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yea in the whole man; and yet those limbs know not that they have such a life. Had those members reason as well as sense, they would perceive how they are enlivened. Thou hast more than reason, even faith, and therefore mayest well know whence thou hast this spiritual life; and art much wanting to thyself, if thou dost not enjoy so useful and comfortable an apprehension.

- Resolve therefore that no secular occasion shall ever take off thy heart from this blessed object, and that thou wilt as soon forget thy natural life as this spiritual; and raise up thy thoughts from this dust, to the heaven of heavens. Shake off this natural weakness, this opinion of thyself, as if thou wert all earth, and know thyself advanced to a celestial condition; that thou art united to the Son of God, and animated by the Holy Spirit of God; so that the life which thou thou now livest in the flesh, thou livest by the faith of the Son of God, who loved thee and gave himself for thee. Gal. ii. 20.

See then and confess what cause we have to condemn the dead-heartedness, wherewith we are subject to be possessed; and how many worthy christians are there in the world, who justly bear a part with us in this blame; who have yielded themselves up to a disconsolate heartlessness and a sad dejection of spirit, partly through the prevalence of temptation: for Satan, well knowing how much it makes for our happiness cheerfully to reflect upon our interest in Christ, and to live in the joyful sense of it, labours by all means to clog us with a pensive kind of spiritual sullenness; accounting it no small victory, if he can bereave us of this habitual joy in the Holy Ghost, arising from Christ's living and breathing within us.

So much the more, therefore, must we bend all the powers of our souls against this dangerous and deadly machination of our spiritual enemy. Labour as for life, to maintain this fort of our joy, against all the powers of darkness; and if at any time we find ourselves beaten off, through the violence of temptation, we must endeavour to renew our courage, and expostulate the matter with ourselves as David did: Why art thou cast down, oh my soul; and why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise him who is

the health of my countenance, and my God. Psal. xlii.

11.

2. What cause is here for heavenly joy, and raptures of admiration, at that infinite goodness and mercy of our God; who hath vouchsafed to honour his people with a special inhabitation of his ever-blessed Deity; yea, to live in them, and to make them live mutually in and to himself. What capacity is there in the narrow heart of man, to conceive of this incomprehensible favour to poor sinful creatures. Oh Saviour, this is no small part of that great mystery, into which the angels desire to look, and can never look to the bottom of it. How then shall the weak eyes of sinful flesh ever be able to reach it?

When thou in thy state of human infirmity, offeredst to go down to the centurion's house, that humble commander could say, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof. What then shall we say, that thou, in thy state of heavenly glory, shouldest vouchsafe to come down and dwell with us in these houses of clay, and to make our breasts the temples of thy Holy Spirit! 1 Cor. vi. 19. When the holy virgin came to visit the partner of her joy, thy forerunner, then in the womb of his mother, was animated with thy presence. What then should be our joy, seeing thou hast been pleased to visit us in so much mercy, as to come down and be spiritually conceived in our hearts, and thereby to give us a new and spiritual life; a life of thine own, yet made ours; a life begun in grace, and ending in eternal glory!

3. Never did the Holy One give a privilege, where he did not expect a duty. He hath more respect to his glory, than to throw away his favours. The life arising from this blessed union with Christ, as it is the height of all his mercies, so it calls for our most zealous affections, and most effectual improvement.

Art thou then thus happily united to Christ, and thus enlivened by him? How intimate must thou needs be with him; how dear must thy valuations be of him; how heartily must thou be devoted to him! The spirit of man, saith Solomon, is the candle of the Lord, searching all the inward parts of the belly. It therefore cannot but

blessed; and therein a right to all the blessings of God, both of the right hand and of the left; and an interest in all the good things, both of earth and heaven. Hence it is that the glorious angels of heaven become our guardians, keeping us in our ways, and working secretly for our good upon all occasions; that all God's creatures are at our service, and that we have a true spirithal title to them. All things are yours, saith the apostle; and ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's. 1 Cor. iii. 22, 23.

But take heed, my son, of mislaying thy claim to what, and in what manner, thou oughtest not. There is a civil right that must regulate our claim to earthly things: our spiritual right neither gives us possession of them, nor takes away the right and propriety of others. Every man hath and must have what, by the just laws of purchase, gift or inheritance, is derived to him: otherwise there would follow an infinite confusion in the world. We could neither enjoy nor give our own, and only will and might must be the arbiters of all men's estates. How unjust this would be, both reason and experience evince. There were no theft, no robbery, no oppression in the world, if any man's goods might be every man's; and were they not secured to us by the intervention of human laws. The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. In his right whatever portions lawfully descend to us, we may justly possess, as we have them legally made over to us, from the secondary and immediate owners.

There is a generation of men who have vainly fancied the founding of temporal dominion in grace; and upon this mistake have dispossessed the true heirs as intruders, and scoffed at the just and godly in the possession of wicked inheritors. Whether they be worse commonwealth's men or christians, is to me utterly uncertain ; but sure I am, they are enemies to both. On the one side they destroy all civil propriety and commerce; and on the other they extend the power of christianity so far, as to render it injurious and destructive, both to reason and to the laws of all well-ordered humanity.

Nothing is ours by injury and injustice all things are so ours, that we may with a good conscience enjoy them as from the hand of a munificent God, when they are con

veyed to us by the lawful convention or bequest of men. In this respect a christian is the lord of the world, and hath a right to the whole creation of God. How can he challenge less? He is a son, and in that an heir; and according to the high expression of the Holy Ghost, a co-heir with Christ. While therefore we may not be highminded, but fear; so we may not be too lowhearted, in the undervaluing of our condition. In God we are great, how mean soever in ourselves. In his right the world is ours, whatever pittance we enjoy in our own, How can we go less, when we are one with him, who is the possessor of heaven and earth?

It were but a poor comfort to us, if by virtue of this union we could only lay claim to all earthly things. Alas, how vain and transitory are the best of these; perishing under our hand, in the very use of them; and in the mean time how unsatisfying in the fruition! All this were nothing, if we had not an interest in the best of all God's favours, in the heaven of heavens, and the eternity of that glory which is there laid up for his saints, far above the reach of all human expressions or conceits. It was the word of him who is the Eternal Word of his Father Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am: that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me. And not to be mere spectators only, but even partners of all this celestial bliss, together with himself: The glory which thou gavest me, I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one. John xvii. 22-24. Oh the transcendent and incomprehensible blessedness of believers, which even when they enjoy, they cannot be able to utter; for measure infinite, for duration eternal! Oh the inexplicable joy of the full and everlasting accomplishment of the happy union of Christ and the believing soul; more fit for thankful wonder and ravishment of spirit, than for any finite apprehension.

CHAP. VI.

THE MEANS BY WHICH THIS UNION IS EFFECTED.

THAT we may look a little further into the means by which this union is wrought, know, my son, that as there are two persons, betwixt whom this union is made, Christ and the believer; so each of them concurs in effecting it. Christ, by his Spirit diffused through the hearts of all the regenerate, gives life and activity to them; and the believer, thus influenced, lays hold by faith upon Christ. From this re-action and mutual operation, results this gracious union of which we speak. Here is a spiritual marriage betwixt Christ and the soul. The liking on one part doth not make up the match, but the consent of both. To this purpose Christ gives his Spirit, and the soul plights her faith. What interest have we in Christ, but by his Spirit; what interest hath Christ in us, but by our faith?

On the one part: He hath given us his holy Spirit, saith the apostle. 1 Thess. iv. 8. Agreeably to this, We have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God. 1 Cor. ii. 12. And this Spirit we have so received, that he dwells in us; and so dwells in us, that we are joined to the Lord; and he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit. 1 Cor. vi. 17.

On the other part: We have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And the life we live in the flesh, we live by the faith of the Son of God; who dwells in our hearts by faith. Gal. ii. 20. Oh the grace of faith! According to St. Peter's style, how truly precious. Justly is it recommended to us by St. Paul above all other graces, as that which, if not alone, yet chiefly transacts all the main affairs tending to salvation. Faith is the quickening grace, Rom. i. 17; the directing grace, 2 Cor. v. 7; the protecting grace, Ephes. vi. 16; the establishing grace, Rom. xi. 20; the justifying grace, Rom. v. 1; the sanctifying and purifying grace, Acts xv. 9. Faith is the grace that apprehends, applies, and appropriates Christ; hence

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