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tion, and return to duty. And the fallen prince waited no exhortations-needed no entreaties"I acknowledged my fin unto thee; and mine iniquity have I not hid; I faid I will confefs my tranfgreffions unto the Lord; and thou forgaveft the iniquity of my fin." *

THUS the opinion of thofe who fuppofe that David remained impenitent and fecure, till awakened to confideration by the miniftry of Nathan, is devoid of proof, and even of probability. David's well known character-the nature of renewing grace; and the temper and conduct of this tranfgreffor, when reproved by the prophet, concur to prove him then already a penitent; which is confirmed by the confolations forthwith administered to him by the Lord's meffenger.

İr in this inftance God pardoned, and gave a sense of pardon, to fo heinous an offender, without a moment intervening fenfe of guilt, and evidence of pardon and peace, it must have been a very fingular divine treatment of fo vile a finner!

AND if David, after having been long eminent for piety, lived a year of stupid unconcern, ünder fuch enormous guilt, it must have been a very ftrange event! A phenomenon in the hiftory of man, unequalled in the annals of the world! Whether there is evidence to juftify fo ftrange a conclufion, judge ye.

If we have not mistaken our fubject, this affair gives no countenance to those who pretend religion to be a thing of nought-that it doth not change

S

Pfalm xxxii. 5.

the heart and life, turning men from fin to holinefs. Good people may be feduced into fin, but they are foon renewed by repentance-soon turn again to the Lord in the way of duty, confeffing their fins and renewing their purposes and engage. ments to ferve the Lord-" That which I know not teach thou me; and wherein I have done iniquity, I will do no more."

NEITHER doth this affair yield comfort and hope to those, who while they call themselves faints, live like finners. If here they find no comfort and fupport, Where will they find it? The only example thought to have been found in "the footsteps of the flock," fails them; and we are left to conclude that fanctification is the principal evidence of juftification-" that by their fruits we are to know men."

It is a dark omen when profeffors paliate their errors and deviations from duty, by pleading thofe of faints of old. Those faints erred; but they did not long continue in fin—“ When they thought on their ways they turned by repentance." Neither did they flatter themselves in allowed wickedness.

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Ir any allege the fins of former faints in excuse for their own, they allege not that which diftinguish. ed them as faints, but that which they retained as finners-not that which they poffeffed of the image of God, but that which remained to them of the image of Satan. This they may have in full, and yet be of their father the Devil. And fuch is

the fad ftate of those who allowedly ferve fin, un

der whatever pretence.

THOSE who are born of God, favor the things which are of God. Sin is odious in their view. They long for freedom from it-"Oh wretched man that I am! Who fhall deliver me from the body of this death ?"

THE faints wish for heaven, not only that they may fee" their father who is in heaven," and the divine Redeemer, "who loved them and gave himself for them;" but because there "the fpirits of the juft are made perfect"-because there they expect to be holy as God is holy-because there, to be "fatisfied with God's likeness, and rejoice always before him." May God give us this temper, and keep us to his kingdom, for his mercy's fake in Chrift. Amen.

SERMON XI.

General Character of Christians.

GALATIANS V. 24.

And they that are Christ's have crucified the Flesh, with the Affections and Lusts.

ST. PAUL is fupposed to have been the first herald of gospel grace to the Galatians; and they appear to have rejoiced at the glad tidings, and to have received the bearer with much refpect. But after his departure, certain judaizing teachers went among them, and labored but too fuccessfully, to alienate their affections from him, and turn them from the fimplicity of the gospel.

THE malice and errors of thofe deceitful workers, and the mischief which they occafioned at Galatia, caufed the writing of this epiftle ; which, like the other writings of this apostle, reflects light on the gospel in general, while it ferved to correct the mistakes of thofe profeffors of Christianity, and guide their erring footsteps into the way of peace and truth.

It is not our defign to enter into the controverfy between this infpired teacher, and his enemies. We are only concerned to understand him, and fhall receive his inftructions as communicated from above.

THE primary design of this epiftle was to refute those false teachers who urged circumcifion, and the observance of fundry parts of the Levitical code, which had been abrogated by the gospel. This appears to have been a leading error of those anarchists. That the apostle did not lay the intolerable burthens of the Mofaic ritual, on the profeffors of Chriftianity, was made the ground of a charge against him. St. Paul defended himfelf by evincing the errors of his opponents, fhew. ing that Chriftians are made free from the ceremonial law; and that their juftification before God is not in virtue of any obedience of their own, to either the ceremonial, or the moral law, but of grace through faith in Chrift.

In the former part of the epiftle, he shows the impoffibility of justification in any other than the gofpel way-efpecially in that way, to which those false teachers directed-fhews that they fubverted the gospel, and rendered Chrift's sufferings of no effect" By the works of the law, shall no flesh be juftified-If righteousness come by the law, then Chrift is dead in vain.”*

WE conceive these to be obvious truths, and wonder that they fhould be matter of doubt, or difpute, among those who are favored with reve

*Chapter ii. 16, 21.

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