greatly afflicted. Light as they may have made of religion before, they now believe enough to make them tremble. At such times it is common for them to think how good they would be, and what a different life they would lead, if it would please God to restore them. And should a favourable turn be given to their affliction, they are affected in another way; they weep, and thank God for their hopes of recovery, not doubting but that they shall become other men. But I need not tell you, or the reader, that all this may consist with a heart at enmity with the true character of God, and that it frequently proves so by their returning, as soon as the inpression subsides, to their old courses. The whole of this process may be no more than an operation of self-love; or, as Mr. SANDEMAN calls it, " love to that which relieves them," which is something at a great remove from the love of God, and therefore is not " godliness." Godliness has respect to God, and not merely to our own relief. The distress of an ungodly mind consisting only in a fearful apprehension of consequences, may be relieved by any thing that furnishes him with a persuasion of the removal of those consequences. It may be from an idea that he has performed the conditions of salvation; or from an impulse that his sins are forgiven; or from his imagining that he " God just in justifying him, ungodly as he stands." Any of these considerations will give relief; and no man will be so wanting to himself as not to "love that which relieves him." There may be some difference in these causes of relief:

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the first may be derived from something in ourselves; and the last may seem to arise from what Christ hath done and suffered: but if the undertaking of Christ be merely viewed as a relief to a sinner, we overlook its chief glory; and the religion that arises from such views is as false as the views themselves are partial.

The first idea in the doctrine of the cross is, "Glory to God in the highest." Its proclaiming "peace on earth, and good will to men" is consequent on this. But that which occupies the first place in the doctrine itself, must occupy the first place in the belief of it. The faith of the gospel corresponds with the gospel: "So we preached, and so ye believed." God will assert his own glory, and we must subscribe to it, before we are allowed to ask or hope for the for giveness of our sins; as is clearly taught us in what is called the Lord's prayer. He, therefore, that views the cross of Christ merely as an expe-, dient to relieve the guilty, or only subscribes to the justice of God in his condemnation, when conceiving himself delivered from it, has yet to learn the first principles of christianity. His rejoicing in the justice of God as satisfied by the death of Christ, while he hates it in itself considered, is no more than rejoicing in a dreaded tyrant being appeased, or somehow diverted from coming to hurt him. And shall we call this the love of God? To make our deliverance from divine condemnation the condition of our subscribing to the justice of it, proves beyond all contradiction, that we care only for ourselves, and that the love of God is not. in us. And

herein, if I may adopt Mr. SANDEMAN's term, consists the very poison" of his system. It is one of the many devices for obtaining relief to the mind without justifying God, and falling at the feet of the Saviour; or, which is the same thing, without "Repentance towards God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ."

The doctrine of the cross presupposes the equity and goodness of the divine law, the exceeding sinfulness of sin, the exposedness of the sinner to God's righteous curse, and his utter insufficiency to deliver his soul. To believe this doctrine therefore must needs be to`subscribe with our very heart to these principles, as they respect ourselves; and so to receive salvation as being what it is, a message of pure grace through a mediator. Such a conviction as this never possessed the mind of a fallen angel, nor of a fallen man untaught by the special grace of God.

Yours, &c.

LETTER V.

On the connection between repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

THE advocates of this system do not consider the order in which these graces are ordinarily introduced in the new testament as being

the true order of nature, and therefore generally reverse it, putting faith before repentance, and invariably placing repentance among the effects of faith. A sinner therefore has no spiritual sense of the evil of sin, till he has believed in the Saviour, and stands in a justified state.Then, being forgiven all trespasses, and reconciled to God through the death of his son, he is melted into repentance.

The question is not whether the gospel when received by faith, operates in this way; for of this there can be no doubt. Nothing produces godly sorrow for sin like a believing view of the suffering Saviour. Nor is it denied that to be grieved for having dishonoured God, we must first believe that he "is ;" and before we can come to him in acceptable worship, that through a mediator he is "the rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Without a mediator, repentance, even if it could have existed, must have been hopeless. I have not such an idea of the sinner being brought to repentance antecedent to his believing in Christ for salvation, as Mr. SANDEMAN had of his believing antecedent to repentance. According to him, he believes and is justified, not merely considered as ungodly, or without any consideration of godliness in him, but actually "ungodly as he stands ;" and then, and not till then, begins to love God, and to be sorry for his sin. This is manifestly holding up the idea of an impenitent believer, though not of one that continues such. But the antecedency which I ascribe to repentance does not amount to this. I have no conception of a sinner being so

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brought to repentance as to sustain the character of a penitent, and still less to obtain the forgive-ness of sin, previous to his falling in with the way of salvation. I believe it is not possible for a sinner to repent, and at the same time to reject the Saviour. The very instant that he perceives the evil of sin so as to repent of it, he cannot think of the Saviour without believing in him. I have therefore no notion of a penitent unbeliever. All that I contend for is, that in the order of cause and effect, whatever may be said as to the order of time, repentance precedes as well as follows the faith of Christ; and that faith in Christ cannot exist without repentance for sin. A sense of sin appears to me essential to believing in the Saviour; so much so, that without it, the latter would not only be a mere 66 notion," ," but an essentially defective one.

It is admitted on both sides, that there is a priority of one or other of these graces in the order of nature, so as that one is influenced by the other; and if no other priority were pleaded for, neither the idea of a penitent unbeliever on the one hand, nor an impenitent believer on the other, would follow for it might still be true, as Mr. M'Lean acknowledges, that "none believe who do not repent," (p. 39) and as I also acknowledge, that none repent who, according to the light they have, do not believe. But if we maintain not only that faith is prior in the order of nature, but that antecedent to any true sorrow for sin, we must " see God to be just in justifying us ungodly as we stand," this is clearly maintaining the notion of an impenitent believer.