one general benefit coming out of the atonement that has been rendered for him on the cross, and which does not admit of being severed into parts, as has been done by the adepts of an artificial and scholastic theology. They are not disposed to look separately to our being freed from condemnation, and so rescued from hell; and to our being vested with a positive righteousness, and so made the rightful heirs and expectants of heaven. They would rather abide by their habit of viewing the gift that is by Jesus Christ as one and indivisible; and regard the attempt to decompose it into ingredients, more as a subtilty of human invention, than as the dictate of a mind that has been soundly and scripturally informed. And thus would they treat lightly the distinction that has been so much urged by some theologians, between the passive and the active obedience of Christ; or between the efficacy of the one to redeem from the incurred penalty, and the efficacy of the other to reinstate in the forfeited reward; between the tendency of His sufferings to avert all the wrath of the Divinity, and so to turn away from us the displeasure under which we lay, and the tendency of His services to restore to us the forfeited reward, and so transfer to us, for whom these services were undertaken, God's favour and kindness, as much as if they had been rendered in our own person and by our own performances. This attempt to mark off the mediatorship of Christ into two great departments, has been branded as an attempt to be wise above that which is written; and, when pursued into the still greater nicety of endeavouring to trace and to

follow it throughout the line of demarcation that is betwixt them, then has the whole speculation been denounced as one that ministers questions of strife rather than of godly edifying, and to which we cannot turn aside, without being involved in perverse disputings, and the jangling of vain contro

versy.

Now, we fully participate in this dislike at all such metaphysics of theology, as minister nothing in the way of comfort, or of direction, or of salutary influence to the plain mind of a plain and practical inquirer. And therefore we shall attempt nothing at present that is not quite broad and palpable, and shall avoid every thing that would require an eye of very minute or microscopic discrimination. It may be a matter of no great usefulness so to arrange and to classify the privileges of a believer, as accurately to refer each to the distinct services by which Christ hath insured it for those who put their trust in Him. But surely it is of importance to know what these privileges are, and for this purpose to make them the objects, if not of any acute or subtile exercise of the understanding, at least of simple enumeration. And we should feel

as if much had been left untold, were we not made to know that Christ hath brought in an everlasting righteousness, as well as finished transgressions, and made an end of sins-that He hath won for us the reward of heaven, as well as averted from us the vengeance of hell-that He hath not only redeemed us from the sentence of death but hath built up for us a title unto life everlasting-that, besides expunging our name from the book of condemna

tion, He hath graven it in the book of life-that, instead of standing before God simply as acquitted creatures, and therefore preserved from the place of condemnation, we stand before Him in the robe of another's righteousness, and therefore with the investiture of such an order of merit, as makes it fit that we should be translated to a high place of favour and of dignity. We want not to probe and to penetrate into the hidden intricacies of the question. But surely, if to be simply dismissed from the bar at which we stood as arraigned criminals be one thing, and it be another to be thence preferred to a title of renown, or to some station wherewith happiness and honour await us near the palace of our sovereign, then it concerns us to know that there is a justification as well as an atonement; that there is a righteousness as well as a redemption; that Christ hath done more than advance us to the negative or midway condition of mere innocence; that He hath wrought out for us a mightier transition than to a state of exemption from the torments of the accursed; that He hath not only retrieved our condition, but hath reversed it, utterly changing the character of our eternity, and turning it from an eternity of torment to an eternity of triumph-having both borne the full weight of our sufferings by taking on Himself the guilt of our sins, and having given us of His own righteousness, as our passport and title-deed to the glories of paradise.

And this view is not without warrant and authority from Scripture. The redemption which is through the blood of Christ is the forgiveness of sins. The righteousness of Christ, which is made

to rest on all who believe, brings along with it a title to positive favour, which is something more than forgiveness. The creditor who cancels our debt, does us a distinct and additional good, when, furthermore, he puts the deeds or the documents into our hands by which we are constituted the rightful claimants of any given property. And so Christ, in one place, is represented as a surety for the sins of those who believe in Him; and in another, as having purchased for them an inheritance, to which they, and they alone, have the right of entry and of possession. Moreover, we read of Christ being "delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification ;" or, that by His death He made atonement for sin; and by His resurrection He reentered heaven, and is there employed in preparing those mansions by which are rewarded the righteousness of those who believe in Him. One fruit of the mediation of Christ is said to be peace with God. But not only so, writes the apostle; in addition to having drawn back His hostility, He sends forth upon us His loving-kindness. And hence another fruit of the mediation is, that we have access to the grace wherein we stand. Yet it must be owned, that, notwithstanding the real distinction which there is between release from a penalty and admittance to a positive reward, and the corresponding distinction that has been made by theologians, between the passive obedience of Christ, by which it is held that the one has been averted, and the active obedience of Christ, by which it is held that the other has been rightfully earned for us,-it must be owned, we say, notwithstanding, that it is

the obedience of Christ unto the death which seems to have formed the main price, not only of all the immunities, but of all the privileges that believers enjoy. It was from His death that the incense of a sweet-smelling savour arose unto God. It was because of His death that God highly exalted Him, and gave Him a name above every name. It was from the grave that He ascended, rich in the spoils of a superabundant merit, wherewith He decks and dignifies all His followers. And thus there is not only a remission, but a righteousness that has been wrought out by the expiation on the cross. It was there that He became sin for us, though He knew no sin; and it was also in virtue of what has been done there, that we are made the righteousness of God in Him. The hope of our glory, as well as the price of our deliverance, stands connected with the knowledge of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

We affirm it to be of the very essence of gospel mercy, that, instead of a mere demonstration of Heaven's love, there went along with it a full demonstration of Heaven's righteousness-that it rendered glory to the law, and by the very act wherewith it rendered grace unto those who had trampled on the law. The forgiveness that is unto the sinner under this dispensation, bears upon it an awful character of sacredness and majestyseeing that it never could have issued on a guilty world but through the channel of a consecrated priesthood, and with the blood of a divine expiation. There is pity on high to the children of men—but it is pity enshrined in holiness, and to which there is no other way of access than by the safeguards