conduct of some be adduced as an argument subversive of the doctrine: appeal can with confidence be made to the holy lives of thousands in confirmation and support of it.

To conclude. If the discussion of this subject fall short of the end proposed; if it prove insufficient to carry conviction to those for whom it is designed; yet let it not fail of producing its proper effects on the advocates for Justification by faith only. Is so formidable an objection alleged against your fundamental doctrine? Let your whole life be a refutation of the charge. Are you reproached with the pernicious consequences of your tenets? Labour the more strenuously and circumspectly to shew by your own example, that the doctrine which you profess is "a doctrine according to godliness." Are you called to contend for what you conceive to have been "the faith which was once delivered unto the saints?" Contend with meekness of wisdom. Contend in the spirit of love. Prove that the way of truth is the more excellent way by the excellence of the fruits which it displays. Let this be the object of your contention, to excel in good works; to abound more and more in all holy conversation and godliness; "by well doing to put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. Finally, my 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, if there be any praise, think on these things. Those things which we have both learned and received" from Christ and his apostles, do; "and the God of peace shall be with you." *Phil iii. 8, 9.

37

SERMON IV.

SCRIPTURAL STATEMENT OF THE DOCTRINES OF HUMAN CORRUPTION, AND OF THE RENEWAL OF THE HEART TO HOLINESS.

The heart of the sons of men is full of evil. Ecclesiastes ix. 3.

IT is a truth, which scripture throughout inculcates, and experience every day confirms, that no man, without some previous sense of his guilt and danger as a sinner, will ever cordially submit himself to the righteousness of God. By one, who retains the presumptuous hope that he has a righteousness of his own in which he may appear before God, the free gift of Justification will be little esteemed. If the man-slayer had not dreaded the sword of the avenger of blood, would he have fled for safety to the city of refuge? If the Israelites had not felt the envenomed bite of the fiery serpents, would they have looked up for a cure to the brazen serpent? If the sinner be not impressed with some conviction of his misery, will he ever flee to Christ for refuge or look up to him for deliverance from the wrath to come?

The same train of reasoning may be adopted with respect to the other branch of salvation, our sanctification. By those who cherish favourable sentiments of the goodness of their own hearts, or entertain very limited notions of their original depravity, the promise of the Spirit, and of the renewal of the heart to holiness will be lightly regarded. "They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick." Some adequate conceptions must be obtained of the strength and inveteracy of the disease, before any just apprehensions can be formed of the necessity and magnitude of the projected cure. what other cause, indeed, but to inadequate conceptions of the nature and extent of human corruption is it owing that so many partial and defective sentiments prevail respecting the meaning of conversion; of being "born again of the spirit; of putting off the old man and of putting on the new man;" and of other corresponding

E

Το

expressions, by which a transition from a state of sin to a state of holiness is designated. Yet such inadequate conceptions cannot but exist, so long as men, instead of simply crediting the plain and positive declarations of the word of God, listen to the suggestions of their own proud and carnal reasonings, and interpret the sacred text in conformity to their favourite and pre-established opinions. With the view of offering some remedy for this evil, I have on the present occasion made choice of a text, in which the inspired writer asserts in very unequivocal terms the inherent and extensive depravity of human nature. "The heart of the sons of men is full of evil." From the numerous passages of scripture, which bear decisive testimony to this truth, perhaps it would be difficult to adduce a text, in which the doctrine is exhibited in a more concise and comprehensive view. In discoursing on these words I purpose to employ them for obviating some misconceptions, which prevail on the subject.

I. Of man's natural corruption. II. Of his renewal to holiness.

I. One prevailing misconception on the subject of human corruption respects the seat of the disorder. The wickedness of the lives of men is readily admitted. Their ambition, cruelty, injustice, animosity, revenge, their evil tempers, their immoral practices, are too notorious to be denied. But while the effects are acknowledged the cause from which they spring, is overlooked. These violations of the law of God are represented as resulting from weakness, from inadvertency, from surprise, from the violence of temptation, from the force of habit, from the influence of example. They are described as irregularities, greatly indeed to be lamented, but accidental and extraneous, not necessarily connected with any inward principle of evil. Nay, what is the daily language of numbers? 'Our lives, it is true, are not exempt from blame. We are guilty of many indiscretions. But our heart is good.' In opposition to this language, what asserts the text? It asserts that the origin of all the evil is within. "The heart of the sons of men is full of evil." Not the streams alone are filthy and defiled; but the fountain is polluted. The disease is not merely external. Not the

extremities only are affected. The blood is tainted. The very vitals are unsound. The corruption is a radical corruption. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit. Where so much practical wickedness abounds, the heart cannot be good. Does not the whole tenor of the word of God accord with the assertion in the text? Does not the Almighty declare, "The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; the heart is deceitful above all Is not the perverse things, and desperately wicked?"*

and ungodly conduct of mankind repeatedly ascribed, to their "walking after the imaginations of their evil heart?"+ From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence; "even of your lusts, which war in your members?" The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity; an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. But it is "out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaketh."§ To what source does Christ who "knew what was in man" refer every evil of which man is guilty? To the evil principle which operates within. "Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false-witness, blasphemies."||

Another ground of misconception on the subject of human corruption respects the degree and extent of the disorder. Though the heart, it is admitted, be bad, yet it is only partially bad. If some propensity to evil be found within us; yet many contrary dispositions exist to counteract it. Look at the most barbarous nations. Even among these, generosity, gratitude, fidelity, and other similar good qualities frequently abound. Look at the young and at such as are not deeply sunk in vice. They will uniformly applaud an instance of integrity, of disinterestedness, or of any other virtue, placed before them in practice or in narrative; and will condemn a Do not these examples prove that contrary conduct. there is some tendency in man to what is good: that goodness maintains even a preponderating influence in "The heart of the heart?' But what says the text? the sons of men is full of evil." The corruption is not only radical, but total. In the figurative language of the Prophet, "the whole head is sick, and the whole heart * Gen. viii, 21. Jer. xvii. 9. § Matt. xii. 34.

+ Jer. vii. 24.

Matt. xv. 19.

± James iv. 1.

faint. From the sole of the foot, even unto the head there is no soundness."* The propensity to evil, far from being counteracted by contrary dispositions, naturally experiences no check. The examples adduced prove nothing to the purpose for which they are advanced. Generosity, gratitude, fidelity, and the exercise of many other pleasing qualities between man and man; the spontaneous applause of virtue and morality: the decided condemnation of immorality and vice, may all exist, without any tendency in man to what is truly good. They are not necessarily connected with any inward principle of goodness, in the scriptural meaning of the word. For what is goodness, as opposed to evil in the text? It is godliness. It is holiness. It is a spiritual conformity to the law, to the will, to the image of the Almighty. Goodness, thus considered, far from maintaining a preponderating influence in the heart, is utterly excluded. Evil alone exists and reigns within. Such is the universal language of the word of truth. I know, says the apostle, "that in me (that is in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." It is emphatically said that "the carnal mind is enmity against God." In what light does the Almighty, before whom "all things are naked and opened," view the human heart? He sees "that every imagination of the thoughts of man's heart is only evil continually."+ Words cannot more strongly and copiously depict the total depravity of man. Observe the force and fulness of the expressions. "The thoughts of man's heart, the imaginations" of the thoughts of his heart, are evil: evil without exception, for it is "every imagination" which is evil: evil without any intermixture of good, for it is only evil: evil without any interruption, for it is evil continually.

Another ground of misconception still remains to be considered. If such,' it is contended, be in some instances the state of the heart, yet it is not always, or even generally such. It is not every man, nay perhaps in modern times, at least in christian countries, there is not any man, of whom it may with truth be said, that the thoughts of his heart are only evil continually. This total depravity is the effect of gross darkness, and of a long unrestrained course of iniquity. In the antedilu* Isaiah i. 5, 6. + Rom. vii. 18. viii. 7. Gen. vi. 5.