. 7., But these things have no weight with corrupt affections; they favour not the things that be of Christ, but love the praise of men more than the praife of God; yea, fuch love the devil himself more than God, for "God is light," and the devil is darkness: "And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil," John iii. 19. Here we fee the objects on which corrupt affections dote; they love death, they love the praife of

C