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you.

ye

He that keepeth my commandments, be it is that loveth me. Ye are my friends, if ye do whatfoever I command Herein is my Father glorified, that yé bear much fruit : fo fhall ye be my difciples (c). Is not the beloved disciple in complete accordance with his Mafter? But after the afcenfion of our Lord do the other Apostles agree with St. John in preaching this doctrine? Hear, in the first place, St. James. Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own felves. What doth it profit, though a man fay he hath faith, and have not works? Can faith fave him? Know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead (d). Against whom does St. Jude direct the condemning force of his Epistle? - Against men polluted by continuance in fin; concerning whom he pronounces that, because they walk after their own ungodly lufts, they have not the Spirit (e). How speaketh St. Peter? His Epiftles are replete with exhortations to holiness as indifpenfable to falvation; and warnings against fin as the forerunner of deftruction. He defcribes Chriftians as appointed through

(c) John, xiv. 21. 23, 24. XV. 14. 8. (d) James, į. 22. ii. 14. 20. (e) Jude, 18, 19.

fanctification

fanctification of the Spirit unto obedience. He commands them to be obedient children, not fashioning themselves according to the former lufts in their ignorance, but to be holy in all manner of converfation: to abstain from flefbly lufts which war against the foul: to efchew evil and do good, if they love life; to add to their faith virtue and knowledge and temperance and patience and godliness and brotherly kindness and charity, if they would bave an entrance ministered unto them into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jefus Chrift (f). The only remaining writer of Epiftles, whether addreffed to individuals, to particular churches, or to Christians at large, is St. Paul. Is he of the fame fentiments with his brethren? Time allows me to produce but few of his expreffions: but they fhall be fuch as are decifive. They that are Chrift's, have crucified the flesh with the affections and lufts.. If any man have not the Spirit of Chrift, be is none of His. As many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the fons of God (g). How is a perfon to know whether he is led by the Spirit of God? By examining

(f) Pet. i. 2. 14, 15. ii. 11. (g) Gal. v. 24.

i. 5, 6. 11.

iii. 10, 11. Rom. viii. 9. 14.

2 Pet.

whether

whether the fruits of the Spirit are brought forth in him. What are the fruits of the Spirit? St. Paul replies; The fruit of the Spirit is all goodness and righteousness and truth; love, joy, peace, long-fuffering, gentleness, faith, meekness, temperance, every good word and work (h).

All these teftimonies, my brethren, whether of our Lord Jefus Chrift or of his Apostles, breathe the fame language, proclaim the fame truth. They proclaim that God acknowledges not any man as one of His people, who does not habitually and unreservedly labour in all things to keep His commandments. Evangelical obedience is to be the foundation of evangelical comfort. It is by obedience, not separated from faith, but wrought through faith and in evidence of faith: not regarding itfelf as poffeffed of any native holinefs, but afcribing every thing in itself which is pure to the Spirit of grace: not laying claim to recompenfe as of debt, as in any degree purchased by inherent merit of works, but looking for reward entirely as grace, as in every particular from first to laft purchafed by the juftifying atone

of

(b) Ephef. v. 9. Gal. v. 22, 23.

2 Theff. ii. 16, 17.

ment

ment of Chrift: it is by this obedience and by this only that you can prove yourselves to be the people of God, that you can become entitled as fuch to the confolations of the Gospel.

Let us proceed briefly to apply the obfervations which have been made.

Can any

Truth, by establishing itself, overthrows error, and diffipates delufion. If a true ftandard of judgement be recognised; the authority of every false standard is deftroyed. If Chriftian obedience be the criterion by which you are commanded to judge of your title to comfort; can any other criterion be neceffary? other be fafe? Can any other be fcriptural? You perhaps have been accustomed to believe that God has been pleased by a fovereign decree to felect from the mass of mankind certain favoured individuals; whom, while he leaves the reft of the pofterity of Adam to merited punishment, he exclufively crowns with the privileges of mercy. "Thefe," you have faid to yourself," are the elect of God: these are "the heirs of falvation and its attendant bleffings. To this chofen number I belong. To me, as belonging to them, "the comforts of the Gospel, present and "future,

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"future, are enfured." Unbiaffed fearches into Scripture, and a clofer comparison of things fpiritual with fpiritual, might poffibly convince you that your fundamental doctrine is not the doctrine of your Lord. But what if it were? Why speak you of comfort belonging to you as one of the elect; when your Lord pronounces it to belong only to the obedient? If you are not faithful in obedience; will you prefume, under pretence of being one of the elect, to take comfort in contradiction to the declaration of Jefus Chrift? If If you are faithful in obedience; is any thing farther requifite to authorife you to apply to yourfelf the comforts, which Jefus Chrift affures to the obedient? Or have you, on your own principles, any right to confider yourself as one of the elect of God longer than while you continue faithful in obedience?

But your miftake may be of a different

kind.

"I have experienced," you affirm, an internal impulfe, an impreffion from "above, an indefcribable fenfation of peace "and joy wrought, in my heart by the

Holy Ghoft, as a feal and pledge of the "actual forgiveness of my fins. When a "reconciled God has thus fpoken peace

to

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