his head, that believing children are bound only to obey believing parents, he might-with equal justice-adduce, in support of his opinion, the Apostolic words in Eph. vi. 1.-“ Children, obey your parents in the Lord:" and might turn them, by a similar insertion, into-obey your parents, if they be in the Lord. We should be at no loss to reject his corruption of the passage, to deny his right of adding arbitrarily to the text, and to mark the obvious sense in which Christians are spoken of as acting so or so in the Lord,—namely, in a Christian way-from Christian principles, and as becomes disciples of the Lord. What has now been said, at once suggests the real meaning of the Apostle's language relative to widows: but it may be set in a still clearer light, by bringing the latter part of the verse into immediate connexion with the previous expression, to which I am persuaded they refer-" She is at liberty—only in the Lord-to be married to whom she will." Let us compare with this the expression in Gal. ii. 4-" who came in privily to spy out our liberty, which we have in Christ Jesus." And that in Gal. v. 13— "ye have been called unto liberty, only use not your liberty for an occasion to the flesh." And now, how plain and how suitable is that restrictive guard which the Apostle throws in upon the consideration of the Christian widow! He asserts, indeed, her liberty to be married to whom she will; but immediately suggests to her attention, that the liberty which he speaks of, is a liberty which she has in Christ Jesus-a Christian liberty, and therefore not to be used for an occasion to the flesh, but exercised, or abstained from, under the regulation of Christian principles, and with a view to the will and glory of the Lord.

Fully persuaded that the views, I have put forward in this paper, are accordant with the Scriptures of truth, I have every confidence in the Lord that they will commend themselves to the new mind of all my dear brethren; and that through the abundant mercy of our God, we shall be all found of one mind upon this, as upon other scriptural subjects.

LXXVIII.

TO J. G. S

April 4th, 1821.

THERE was one who could say—" I am a stranger upon earth.” All that surrounded him in this sinful world presented no attractions to him. We are of the earth, earthly; but this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith, turning worldly-minded sinners into strangers and pilgrims upon earth, according to the mind of Christ. Well for us that the word of Jehovah has gone out, not to be recalled-" rule thou in the midst of thine enemies." Ps. cx.

2.

His power seems blessedly manifested here (though in a way the most quiet and contemptible to man), giving his word entrance into the heart of one and another sinner-almost ail in the lowest ranks of life and hitherto I have the joy of seeing that the little body gathered in this great city, rest and rejoice simply in the one work of redeeming mercy finished on the cross, as all their glorying before God, and a sufficient ground of glorying for the chief of sinners. They are not such theologians as your Scotch folk. It is well ordered for the pride of my heart that I have little or nothing to do, even instrumentally, in the work that is going on. Those who have received the word tell their friends and acquaintances of the great thing it reports, and the Lord opens the heart of others at once to see and rejoice in the glory of it. When I write thus, you are to understand that the number gathered does not exceed thirty. Most of them (and the most satisfactory of them) are persons who never had made before even what is called an evangelical profession. The only one of the body who plagues us occasionally, talking of duties, is an old Scotch professor.

Now that I have told you all about our course here, I shall expect you will communicate freely to me all about yours, and those that you know I would wish to hear of. Are you still for making the LORD's ordinances matters of mutual forbearance? Oh! my friend, that may carry a fair show to the flesh; but it cannot consist with real obedience to the word of the LORD. Is it in obedience to that, you take up the attempt of walking in fellowship with any? or is it in the indulgence of a kind of private taste or fancy? But I have done. Very truly yours,

LXXIX.

TO THE SAME.

June 12, 1821.

S

MY DEAR FRIEND,-As I have to dispatch a packet to Mr. D————— to-morrow, I now sit down to give all the answer I can to Mr. inquiries about Messrs. &c. The only one of them, of whom I have had any personal knowledge, is Mr. E- a pleasing intelligent gentleman, but quite the clergyman still. I have not kept up any acquaintance with him since his last publication. Mr. Kat one time opened a correspondence with me on the subject of baptism; which I of course turned to the grand fundamental topic. On this he wrote once or twice very pleasingly; but very soon got tired. He never replied to a letter in which I marked the error of the high Calvinists, who mistake for faith a strong persuasion that they are among the elect of God. Some observations that I offered

upon that, seemed evidently to touch him on a sore point. And I have otherwise reason to apprehend that the error I noticed widely pervades their connexion, though some of them have got to speak a correct language about the meaning of faith. But as far as I have had opportunity of observing, they generally seem more occupied with the talk and consideration of the love of God to them individually, than with the glorious mercy revealed and testified in the word. And indeed it is amazing what a plausible language the deceivableness of unrighteousness sometimes assumes in such professors, and what zeal for doctrines that sound most like the truth. There are many subordinate differences of sentiment and practice among them; but none (as far as I have heard) that have at all disturbed their amiable brotherhood; for on all the principles of christian fellowship, they are as lax and tolerant as Mr. or any such could wish.

They all however agree in direct and open opposition to the truth, in the person of the LORD Jesus. Mr. E and Mr. B- have published books upon the subject; but I confess I have not read a page of either of their productions, for I abhor the proud speculations in which they fearlessly indulge, and which are too congenial to my own ungodly heart. They seem very vain of their system, as if it were a new discovery that reconciled all difficulties; though I believe it to be abundantly old. As far as I can understand, it is a kind of compound of Sabellianism and Socinianism. They allow to Him who was made flesh, a kind of angelic human nature created before any thing else; and apply to him the epithets and character of God, from the most High dwelling in him as his temple. One of them (a disciple of Mr. E- -) attended one of our meetings, and getting. into conversation with some of us afterwards, expressed (as they usually do) the greatest satisfaction with all that she had heardexcepting (she added) one little expression. This on inquiry proved to be some expression, in which a brother had intimated the proper Godhead of Him who came into the world to save sinners. I proceeded to expostulate with her, and asserting that He who was made flesh was indeed God over all, she keenly interrupted me with"No-he who was made flesh was not God." Here I thought she had involved herself in such a direct contradiction of the express testimony of the word, that she might at any rate be made ashamed. I therefore calmly referred her to the declaration that the word was GOD-and the word was made flesh: but I soon found that she paid no more regard to that declaration, than if it were quoted from the Koran. Mr. S of C is the one among them all who presents the most pleasing appearances: but even he is carried away with their philosophy and vain deceit on this point. He visited Dublin some time ago, and after attending a meeting of the church in Stafford-street, got into close and long conversation with some of my brethren, in which he expressed the greatest delight with what he had heard and witnessed, and afforded them equal delight by the apparent clearness and simplicity with which he confessed the truth; till one of them, who had heard of these speculations, introduced that subject and inquired his views. He was very unwilling to bring them forward, for he seemed quite anxious to present himself as fully

of one mind with us: but when pressed, he avowed himself quite of a mind with Messrs. E and B- ; and went into a long disquisition in defence of their sentiments. I have heard also from a sister who heard him at C—, that though he had often spoken agrecably to the truth, he on one occasion expressed principles in direct opposition to it. Some of them have discovered that the ordinance of the supper and all other things delivered to the churches formerly, have no decisive authority now;-that christians now are under a higher dispensation than was in the apostolic age; that this was the dispensation of the Son, but that now is the dispensation of the Spirit, &c. But enough. What I have said is sufficient to intimate to in what light I view them all. He probably will think it very happy that they are not bigots in matters of church fellowship.

On the morning after I wrote to you in reply to your letter of the 6th, I was seized with a slight paralytic affection, which among various other symptoms promises the religious world a speedy release from one of its plagues. But HE, before whom the walls of his Zion are continually, will accomplish all his own work, and be at no loss for instruments-will make his arrows still sharp in the hearts of his enemies, so that one generation shall declare his name to another, till the great controversy is finally decided by his coming in his glory. Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly!

Affectionately yours,

LXXX.

TO THE CHURCH IN DUBLIN.

May 27th, 1821.

BELOVED BRETHREN,-We have received the letter which you commissioned two of your members to send us, and have read it with that attention which the importance of the subject demands. We receive it as an expression of your godly jealousy for the truth, and of your love to us and to the brother with whom you call us to deal, and for whose "unscriptural language" and "avowed error" on the subject of repentance you say we are accountable. Accurate expression of our meaning upon every scriptural subject, we acknowledge to be very important; and still more important the accurate interpretation of scriptural language. It must be held so by all who truly fear the LORD and tremble at his word. But we have to acknowledge also how short we all come in this; and how prone we are either to mistake the meaning of the divine word, or to express our sense of it incorrectly. To be watchful over and helpful to each other here, is indeed one of the most important exercises of brotherly

love. We acknowledge also that every church of Christ is so far accountable for any manifested departure from the purity of the faith in any of their body, that if they suffer that " root of bitterness" to remain among them, they are partakers with the offender in his sin, and betray their own allegiance to the truth. But we confess, brethren, that even supposing our brother's interpretation of repentance to be erroneous—(and if it be, we must observe that it has been avowed in much earlier publications from him, than the one you refer to-see, for instance-) (Note I. Vol. i, 554)—we do not view his error as inconsistent with the faith and hope of the gospel, though its correction cannot be unimportant: and we do not therefore see it an occasion for that dealing with him from the collective body, which we conceive ought not to be taken up unless where it ought to be pursued, if necessary, to the last stage of discipline. We would not be understood as by any means declining the serious consideration of the subject presented to us in your letter: but we hope that, on the grounds which we have stated, you will allow us to refer the immediate discussion of the question to a communication between the brother whose sentiment you reprehend, and some individuals of your body.

We are the more led to this course, because we are almost all of us very young in scriptural knowledge, and incompetent to nice verbal disquisition; and because we have to acknowledge that there are parts of your letter which we do not understand. We would rather for the present set it down to this cause, that some passages of it strike us as very objectionable, than suppose that it arises from unscriptural sentiments in those, of whom we have every confidence that they are of one mind with us on the things of our common salvation. We do not, for instance, understand what you mean by pronouncing, that "there is a sense in which repentance may be scripturally said to precede faith, but no sense in which faith can truly be said to go before repentance." The only sense in which we can understand that repentance may be said to precede faith is this-that till a sinner's mind is changed he believes not the gospel and in this sense we conceive it may be as truly said that faith precedes repentance, inasmuch as there is no true repentance till a sinner believes. But we confess that all such questions-as whether faith precedes repentance or repentance precedes faith, we consider among the foolish and unlearned questions which we are called to avoid; because we cannot acknowledge any period when a sinner has repentance without having faith, or has faith without having repentance.

Whether, in the scriptural application of the term repentance, the change of mind to which Jesus Christ came to call sinners, and is exalted to bestow upon his people, refers exclusively to the change in their judgment, understanding, and discernment, in opposition to our natural ignorance of God,-or whether it refers generally to that new mind of the spirit, which in all its characters is opposed to the mind of the flesh,—is a question on which we would forbear pronouncing a decisive judgment, till we understand better what you mean to urge against the latter sentiment.

We all, however, desire firmly to maintain, that it is in believing