state of things, under the ordinary dispensations of providence, was here by a special and particular sentence ordained to be the mode, and probably a most efficacious mode, of restraining and correcting an offence, from which it was of the utmost importance to deter the Jewish nation: because that nation was to be the depository of, and the means of preserving in the world, the knowledge and worship of the one true God, when it was lost and darkened in other countries. The prophet tells us again, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are turned an edge ; meaning by this figure, only to express to us, that the bad conduct of parents must in some degree affect their offspring. Nor is it unjust. For children are considered, as the most valuable enjoyments of parents. And it is always just in God to punish men in their dearest and most beloved enjoyments, provided the children be not dealt with unjustly.

18. The result of the whole then is, that the threat, of which we have been speaking, was at no rate meant to affect the acceptance or salvation of individuals in a future life. This must be evident from the eighteenth chapter of Ezekiel, wherein some of the Jews are repre

sented as it were expostulating with God and saying why? Doth not the son bear the iniquity of the father? And the prophet's answer in the name of the Almighty is, When the son hath done that which is lawful and right, and hath kept all my statutes and done them, he shall surely live. The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him. Now apply this to the second commandment, of visiting the iniquities of the fathers, &c. and the only way to reconcile them is, by supposing this commandment to relate solely to temporal, or family adversity and prosperity; and Ezekiel's chapter, to the rewards and punishments of a future state. And when it is further recollected, as has been noticed before, that the threatening in the commandment belongs only to the crime of idolatry, and that it also formed a part or branch of the mosaic system, which dealt thoughout in temporal rewards and pun ishments, at that time dispensed by a particular providence, the objections, which may have arisen in our own minds to that threatening, must, at once, disappear.

PART XII.

CONCLUSION.

SHEWING WHAT IS THE SIN AGAINST THE HOLY GHOST, AND WHY IT CANNOT BE FORGIVEN.

1. WHEREFORE Isay unto you, says Jesus Christ, in St. Matthew's gospel, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men. But the blasphemy against the holy ghost shall not be forgiven unto men, neither in this world, neither in the world to come. These words, in their true sense, are neither calculated to fill the impenitent with presumption, nor the humble with despair. To the first indeed they utter the voice of terror. To the last they speak the language of comfort and of hope.

Our blessed Lord, having cast out a devil, and by a power, evidently divine, healed the diseased person,

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so that he, who had been dumb and blind, instantly both saw and conversed, by the magnitude of this miracle, convinced many, who expressed their belief, that he was the Saviour, who should come into the world. Upon this event, certain of the Pharisees, who formed a part of his audience, hardened by a malice and hypocrisy beyond the possibility of conviction, intimated, that, perhaps what Christ had performed might be owing to some assistance he had received from evil spirits. He doth not cast out devils, say they, but through Beelzebub, the prince of devils. The miracle was too plain to be denied, and the effect too notcrious to be disputed. The means, therefore, with more subtilty, but with equal malice, they ventured to traduce, and thought fit to represent as diabolical.

2. To evince the absurdity of this blasphemous insinuation, our divine teacher argues, that common sense must suggest that whatsoever is done by confederacy with Satan, must be something that promotes the interests of his kingdom, and not any thing directly contrary to it. Because every kingdom divided against itself must be brought to desolation; and every city or