of creatures only who have never sinned. The new covenant is adapted, by infinite wisdom and love, to the condition of sinners involved in infinite guilt, and hopelessly lost, as far as any efforts of their own are concerned, under the power of sin.

6. The exclusive influence of the first covenant upon sinners, is to increase their guilt, and aggravate their depravity. The new covenant redeems these very sinners from the curse of the law, and "delivers them from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God." Hence the first covenant is said to "gender to bondage," i. e. sinners under its influence are left in hopeless bondage, under the power of sin; while all who are under the full influence of the new covenant, are free, i. e. are delivered from the power of sin, and introduced into a state of purity and blessedness, Gal. iv. 25, 26. "For these are the two covenants; the one from the Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which is the mother of us all."

7. The first covenant is a dispensation of justice. The new is a dispensation of mercy, under the influence of which the sinner is brought to the "blood of sprinkling which speaketh better things

than the blood of Abel." The former influences the subject by commands and prohibitions, rewards and penalties; the latter subdues and melts the heart of the rebel by the power of love.

8. Finally, whatever the old covenant, or the moral law, requires of the creature, the new covenant, as shown in a former discourse, promises to the believer. The first covenant, for example, requires of the creature perfect and perpetual holiness. The new covenant promises to the believer perfect and perpetual holiness. I will first cite a few of the passages quoted in that discourse, to sustain the above declaration, and will then offer some general remarks to show, that the construction there put upon them is correct. Jer. xxxii. 39, 40. "And I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me for ever, for the good of them and of their children after them; and I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn from them to do them good; but I will put my fear in their hearts, and they shall not depart from me.' Ez. xxxvi. 25. Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean; from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart, also, will I give you, and a new spirit will I 'put within you; and I will take the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit

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within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments and do them." Deut. xxx. 6. "And the Lord thy God will circumcise thy heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy sout." Jer. 1. 20. "In those days, and at that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found." 1 Thess. v. 23, 24. "And the very God of sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body, be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it." That Christ, as the Mediator of the new covenant, does, in these and kindred passages, promise to the believer all that the law requires of him, will appear perfectly evident from the following considerations.

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1. This sentiment is in accordance with the most direct and obvious import of the phraseology employed in such passages,-that meaning I refer to, which most naturally suggests itself to plain and unlettered men, reading the sacred text without note or comment, and with their judgments unbiassed by pre-conceived opinions. For such minds the Bible was written, and its import to.

them, in the state referred to, is in accordance with the "mind of the Spirit."

2. This is the construction which would, by all mankind, be put upon the same language, if found in any other book but the Bible.

3. Let any minister, in any congregation in the land, use this identical language in the same full and unqualified manner in which the sacred writers use it, and their hearers will, with one voice, charge him with holding the doctrine of Christian Perfection, as maintained in these discourses; so obvious is the import of such phraseology, when presented without qualification.

4. All Christians admit that entire justification is promised in the new covenant, that the Bible teaches that heaven is a place of perfect holiness, and that Christ was free from all sin while on earth. Now the same identical principles of interpretation, by which either of the above doctrines can be proved from the language of the Bible, demand the admission of the doctrine under consideration, in all its fulness. If the language employed in the above passages, does not sustain this doctrine, neither of the above doctrines can be sustained by the language of inspiration. Every candid reader of the Bible, who will carefully study the sacred volume, with his eye upon the phraseology

there employed, in reference to all these doctrines, will find the above affirmations fully sustained.

5. The principles of interpretation by which it can be shown that the phraseology of the passages before us does not sustain the doctrine under consideration, would be equally conclusive against any other phraseology which the sacred writers could have employed, when from such phraseology this doctrine should be inferred.

6. This is the very sentiment which is invariably impressed by the Spirit of God, upon the young convert in the warmth of his early love. The language and sentiment of every such heart, is—

"Lord, I make a full surrender;
Every thought and power be thine-

Thine entirely,

Through eternal ages thine."

With the young convert, this is not a poetical hyperbole, but the real sentiment and conviction of the heart. Now present to such a mind, in the unsophisticated worth of its "first love," the exceeding great and precious promises of the new covenant, and how would he interpret them? Who can doubt that he would understand them in conformity with the pure sentiments and convictions impressed upon his mind by the Spirit of God, in his conversion? Such are the promises of the new covenant, of which Christ is the Mediator.