dred; they are chiefly confined to those narrow limits which circumscribe the connective ties of flesh and blood, and seldom, if ever, extend further than to those who are excited by interest, or some other selfish motive, to indulge, flatter and exalt their selfishness. And even here they are liable to be turned from one flattering object to another more flattering, and which can afford a higher gratification to self. So contracted, selfish and fleeting are carnal affections.

But spiritual affections are not circumscribed within so small a compass. They cannot be confined to such narrow limits; they embrace the whole creation of God; they shed abroad their benign love to all the human race; they extend the hand of kindness and charity according to the spirit of that Divine precept, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." The most powerful operations and the most extensive stretch of natural affections are very feeble and limited, when compared with the wide-spread effusions and divine operations of spiritual and heavenly affections. These heavenly affections are the rich and abiding treasure of every faithful believer; they are the treasures of a life of continence, the fruits of the cross of Christ, the genuine offspring of a virgin life. As carnal affections have a natural tendency to produce selfishness, with all its consequences; so spiritual affections will bring forth the genuine fruits of peace, love and disinterested benevolence.

4. Man is required to love God with all his heart, squl, mind and strength, and to place his highest affections there. He is at the same time, required to deny himself of all those carnal and earthly propensities, affections and lusts which bind him to the flesh, and which constitute the life of the natural man, in his fallen and depraved state; and in this sense, he is required to hate his own life. It is the same fallen and depraved nature which he is required to hate in all his earthly kindred. And when this nature is overcome and destroyed in himself, and in them, by the power of the gospel and a daily cross, then there is room for Christ to dwell in the soul, and the man can then love God in every such soul, whether they have been connected with him by the kindred ties of the flesh or not. God is no respecter of persons; and those who have the Spirit of God dwelling in them, will love those best who possess the most of that spirit.

When therefore, this important work is effected in the soul, by subjection and obedience to the cross of Christ; when the soul has gained a complete victory over that carnal, selfish nature, which first led to a wife, and, in its effects, produced all those carnal connexions which bound his affections to a carnal life; then he has obeyed the precept of Christ, and fully proved his hatred of that life, with all its connexions, by renouncing it and travelling out of it; and then also, is fulfilled to him, and in him, the promise of Ꮓ

Christ: "There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake and the gospel's, but he shall receive an hundred-fold "now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, "and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to 66 come eternal life."*

Here then is the substance of the true virgin life; and this is its promised reward. Here is the hatred which constitutes a true christian disciple, and the blessing which follows it. A full and final cross against the carnal nature of the flesh, and a hatred of that life, with all those affections and lusts which have a natural tendency to indulge and gratify it. In the reward, the wife is not found; but persecutions supply her place. Nothing will sooner kindle the fire of persecution than a cross against this carnal life; especially where a wife is unreconciled to bear a part in the cross which her husband has conscientiously taken up for Christ's sake and the gospel's.

But, replies the objector, it cannot be that wives are to be hated and forsaken; for the apostle Paul says, "Husbands, love your wives." A very weak objection truly, after what has already been said on the subject. But objectors generally omit the most important part of this passage, which shows in what manner the apostle taught the married christians, of that day, to love their wives; we will therefore take the liberty to transcribe the passage in connection, and let modern christians see whether they live up to the apostle's instructions. "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved "the church and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and "cleanse it;—that he might present it to himself a glorious church, "not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should "be holy, and without blemish: So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies." Christ's love to the church, according to this testimony, does not lead him to defile it, but to sanctify and cleanse it, that it may be holy, and without blemish. "So ought men to love their wives;" not with a carnal love, but with the same pure virgin love; not defiling themselves and their wives with the impure gratifications of lust; but in living lives of continency—in maintaining a virgin life.

5. The same apostle also says, in another place, "I am jeal66 ous over you with a godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ."‡ It was as a chaste virgin that they were to be presented to Christ; and he would accept them in no other character. Knowing this, the holy zeal of the apostle was stirred up to admonish these Corinthian christians; lest their minds should be led away from the purity and simplicty of the gospel, so that they would not preserve

* Mark x. 29, 30.

Eph. v. 25 to 28..

+2 Cor. xi. 2.

their bodies" in sanctification and honor," by following the principles of purity and holiness, by living as Christ lived, and walking as he walked, which was evidently in a life of continence and chastity, in a virgin life. If then, this principle of a virgin life were of the world, the world would undoubtedly love its own. But the very nature of man is wholly opposed to it, which is a sufficient evidence that it is not of the world, but of a superior origin.

6. But the most plain and pointed testimony of the apostle, in favor of a virgin life, is given in the seventh chapter of his first epistle to the Corinthians, by which he clearly shows the wide difference between virgin purity, and sexual indulgence; and in which he prophetically points to a day of more perfect purity, when all such indulgences must come to an end. And all the attempts of modern christians to draw from the apostle's doctrine any licence to indulge their lascivious propensities, are but so many evidences of the depraved state of their own minds, and their ignorance of the true nature of that gospel purity which the apostle is so careful to impress upon the minds of the Corinthian christians.

"Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me,” saith the apostle; "It is good for a man not to touch a woman." Having laid down this principle at the beginning of the chapter, he could not reverse it without involving himself in a contradiction. "For," as he said on another occasion, "if I build again the things "which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor."* Nor is there the least evidence to be found, in any of his writings, that he ever ceased to give the preference to a virgin life; altho the time was not then come for a full manifestation of the truth on this subject.

"It is good for a man not to touch a wife. But because of the 'fornications, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband."+ This is the extent of the apostle's toleration; and he affirms that he spoke this by permission, and not of commandment. And why this permission? Evidently because of the uncontrollable passions of many among these Corinthians, whom the apostle calls carnal, and who, previous to their conversion to christianity, had been accustomed to a plurality of wives, and whose licentious habits, even after their conversion, could hardly be controlled within the bounds of moral decency,

* Gal ii. 18.

†The reader will perceive that the Italic words in this quotation, do not agree with our common translation; but they accord with the literal meaning of the original Greek, in which the apostle wrote. Tuvainos, the word translated woman in the 1st verse, means wife, and is the same as that translated wife in the 2d, 3d and 4th verses. The 2d verse in the Greek begins with these words; Διὰ δε τας πορνείας, which are literally rendered thus; But because of the fornications. The word to avoid is not in the Greek, but was inserted by the translators.

notwithstanding all the apostle's permissions and indulgences. But all these indulgences, which modern christians so readily arrogate to themselves, to justify their lascivious practices, cannot alter the nature of holiness, nor lessen our obligations to follow Christ's example.

It is contended by many, that the apostle gave his instructions in favor of a virgin life by permission only; but the fact is directly the reverse; nor is there any deviation, in all his writings, from the principle laid down in the first verse of this chapter; and every indulgence permitted to the Corinthians, was evidently on account of their weakness. It would have been very extraordinary indeed, for the apostle to recommend continence and virgin purity by permission, or grant it as an indulgence, when every feeling of the carnal nature of man was wholly opposed to it. Nor would ten thousand such permissions ever induce one carnally minded soul to take up such a cross; nor would he ever take it up so long as he could find the least hope of salvation without it. The apostle's permission therefore, was not in behalf of those who were willing to take up their crosses; but in behalf of those who chose rather to indulge the flesh than to cross it. And the plain reason why these permissions and indulgences were suffered in that day, was, that the day of full redemption was not then come; and therefore a full and final cross against those indulgences, could not then be absolutely required. But the apostle told them plainly what was the best way; and those who had spiritual discernment enough to prize a life of purity, followed the apostle's advice.

Again it is said that, "the present distress," mentioned by the apostle, alluded to outward afflictions, occasioned by persecution. But this is not true; nor can any evidence be produced, either from sacred or profane history, to warrant such a conclusion; but on the contrary, the time when the apostle wrote this epistle, appears to have been a time of the greatest tranquillity the primitive church ever enjoyed; nor has the apostle given the least hint that persecution was the cause of that precept. The real cause was the uncontrollable passions of these carnal professors, which the apostle strove to keep within some bounds, by certain permissions and indulgences, in a lawful way; otherwise they would have been ensnared by the devil and their own lusts, and led into fornication and adultery. That this was the real state of many among these Corinthians, will appear very evident on examining the third, fifth and sixth chapters of this same epistle. Yet that there were some among them who were spiritually minded, appears evident by their writing to the apostle on this subject; and his answer is a clear proof that many evils had got in among them.

We do not disagree with the apostle, that those who cannot, or will not abstain from fornication, would do better to marry and

confine themselves to one wife, and become orderly members of civil society, than to continue in the practice of promiscuous debauchery. But a thousand indulgences to carnal men and women, can never purify the nature of lust, nor purge it out of the soul. The marriage of the world still belongs to the first Adam, and not to the second; to the kingdoms of this world, and not to the Kingdom of Christ. This appears evident from the apostle's own testimony in this same discourse, from which carnal christians draw so much indulgence to please the flesh. Why do they not see the distinction?

"He that is married, careth for the things that are of the world, "how he may please his wife." Also, "she that is married, car"eth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband." But the unmarried, or those who live a virgin life,* "care for the "things of the Lord, how they may be holy, both in body and in "spirit." Here we see the principle of a holy life directly pointed out; therefore let those who desire holiness, follow it. "I would that all men were even as I myself," says the apostle, who himself was not married. "I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I."

7. But after all the apostle's permissions and indulgences to the Corinthians, whom he declares to be "carnal," he points them to a future day in which all these indulgences must cease; when carnal gratifications, separate possessions, and whatever else among chrisitans pertained to the customs and manners of a selfish world, must be done away in the church of Christ; and a more inward and spiritual work be wrought in the soul, and a new order of things succeed in the church.

"But this I say, brethren, The time is short. It remaineth, "that both they that have wives, be as tho they had none; and "they that weep, as tho they wept not; and they that rejoice, as "tho they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as tho they possessed not; and they that use this world as not abusing it; for the "fashion of this world passeth away."

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Some have supposed that the apostle alluded to a state beyond the grave; but a little reflection will show the inconsistency of this supposition. To make it consistent, they must also suppose that the practice of buying and using this world is likewise to be carried beyond the grave. But this they themselves would hardly believe. The truth is, that passage points directly to the second coming of Christ, and the established order of his Kingdom on earth, in which the apostle evidently foresaw that a final cross against the carnal indulgence of the flesh, would put an end to that use which had hitherto been made of wives: That those who had

It is evident that the apostle here alluded to those who really lived a virgin life for Christ's sake and the gospel's, and not to those who were merely unmarried, and yet lived in carnal indulgences.