men more than the praife of God, and darkness more than light. They love the uppermoft rooms at feafts, they love greetings in the markets, and they love to be called of men Rabbi, Rabbi. This was the law that all these men cleaved to, abode by, and obeyed, for they had no other in them, as Chrift declares; "But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you,” John v. 42. Now death is in all the objects above described, on which corrupt affections dote, which confirms what the Saviour afferts; "All that hate me love death." This law in the members, or thefe corrupt affections, cannot be fubject to the divine law of God; they cannot favour the things of God; they are at enmity with God, his Spirit, and his grace; and never can affect, delight in, or call for, or crave, any one thing but the obedience or the compliance of fleshly lufts. All the motions of this law work in evil, and in nothing else, and how can it be otherwise, when it is not the moral law, nor the law of faith, but the law of fin? and finful flesh will ferve this law, and no other. "So then with the mind I myself ferve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of fin," Rom. vii. 25.

The apoftle intimates that these corrupt affections are the heart and life of the old man; for fin of itself has no life but in the corrupt love of the finner: hence he ftyles the old man corrupt according to the deceitful lufts. Craving, de

firing, and imagining evil things is the life and labour of this law; and to crucify the flesh, with these affections and lufts, is the labour which God has given us to be exercised with under the fun. Difobedience to this law of fin is what our Lord calls denying felf daily, and taking up the crofs and following him. Making provifion for the flesh, in laying up treasure on the earth, pampering the body, adorning and fetting it off to be admired, vain imaginations about creature charms, chambering and wantonness, fornication, uncleannefs, and (as Paul calls it in himself) all manner of concupifcence, Rom. vii. 8; by these vain imaginations does the flesh serve the law of fin, which works even in good men. Paul fays he faw this law in his members warring against the law of his mind. It works in the eyes, Peter fays, and fills them with adultery, 2 Pet. ii. 14; it works in the ears at the hearing of foolish conversation; in the hands by unwarrantable liberty, and in the feet by running to mifchief: but evil concupifcence is its natural element, making all the members fervants to uncleannefs, and to iniquity, Rom. vi. 19.

This law in the members has two branches, love and hatred; it hates God, and loves death; for Paul fays, "the carnal mind is enmity against God," who is love; and that it is not fubject to the law of God, which commands love, nor can be, because they are natural affections, corrupted

by fin: and this may be seen in the royal Pfalmift, when the law in his members warred against the law of his mind, and brought him into captivity to the law of fin. It is the old man with his deceitful lufts that is called the wayfaring man in Nathan's parable to David: he wrought first in David's eyes on the house top; then the ewe lamb was searched out, looked up, and brought home to be dressed for this wayfaring man. To the faint he is in fome fenfe but a wayfaring man, not being suffered to fhew his head when God and his love are prefent; but to the finner he is a constant inmate, yea the only ruler and leader. David's fall by this law in the members is called a defpifing both God and his law. "Wherefore haft thou despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in his fight? thou haft killed Uriah the Hittite with the fword, and haft taken his wife to be thy wife, and haft flain him with the fword of the children of Ammon. Now therefore the fword fhall never depart from thine house; because thou haft defpifed me, and haft taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife," 2 Sam. xii.. 9, 10. By this it plainly appears that the carnal mind and the law of fin are enmity against God, and lovers of evil. Nor was this the only time that David was enfnared by corrupt affections. Abfalom appears to have been one of the worst of men, an enemy both to God and his own father, and nothing admirable about him but the

figure of his perfon and the hair of his head; and yet the violence offered to his daughter Tamar, and the murder of Amnon by Abfalom's orders, never affects David like the death of Absalom, who was cut off in the very act of treason and rebellion, both against God and the king. "Oh Abfalom, my fon, my fon, would God I had died for thee!" and what is this but inordinate affection? which Paul tells us to mortify;" Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection," &c. Col. iii. 5. The love of this world, and the things of it, at times drew down the foul of David to them, and for the moment feemed to glue his mind to them; "My foul cleaveth unto the duft; quicken thou me according to thy word," Pfalm cxix. 25. At another time he found his corrupt affections working him up to covetoufnefs, and to the love of money: hence his prayer; "Incline my heart unto thy teftimonies, and not to covetousness," Pfalm cxix. 36. You may fee what was working within by the prayer that came out; and from this fenfe of danger (prung the following caution; "If riches increase, set not your heart upon them," Pfalm lxii. 10.

There is not one natural power or faculty in the human foul that can ftand before corrupt affections; they prevailed against confcience, convictions, and faith in the Jewish rulers, as we have already obferved; many of them be

lieved on him, but did not confefs him, loving the praise of men more than the praise of God. Men may will and determine, as Paul fpeaks, "To will is prefent with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not.' Why? Becaufe "evil is prefent with me." What evil? Why a law in my members warring against the law of my mind; my mind is engaged in ferving the law of God, but my flesh in serving the law of fin. This law prevails not only over the will, but over the mind alfo, of every natural man; hence you read of being vainly puffed up with a fleshly mind, Coloff. ii. 18; yea, over the judgment alfo, as Chrift fays to the Jews, "Ye judge after the flesh," John viii. 15. And I much queftion if thefe corrupt affections be not the chief fpring in all natural religion. Some indeed may be driven by fears and terrors, and the reproaches of confcience, for awhile, into a profeffion; but these things do not destroy legal pride; the love of praise and the applause of men are ftill the main springs that keep them in motion, as our Lord declares of the pharifees, " But all their works they do to be feen of men," Matt. xxiii. 5. Hence it is plain that corrupt affections and the lufts of the flesh make fome people labour hard in religion, as they did in the judaizing preachers who followed Paul; "As many as defire to make a fair fhew in the flesh, they conftrain you to be circumcifed,' 'Gal, vi. 12. Here