heard; come up to the assertions and declarations which are delivered concerning it.

Now allowing the subject to stop here: allowing that we know nothing, nor can know any thing concerning it, but what is written: and that nothing more is written than that the death of Christ had a real and essential effect upon human salvation, we have certainly before us a doctrine of a very peculiar, perhaps I may say, of a very unexpected kind, in some measure hidden in the councils of the divine nature, but still so far revealed to us, as to excite two great religious sentiments, admiration and gratitude.

That a person of a nature different from all other men; nay superior, for so he is distinctly described to be to all created beings, whether men or angels: united with the Deity as no other person is united : that such a person should come down from heaven, and suffer upon earth the pains of an excruciating death, and that these his submissions and sufferings should avail, and produce a great effect in the procurement of the future salvation of mankind, cannot but excite wonder. But it is by no means improbable on that account; on the contrary, it might be reasonably supposed beforehand, that if any thing was disclosed to us touching a future life, and touching the dispensations of God to men, it would be something of a nature to excite admiration. In the world in which we live, we may be said to have some knowledge of its laws and constitution and nature: we have long experienced them as also of the beings with whom we converse, or amongst whom we are conversant, we may be said to understand something;, at least they are familiar to us; we are not surprised

1

But of

with appearances which every day occur. the world, and the life to which we are destined, and of the beings amongst whom we may be brought, the case is altogether different. Here is no experience to explain things: no use or familiarity to take off surprise, to reconcile us to difficulties, to assist our apprehension. In the new order of things, according to the new laws of nature, every thing will be suitable to the beings who are to occupy the future world: but that suitableness cannot, as it seems to me, be possibly perceived by us, until we are acquainted with that order and with those beings: so that it arises, as it were, from the necessity of things, that what is told us by a divine messenger of heavenly affairs, of affairs purely spiritual, that is, relating purely to another world, must be so comprehended by us as to excite admiration.

But, Secondly; partially as we may, or perhaps must, comprehend this subject, in common with all subjects which relate strictly and solely to the nature of our future life, we may comprehend it quite sufficiently for one purpose: and that is gratitude. It was only for a moral purpose that the thing was revealed at all; and that purpose is a sense of gratitude and obligation. This was the use which the apostles of our Lord, who knew the most, made of their knowledge. This was the turn they gave to their meditations upon the subject; the impression it left upon their hearts. That a great and happy Being should voluntarily enter the world in a mean and low condition, and humble himself to a death upon the cross, that is, to be executed as a malefactor, in order, by whatever means it was done, to promote the attain

ment of salvation to mankind, and to each and every one of themselves, was a theme they dwelt upon with feelings of the warmest thankfulness; because they were feelings proportioned to the magnitude of the benefits. Earthly benefits are nothing compared with those which are heavenly. That, they felt from the bottom of their souls. That, in my opinion, we do not feel as we ought: but feeling this, they never ceased to testify, to acknowledge, to express, the deepest obligation, the most devout consciousness of that obligation to their Lord and Master, to him whom, for what he had done and suffered, they regarded as the finisher of their faith, and the author of their salvation.

XIX.

ALL STAND IN NEED OF A REDEEMER.

(PART II.)

HEBREWS, ix. 26.

Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

IN

In a former discourse upon this text I have shown, first, that the Scriptures expressly state the death of Jesus Christ as having an efficacy in the procurement of human salvation, which is not attributed to the death or sufferings of any other person, however patiently undergone or undeservedly inflicted and farther it appears, that this efficacy is quite consistent with our obligation to obedience; that good works still remain the condition of salvation, though not the cause; the cause being the mercy of Almighty God through Jesus Christ. There is no man living, perhaps, who has considered seriously the state of his soul, to whom this is not a consoling doctrine, and a grateful truth. But there are some situations of mind which dispose us to feel the weight and importance of this doctrine more than others. These situations I will endeavour to describe; and, in doing so, to point out, how much more satisfactory it is to have a Saviour and Redeemer, and the mercies of our Creator, excited towards us, and communicated to us by and through that Saviour and Redeemer, to confide in and rely upon, than any grounds of merit in ourselves.

First, then, souls which are really labouring and endeavouring after salvation, and with sincerity; such souls are every hour made sensible, deeply sensible, of the deficiency and imperfection of their endeavours. Had they no ground, therefore, for hope, but merit, that is to say, could they look for nothing more than what they should strictly deserve, their prospect would be very uncomfortable. I see not how they could look for heaven at all. They may form a conception of a virtue and obedience, which might seem to be entitled to a high reward: but when they come to review their own performances, and to compare them with that conception; when they see how short they have proved of what they ought to have been, and of what they might have been, how weak and broken were their best offices; they will be the first to confess, that it is infinitely for their comfort, that they have some other resource than their righteousness. One infallible effect of sincerity in our endeavours is to beget in us a knowledge of our imperfections. The careless, the heedless, the thoughtless, the nominal Christian feels no want of a Saviour, an intercessor, a mediator, because he feels not his own defects. Try in earnest to perform the duties of religion, and you will soon learn how incomplete your best performances are. I can hardly mention a branch of our duty, which is not liable to be both impure in the motive and imperfect in the execution; or a branch of our duty, in which our endeavours can found their hopes of acceptance upon any thing but extended mercy, and the efficacy of those means and causes which have procured it to be so extended.

In the first place, is not this the case with our acts