grace is called, (Col. iv. 6.) that should make holy and heavenly things to be savoury to them. What a torment is it, to be still chewing an unsavory prayer and an unsavory meditation! to hear and speak those words, that their ears cannot relish! "Must I always," says the sinner, "offer this force to myself? Must I still strain and pump for tears and sighs? Were holiness as easy to me as it is to some, no life would I choose sooner than that: but I am straitened and pinched up, and all good things come out of me like the Evil Spirit, which rends and tears me, and is a torture and anguish to my heart and bowels." And it is so, because, in the performance of them, there is a neglect of that grace, that should make duties become easy: and, therefore, such a one will shartly give over duties themselves, which he finds to be so troublesome: yea, and will also give over all hopes of attaining any good at all by them.

2. Such works are also, as to the obtaining of the last and main end, Vain and Fruitless: and that, upon Two accounts.

(1) Because the Acting of Grace is the Life and Spirit of all our Works; without which, they are all but carcasses and dead things, and only equivocally called good works, even as the picture of a man may be called a man.

We are, says the Apostle, his workmanship; created in Christ Jesus unto good works. As, after the First Creation, God took a survey of all the works of his hands, and pronounced them all very good so there is no work of ours, that God will pronounce to be a good work, but what is the effect of his creating power; that is, the product of his Second Creation: created, says the Apostle, unto good works: Eph. ii. 10. Good works are no otherwise necessary to salvation, but as they are the exercises of grace, by which we express the life and likeness of God: so, only, are they necessary unto salvation. How should grace be seen and known but by works? First, God imprinted his own image upon our souls, in regeneration; and stamped us feature for feature, grace for grace, and glory for glory: but, because this is hid and concealed, therefore are we to copy forth this image in a holy conversation, and to express every grace in some duty or work of obedience. As those, that we call falling stars, dart from heaven, and draw after them long trains of light; so God would have us to shoot up to heaven, but yet to leave a train of light behind us: our graces must shine always: we must go on in good works. And those good works are of no value or account with God, of which grace is not the end or princi ple

What says the Apostle? Though 1 bestow all my goods to feed the poor....and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing: 1 Cor. xiii. 3. can a man bestow all his goods upon the poor, and not be charitable? indeed, the word, that we translate charity, might, for the avoiding of some mistakes, better have been translated love but, however, we must take charity for a disposition to relieve the wants and necessities of others with respect of love to God and his image: if this good work be not from grace, through a principle of love to God and obedience to his command, it is but the empty shell and husk of a good work, and it avails a man nothing. Yea, further: if, after this, I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing if my soul burn not as clear and bright in love, as my body in the flames, it availeth me nothing: I burn only what was dead before; and offer a carcase, instead of a sacrifice. There is no work or duty, how specious soever, that is of any profit to the soul, if that work or duty hath not the life and power of some grace or other expressed in it.

This, then, is the First ground, why works without grace are fruitless: because they are empty and lifeless. Grace is the life and spirit of good works.

(2) All works and duties whatever, without grace, leave the Heart in the same estate of Sin, and therefore the Person in the same estate of Wrath and Condemnation, as before.

For,

[1] All of them are not a sufficient Expiation for the guilt of any one sin,

Should such men pray and sigh, till their breath were turned into a cloud, and covered the face of the whole sky; should they weep, till they drowned themselves in their own tears: yet, if all this could be supposed to be only the remorse of nature, and not true and godly sorrow, they would still be under the same state of condemnation as the most seared sinner in the world. The Prophet Micah tells of some, that bid very high for pardon and forgiveness, as if they were resolved to carry it at any rate whatever: Wherewith, say they, shall we come before the Lord, and bow ourselves before the most-high God? Shall we come before him with burnt-offerings, and with calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, and with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall we give our first-born for our transgression, the fruit of our bodies for the sin of our souls? Micah vi. 6, 7: what high rates are here bidden, and yet all

this falls short! There is but one grace, and that is Faith, that can give us a right and title to that righteousness, that shall be a sufficient expiation and atonement for all our sins.

[2] All attainments and attempts, all endeavours and duties, without grace, can never mortify and subdue the Power and Dominion of any one lust or corruption.

Men may divert, and chain, and restrain their corruptions; and impale in their lusts, so that they shall not break forth into any outrageous wickedness: but, yet, without grace, they can never subdue them; because it is grace alone, that can lay the axe to the root of this evil tree.

Notwithstanding, then, all, that hath been said concerning the power of nature, what men may do thereby and how far they may go yet here you see what impotency there is in nature, without grace; and what it cannot reach to perform.

But, this is not spoken, that, hereby, any should be discouraged from working; and, because some doubt of the truth of their graces, that therefore they should desist from a course of holiness and obedience: this were plainly to thwart the whole design of this subject. No: all, that hath been said, is, to persuade men not to rest satisfied in any work of obedience or religion, in which some grace is not breathed or exercised; nor to look upon them at all as inductive to salvation, as in themselves, but as in reference to true grace.

How many poor souls are there, who, because they run on in a round of duties, because they do something that they call good works, think that salvation is as surely their own, as if all the promises in the Scripture were sealed and delivered to them by God himself! and yet, poor creatures! they never examine or regard from what principle this their obedience flows: whether from a principle of grace; or from the old corrupt principle of nature, new vamped from some new operations of the Common Spirit. Believe it, this is not that obedience, that God requires, nor that he will accept: an inward groan, if breathed by grace, is of more account with God, and will be more available to the soul, than the most pompous and specious services of unregenerate men. What is. it to God, when you offer not only the blind and the lame, but the dead also? Is it not rather an abomination, than obedience? The Apostle tells us, Without works, faith is dead: James ii. 20. and it is as true, on the other side also, that works, without faith and other graces of the Spirit, are not only dead, but rotten and noisome. Every duty, which men

perform in a graceless state and condition, God must needs loath, and them for it: the prayer of the wicked is an abomination unto the Lord: Prov. xxviii. 9. it is as hateful unto God, as vapours, that ascend up out of tombs from putrified bodies, are unto us.

What, then! must such persons give up themselves to sin therefore? God forbid! no, rather let such think thus: "If our duties and our righteousness be so loathsome, what are our sins and iniquities?" Though every sinner be dead in trespasses and sins, yet is it less offensive to have a dead carcase embalmed than to have it lie open. Still, therefore, continue working; but, in your working, first aim at the obtaining of grace, before you aim at the obtaining of heaven and salvation: let it, at no time, content you, that such and such duties you have performed; but look what grace you have acted in them; what is there of God breathing in this prayer, that I now put up? how am I in hearing, in meditation, in discoursing of the things of God? is my heart holy and spiritual? are my affections pure and fervent? are my graces active and vigorous? and, are they vigorous in this work of obedience? Else, to perform duties, and to neglect grace that alone can enable us to perform duties acceptably, is only to go to hell a little more cleanly,

DIRECTION ii. If you would work out your own salvation, as you must look to the Actings of Grace as well as to the Performance of Duties; so you must LABOUR TO GROW AND INCREASE IN THOSE GRACES, THAT ARE MOST ACTIVE AND WORKING.

And they are two, the grace of Faith, and the grace of Love. To grow strong in these graces, is the most compendious way for a Christian to dispatch his great work. I may call them the two hands of a Christian: and he, that is most active in these, works out his salvation with both hands earnestly.

1. The Actings of Faith are of mighty advantage to the working out of our salvation.

Two senses there are, in which salvation may be said to be wrought out.

In Title:

In actual Possession and Enjoyment.

Now faith is a working out of the one, and a compendious furtherance towards the working out of the other.

(1) Upon our believing, salvation is already wrought out for us, in Right and Title.

He, that believeth, shall be saved: here is the Title. The great work is then done and finished, when once faith is wrought. And, therefore, when the Jews came to enquire of our Saviour, how they should do to work the works of God: John vi. 28, 29. our Lord tells them, This is the work of God, That ye believe on him, whom he hath sent. Nay, further, as a faith of adherence or acceptance gives a right and title to salvation; so a faith of full assurance is this salvation itself: for, Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen: Heb. xi. 1: in its justifying act, it gives a title to salvation; in its assuring act, it gives the substance of the thing itself: for it is much at one to a strong faith, to believe heaven, and to enjoy it.

(2) Faith doth compendiously further and promote the working out of our salvation, in Actual Possession.

And that, because faith is that grace, which fetcheth all that ability and strength from Christ, whereby a Christian is enabled to work. Faith is not only a grace of itself, but it is steward and purveyor for all other graces; and its office is to bring in provision for them, while they are working: and, therefore, as a man's faith grows either stronger or weaker, so his work goes on more or less vigorously. When other graces are in want, and cry Give, Give; then faith betakes itself to Christ, and saith, "Lord, such a grace stands in need of so much strength to support it; and such a grace stands in need of so much support to act it: and I have nothing to give it myself; and therefore I come to fetch supplies from thee." And, certainly, this faith, that comes thus empty-handed unto Christ, never goes away empty-handed from Christ. What is it that you complain of? is it, that the work stands at a stay, and you cannot make it go forward? is it, that temptations are strong and violent; that duties are hard, irksome, and difficult? why set faith on work to go to Christ, and there you may be sure to have supply; because faith is an omnipotent grace: All things are possible to him, that believeth; and that, because all things are possible to that God and to that Christ, on whom faith is acted. There is no grace, nor no supply, nor mercy laid up in the Lord Jesus Christ, but it is all in the hands of a believer's faith; and he may take from thence whatsoever he - needs, to supply the present wants and necessities of his soul.

2. Another working grace is the fervent Actings of Love. Love is the great wheel of the soul, that sets all the rest a moving; and makes it like the chariots of Aminadab, to run swiftly towards its desired object. There is a mutual depen