'fecure from human difcovery, tempt you to encroach on the divine rules of justice and equity? Can you blefs them that curfe you, and render good for evil, and forgive the most galling injuries, even when Providence puts your enemies in your power? Did the objects of criminal defire not only tempt but fo

licit you; were you favoured with every circumftance of time and place, could you check the career of paffion, with Joseph's reflection, "How can I do this great wickedness, and fin "against God?" Thefe, indeed, are fure figns that the flesh is crucified, with its affections and lufts. But if, on the contrary, the fear of man's cenfure or punishment would turn you afide from the practice of your duty, if the prospect of secret gain could tempt you to lie or cheat, or diffemble; if any injury appears too great to be forgiven, or any fenfual appetite too importunate to be denied ; in a word, if any temptation, be its circumftances what they will, would prevail on you to indulge yourselves in the deliberate omiffion of any known duty, or in the practice of any known fin; then, whatever your pretences are, the flesh, with its affections and lufts,

A a 3

lufts, is not yet crucified in you.

But do not

mistake me, as if I meant to affert, that none have crucified the flesh but those who are perfect in holiness. No; the righteous man falleth seven times a day, and rifeth again. Nay, there is not a just man upon earth that doth good, and sinneth not. And therefore I speak not of those false steps to which the best are liable through the remainders of corruption; but of known and habitual fins, committed with the full bent and inclination of the will. These plainly betray the predominancy of the flesh, with its affections and lufts; and show, that the person who is under the dominion of them, has no just or Scriptural claim to an intereft in Christ. For a worldy Christian, or a carnal Christian, or a dishonest Christian, are as grofs contradictions in terms, as an infidel Chriftian. And this naturally leads me to the

Second thing propofed; which was to show, that it is the diftinguishing character and the real attainment of all who are Chrift's, to crucify the flesh, with the affections and lufts, This is fo much the uniform language of the New Teftament, that one fhould hardly think

it required a proof. The great leffon which our Lord taught his difciples was expreffed in thefe words:" If any man will come after

me, let him deny himfelf, and take up his "crofs, and follow me." This he repeated on various occafions, as a fubject that ought to employ their conftant attention. "He that "taketh not up his crofs and followeth after ແ me, is not worthy of me."-If any man t come after me, and hate not his father and "mother, and wife and children, and brethren and fifters," thofe nearest and deareft relations according to the flesh, “ yea, and his own life alfo," when the prefervation of it becomes inconfiftent with the duty he owes to God," he cannot be my difciple." And again, "Whofoever he be of you that for

faketh not all that he hath," namely, habitually in affection, and actually too, when God calls him to it, "he cannot be my dif

ciple."-Thefe are the permanent, the invariable laws of Christ's spiritual kingdom, and are equally binding on us, as on thofe to whom they were originally addreffed. For had our Lord ever intended to relax or mitigate them in any degree, he would certainly have done

it in favour of his firft difciples, when his church was yet in its infant ftate, and therefore ftood in need of greater indulgence. But these feemingly hard fayings exprefs the true fpirit of Chriftianity, and afford the most convincing proof of its divine original. Man fell by feeking himself, and muft therefore be raised in the way of felf-denial. He forfeited his innocence and happiness by hearkening to the folicitation of a fleshly appetite; and, before he can regain happiness, the flesh muft be crucified, with the affections and lufts.

Accordingly, we find that our Saviour's meaning was well understood by his immedi ate followers; and their practice is the best commentary on his injunctions. What he recommended, they laboured to attain. Thus Paul writes to the Corinthians," I keep un"der my body, and bring it into fubjection, " left when I have preached to others, I my "felf fhould be a caft-away." The remainders of corruption within him, made him cry out with all the emphasis of distress, "wretched man that I am, who fhall deliver me from the body of this death." Nay, fo fenfible was he of the importance and neceffi

"0

ty

ty of this deliverance, that, as he expreffeth it himself, "He counted all things but lofs and

dung;" first, "That he might win Chrift, "and be found in him, not having his own righteousness, but that which is through "the faith of Chrift, the righteousness which is of God by faith." And next, "That he might know Chrift" experimentally," and the power of his refurrection, and the fellowship of his fufferings, being made con"formable unto his death." Nor was this only his wish; we find alfo that it was his real attainment. "I am crucified," says he, " with Chrift: nevertheless, I live; yet. not "I, but Chrift liveth in me and the life "which I now live in the flesh, I live by the "faith of the Son of God, who loved me, "and gave himself for me." And "God "forbid that I fhould glory, fave in the cross "of our Lord Jefus Chrift, by whom the "world is crucified unto me, and I unto the "world." Neither was Paul fingular in this. It appears to have been the common attainment of all true Christians in his time. For it is fpoken of in my text as the badge of Chrif tianity, the very thing which distinguished • Christians