your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed, and make you a new heart, and a new spirit." But the promise is, "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes." The spiritual resurrection is represented as the work of God and the duty of the sinner. The Apostle considers it as the work of God, when he tells believers, "You hath he quickened who were dead in tresspasses and sins." But God commands the sinner to arise from spiritual death. "Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest and rise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." The new creation is represented as the work of man as well as the work of God. In one place, the Apostle speaking in the name of christians, says, "We are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works." But in another place, he enjoins this new creation as a duty. "Put off concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds; and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." The turning from sin unto God is sometimes represented as arising from a divine operation, and sometimes as owing to human exertion. As a divine operation David prays for it repeatedly in the eightieth Psalm. "Turn us again, O. God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved. Turn us again, O God of hosts, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved." Ephraim prays in the same language for himself. "Turn thou me, and I shall be turned." And the

prophet Jeremiah cries, "Turn thou us unto thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned." But God expressly requires sinners to return unto him, of their own accord. By Isaiah he says, "Let the wicked forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." And by Ezekiel he urges the same duty upon sinners. "Turn ye, turn ye: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?"

Love, the first and noblest of all the christian graces, is required as a duty, and yet placed among the gifts of the Spirit. David calls upon good men to love God. "O love the Lord all ye his saints." "2 And

he resolves to exercise the same affection. "I will love thee, O Lord, my strength." But the Apostle tells us, that love is of God, and the production of his Spirit. "Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us." Repentance, another holy exercise, is represented as the gift of God and the act of the penitent. Timothy is directed, "in meekness to instruct those who oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance, to the acknowledging of the truth." Yet the Apostle tells us, "God now commandeth all men every where to repent." Christ declares, "He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." Notwithstanding this we are told, "Him hath God exalted to give repentance and remission of sins." Though faith in Christ be required, yet it is represented as the effect of a divine operation. When the Jews demanded of Christ, "What shall we do that we may work the works of God? Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent." But the Apostle tells believers, "By grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God." And suggests the same idea, by reminding them, that "they were risen with Christ, through the faith of the operation of God." Coming to Christ, which is indeed the same as believing in him, is represented as the ex ercise of the sinner, while under the influence of a divine operation. "No man can come unto me, except the Father, which hath sent me, draw him." Thus saints are represented as actually loving, repenting, believing, and coming to Christ, under the agency of the divine Spirit.

And we must further observe, that they are represented as exercising not only these, but all other graces and virtues, in the same manner. It is said, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness." Nevertheless, we find these fruits of the Spirit required as christian duties. "Giving all diligence," says the Apostle Peter, "add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity." And the Apostle Paul gives a similar exhortation to christians. "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." In a word, good men are represented as turning from sin unto God; as making themselves a new heart; as raising themselves from spiritual death; as exercising love, repentance, faith, submission, and every other christian grace; as persevering in holiness, enduring unto the end, and being faithful unto death: and yet they

are represented as doing all those things, by virtue of a divine influence upon their minds. God is represented as beginning the good work in them; as carrying it on until the day of Jesus Christ; and as keeping them by his mighty power through faith unto salvation. All this is fully comprised in the text. "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

Finally, the doctrine under consideration is confirmed, by all the commands in the Bible, and by the prayers of all good men. Every command, which God has given to men, plainly supposes, that they are moral agents, who are capable of acting freely in the view of motives; because a command could have no more influence, or lay no more obligation upon men, than upon stocks or stones, were men incapable of seeing the nature, and of acting under the power, of motives. As all the commands in the Bible, therefore, require men to put forth some motion, some exercise, some exertion either of body, or of mind, or of both; so they necessarily suppose, that men are, in the strictest sense of the word, moral agents, and capable of yielding active, voluntary, rational obedience to the will of God. But yet the prayers of all good men equally suppose, that they must be acted upon by a divine operation, in all their virtuous exercises and actions. For when they pray for themselves, that God would give them joy, peace, love, faith, submission, or strengthen and increase these and all other christian graces; their prayers presuppose the necessity of a divine operation upon their hearts, in all their gracious exercises and exertions. And when they pray for the world in general, that God would suppress vice and irreligion every where, convince and convert sinners,

comfort and edify saints, and spread the Redeemer's kingdom through the earth; their prayers are founded in the belief, that God must work in men both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Such clear and abundant evidence the Bible gives us, that saints both act and are acted upon by a divine operation, in all their holy and virtuous exercises.

But still we find many, who consider this scripture doctrine as a gross absurdity, or at least, as the Gordian knot in divinity, which, instead of untying, they violently cut asunder; and so make a sacrifice either of activity, or of dependence. Some give up activity for the sake of dependence; some give up dependence for the sake of activity; and some first give up one and then the other, for the sake of maintaining both. The Fatalists give up activity for the sake of dependence. They suppose men are totally dependent and constantly acted upon as mere machines; and of consequence are not free agents. The Arminians, on the other hand, give up dependence for the sake of activity. They suppose men have a self-determining power, or a power to originate their own volitions, and are capable of acting independently of any divine operation upon their hearts. But many of the Calvinists endeavor to steer a middle course between these two extremes, and first give up activity and then dependence, in order to maintain both. They hold, that men are active both before and after regeneration, but passive in regeneration itself. These three classes of men, however they may differ in other respects, seem to agree in this, that no man can act freely and virtuously, while he is acted upon by a divine operation; and accordingly unite in pronouncing the doctrine, which we have been laboring to establish, inconsistent and absurd. This naturally leads us to inquire,