those who had attained to the most eminent degree of sanctification; who were most distinguished for the mortification of the flesh, and the habitual spirituality of their frames? what has been the experience of such, but an experience of their utter, infinite frailty; of their absolute insufficiency for performing the will of Jehovah? When they turn their eyes upon their own hearts, do they not behold innumerable imperfections, much blindness of understanding, much coldness, and carnality of affection, much proneness to evil, little inclination to what is good? When they turn their eyes backwards and survey the years that are gone, what do their lives appear, but a series of departure from the living God? They are mortified at the recollection of vows made but never performed; they acknowledge their imperfections in every relation of life, whether to God, to their neighbors, or to themselves. None who have ever realized the spirituality of the divine law, or the mystery of iniquity in their own hearts, would depend on any works which they perform for a thousand worlds; their persons, they will frankly confess, need to be adorned wholly and exclusively with the imputed righteousness of Jesus the Mediator, their prayers to be perfumed with the incense of his intercession, their repentance requires to be repented over, their very tears need washing in the laver of his cross.-Hear the testimony of Job, who was pronounced

"perfect in his generation," and was certainly inferior to none of his age either in the purity of his heart, or the spotlessness of his conversation: "Behold I am vile, what shall I answer thee? I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." David the "man after God's own heart" exclaims in the bitterness of his soul, "innumerable evils have compassed me about; mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up, they are more in number than the hairs of my head; therefore my heart faileth me. If thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand.-Enter not into judgment with thy servant, for in thy sight shall no man living be justified." We might pursue our enquiries from David the king to Isaiah an eminent prophet of the Lord, and prove from his language the infinite insufficiency of human attainments for reconciliation with God.-Woe is me, he exclaims, beholding himself in the blaze of this divine holiness, for I am undone ; he utterly despairs of acceptance on the footing of his own performances, “I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen the KING, the LORD of HOSTS:" He makes confession of his own impurity, and the impurity of all around him: He acknowledges that if the Lord God should deal with him or them according to the rigors of his justice, they could not possibly be acquitted; destruction from the divine

presence must be unavoidably their doom. Let us pass over from the prophets of the Old, to the apostles of the New-Testament dispensation, who enjoyed a still clearer revelation of the divine will, and a more abundant unction of the sanctifying Spirit.Their testimony perfectly harmonises with that already delivered. We hear the eminently loving and beloved disciple frankly professing, "if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us: Again, if we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin," is the testimony of the great apostle of the Gentiles. "For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing; for to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. What is the amount of all this evidence; of all the acknowledgments which we have heard from the lips of patriarchs, and prophets, and apostles? Does it not undeniably evince the imperfection of the most perfect; their utter inability to work out a justifying righteousness, and consequently that by "the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified with God."

4. That justification is unattainable by human merit, appears from the very substitution of the eternal Son in our room, and the introduction of another method of reconciliation. To suppose that apostate man

could be restored to the favor of God by his own obedience, is a daring impeachment of that wisdom which devised a different plan; of that love which "set forth the Son of God to be a propitiation through faith in his blood;" of that justice which exacted of him in the character of Surety the full payment of our debt; of that faithfulness which proclaims aloud, THERE IS NO SALVATION IN ANY OTHER: "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth upon him." Is it probable that the eternal God would have had recourse to a scheme so singular, so astonishing, if an ordinary method could have vindicated the honors of his government; or that he would have secured our redemption at an infinite expense, even the blood of his own Son, could an inferior price have satisfied the demands of his justice? "If righteousness came by the law,* then Christ is dead in

*No uninspired man, either before or since the apostles, understood more thoroughly the doctrine of a sinner's justification than the German Reformer; I trust therefore that the sincere enquirer after truth will be both pleased and profited with the following quotation from his writings. "For what need of Christ hath he who is able by the merit of congruence before grace to obtain grace, and then to do such work as by the merit of worthiness after grace, he is able to deserve eternal life. Then take away Christ with all his benefits, for he is utterly unprofitable. But why was he born? Why was he crucified? Why did he suffer? Why was he made my high priest, loving me, and giving himself an inestimable sacrifice for me? In vain, and to no purpose at all, if righteousness come by other means; for without grace and without Christ, I find no righteousness either in myself, or in the law." This truly great and good man afterwards indulges himself in the most elevated contemplation of Jesus as his Saviour and portion. "Mine eyes shall behold nothing else but this inestimable price, my Lord and Saviour

vain;" all the glory of that grace, that sovereignty, that wisdom which shines so illustrious in our reconciliation by his sacrifice is utterly obscured; all his sufferings in the manger and the garden and the cross, however numerous and painful, were undergone to no purpose; they neither reflect glory on any perfection of Deity, nor impart lasting consolation to us. Nay, the substitution of another in our room, the transfer of our iniquity to his account, and the imputation of his righteousness to us, are founded on this principle as their very basis,

THAT PARDON BY HUMAN ATTAINMENTS WAS

IMPOSSIBLE. "If there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness would have been by the law;" that is, if man could possibly have entered the holiest of all through the channel of the former, now violated covenant, "a new and living way would not have been opened up.

5. That justification cannot be attained by the deeds of the law appears evident from this consideration, that in scripture it is uniformly ascribed to divine grace through the righteousness of Immanuel. In all the sacred history there is not an instance of a single sinChrist; he ought to be such a treasure to me that all other things should be but dung in comparison of him; he ought to be such a light to me, that when I have apprehended him by faith, I should not know whether there be any law, any sin, any righteousness or any unrighteousness in the world. For what are all things which are in heaven and earth in comparison of the Son of God, Christ Jesus my Lord and Saviour, who loved me and gave himself for me?—Luther on Galatians, c. 2. v. 21.