then directly tells us, that "therefore it was reckoned to him for righteousness;" that is, it was reckoned for righteousness, because it was such, essentially and eminently.

But what St. Paul really meant, I conceive, was to ascribe our first admission to God's approbation and favour, to the principle of faith, abstracted from all its outward fruits; that is, he intended to maintain that God accounts us righteous so soon as he finds true and living faith in our hearts, without waiting for any of the results of actual conduct to which faith leads, or, more strictly, with which, if vital, it is pregnant; and, in my mind, no idea could have been more important, more beautiful, or more exquisitely philosophical. His object was to guard the minds of his readers against the dry, selfish, servile, superficial religion of the Jewish Pharisees, which he every where denominates the righteousness of the law, and to lead them effectually from this wretched selfworking mechanism, to that vitalising spirit of goodness, that principle of new life and a heavenly nature, which the Gospel was formed to communicate, and of which the Eternal Word, made flesh, was the living source. He, therefore, sets himself to press the acquirement of the simple central principle, without regard, for the present, to any other object. He not only directs them to look for it, to expect it, and to rely upon its efficacy, when obtained, without regard to their own previous character or conduct, whether good or evil; but also with a certain unconcern, even about the duties and virtues which were to follow; not because

these were in any respect of small value, but because they would be far more effectually attained by pursuing them, not immediately, and in themselves, but in the principle which would spontaneously produce them. To all which, as a crowning motive, intelligible to all, he adds this great consideration, that if the favour of God was the object pursued, it was the same vital principle that could alone obtain it: he who was possessed of this, though till then ungodly, and though, perhaps, (like the thief on the cross,) beyond the opportunity of performing one outward act of obedience, being immediately and infallibly accepted.

If the

The wise reason of this is self-evident. object of the Gospel be to redeem men from iniquity, and purify a peculiar people, zealous of good works, the divine Author of the plan must ever be looking for these, its solid results; and his gracious pleasure and approbation will be precisely in proportion as those results are realised. If, then, the method by which the divine apparatus works, is, to produce in the heart a vitally influential principle, which, like a soul within the soul, will actuate and guide the whole man, renovate his nature, and, by fixing his supreme love on God and goodness, and his supreme care on what is invisible and eternal, will make him instinctively pure, and spiritual, and godlike :-if this, I say, be the method, this principle must be the thing which God looks for in us, above every thing else, and which, when formed in us, as surely meets his loving approbation, as when he rested and was refreshed in the view of the new-born world.

Such I take to be the nature and grounds, as far as we can trace them, of St. Paul's divine philosophy respecting justification and faith. Very many good people would start back from the view I am giving, as if I were setting up man's righteousness as the term of his acceptance. I well know I could not convince such; but I am unmoved by their objections. For man's righteousness, in St. Paul's sense, is that which man can work for himself, by his own unassisted strength; and God's righteousness is that which he works in us. It was the grand error of the Pharisees, and is still of their followers, to rely upon, and glory in, the one; it is the leading point of the Gospel to call us to, and bless us with, the other; and it is the beautiful characteristic of the evangelic philosophy to effect this result in a way consummately harmonising with all the known laws of nature. A root of vital faith puts forth the main stem of divine love, and this sends forth two collateral stems of sobriety and charity; these three branch into all possible dispositions to goodness, and become clothed, beautified, and enriched with the foliage, the blossoms, and the fruits, of pure and undefiled religion. Surely of this the Prophet spoke when he predicted that the Messiah " should see of the travail of his soul, and should be satisfied;" for what else can satisfy Divine benignity, but the substantial production of that spiritual life, which alone capacitates for that spiritual happiness to which God has destined our nature, and to recover us to which, the Divine nature humbled itself, even to the death of the cross?

I mentioned above, in speaking of Rev. xxii. 11, that the two first descriptions were given actively, but the two second passively. I then forgot to assign what I conceive the reason; but it falls in pretty much with some of these last remarks. The first form is used, I think, to shew that the formation of evil characters is man's own unfortunate work on himself; but the latter form is used to shew that, in what is truly good, we are far more recipients than agents; that whether we are justified or sanctified, brought effectually out of a state of sin, or confirmed and established in a state of holiness, the excellency of the power is of God, and not of us. First and last, it is God who worketh in us of his own pleasure, both to will and to do.

Little, my good Major, when I began this letter (which has been broken off by illness), did I think of entertaining you with so much theological disquisition; but I got into it, and I found I could more easily proceed than retreat. Besides, I cannot now regret that you should have an actual document of my thoughts on this long-investigated subject. I attach importance to all I have been saying, on this sole ground, that it appears at once to simplify and spiritualise our view of Christianity. The importance which the Calvinistic theory gives to apprehensions, in themselves speculative, if not in substance fanciful, and certainly intricate, would alone make it desirable to reduce our scheme of thought to the reality and certainty of evangelic truth. But what makes this much more important is, that in this division of attention, as I have already observed, there is perpetual liableness to

neglect the true and infallible sources of comfort, the fountain of living waters, and the well of water continually supplied therefrom in the soul; and to take up with the broken cisterns of empty notions and opinions, which only differ from the old Jewish ceremonies in not having the same venerable origin, and being metaphysical instead of material. On the contrary, the view I have been endeavouring to give, in addition to its agreement with Scripture, has this to recommend it, that it draws all the faculties and powers of the mind, without the slightest divergement, to one point-the new creature, the life hid with Christ in God; it takes the mind at once out of all the thorny mazes of dogmatism, and makes its great object the business, not of the head, but of the heart; it identifies every portion of our comfort with our growth in grace, our tenderness of conscience, our inward and outward walk with God; it sends us from perplexing disquisition to tranquillising prayer: in a word, it gives unity to all our thoughts and purposes, spirituality to all our movements and pursuits, and experimental matter-of-fact solidity to all our consolations. As St. Paul assures us that the kingdom of heaven is not meat and drink, so, by parity of reason, is it not dogmatic ratiocination; but, as he proceeds to tell us, it is Δικαιοσύνη, Ειρηνη και Χαρα εν Πνευματι αγίω ; and in what order these are attained, Isaiah most beautifully instructs us, "The work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance for ever." To this order, then, it is, and to an exclusive attention to this inward kingdom, that my remarks