covery to the love of God, and the desire of holiness, by a sense of his goodness, as manifested in the work of our redemption. The stronger the faith, the greater our love and fidelity; and we desire once more to be informed what other root they can spring from, or how they can be built on any other foundation. If this notion is branded as enthusiastic, we conceive the apostles of our Lord lead us into it; and to them we appeal, as infallible expositors of his meaning in the instructions he gave them. For it may here be remarked upon the whole, that the chief design of Christ's ministry, was not to bear witness of himself, or deliver an entire plan of his religion; but to furnish his apostles with the proofs of his being the Christ, when the time came for its being published to the world. It is, therefore, a mistake of some consequence in those who set up the authority of Christ against that of his apostles, and terminate their religion, as it were, in the history of his life, recorded by the four evangelists; which is only preparatory to the full manifestation of his Gospel, in its grace, peace, and happy effects, by those whom he commissioned for that purpose; and whose authority in the case, as being that of the Holy Ghost, and in no respect inferior to his own, is final. "To them was committed the ministry of reconciliation;" and as they had the mind, so they had the command and power of Christ to open the grand design of his coming. What that is, St. Peter

will tell us, Acts, x. 43:" To him give all the. prophets witness, that through his name, whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins;" remission of sins in our best, as well as worst estate. Let this be acknowledged, and that in our highest attainments we must be undone without mercy from the Lord, and it will be evident at once what faith is, and what kind of it must be always in exercise. Salvation, by a free gift to all who receive it in a deep sense of their unworthiness, will then appear in its full lustre, as the pure Gospel, and the necessary relief of sinful man.

I now presume to address myself to my reverend brethren, with respect, and beseech them to consider what kind of preaching is most likely to revive the decayed spirit of religion among us, and make our Jerusalem again a praise in the earth.

We are, under Christ, the depositaries of that grace of God which bringeth salvation, and, if we know our office, ordained to dispense it in all its freedom and fulness; - that grace, which can only be effectual to its end by being received as such that grace, which makes the Gospel glad tidings, by placing man out of the reach of condemnation, notwithstanding the power and malignity of his corruption, and the holiness and purity of God-that mystery of godliness, which destroys sin by pardoning it, and lays us in the dust to raise us as high as heaven-that glorious,

comfortable manifestation of God, which reconciles all his attributes, and makes the offer of mercy and peace to a lost world an act of his justice that grace which, in the inward spiritual experience of it, is the life of a sinner, turns his eyes, heart, and whole soul to God, kindles his hope, and invigorates his obedience that grace which was the basis of the Reformation, in opposition to an inveterate prevailing opinion of selfrighteousness, as a claim for heaven-the awakening of the nations to an evangelical taste and sense of the love of God in Christ, gladly embraced, gloried in, and suffered for-and which, I doubt not, will precede every other reformation of the church, and be the beauty of it in its highest state of perfection upon earth, as it is the triumphant song of the saints in heaven (Rev. v. 9); though now so hardly admitted, so much diminished, so rarely or so cautiously spoken of. Alas! we live upon the stock of our forefathers, and guide ourselves in the apostolical purity of the church we belong to (and apostolical it is, if its liturgy, articles, and homilies, may be allowed to speak for it); and at the same time too generally conceal or discountenance those very doctrines on which it is founded, and by which it is distinguished as a separation from some of the grossest errors of popery. A multitude of great and respectable names, even at some considerable distance from the era of the Reformation, shall give in a full testimony to the doctrine of salva

tion by grace, through faith in the merits and imputed righteousness of a Redeemer, and still be held in great veneration by us; and yet those who now stand out as witnesses of it, and pave the way to it, by laying open the deep apostasy of man, bringing a charge of sin against all flesh, and proclaiming aloud the utter insufficiency of all works and services to atone for transgression, to reinstate us in the favour of God, to heal and comfort the contrite heart, are vilified, and run down as enthusiasts; and their self-denying pains. in vindicating and illustrating the most essential precious truths of the Gospel are branded under the name of the new preaching. The charge of novelty may well be denied; and it is a little surprising from those who have the Bible in their hands, and the Articles of the Church of England formed upon it. But I fear there is no great mistake as to the matter of fact. It must be owned, that salvation by faith alone, and a previous sense of the curse of sin, to make deliverance welcome, and faith possible, has not of late entered much into our idea of preaching; and all attempts to revive it are almost as much wondered at, as the blessed Paul was, when he constantly affirmed, that, being justified by faith, we have peace: with God, through Jesus Christ our Lord." But surely it is matter of consideration, whether this truth must still continue in force among us, and be made the ground of our preaching as the sole relief of conscience labouring under a sense of

66

guilt, and the means of our establishment in holiness; or give way to popular essays on the reasonableness of virtue, or any display of the excellence of Christian morality, and the warmest exhortations to the practice of it, when the right foundation is not laid. It would be cruel mockery of one perishing with hunger, to speak to him of the nature of food, and the suitableness of it to his case, without putting it into his mouth. It is not less so, but much greater cruelty, to amuse our hearers with discourses on the beauty and necessity of holiness, and urge them earnestly to reformation, and, at the same time, withhold that truth from them, which is appointed of God, and revealed by him in great mercy for the life of their souls. As I said before, it is appealing to an ability which they have not; and, what is still worse, confirming them in an opinion of it, and can have no other tendency but to keep them from Christ. For every man would be self-saved if he could; and is easily encouraged to substitute the decency of an outward character, profession of religion, humanity, and acts of beneficence, in the room of that profound knowledge of sin, which brings us to God in penitence and self-abasement; and casts the soul, helpless and undone in itself, upon the Lord Jesus Christ, for his righteousness and salvation. Which, as it is something without us, and wholly undeserved, it is evident can only come to us in a way of believing; that is, in the sense of our absolute want of