works which the sacred volume informs us are produced by this precious principle; and all who "have obtained the like precious faith," will bring forth those fruits, some thirty fold, some sixty, and some an hundred. They who are justified before God by faith, or by simply crediting the Gospel, have peace with God, receive a principle of purity, whereby they are freed from the dominion of sin, and manifest it in their lives and conversations; they love God's character, the doctrines of grace, the word of God, and the people of God, and overcome the world. Now, if a judgment be passed upon the busy, active, bustling, professing, Christian world, by this rule, alas! how little reason shall we have for glorying in the number of nominal Christians! You see, then, HOW it is that a man is justified by works, or approved to possess the faith of the elect of God., But, my dear friends, those effects of believing have no share in justifying the sinner in the sight of God. Whilst we were speaking of these things we were not declaring the gospel, but what the gospel always produces when believed. The gospel itself is nothing more than the announcement of pardon, and acceptance to the ungodly, through the obedience unto death of the Son of God. In the proclamation of it it is to be unalloyed with its effects. What it makes him who is given to believe it, has nothing to say to his acceptance with God. The sinner is not accepted because of the character which he has obtained, or shall obtain; but because Christ died for sinners; and

he knows that there is forgiveness with God, by no other means than by believing what God has revealed. The declaration of pardon is free as the air we breathe, and is addressed to men, as sinners justly condemned, and ready to perish. It tells how God may be just at the same time that he is the justifier of the ungodly, and considers every man who hears it as bearing this character. The most amiable man on earth, with all his kindliness of feeling, and usefulness in his generation, will pass into everlasting ruin, unless he have a good hope, through faith in it. The most wretched man on earth, notwithstanding all his iniquities, shall go to the realms of bliss, if God but open his mind to understand and believe it. Should there be, then, among those who hear me this day, one soul more sunken in pollution than another, or one more remarkable for what the world esteems, than his fellows, to both alike, without any difference or exception, without taking into account what either is, or has been, the Apostolic testimony is, "By Jesus Christ all who believe are justified from all things, from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses." (Acts xiii. 39.) "It is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." (1 Tim. i. 15.) "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be sav¬ ed." (Acts xvi. 31.)

REDEMPTION.

"Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works."

TITUS ii. 14.

GOD-according to the "everlasting covenant which is ordered in all things, and sure," purposing to "make known the riches of his glory on those whom, in sovereign compassion, he had afore-prepared thereunto;' and with a view to manifest his love to man, thereby exhibiting his wisdom unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places"-gave unto his Son a

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people out of the fallen family of Adam, in whose nature and in whose behalf, the Eternal Word should sustain the righteousness of the divine character and harmonize the divine attributes, and whose advancement to glory he should render consistent with the fullest expression of the divine perfections. And this his eternal purpose in regard to man, whom he viewed as guilty of revolt against his unquestionable authority, and unwilling as incapable of returning to his allegiance -whom he regarded as justly obnoxious to his righteous indignation, and unable to avert or to appease it-this "his eternal purpose," I say, "which he purposed in Christ Jesus before the world began" to form from our race" a peculiar people" "who would shew forth his praise," is a demonstration of, at once, unparalleled love, such as cannot be fully illustrated by any thing with which we are conversant; and of that uncontrolable sovereignty, the possession of which is essential to his nature as God. "God is love," saith the Apostle John; and again, "In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him." And again, "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 John iv. 8—10.) In providing thus for the reconciliation of any of the rebellious, God acted from no necessity of law: there was nothing in the nature or the character of the offenders, which could have claimed this divine philanthropy; there was nothing in the nature or the

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character of God himself, which laid an obligation upon him to determine it. His purpose to save sinners proceeded purely from the counsel of his own will; and the plan by which his righteousness should be displayed was laid in infinite wisdom and executed by infinite power. "God doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hand, or say unto him What doest thou?"(Dan. iv. 35.) This his sovereignty when exercised in displaying mercy to man is thus set forth in the sacred volume, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy; and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion; so then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, of God that sheweth mercy." (Rom. ix. 15, 16; Exod. xxxiii. 19.) To this he is not influenced by the utmost excellency of man on the one hand, nor diverted from it by the utmost delinquency of man on the other. The supremacy of God is as generally acknowledged as his being but many who allow his rightful dominion over the works of his hands; who never think of questioning his benevolence or impugning his justice in the distribution, however unequal, of temporal blessings; yet limit his sovereignty in the disposal of that which is as much his own, even his saving mercy; and with temerity challenge his justice and arraign his love, in selecting from among the children of men, who are all equally guilty, some to be heirs of glory, and leaving others to reap the fruits of their disobedience. Did Jehovah, indeed, overlook

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