beyond the possibility of mistake, and that notwithstanding this discovery they must not be rooted up. It is, therefore, a Query with me whether the parable be applicable at all to church discipline.

Such an application of the parable appears to be attended with doubt and difficulty. The term "world" seems to be forced, when applied to the church, especially in this connection, as it is used in the next succeeding verses in a very different sense. v. 38-40. Nor can it easily be accounted for, that the devil sows members in churches, seeing the servants are forbidden to cast out what he has evidently cast in. However satan may tempt the person proposing, and the persons receiving, it is only by the voice of the people, and the act of the pastor, or some one deputed by the church, that members are admitted into christian churches. Would it not manifest a want of candour and charity to attribute to the devil the act of a christian society? Besides, it appears that the tares, however introduced, and however manifest and numerous, are not to be severed from the wheat at all, till the end of the world; and then, not by the church, but by the angels. These things, and some others, have always puz. zled and perplexed me, when I have attempted to apply this parable to church discipline. For some years, however, I have considered the parable in another light. Whether my ideas be novel and original, I cannot determine. I do not recollect having heard them from men, or seen them in books. Probably they are not new but it is of greater importance to know that they are correct; that they accord with the analogy of faith, and the oracles of God. The Saviour's exposition of the parable should be the rule of ours,

In explaining particular passages of the divine word, we are sometimes misled by general principles. Many of the parables of Jesus relate to gospel churches, and the gospel dispensation, exclusively; and hence we are inclined to interpret them all by that rule. But in the parable of the tares, we must not proceed on so narrow a basis. The Redeemer's kingdom extends to all periods of time, from the creation of man to the end of the world. His kingdom ruleth over all. It is universal and everlasting. He has power over all flesh, and every knee shall bow to him. The sowing of the good seed, by which I understand the creation of man in a state of perfect holiness, Christ ascribes to himself. By him all things were created; and when reviewed, were very good! The field is the world, in which Adam,

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the father of mankind, was placed. The enemy sowed tares while men slept. Satan tempted Eve, and succeeded, when Adam was absent, or asleep; or, in other words, when our parents were off their guard. He then scattered the seeds of all the evil that has since appeared. When the blade sprung up; when men began to multiply; it became very evident what the enemy had done. It was peculiarly manifest in Cain. Tares are the children of the wicked one, v. 38. Cain was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. The servants, who observed the tares and apprised the housholder of them, may be viewed either as men, or as angels-probably the latter, as they will be employed at the end of the world in separating the tares and the wheat. The good seed, or the children of the kingdom, are the elect of God. The tares must be let alone, lest the wheat be rooted up with them. There is a connection and union between the elect and other men, which cannot be dissolved, but by the destruction of both. As Levi was in the loins of his father Abraham, when Melchisedec met him, so many of the chosen of God have sprung from the loins of ungodly men. It would be very easily proved, that the elect must come into actual existence, must be regenerated, sanctified, and glorified, John xvii. 24; and hat, therefore, their parents must exist, and bring them into being. By parity of reason, we may carry the idea from their immediate, to their remotest ancestors. Strike out any link, "tenth or ten thousandth," and confusion ensues through all the plans of the eternal Mind. For this very end, namely, that the elect may be born and brought to glory, the judgments of God are averted, and the wicked are spared. Thus, respecting the calamities of the Jews, it is said, "Except that the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh should be saved;" (the Jewish nation had been utterly and totally cut off) "but for the elect's sake whom he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days." God has mercy in store for Israel, and therefore their wicked ancestors have been preserved. He saith of the seed of Jacob still," Destroy it not, for a blessing is in it." See Isai. lxv. 8, 9. At no period of the world could the tares (the wicked) have been destroyed, but the elect to spring from them, would have been destroyed also. The purposes of God, on that ground, would have been disannulled; his schemes, deranged; the ends of Christ's death, rendered void; and heaven, the kingdom of which they are the children, and which was prepared for them from the foundation of the world, would have been prepared in vain. Hence the wisdom of the parable: "Let

both grow together till the harvest." The elect, being chosen to eternal life, blessed with all spiritual blessings, predestinated to grace here, and to glory hereafter, and redeemed, or purchased, by the invaluably precious blood of the Son of God; all the attributes of Deity are engaged to bring them into existence, and to spare, and guard the lives of both their immediate and remote progenitors for their sakes. Hence the ungodly are the care of heaven, and cannot die, so long as any of the elect are to be transmitted through their loms. If the above ideas are correct, we see why a wicked world is spared; and why Divine Justice does not seize the guilty, for whom no atonement has been made.

O. H. J.

ADDRESS OF THE REV. EDWARD WALLIN,

Pastor of the Baptist Church, Maze Pond, London, at his Ordination, October 15, 1741.

[From an Original Manuscript.]

"WHEN it pleased God to call me by his grace, and make me acquainted with the exceeding working of his mighty power in them that believe; I saw it my indispensible duty to glorify the Redeemer by a public profession of his name: and under the direction of Providence was led to pitch upon this church of Christ; before whom I solemnly gave myself up to the Lord, and to whom I presented myself according to his will.

Being thus settled, after a little time I began to apprehend myself secure, and fell under those temptations young professors are incident to through an ignorance of their own hearts, the designs of Satan, and too great confidence in a profession. My zeal abated, my spirit grew carnal, and I was quickly entangled with snares of various kinds; by which I looked upon myself many a time upon the point of making sh.pwreck of faith and a good conscience. No conviction was sufficient to rescue me from this degenerate frame, till the sovereign disposer of all persons and things saw meet to take away him who was the desire of our eyes as a church; and who, on many accounts was justly endeared to me and by whose removal I was stripped of a father, a guide, and a comforter both in a natural and spiritual sense.*

***The Rev. Benjamin Wallin, many years a very respectable Pastor of this church.

children together, even as a hen gathereth her children under her wings, and ye would not.

THIS is a passage of inimitable beauty and pathos, and contains some of the last words of Jesus in his public ministry. This being done, we may say,' The words of Jesus, the son of David, are ended.'

1. The repetition of the name of the city marks his intense and tender affection. So when Jesus said, "Simon, Simon," it was equivalent to saying, [My dear Simon]" satan hath desired, &c." Luke xxii. 31. Martha, Martha, [My dear Martha] thou art careful, &c." Luke x. 41.

2. He sketches in a few words the most prominent features of that celebrated city. "Thou that killest the prophets, &c." As if Jerusalem had been remarkable for nothing so much as its persecuting spirit. "It cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem." Luke xiii. 33.

3. He delicately refers to himself under the words, "them that are sent unto thee." He was the Shiloh, emphatically, he that was sent. Thus we read that the Jews took up stones to stone him. John viii. 59. x. 31,

4. He nobly returns love for hatred, and kindness for cruelty. The oracle had cried aloud: "Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm." Ps. cv. 15. But the bigotted Jews were “disobedient to the heavenly vision.”

5. Though he appeared to be but a poor man, attended by a few unarmed fishermen, he intimates that he could have sheltered the nation. Such was the invisible grandeur of his power and majesty. Alas! they knew not the Lord of glory, "He came unto his own and his own received him not." Johni. 11. He had been the king of the Jews for many ages; and this truth, ill understood, was inscribed afterwards, in three languages, on his

cross.

-6. He beautifully compares himself to a hen gathering her chickens under her wings in time of danger. That powerful, affectionate, parental instinct which the Greeks called rogyn is remarkably exemplified in the hen. Nature, in its widest range, furnishes not a more apt and striking instance. "The hoarseness of her voice, and its different inflections, are all expressive of her situation, and of her maternal affection and solicitude. For their preservation she neglects herself, and exposes her life to danger in their defence. Whatever the enemy be that assails

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them, she warns them by her repeated cries, and boldly attacks the foe, while her brood are driven into some place of security." (Rees's Cyclop.) So Jesus saw the approaching storm that would bring with it the destruction of Jerusalem. He saw the clouds gathering, spreading, blackening deeper and deeper, all around. He saw the Roman eagle on the wing, hastening to its prey. 7. He most pathetically charges their ruin on themselves. How flen would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not. Vital religion was extinct, and the nation was now become a dead carcase. "Wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together." Matt xxiv. 28. Their ruin was aggravated by the punishment due to his unwearied and unspeakable kindness. "Wrath came upon them to the uttermost.”

Let the reader now listen to the sweet and winning invitations of Jesus, and beware lest he be numbered with those to whom it was said, "Ye will not come to me that ye might have life.” John v. 40. Stepney.

W. N.

ELECTION A DOCTRINE ACCORDING TO GODLINESS.

"PUT on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering; forbearing one another, and forgiving one another." These are the words of an inspired Apostle, and they. are words which may with the utmost propriety stand at the head of this paper, in which it is proposed to vindicate the sanctifying tendency of the doctrine of election. The aim of the sacred penman was to exhort the believing Colossians to the prac tice of various Christian virtues; and far from keeping this doctrine out of sight while doing so, he purposely introduced it.

Now if we have scriptural reason to believe ourselves to be "elect of God," his eternal choice of us lays us under the strongest obligations to be holy. It gives additional force to the most weighty motives we have to purity. Ought we to fulfil the con mands of God because he made us? Surely the obligation is increased if we can say, "He did so purposely that we might glorify him in our everlasting salvation; so that while he rejected millions around us, he made us vessels of mercy." Ought we