9 , S~V LIBRARY Ihcoloqi ca \ $ t m i n a v y , PRINCETON, N. J. The Stephen Collins Donation. Division . No. ta- . * ♦ *> / I i THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 7 SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. BEING THE SECOND PART OF THEOLOGY CONSIDERED AS A SCIENCE OF POSITIVE TRUTH, BOTH INDUCTIVE AND DEDUCTIVE. BY ROBERT J. BRECKINRIDGE, D.D., LL.D., PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE SEMINARY AT DANVILLE, KENTUCKY. NON SINE LUCE. NEW YOEK: ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS. LOUISVILLE: A. DAVIDSON. 1 8 5 9. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New York. STEREOTYPED BY T. B . Smith & Son, 82 & 84 Boekman st. PRINTED BY E. 0. Jenkins, 28 Frankfort st. TO ALL WHO FERVENTLY DESIRE LIFE AFTER DEATH, THIS TRIBUTE OF SYMPATHY AND LOYE IS OFFERED IN THE NAME OF THE SAVIOUR OF SINNERS, WHO HAS ABOLISHED DEATH, AND BROUGHT LIFE AND IMMORTALITY TO LIGHT THROUGH THAT GOSPEL, WHICH IS THE POWER OF GOD UNTO SALVATION TO EVERY ONE THAT BELIEVETH. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library https://archive.org/details/knowledgeofgodsuOObrec_O CONTENTS. Preliminary Statement PAGE ix BOOK I. THE COVENANT OF OKACE. Argument op the First Book . 1 Chap. I. — The Condition of the Universe : as it lay under the sentence of God, but with the promise of deliverance . . 3 II. — The Covenant of Redemption : General Statement of its Great Princi¬ ples and Truths . 27 III. — Relation of the Covenant of Redemption, to the inner life of Man, and to his fundamental Religious Convictions . 48 IY. — The Special Obligations laid on Man, as Special Conditions of the Cov¬ enant of Redemption . 63 Y. — The (Economy of the Covenant of Redemption . 78 BOOK II. UNION AND COMMUNION WITH THE SON OF COD. Argument op the Second Book . 103 Chap. YI. — The application of the Covenant of Redemption to individual Men: Union and Communion with the Lord Jesus Christ . 107 YII. — Effectual Calling: with the manner of its occurrence . 122 YIII. — Regeneration : its nature, and the mode of its occurrence .... 139 IX. — Justification: with its nature, method, and effects . 158 X. — Adoption: its grounds, nature, and fruits . 178 VI CONTENTS. PAGB Chap. XI. — Sanctification : relation to the Plan of Salvation : nature : means : relation to the Godhead . 203 XII. — Communion with Christ in Grace complete : Communion with Christ in Glory begun . 227 BOOK III. THE OFFICES OF CHRISTIANITY. Argument of the Third Book . 247 Chap. XIII. — Paith toward the Lord Jesus Christ . 253 XIV. — Repentance toward God . 272 XV.—1 The New Obedience . 293 XVI.— Good Works . 307 XVII. — The Spiritual Warfare . 326 XVIII. — The Infallible Rule of Paith and Duty . 344 BOOK I Y . COMMUNION OF SAINTS, Argument of the Fourth Book . 369 Chap. XIX. — The Children of God united into a Visible Kingdom for Christ. Fundamental idea and elemental principles of the Church of God . 375 XX. — The Nature and End of the Kingdom of God: with the means of estimating both . 389 XXI. — Deduction and Exposition of the Kingdom of God, considered as the Visible Church of Christ . 401 XXII. — The Preedom of the Visible Church, considered in its independence of the State, and its consecration to Christ . 414 XXIII. — The Historical, Logical, and Supernatural Elements of the Question of the Church : considered with reference to the Marks of the True Church . 426 CONTENTS. Vll PAGE Chap. XXIV. — Purity of Faith : the first Infallible Mark of the True Church . . 444 XXV. — The Worship of God in Spirit and in Truth: the second Infallible Mark of the True Church . 458 XXVI. — Holy Living : The third Infallible Mark of the True Church . .471 BOOK y. GIFTS OF COD TO HIS CHURCH. Argument of the Fifth Book . 485 Chap. XXVII. — Supreme Gifts of God to his Church: his Son: his Spirit: his Word . 491 XXVIII. — Divine Ordinances: the Sabbath — the Sacraments — Instituted Worship — Discipline — Evangelization . 517 XXIX. — The Sacrament of Baptism : its Nature and Design : Subjects of it : Mode of Administration : Apostolic Practice . 539 XXX. — The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper : considered in its Institu¬ tion, Nature, Use, and End . 594 XXXI. — Office Bearers in the Gospel Church : and the Government in their hands . 616 CFNFRAL CONCLUSION. Argument of the General Conclusion . 655 Chap. XXXII. — General Conclusion : Progress and Consummation of God’s Eter¬ nal Covenant . 657 « A FEW PRELIMINARY WORDS. CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY; PROGRESS, TRUE CONCEPTION, SCIENTIFIC STATEMENT. During the first seven centuries of the Christian Church, the attention of Theologians, so far as we can judge, seems to have been directed chiefly to the establishment of the claims of Christianity as the true religion of God, and to the establishment within the Church itself of the funda¬ mental truths of that religion. By the end of that period, and after in¬ numerable conflicts, the doctrine of the Church everywhere, seems to have been fully settled and confirmed by the decisions of general coun¬ cils, concerning God and concerning Christ ; and in the W est, at least, settled also, very generally concerning man. But these — God, Man, and the Godman, are the grand elements of the science of Theology; and when they were settled in the faith of the Church, that science ought immediately to have risen, and, resting upon divine truth, to have passed steadily and rapidly to its perfect state. Instead of this, we have in the Western Church a period of eight centuries during which scholasticism in its rise and predominance is the most conspicuous manifestation of thought, down to the outburst of the Reformation of the sixteenth cen¬ tury. The Schoolmen interpreting the religion of Jesus by the Philoso¬ phy of Aristotle, as their predecessors of the Alexandrian school had interpreted it by the Philosophy of Plato ; added, it may be allowed, to the stock of inquiry and speculation, much that deserved the consider¬ ation of posterity ; but they added almost nothing to Theology, consid¬ ered as the science of the knowledge of God unto salvation, whether as to its conception, the method of its proper treatment, or its practical de¬ velopment. Considered from the point of view of Reformed Christianity, scholasticism was a complete failure. In this state of things that great awakening occurred, which we call the Reformation; which was connected with the past by so many streams, which combined in one movement so many powerful influences, which delivered to the future the seeds of so much that was glorious. It was an awakening of the Church of God to the spirit of its primeval and only true life ; and it manifested itself in the reception and love of divine truth, X PRELIMINARY REMARKS. and by consequence in true faitli and true holiness. The scientific treat¬ ment of Divine truth, therefore, followed the movement of the Reforma¬ tion, more closely than it had followed the movement of the first plant¬ ing of Christianity. In the Latin Church, the spirit and the method which had predominated during so many centuries of fatal error remained, and still remain ; for to have shaken them off would have been to share in the revolt which emancipated the Reformers, the dread of which gave so strange an aspect to Ancient Theology, and exercised such fatal influ¬ ence upon the speculations of the Schoolmen. In the bosom of the Re¬ formation a division in the conception and treatment of Theology as a science, manifested itself from the beginning and has continued. In Pro¬ testantism, these diverse conceptions have been called, accurately enough, the one material, the other formal : the one grounding everything in a particular aspect of Divine Truth — the doctrine of Justification by Faith, for example ; the other grounding everything in the sum of the whole truth revealed by God. The former conception, however true in particu¬ lar, is altogether too narrow, altogether incomplete, as the conception of a science so vast. The latter conception — that of the Reformed strictly so called — was just. From it, the Reformed Theology ought to have de¬ veloped itself, firmly and at once. The Church had not only recovered the position she occupied at the end of the seventh century — but had taken a great step in advance. That the Reformed Theology did not adequately avail itself of its great position, nothing can prove more clearly than that after three centuries, the first attempt — that of Calvin — retains its supremacy. Augustine, even with his strange conception of the Papal Church, finds no name to match him — till Calvin. And Calvin’s great work — which I had no small share in restoring to general circulation — though it is arbitrary in its method, and though abstract, practical, and controversial Theology, truth objective, subjective, and relative, are mingled confusedly throughout it ; has no rival amidst the hundreds which have followed it. I attribute this fail¬ ure of the Reformed Theology to develop itself completely as a perfect science, to the imperfect conceptions which these very defects signalize. It failed to conceive adequately what that science is, wdiich is the sum of all revealed truth. It failed necessarily after that failure, to conceive ad¬ equately the method responsive to the true conception of that grandest of the sciences. It failed necessarily after these two failures, of adequate breadth of spiritual insight into the divine proportion of that truth, which was itself the very substance of the whole science of Theology. Who¬ ever is willing to survey with candour, the whole field of scientific The¬ ology, abstract, practical and controversial — Latin, Lutheran, and Re¬ formed — since the Reformation was firmly established and its first fruits gathered ; will see small cause to be satisfied that the Critical, Speculative, PRELIMINARY REMARKS. XI or Philosophical methods of the ages which have succeeded that great period, are to be preferred to the arbitrary and artificial method they would supplant, or perhaps even to the best specimens of the scholastic spirit which the Reformation overthrew. Is there, then, no natural method, whereby Theology planting itself on the grand foundation which the Reformers obtained three centuries ago, may develop itself as a science of positive truth ? It may be true that Theologians have always felt obliged to confess to themselves, that the Knowledge of God attainable by man, was in some vague sense a true science — nay, the highest of the sciences. Manifestly, they were obliged to see that whatever Knowledge of God man does obtain, must be obtained by some means or other which are answerable to the faculties of man ; and all of these have designated the Word of God as one of these means — wrhile all the orthodox have held that Divine Word to be the chief means, and all the Reformed have held it to be the only infallible means. But all this militates nothing against what I assert, nor against the importance of it. What I maintain is, that seeing the Knowledge of God is attain¬ able by lost men unto salvation, seeing that the sources of this knowledge are few, precise and capable of exhaustive demonstration : it follows ab¬ solutely from these data, that the Knowledge of God unto salvation must be in the strictest sense — a science. And then as soon as those fewr and precise sources of knowledge are exhaustively demonstrated, it follows absolutely that the kind of science proved, is one of positive truth, both inductive and deductive. It may also be conceded that all Theologians have been obliged to see, that some method or other must always be resorted to, by every one who will teach anything, or acquire anything, worthy to be called scientific knowledge. But it is nevertheless true, that they have to a deplorable extent, failed to observe that any particular method lay in the very nature of this divine science itself; failed to observe that the Revelation of divine truth, and the divine operation of truth in the human soul, fol¬ lowed any particular method; failed to observe that any particular method of teaching men the Knowledge of God unto salvation had pre¬ eminent if not exclusive claims ; while it is undeniably certain that they have generally and continually used methods in the treatment of Theol¬ ogy, which were arbitrary, capricious and inconsistent with each other. On the other hand, what I maintain is, that a science being given, a method responsive to the nature of that science, follows of necessity; that the science of the Knowledge of God unto salvation being a pure science of absolute truth both inductive and deductive — and the sources of it exhaustively demonstrated — an analogous method of developing and teaching that science is inevitable : that till the acknowledgment and sue- Xll PRELIMINARY REMARKS. cessful application of that method, the science to which it appertains can¬ not possibly reach its complete development and statement ; and that e\ en after the perfection of the science, it could not be adequately taught otherwise than by its own natural method. It seems to me that if all this were propounded merely as a speculation, instead of being almost self- evidently true as soon as it is clearly stated ; the history of the progress of Theology through all ages, would beget the most violent presumption that the speculation was true. Truth is capable of being considered systematically and absolutely, simply as truth reduced into a scientific form. Thus understood, but not otherwise, any system of truth is afterwards capable of being considered in all the possible effects and influences of that system of truth. Let it be remembered that no number of isolated truths, which have no known relations to each other, can ever be reduced into a scientific form, or ever produce any effects, or have any consequences, considered as a system. They cannot compose any system, nor be the subject of any knowledge beyond the mere knowledge of them as intractible particulars. If this be the character of Divine Revelation, it is idle to speak of systematic knowledge of it — absurd to talk about the plan of salvation. If there is any such thing as a system of divine truth capable of being known by man, then that system is necessarily subject to the distinction stated above; and considered in both the aspects stated, it is capable of being precisely distinguished from all serious error. It is in these three aspects that the Knowledge of God unto salvation must be considered, if it is to be com¬ pletely understood — must be stated if it is to attain a complete scientific form. When so stated and so understood — allowance being made for human weakness — every pure science is placed in the only position in which its own perfect development is possible ; and every separate truth which enters into that science, as it is demonstrated and located with pre¬ cision, instead of weakening, confirms the science and adds to its effi¬ cacy, whether considered in an abstract, a practical, or a relative point of view. Every system of truth, and above all the system of divine truth, must be capable of maintaining itself under the test of this threefold and exhaustive aspect of all truth. In divine truth thus tested, even those sublime mysteries which men are pleased to call the contradictions of the Scriptures, disclose their real nature as great spiritual paradoxes inherent in the nature of the subject, necessarily liable to a double solution by us, and perceived to belong to a generalization higher than our faculties can reach in their present state. Thus there is the clearest possible distinction between the exact state¬ ment of truth, and a disputation in support of that truth ; a distinction, I . insist, which cannot be overlooked in the elemental statement of any PRELIMINARY REMARKS. Xll] science, without arresting its progress and weakening the impression of truth ; and in the moral sciences above all, a distinction most needful to be strictly observed. Thus too, after the truth has been completely extricated, and clearly stated in its elemental forms, the further distinction becomes perfectly obvious, namely, that between truth, and the effects of truth ; and the neglect of it is as fatal as the neglect of the preceding distinction. It took seven centuries for Theologians to settle, in scientific form, the great elements of their science — the doctrines of God — of the Godman, and of man — though during all these seven centuries, not a single child of God erred fatally touching either doctrine. It took the Theologians eight centuries more to obtain the grand position of the Re¬ formers, namely, that the sum of the whole Knowledge of God attainable by man, of which the sacred Scriptures are the only infallible rule and guide, is that which is to be cast into a scientific form, as Christian The¬ ology. I have pointed out both the failure, and the causes of it, of the scientific progress of the Reformed Theology beyond the position won for it in the sixteenth century. Distinctions inseparable from the complete conception of any system of truth whatever, cannot be overlooked with impunity ; nor can the denial of the existence of such distinctions pro¬ duce any effect so immediate, as the exclusion of the supposed truths to which those distinctions do not apply, from the pale of the sciences. In Theology, to neglect the former distinction is to deprive divine truth, as far as an evil method can, of whatever power it has by reason of its own inherent force and glorious light ; and to neglect the latter distinction is to confound the efficacy, which the Holy Spirit gives to truth by his su- peradded work in man, with the truth itself after it has first had its self- evidencing light obscured. On the other hand the clear recognition of the distinctions I have pointed out, unavoidably presents the Knowledge of God unto salvation, under three distinct aspects: one of them objective — the mere truth; one of them subjective — the effects of truth in us, and on us; one of them relative — truth and its effects confronted with untruth. Whether or not the Knowledge of God is a science of positive truth, does not depend on us, but on God. I maintain that it is, and that the just acquisition, state¬ ment, and teaching of it, require in us an adequate conception of it as such. Whether or not being such a science, it must be treated by a method responsive to its own nature, does not depend upon our caprice ; but on the very nature of knowledge, and of our own mental and moral constitution. I maintain that the slow, irregular, and imperfect progress of scientific Theology in all ages, is to be attributed in a great degree, to the inadequate conception of the science itself, and to the vicious methods of treating it which necessarily resulted from that inadequate conception ; and I have suggested and used what I conceive to be a XIV PRELIMINARY REMARKS. method naturally responsive to an adequate conception of the science itself; starting from the great elements settled in the seventh century, and the great position reached in the sixteenth — since which period, in my opinion, little true progress has been made in the systematic state¬ ment of divine truth considered as a great science. Whether or not a particular attempt to vindicate this science in its adequate conception, and by a true method responsive to its nature, restate it in its own simple, coherent, and august power, is worthy of the consideration of the people of God ; depends essentially on the ability, the insight, the attainments, and the patient toil of him who makes the attempt. As to the value of my own attempt, they to whom I have dedicated this and the preceding Treatise, shall judge. If the penitent and believing followers of the Saviour of sinners — if they who fervently desire life after death — find light and consolation in what I have written — that which I have done will live. Otherwise no oblivion can await my labours, more remorseless than that which covers those of the bulk of my predecessors. Concerning the present Treatise, I think I may say with confidence, that no one who will patiently consider it can misunderstand the general view it presents of the saving grace of God, or the general argument sus¬ tained throughout, concerning the whole method and effects of that Grace. I accept the Scriptures as the Word of God ; I understand them to relate to the salvation of fallen men, to disclose the precise nature of that salva¬ tion, the exact manner in which it is achieved in man, and the whole effects and consequences, personal and, general, present and eternal, which are wrought out in us, through the truth contained in them, by the Holy Ghost. What I attempt is to follow rigidly the course of the divine thought, to illustrate faithfully the progress of the divine work, and to demonstrate both throughout. Upon my conception of the subject, no other course is possible : upon the method responsive to that conception, this direct and concatenated treatment is unavoidable. It ouodit to follow, according to the measure of grace given to me, that herein is a compact and continuous exhibition of the life of God in the soul of man, respon¬ sive to the revealed way of life eternal ; everything hetoregeneous being excluded, and everything admitted being a part of the uninterrupted de¬ monstration. Besides this complete personal exhibition of salvation, the organization by God of his covenant people into a visible kingdom, gives to salvation an organic and social aspect, precisely commensurate with the relation of the Church of Christ to the work of divine grace in sal¬ vation. There ought, therefore, to be found herein, according as God has enabled me, a precise and complete demonstration and exposition of the Church of the living God, in its nature, and end — and very especially in its Gospel state. The Christian and the Church of God ought to be de¬ monstrated on the divine word, in developing the Knowledge of God PRELIMINARY REMARKS. XV Subjectively considered. This illustrates what I mean by teaching The¬ ology, as distinguished from a compend of Theology. This is what my conception and method exact. In so far as I may have done anything approaching what I have just stated, it is through God’s grace. My short¬ comings are, I think, justly to be attributed, not to my conception of the subject, nor to my method of treating it, but to my personal incapacity to work out so great a result, in a fitting manner. The order of the general demonstration may be made intelligible, by a brief statement. In the First Book, I attempt to trace and to prove the manner in which the Knowledge of God unto salvation passes over from being merely objective, and becomes subjective. In the Second Book, I endeavour to disclose and to demonstrate the whole work of God in man, unto his personal salvation. In the Third Book, the personal effects and results of this divine subjective work, are sought to be expli¬ cated. This seems to me to exhaust the subject, in its subjective personal aspect. But these individual Christians, by means of their union with Christ, and their consequent communion with each other, are organized by God into a visible Kingdom ; which has a direct and precise relation to the subjective consideration of the Knowledge of God. From this point, therefore, the social and organic aspect of the subject arises ; and the Fourth Book is occupied with what is designed to be a demonstration of the Church of the living God. But just as the work of grace in indi¬ vidual men, is necessarily followed by the Christian offices, and so the sub¬ ject of the Third Book necessarily followed the subject of the Second : in like manner, the consideration of the gifts of God to his Church, and of all the effects of those gifts, follows the organization and progress of the visible Church in a peculiar manner. And thus the subject of the Fourth Book leads directly to the subject of the Fifth, in which the life, action and organism of the Church are discussed, with reference to the special gifts bestowed on it by God. And here the organic aspect of the Knowledge of God unto salvation, subjectively considered, seems to terminate. What remains is the General Conclusion of the whole subject, in a very brief attempt to estimate the progress and result of these divine realities, and to disclose the revealed consummation of God’s Works of Creation, Prov¬ idence and Grace. A true Christian Theology ought to be just in its scientific conception, exact in its method of development, natural in the order of its topics, clear in its continual expositions, adequate in its great generalizations, carefully observant of the divine proportion of its parts, pervaded by the unity which belongs to a high and continuous demonstration, and guided by a spiritual insight and a sense of the presence of the living God in all and through all. For, after all, it is the Knowledge of God unto salvation which is the substance : Scientific Theology, at the best, is only the form XVI PRELIMINARY REMARKS. under which that divine substance is presented. Its glory and its tri- umph would be, to obtain, at length, that form which accords perfectly with that heavenly substance. Whoever will attempt to exhibit in a scientific manner, the chief parts of that Knowledge so far as he possesses it ; will have occasion when his task is even worthily accomplished, to bewail the poverty of the exhibition he has made, compared — I need not say — with the grandeur of his theme, but even with his own conception of it. In the Preliminary Words prefixed to the First Part of Theology, I made certain statements and explanations upon such topics as seemed to me to require it ; some of which had more particular reference to that Treatise, and others more particular reference to the whole work, of which that was the first of three parts. Without repeating here any of those statements, — I refer to them and adopt them all, as applicable with the same emphasis, and in the same sense, to this Treatise as to that. They were never capable of being misunderstood; unless, perhaps, to authorize the supposition that my use of the labours of others, both in that Treatise and in this, was far more extensive than in fact it was ; and that my con¬ tributions to the true progress of Christian Theology were less distinct, than they might turn out to be. Claiming nothing, except a patient con¬ sideration by the people of God, of a sincere endeavour to restate with perfect simplicity, and according to its own sublime nature, and in its own glorious proportion, the Knowledge of God unto salvation ; I confidently ask, who are they amongst the living, — how many are there amongst the dead, — on whose behalf it can be truly asserted, that such a claim is un¬ just to them, or unbecoming in me? The preceding volume was a complete Treatise ; the present volume is also a complete Treatise : the two united contain all I propose to ad¬ vance on what is sometimes called Systematic Theology, sometimes Dog¬ matic Theology, sometimes merely Theology. The former volume con¬ tains the objective, the present one the subjective consideration of saving truth : saving truth in itself — saving truth in its working. It will com¬ plete my original design, if the Lord spares me and enables me to compose and publish one more volume, devoted to what is commonly called Po¬ lemic or controversial Theology, embracing Apologetics ; that is, to what I contemplate as the Knowledge of God considered relatively to all un¬ truth incompatible with salvation. Br.edalbane, near Lexington, Ky., April, 3 859. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST BOOK. I have attempted in a former Treatise, to demonstrate and to classify the whole knowledge of God attainable by man unto salvation, considered as mere Know¬ ledge ; and thus to exhibit Theology in the purely objective — as in every other aspect of it, as a science of Positive Truth, both inductive and deductive. This volume, devoted to the thorough treatment of the knowledge of God subject¬ ively considered in the actual salvation of fallen men, occupies this First Book of it in pointing out the whole aspect and method, both universal and particu¬ lar, of the transition of that knowledge from the Objective into the Subjective. It concerns itself in explicating the divine Plan, Economy, and Method, whereby, what has been hitherto treated as mere knowledge, attainable by man, passes over and becomes an infinite force upon man and in man; and in demonstra¬ ting the certainty of salvation in this way, and its utter impossibility in any other. The First Chapter, therefore, of this First Book, discusses the condition in which the created universe was placed by the Sentence of God and his Pro¬ mise of a Saviour, upon the Fall of Man ; and, in particular, it attempts to settle the actual condition of the human race as determined by the creation, the trial, the fall, the sentence, and the promise ; and to solve all the great problems involved in that attempt. The Second Chapter is devoted to a discussion of the Covenant of Redemption, of whose existence the promise of the Seed of the woman, so decisive upon the fate of the universe and especially of man, was the first inti¬ mation ; wherein the nature and reality of that Covenant, together with its relation to the nature and grace of God, and to the Persons of the Godhead, and to the salvation of man, are exhibited ; and the chief principles and truths on which it rests, with the chief cavils against it, and the method and efficacy of its operation, are considered. The Third Chapter discloses in a special man¬ ner the relation of this Eternal Covenant to the intimate nature, inner life, and fundamental convictions of man ; the nature and rule of Duty, — the sovereignty of God and the dependence of man, the relation of divine Grace to such con¬ ditions, and the efficacy of personal redemption — are discussed ; and the whole question of personal salvation and the failure of it, is traced to its ultimate ground, and the true nature of Redeeming Love is exhibited in its method and in its results. The Fourth Chapter is occupied with an exposition of the special obligations laid on man, as the special conditions of his participation in the ben¬ efits of the Covenant of Redemption ; wherein the ultimate truths concerning human nature are examined, with reference to the divine means of human res¬ toration, and as the result it is shown that Repentance towards God, and Faith, towards the Lord Jesus Christ, both of which are summarily explained, are the unavoidable and the universal, as they are the revealed and effectual conditions 2 ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST BOOK. of salvation for fallen men ; and the nature of the impotence produced by sin — the universal need of divine aid by every created being — the glory of divine Grace, and the certainty of perdition without it, are set forth. The Fifth Chapter, which is also the last one of this First Book, is an attempt to disclose the whole Economy of the Covenant of Redemption, under all its administra¬ tions — with the special design of determining with precision our own actual po¬ sition with reference thereto ; wherein the Covenants of Works and Redemption are compared, and their agreement and difference pointed out; the successive dispensations of the latter Covenant, from Adam to the consummation of all things, are briefly exhibited — together with the condition of the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world at each great epoch relatively to each other ; and the absolute unity of the essence of the Covenant of Redemption under all Dispensations is demonstrated — together with the nature and power of the knowledge, and the certainty of the salvation, thus attainable. As the result of this course of enquiry and demonstration, we are brought imme¬ diately to the direct application of divine knowledge, with divine power, through divine Grace, to our own hearts as individual sinners ; which great work is developed in the Second Book. In this Book — if a selection can be made of a small number of fundamental truths covering in a general but deci¬ sive way, the immense field explored in it — the following statements may be considered as condensing the whole, namely, — That as the result of the Fall of Man, of the interlocutory Sentence then pronounced by God, and of the Pro¬ mise of a Saviour then made by Him, the human race lies in a condition of sin and misery under the penalty of the broken Covenant of Works, and under the curse of God’s violated law, but with God’s promise of deliverance through the Saviour to all the followers of Christ, — and awaiting the final sentence of eternal life or eternal death at the judgment of the great day : — That the sole foundation of the sinner’s hope lies in the sovereign Grace of God, of which grace the Word of God is a divine Revelation, and the manner of which grace in its fundamental statement is, the Covenant from Eternity between the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, to save by the work of each with the concur¬ rence of all, the Elect of God whom the Son represented as their Federal head in that Covenant, with each of whom it becomes a personal covenant of life on his union with Christ, by the renewing of the Holy Ghost : — That the funda¬ mental principles and truths involved in the Covenant of Redemption, have a relevancy most intimate and most efficacious, to the spiritual nature, inner life, and religious convictions of fallen men, they being and they alone being, that Gospel which is the power of God unto salvation: — That Repentance toward God and Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, are the universal and unalterable obligations and conditions of the Covenant of Redemption, — obligations bind¬ ing upon every sinner, — conditions irrespective of which none can be saved : — That the Administration of the Covenant of Redemption embraces all that God has ever done or will do for men considered as sinners, — throughout every Dispensation of which the same grace reigns, the same salvation is propounded, the same Saviour is held forth, the same union with him through the renewing of the Holy Ghost is exhibited, and the same eternal life is made the inherit¬ ance of God’s Elect, through God’s love. CHAPTER I. THE CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE: AS IT LAV UNDER THE SEN¬ TENCE OF GOD, BUT WITH THE PROMISE OF DELIVERANCE. I. 1. The Law of Nature. — 2. Revealed Will of God anterior to the Covenant of Works. — 3. The Covenant of Works : Penalty, General and Special. — 4. Perfect Solution of the Origin, Career, Position, and Destiny of Man. — 5. Explication of the Theoretical by the Actual. II. 1. Moral Constitution of Man. — 2. It in¬ volves the Existence of an Infinite Ruler. — 3. The Nature of His boundless Do¬ minion. — 4. Its Infinite Certainty, Rectitude, and Completeness. — 5. The State of the Fallen Universe under that Dominion, and Modification of that State by the Covenant of Grace. III. 1. The Problems to be solved after the Fall, and the Parties thereto. — 2. Statement of the Case. — 3. God’s Irreversible Sentence on Satan: Its Nature and Effects. — 4. Sentence upon the Woman and the Man: General Statement. — 5. Detailed Explanation of those Sentences, in their Nature and Effects: Mixed Condition of Things. — 6. God’s Sentence upon the Earth: And the Earth’s promised Deliverance. IV. 1. The Posture of the Universe, as explained with, and without, the Word of God. — 2. The Posture of the Universe, as explained with, and without, the Idea of Divine Grace. — 3. What God actually did after the Fall of Man : And the Effects thereof. — 4. Combined Result of the Covenant of Works, and the Covenant of Grace, upon the Condition of Man. — 5. Difference between God’s Conduct towards Satan and his Seed, and towards the Followers of the promised Seed of the Woman. — 6. Every Thing depends on the Grace of God, and the Willingness and Sufficiency of Jesus Christ. I. — 1. If we reject the divine revelation which is recorded in the Sacred Scriptures, we are left wholly without knowledge of the primeval state of man ; and are unable to penetrate the final destiny of our race, or any individual of it. That revelation explains in the most precise manner, the original creation of man, the position he occupied, at first, with respect to God and to the universe, and the intimate nature of his own being, his endow¬ ments and his duty, his peril and his reward. Out of the state of the case thus exhibited to us by God, there necessarily arose obligations founded in the very truths, great as they were, upon which the case proceeded ; principles inherent in the very nature of the case ; necessities of every sort which must control man¬ kind, considered in their relations to each other, to the universe, 4 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. and to God ; laws in their very highest sense, and whether they were uttered in words or not, which are the necessary middle term between the idea of a creator and the idea of a creature. Here is the Law of Nature. And whatever nature herself may be, than which hardly anything is more difficult to conceive or define precisely, that code to which we justly give her name and which her Creator and ours stamped upon her in her first purity, must not only abide while she endures, hut has received the sub¬ lime confirmation of being fully recognized and largely restated in the inspired Word of God. 2. In addition to this fundamental law of our very being, in¬ corporated by our Creator in our very nature, still dimly felt notwithstanding our fall, and explicitly restated in the sacred Scriptures ; God added other laws, having special relation to man, which were clearly stated to him at his creation, and which were recorded twenty-five centuries afterwards on the earliest pages of the Scriptures. Thus God consecrated man whom he had created in his own image, to his endless service and enjoyment ; thus God consecrated the Sabbath day, the type and commemoration of this ineffable repose when this work of creation was done ; thus God gave to man an unlimited dominion over the earth and over every creature inferior to himself, and bade him increase and multiply, possess the earth, subdue it, and enjoy it. And these laws of the primeval state of man, following immediately after the Law of Nature, and preceding immediately the Covenant of Works, however they, like all else, may have been defaced and im¬ paired by the Fall of Man, are indestructibly united with the mortal existence of the human race, and enter decisively into the eternal results of that existence. 3. Thus created by God, thus additionally bound to God, man in his primeval estate became the object of a still further proof of the care and love of his Creator. God made with him a Cove¬ nant of Life, upon the single condition of perfect obedience to a single precept and a single prohibition. A Covenant, that is, whereby the probation incident to a perfect but fallible being, was made precise, temporary, and slight ; whereby the probation of a whole race was concentrated on the probation of the natural progenitor and federal head of that race ; whereby the high es¬ tate already possessed might not only be delivered from all risk and confirmed forever, but might be gloriously and eternally ad- CHAP. I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 5 vanced ; whereby even if he fell, certain advantages would re¬ main to his race, beyond what were possible after a fall, in other manner. This is the Covenant of Works. It found man in a condition of great glory and blessedness, and it proposed to se¬ cure to his whole race forever, the possession and increase of both. In this respect it failed. The same transgression which defeated it as a Covenant of Life, and brought upon the sinner its just penalty, was at the same time a violation of the fundamental Law of Nature, and of the fundamental consecration of man to the service and enjoyment of God superadded to the Law of Na¬ ture, and subjected him to the just penalty of both. What was the penalty to the Covenant of Works, was stated in the Cove¬ nant itself. What was the penalty of the violation of the first and highest Law of Nature, and what was that annexed to those additions to it which preceded the Covenant, were not declared beforehand : they remained to be disclosed by God, when and how he pleased. All might be presumed to be concentrated in the fearful penalty annexed to the Covenant ; the more readily, as it was a Covenant, not of vengeance but of Life, and as its penalty was the highest ever inflicted by Jehovah. At any rate, the Covenant of Works, like both systems of Law which preceded it, abode as an elemental and indestructible part of the spiritual system of the universe to which man appertained ; and it, like them, will endure, in its place and to its ends, until the final catastrophe of nature, and man, and sin. 4. It is to the breach of the Covenant of Works — the Fall of Man — that the word of God constantly attributes the present condition of the human race, a condition which it every where describes as one of sin and misery. Nor can it be denied that in the facts stated in the Scriptures, concerning the creation, original state, trial, and fall of man, a perfect explanation is fur¬ nished of the whole career and present condition of the human race. Theoretically, at least, the grandest problems of humanity are solved ; and it behooves the caviller to cast some doubt over the facts themselves, or to accept the perfect solution they afford ; and all the more urgently, since besides these facts asserted by God and transmitted through all generations, the whole human race has been unable to suggest even a conjecture, upon which its own actual condition could be adequately explained. The original perfection, and at the same time the fallibility of human 6 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. nature, are the fundamental data of the Covenant of Works ; precisely as the pollution, and at the same time the susceptibility of restoration, in fallen human nature, are the fundamental data of the Covenant of Grace ; data infinitely remarkable and fruitful, not one of which any human intellect had ever of itself j)erceived to he an element in the solution of the great problems of humanity, at which the human intellect has never ceased to labor. No less remarkable — nor less fruitful — was that other basis of the Covenant of Works, namely, that moral evil, and by means of it physical evil also, might find entrance into a perfect universe through the act of a perfect but fallible creature ; just as it is a basis of the Covenant of Grace, that these evils can be repaired through the incarnation of the Godhead in the very na¬ ture which fell, and in no other way ; sublime realities, before which the mysteries of our condition vanish. No less remarkable again — nor yet less fruitful — is that other basis of the Covenant of Works, that while God deals with every human being indi¬ vidually and directly, yet besides this and beneath this, there is a wider and deeper mode of God's dealing with the common head and root of all — for the whole race ; both of which truths apply with perfect force under the Covenant of Grace ; immeas¬ urable truths, in the absence of which our condition and God's dealings with us are alike inexplicable, but in the combined light of which both Covenants and the effects of both of them upon us are perfectly comprehensible. 5. That perfect but fallible head and progenitor of our race was tried — and fell. That possibility of the entrance of evil into a perfect universe, actually occurred. That principle of cove¬ nanted dealing by God with man, through which life and immor¬ tality are now brought to light through Jesus Christ, when first applied produced through Adam the ruin of our race. The fa¬ vour and the image of God are lost; the race is no longer perfect, but is fallen and depraved ; it lies under the curse of God's vio¬ lated law, the penalty of his broken covenant. And in this con¬ dition the personal dealings of God with each individual sinner, must necessarily have regard to all those transgressions, which besides their original source in the primeval fallibility of man, have a new and more virulent source in the polluted nature in¬ herited since the fall. Nor are the results of these transactions either doubtful, accidental, or capable of remedy by us. Man CHAP I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 7 has broken covenant with Gocl, and rendered himself alike un¬ worthy and incapable of life by means of that defaced covenant ; and God has judicially annulled it as a covenant of life, has passed an interlocutory sentence upon all who were implicated in its breach or involved in its penalty, has been executing that sentence since the hour in which he uttered it, and only awaits the judgment of the great day to make it final and complete. The actual condition of the universe, and more especially that of the human race, is exact and determinate — ascertained and de¬ clared by God himself — the inevitable result of what had gone before' — -and wholly irremediable except through the sovereign grace of God, and the incarnation and sacrifice of his only begot¬ ten Son. These sublime principles and truths find their expla¬ nation and defence throughout the sacred Scriptures ; the whole providence of God affords a perpetual illustration of them ; and every human heart, and every human life displays the constancy and the power with which they separately or unitedly control the condition and destiny of man. II.- — 1. It is impossible for us to separate the inward sense of duty from the outward ideas of obligation and responsibility ; or from the inward sense of blameworthiness if that sense of duty is violated, and of satisfaction if it is obeyed. But this sense of blameworthiness is no less than the testimony of nature to our righteous liability to punishment for transgression ; and this sense of inward satisfaction is no less than a corresponding testimony of nature to the reality of virtue, which considered merely of the soul may well be called the realization of the health and beauty and good habit thereof. So that in the very constitution of our nature as it now exists, there is the clearest proof that there are such things as right and wrong — that the difference between them is ineffaceable — that wrong doing is not only the proper ground of punishment, but directly productive of misery — and that right doing is not only the proper ground of approbation, but directly productive of happiness. 2. The direct punishment of wrong doing is to be distinguished from the incidental consequences of that wrong doing, in the way of incurring or even of enduring the punishment. Those inci¬ dental consequences may be, even under a perfect administration, a very sore aggravation of the punishment itself ; and in all im¬ perfect administrations may become more terrible than the proper 8 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. penalty of* transgression. On the other hand, they may become not only great alleviations of punishment, but the means of great and lasting benefit to the transgressor. Wherefore to call them punishment in the proper sense, would be to say that even under a perfect administration the violation of duty stands an equal chance of being advantageous ; and that under an imper¬ fect administration fitness to be punished is not a proper ground upon which justice can proceed, either with safety or certainty : results which subvert all moral distinctions. It will be observed that the very terms I have used, and every idea they all suggest, necessarily involve a lawgiver, a law, and a subject of it — three terms which absolutely stand or fall together. So that the exis¬ tence of an infinite Ruler of the Universe, the approver of right doing and the punisher of wrong doing- — the administrator also of the boundless complexities incidental to both actions, is in¬ volved in the very nature of our own moral constitution. 3. What has been said in the preceding paragraph embraces the whole distinction between punishment properly considered, and whatever is merely incidental thereto — 'Whether these incidents appertain to the actual infliction of the punishment, or whether they appertain immediately to the trangression itself, or whether they appertain to the method of dealing with the culprit between the perpetration of the offence and the infliction of the penalty. To suppose that all these incidents are merely proofs of an im¬ perfect administration, would not alter the case at all, or affect the moral principles involved in it, even if the supposition were true. To suppose, with regard to the infinite administration of God, that all these incidents must have been foreseen by him, and all been allowed for in giving us such a nature as he has, and such a moral code to the universe as is answerable to that nature — is but stating the condition under which the principles themselves operate, under which the incidents themselves occur. The infinite complications of the universe, and the infinite wis¬ dom, power, justice, and goodness of God in directing them all by his adorable providence, are subjects of the most transcen¬ dent interest : but the very thing we need is the means of piercing those endless complications which surround us on all sides, the fundamental truths upon which that boundless and irresistible providence may be at once understood and vindicated. If we will deal justly with ourselves, as the beginning of that CHAP. I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 9 perpetual right doing which God approves, and which diffuses satisfaction through our own souls, we shall find that God has laid in the very nature we possess those precise elements, and has explicated throughout his most blessed word those great and satisfying truths, whereby the conscience and reason he has given us are competent to justify his ways, and to know, not only that he is, but that he is the re warder of them that diligently seek him. 4. How God could permit transgression to go unpunished, is wholly inconceivable. The highest manifestation which has ever occurred of his infinite grace to sinners and his infinite compas¬ sion for the miserable — the cross, namely, on which his only be¬ gotten Son offered himself a sacrifice — is the very highest proof of which we can conceive, that every transgression and disobe¬ dience must receive a just recompense of reward. And so the Scriptures perpetually assert. That which our own hearts teach us wTe deserve — punishment for transgression ; that which our reason can discover no possibility of avoiding, when contemplated merely on the human side of the case ; becomes an irresistible necessity as soon as we allow ourselves to contemplate the divine side of it. There is no more possibility that God should allow' sin to go unpunished, than that he should allow innocence to be condemned. And in nothing is he more careful to inform us, than that the apparent departures from these eternal necessities which we observe in human affairs, are bpt temporary and anom¬ alous ; and that the stupendous departure from them in the work of redemption through the divine Saviour of sinners, is the very highest manifestation of the principles themselves, wrought out through the infinite goodness of God, to the infinite glory of God, and springing from a transcendent generalization of all the perfections of God. 5. Satan, and man, and the brute creation, and the earth it¬ self — our universe ; all, lying under the curse of God, lie under the force of all the truths I have stated, all the principles I have distinguished. Every thing is polluted by sin ; every thing lies under the penalty of transgression ; every thing has actually re¬ ceived sentence, and awaits a farther sentence at the great day ; every thing must endure, in some form or other, its due recom¬ pense. Besides this, whatever things are incidental to transgres¬ sion, let them be what they may ; and whatever are incidental 10 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [book I. to punishment ; and whatever are incidental to process in its widest sense, if I may so speak ; all — all must he encountered. And the infinite complications of the universe, and the infinite dominion of God, are — as to the former but elements, and as to the latter but the means, whereby, and wherein, infinite wisdom, and justice, and grace continually expatiate in accomplishing the eternal purpose of God's infinite will, to his own boundless glory. The entrance of the Covenant of Grace modified everything. The primeval promise of a Saviour, uttered by God as a part of the sen¬ tence he pronounced on Satan, changed the condition of the uni¬ verse. God revealed therein the principles on which he would act towards a universe lying under his curse : on the one hand, inex¬ tinguishable wrath against Satan and his seed ; on the other hand infinite grace towards fallen man ; gloriously developed through¬ out the word of God, and efficacious to eternity. But still the curse remained, and the universe lay under it ; and it lies under it still. A universe under God's curse — hut with the promise of an infinite deliverance, limited only in that Satan and his seed have no part in it ; a universe before our eyes, after so many weary ages, still struggling under that curse towards that deliv¬ erance ; groaning and travailing in pain under the bondage of corruption, hut still cherishing the hope in which it was subjected of attaining to the glorious liberty of the children of God. III. 1. Let us attempt to estimate in a more detailed manner this mixed condition of the universe, as the elements thereof are delivered to us in the account of them inspired by God himself. Nothing more remarkable ever occurred on earth. It is God the Creator and Ruler of the universe, Satan the head of the fallen angels and the destroyer of the human race, and the first parents of that race, who are the parties to transactions so wonderful. And the questions adjudged are vast beyond the conception of any but God himself; the fate of the universe he had created, the destiny of the human race created in his own image and now fallen from it — the overthrow of his first covenant as a Covenant of Life — the first discovery of his new and better covenant’ — the question of his own eternal glory, of vengeance on the Devil and his seed, of grace and salvation for his own elect ! How can the grandeur of such topics, and the utter insufficiency of human reason for their solution, he more clearly displayed, than by the fact that their solution resulted, as I have before ventured to ex- 11 CHAP I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. press it, through a transcendent generalization of all the perfec¬ tions of God, and that the method of that salvation lay in the incarnation and sacrifice of the Son of God ! 2. The first three chapters of the Book of Genesis, with which the inspired volume opens, contain a detailed though wonderfully compact statement of the creation of the heavens and the earth and all that in them is ; very especially of the creation and original nature and primeval estate of man ; of the giving to him by God of the Covenant of Works, his trial under it, his breach of it, and the consequent fall of the sentence of God upon all the parties implicated in this transaction, and upon the uni¬ verse which was involved with them ; and of the first intimation by God, that the great deliverer should come, and that all things should be restituted and recapitulated in him. It is the clo¬ sing portion of these transcendent acts, with which, at this mo¬ ment, we are specially concerned in the present attempt to appreciate the condition in which the universe was left, when they were all finished, and our first parents were driven from the Garden of Eden ; the sentence of God, namely, and the promise of the Seed of the woman, and the threat of the destruction of Satan. The whole of these vast subjects have been carefully analysed and expounded, as the sources of complete and universal knowledge to us, touching the matters to which they relate — in a former Treatise ; and having occasion now to examine a portion of them for the special purpose immediately before us, I content myself, as to what does not fall necessarily into the present use, with this general reference to that Treatise. 3. The Scriptures abundantly testify that Satan, under the form of the serpent, was the real tempter of our first parents.1 His sentence, therefore, has this twofold aspect of the bestial and the diabolical nature of the agency which produced the fall of man ; and as God has put these aspects together, we need not be careful to separate them. The penalty denounced on him, was for his agency in the fall of man. Whatever punishment he may deserve, or receive for other sins, it is for his part in the ruin of man that he is sentenced and punished, in connection with the dispensation of God towards man. Because thou hast done this, is the formula used by God ; the very same used in sentencing Adam ; the fault first, and then the punishment. Not 1 Rev., xii. 9 ; xxii. 1-3. 12 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. only does the curse of God and all that is involved therein rest on Satan, hut it does so in a manner the highest and deepest of all ; cursed above all cattle and above every beast of the field ; of which a flagrant — as well as a symbolical exhibition should be made to the universe, in the prostrate condition of the serpent, and in the vileness of his common sustenance. But the main part and proof of the penalty and curse on Satan, lies in the enmity denounced by God between the Devil and his seed on the one side, and the woman and her Seed on the other side.1 We have herein a very extraordinary intimation of the preter¬ natural generation of Christ, and of all that is involved therein ; and the enmity between the seed of Satan and the Seed of the woman is as clearly denounced as the enmity between Satan and the woman. Bat beyond all doubt, Christ is that Seed of the woman intended, and his people in him as their head.2 And again, beyond all doubt, the obstinately impenitent are em¬ braced among the seed of Satan, and are expressly and repeat¬ edly called the children of the Devil, a generation of vipers and the like.3 The obstinately and finally impenitent are, therefore, no more embraced in any provision of the Covenant of Grace, terminating in salvation, than the Devil himself is. This quench¬ less and eternal enmity of Satan and his seed to the woman and her Seed, is a large part of their interlocutory sentence, and of so much of the penalty of transgression as is executed upon them before their final sentence and second death. Pitiless hate, and malice, and every evil passion consuming them ; aggravated be¬ yond conception by the object of their enmity being worthy of their boundless love, and beyond the reach of their inextinguish¬ able hate ; a state of case applying in its degree, to their enmity towards every child of God. At the same time the enmity of the Seed of the woman to Satan and his seed, begets in these enemies of God, endless disquiet, dread, and terror, and ends in their total overthrow, ruin, and perdition. Even their partial success in bruising his heel, being utterly malicious and diabol¬ ical, can add nothing but misery and pollution to them, and can effectually promote only their own punishment and woe. It can never be more than a partial success, bruising the heel only ; 1 Gen., iii. 14, 15. 2 Ps., cxxxii. 11 ; Isa., vii. 14; vili. 8; Matt, i. 23-25 ; Luke, i. 31-35 ; Gal., iv. 4. 3 Matt, iii. 7 ; xiii. 38 ; xxiii. 33; John, viii. 44; Acts, xiii. 10 ; 1 John, iii. 8. CHAP 1.1 CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 13 it can never fail to be in the end a source of rage and disappoint¬ ment — even in its progress attended with tormenting uncertainty, disquietude, and alarm. Even when the crucifixion of the prom¬ ised Seed had been achieved, the effect was the overthrow of the kingdom of darkness ; a result whose possibility Satan himself seems to have had some fearful suspicion might be impending in some way he did not comprehend ; as appears to be intimated in that remarkable attempt of the wife of Pilate to arrest the exe¬ cution of Jesus.1 In all the Scriptures scarcely anything is more distinctly set before us, than the great outline of the character and career of Satan. His original state as a pure and exalted spirit ; his revolt in heaven and his being cast into hell ; his ruin of our first parents ; his hatred and malice against the Christ of God and all his followers ; his ceaseless temptations, accusa¬ tions, and persecutions ; his boundless cruelties, his endless se¬ ductions, his shameless lies, even to the denial of his own exist¬ ence, his employment of civil butchers, his inciting religious seducers, his uniting both in one in the long lines of Heathen, and Papal, and Mohammedan oppressors of the children of God ; a liar and a murderer from the beginning — a liar and murderer to the end ! Blessed be God for the hope that we are approach¬ ing the period, when God's angel will lay hold on the Dragon, that old serpent which is the Devil and Satan, and bind him for a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him.2 Blessed be God for the assu¬ rance, made ours through the blood of Christ, that after those thousand years are out, and after Satan shall have been loosed out of his prison to deceive the nations ; our eyes shall at last behold death and hell and Satan cast into the lake of torment, even the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the fallen prophet are, and where they shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.3 Analogous to the character, the career, and the destiny of Satan, is that of those whom the Scriptures in view of their original ruin through him, their bond service of him through their mortal existence, and their final perdition with him — call his seed. However fearful it may be to contemplate any portion of the human race under an aspect so terrible, it is impossible for us to escape the meaning of God in the sentence we have been considering, or to avoid the confirmation thereof in J Matt., xxvii. 19. 2 Rev., xx. 1-3. 3 Rev., xx. 7-15. 14 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. every statement of tlie divine word relating to the finally impeni¬ tent, or to shun the overwhelming proof of the guilt, pollution, misery, and ruin of the ungodly, which is the most conspicuous part of the sum of all human knowledge concerning the human race. Nay, the more we know of God and his word, of Satan, of the human race and of ourselves, the more are we ready to mag¬ nify the riches of that divine Grace whereby sinners are saved, and to confess that it is because they are unsearchable riches, that any sinner at all is saved. It is in vain that we would shut our eyes to the fact that it is not only a part of our vocation, but a part of the very blessedness thereof, that we must suffer with Christ.1 It is worse than in vain, it is an abnegation of the very nature of redemption, and the very nature of the universe in which redemption is manifested, to suppose that Christ Jesus, contrary to his own express teachings, did not come into the world to send a sword, but only peace on earth.2 4. Following the sentence of the serpent, the sentence of the woman, and then the sentence of Adam is recorded by Moses.3 Referring to the former Treatise, in which the whole subject has been carefully examined, it belongs to the present necessity to treat it only in a special aspect. It is to he carefully observed that these sentences are pronounced by God after the sentence upon Satan had been pronounced, and after the promise of the Seed of the woman, which was a portion of that sentence. They are, therefore, sentences of God upon the human race considered really as fallen and guilty, but with the further and transcendent facts, that God had already promulged his purpose to destroy their destroyer, and to do this through their own nature mani¬ fested in the promised Seed of the woman ; and in these ele¬ ments combined lie the elements of the whole issues of human existence, and of the complete explanation of them all. The facts themselves, few as they are, and the order of their occur¬ rence, precise as it is, all divinely made known to us, and all en¬ tering fundamentally into every subsequent portion of the word of God, are perfectly adequate to the explanation of every prob¬ lem in the destiny of our race, and among the rest that great problem immediately before us, of a race lying under the sentence of God, but with God's promise of deliverance through a Saviour. For example, the fall preceded the promise of the Saviour ; the 1 Rom., viii. 17 ; Phil., i. 29. 2 Matt., x. passim. 3 Gen., iii. 16-19. CHAP I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 15 promise of the Saviour preceded the sentence of the woman and of Adam ; how wonderfully distinct it is, therefore, that the ]Dromised Seed of the woman had nothing to do with the Cove¬ nant of Works, either in its binding obligation, its breach, or the pollution and sentence which followed ; and how clear is the light thus thrown on the person and work of Messiah, and re¬ flected hack upon the condition of man ! It is also to be care¬ fully observed, that these sentences of Eve and of Adam, and of their race in them, so far from being final, are in a manner ob¬ viously limited and interlocutory, tending to and distinctly awaiting the absolute sentence after we shall have returned to the dust as we were. And so far are they from being complete, in the immediate and full execution of the penalty of the Cove¬ nant of Works, that they do not even recite that penalty in its fulness : and they say nothing of our enormous guiltiness .as un¬ der the Law of Nature, the Moral Law, and the Law of those primeval Institutes of God which lay between the creation and the covenant ; of all which I have treated specially in another place. As in the case of Satan, so in the case of these sentences upon the woman and the man, they are specific sentences under the Covenant of Works — omitting all allusion to other guilti¬ ness ; and these especial sentences tempered with the remark¬ able omission of any distinct curse upon the human race, while that curse forms a most conspicuous part both of the sentence of Satan, and of the sentence of the earth. They are sentences, which on their very face show, that terrible as they were, they were compatible with the promised deliverance, and that they were pronounced against a race whose condition taken as a whole, was one of trial under a new form, and not of final condemna¬ tion. A peculiar sense is therefore to be given to all our state¬ ments of the curse of God upon our race, and of a divine deliv¬ erance for the race — which though they be true as general statements, are not true universally and strictly of all individuals. It is strictly and universally true that every human being under¬ lies the penalty of every system of divine laws, for in one sense or other we have all violated them all ; and it is strictly true that every transgressor lies under the curse of every law he has violated ; and it is strictly true that Jesus Christ our Lord is able to save and is willing to save, and will save to the uttermost all who come to God by him. But it is not true that God has 16 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I, ever by a formal sentence promulged Ins curse against his re¬ deemed, who are the objects of that eternal love and that irre¬ versible decree, of which the Covenant of Grace is, in thought, an outbirth. Nor is it true that God ever promulged a promise of deliverance to our fallen race, which can be tortured into an intimation that he would ever save from endless perdition, even so much as one single obstinately impenitent and unbelieving sinner. Under the sentence of God, and under the curse of God’s law, and under the promise of divine deliverance, we strug¬ gle together on this side of the Jordan of death ; on the other side, it is all glory, or all perdition. 5. The mother of mankind incurred a double liability ; first — as she was first in the temptation and a direct agent in Adam’s fall ; and secondly, as she was our common progenitrix, and in him also as formed out of his rib, one of his race. She is, therefore, first sentenced separately, and then is embraced with us all in the sentence pronounced on Adam. Her separate sen¬ tence involved in a special manner all her sex, considered in the particular relations occupied by her — every wife and every mother in the race.1 As a wife — subjection ; as a mother, sorrow in con¬ ception, and sorrow in bringing forth children ; the fundamental conception which under our estate of sin and misery answers to mother is anguish, and to wife is servitude. It is the sentence of God ; and while sin pollutes man, every wife and every mother underlies it, as a perpetual proof of the overwhelming calamities which the first wife and mother brought upon all her posterity ; calamities which these most sacred relations may indeed assuage, but may also fearfully aggravate. It is thus that every decisive fact which the Scriptures connect with the Fall of Man lives and has its import made manifest through all generations. The sen¬ tence of God upon Adam immediately followed the sentence upon Eve ; it is, as I have largely explained in the former Treatise, a sentence upon the race of which he was at once the natural progen¬ itor and the federal head — in one word the root. This sentence contains two parts, of which the first relates to the mortal exist¬ ence of the race, and the second to the death which swallows it up ; embracing under both, the moral aspects which are the chief aspects of the whole case.2 A life of trouble, and a life of toil, is the essence of the first part of this brief and awful 1 Gen., iii. 16. 2 Gen., iii. 17-19. CHAP. I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 17 sentence. Trouble of every sort and from every source ; toil, ceaseless toil, the livelong day of the world's life. If our lives were lives of innocence and virtue, if the sentence of God had only touched our physical and mental condition, how terrible is the catastrophe which has thus reduced us, the condition which this sentence contemplates and in which we behold ourselves this day, compared with our estate before the fall ! Being thus re¬ duced by transgression, and being therefore depraved, how great is the goodness of God that both trouble and toil are means — perhaps chief means of moral good to us ! For toil is the pa¬ rent of innumerable virtues, as well as of all true success, ad¬ vancement, usefulness, and greatness ; and trouble and sorrow are common and chief occasions of the richest blessings of God, and of the purest and highest manifestations of virtue. And thus on both sides, in the whole progress of our existence, the mixed condition of our present estate, is manifested to us ; our fall and our sentence on one side — the divine promise and our hope of deliverance on the other. But the second part of this sentence is still more terrible : Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.1 That temporal death was an express part of the penal sanction of the Covenant of Works, that it is expressly de¬ nounced as such in God's sentence upon Adam, and that in this way and in no other it found access to man and passed upon all men ; cannot be denied without subverting every claim of the Scriptures to be a divine revelation.2 It is a denial, moreover, as absurd as it is impious ; for death as the result of life, is one of those inscrutable phenomena, the denial of which is impossible, the occurrence of which is shocking to hu¬ man reason, the infidel explanations of which are ridiculous, and the divine solution of which is perfectly simple and complete. I do not know that Christianity has any interest in the question, nor that the Scriptures decisively settle it, how far the decay and death of the inferior creatures, are to be considered as the results of the fall of man. As none of those creatures are either spiritual or immortal, it is certain they do not incur either spir¬ itual or eternal death, as the result of Adam's fall ; and there¬ fore escaping the two greater portions of the penalty, it seems to me a very minute question, and unworthy of discussion here, what may be the relations of dumb beasts to the third and low- 1 Gen., in. 19. 2 Rom., v. passim. VOL. II. 18 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. est portion of it. As to man, the Scriptures teach us plainly not only that his mortal existence is forfeited by the fall, but that the portion of it allowed to him, has been from time to time greatly shortened and weakened, and thereby many other tem¬ poral evils of the hill aggravated upon the race. But even here there is proof of the mixed condition we are contemplating. For as the life of man is depraved, it is good that it should be short ; as in that way it can the less establish on earth the means and instruments of sin and misery. And besides, everything which can keep us alive to the connection of sin with death, and to that of virtue with life, is at once a testimony to our actual condition and the manner in which we fell into it, and an incentive to shun evil and to pursue good. It is, however, the body only of man which is of the dust ; his living soul is of the breath of God.1 Separated at death, to be reunited in the resurrection, the body returns to the dust as it was — the spirit to God who gave it.3 And then when the final judgment is passed upon the united soul and body, the sentence will be, Come ye blessed , or Depart ye cursed , as their works shall be, when the books are opened.8 Eternal death, therefore, was as directly involved in the penalty of the Covenant of Works, as temporal death was ; and nothing but the intervening promise of a Saviour, prevented it from being the very form of the divine sentence. After that promise, its indiscriminate pronunciation upon the whole race, was no longer possible ; the final separation and sentence of the blessed and cursed being laid over to the great day ; and the seed of Satan and the redeemed of God being permitted, under this long re¬ spite of judgment and execution, to walk together through all ages of trial with the curse and the promise perpetually mani¬ fested. Let us note, however, that it is only final sentence and complete execution that is thus respited to either party, till the day of judgment ; the penalty of the broken covenant, and the promise of deliverance which latter has already been so gloriously fulfilled, both abiding in their unalterable force ; and the final issue of the mixed condition of things being as distinct to God as it can be when it is reached. But there is still a third aspect of this penalty of death annexed to the Covenant of Works which is indeed the fundamental aspect, and which is made the explicit ground of the sentence we are immediately considering, 1 Gen., ii. 7. 3 Eccl., xii. 7. 3 Matt., xxv. 31-46. CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 19 CHAP I.] as it will be also of the eternal sentence, according to the per¬ petual statements of the word of God. Because thou hast done this, are the words with which God prefaced the sentence upon the serpent and in like manner he said to Adam, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, thou shalt not eat of it.* The whole trial and sentence imply, are based upon, and con¬ clude to trangression. It is because there was sin, that there was any punishment. Without it, there could be no condemnatory sentence by God. But there could be no sin on the part of a perfect but fallible being sentenced as Adam was, which did not involve the violation of his own nature, and that of every rela¬ tion in which he stood to God. We may indeed cavil about the terms in which we will express our idea of the spiritual condition of Adam after this transgression ; those in which God has chosen to express it, and which his people in all ages have adopted, are that it was a condition of spiritual death, and that the act whereby it occurred, was the Fall of Man. It is this, the whole of which I have carefully expounded in another place, out of which both the temporal death and the eternal death of man come. Here lies the chief part of that ruin, and the source of all the rest — which nothing but the blood of the Son of God could heal ; the fountain of all the sin which pollutes our race, and of all the misery which makes its career so deplorable. The execu¬ tion of the sentence of God commenced from its very utterance ; for we are told that God drove out the man from the Garden of Eden, and placed cherubim and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.3 No symbol of the Scriptures is more remarkable than the cherubim ; and every¬ where they appear to be a token of the divine presence. With¬ out departing from the special object of our present enquiry, in an attempt to expound that portion of the sacred record which recounts the expulsion of man from Eden after his sentence ; nothing can be more certain than that the Covenant of Works had ceased to be a means of access to God, and that man by his fall had ceased to be worthy to enjoy, or qualified to use those mercies and blessings which had been unto him, in his estate of innocence, both signs and seals of God’s covenanted relations with him. That way of the enjoyment of God’s favour was open 1 Gen., iiL 14. 3 Gen., iii. 17. J Gen., iii. 22-24. 20 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. only for the innocent ; that method of approach to him was im¬ passible for the guilty. Surely no lesson was ever taught more impressively — surely none can be more obvious to human reason — than that upon the ground of our own righteousness we can have no access to God, unless that righteousness he perfect ; and that as fallen creatures our own righteousness neither is, nor can be, perfect. 6. Just as the promise of deliverance to man was uttered in the divine sentence upon Satan ; so the curse promulged against the earth, was a part of the sentence upon Adam ; cursed is the ground for thy sake.1 Yet, so far as Adam was concerned, even here is one of those perpetual mitigations which keep up the perpetual remembrance of God's great promise, and of the change wrought by it, in all things. For, though our bread must be eaten in sorrow and toil, produced from ground accursed for our sake ; yet the sweat of our face will, under God's promise, make our bread sure, even out of cursed ground, till we ourselves return to the ground out of which we were taken.2 Cursed is the serpent, without mitigation or limitation ; and enmity, without limit and without end is denounced between the serpent and the woman, and between his seed and her Seed. Cursed also is the ground ; but only for man's sake, who was of it ; and only so long as sin¬ ful man shall abide on it in his sinful condition, and it shall bring forth, of itself, thorns and thistles as a memorial of our fall, and shall bring forth, under our toil, bread for us to eat, as a memo¬ rial of God's great promise. This is no more its final, than it was its first condition. For when the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them, God in a survey of their generations, in the day that he made them all, saw every thing that he had made, and behold it was very good.3 Its present subjection is not a willing one — but is a sovereign act of God ; nor is it without hope ; and while it lasts the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together ; even the children of God who are the first fruits of the spirit, groaning while they wait for the redemption of the body ; when the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children of God, in earnest expectation of which manifestation of the sons of God, the creature waiteth.4 Such is the account given by the Apostle Paul, of the present condition and future deliverance of so much of the creation as 1 Gen., iii. 17. a Gen., iii. 17-19. 3 Gen., i. 31; ii. 1-4. 4 Rom., yiii. 19-23. CHAP I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. 21 was cursed for man's sake. Touching that glorious deliverance, the Apostle John is still more explicit. When the time shall fully come for the earth and the heaven to flee away from the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and who maketh all things new ; then shall there be a new heaven and a new earth, in the room of the first heaven and the first earth, which were passed away, and for which no place shall be found.1 And the New Jerusalem shall come down from God out of heaven, pre¬ pared as a bride adorned for her husband — and all the wicked shall die the second death — and the Devil shall be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are — and he that overcometh shall inherit all things — and they which are written in the Lamb's book of life, shall dwell in the city of God, whereof the Lamb himself is the light !2 It is of no consequence here to enquire, what may be the exact nature, or the whole extent of the things embraced in all these sublime statements. It is impossible for them to mean less, than that whatever is subjected to God's curse for man's sake, will receive a glorious deliverance along with man. It is the same great principle which applies to everything which is subjected in hope ; the same mixed condition — actually before us — of good and evil, to gain the knowledge of which Adam destroyed himself and his race together ; the same misery under sin — even though it be but imputed sin. The earnest expectation of the creature strug¬ gling under the burden of the curse and penalty ; the light of God's faithful promise shining brighter and brighter, till the per¬ fect day come ; a universe polluted and under the sentence of God, but with this immeasurable blessing, that it justly expects eternal deliverance ! IV. — 1. Seen from the side of reason and nature only, the con¬ dition of the universe, which I have endeavored to sketch, pre¬ sents us with’ little else than appalling mysteries. But as soon as the light of God's word unfolds everything with its marvellous clearness, even reason and nature are left without any alternative but to reject every testimony, human and divine, or to accept Jesus as the Son of God and the Saviour of the world. What reason and nature left to themselves have to expound, is a uni¬ verse lying under God's curse, without any promise of deliver¬ ance. They cannot expound it ; and atheism or superstition is 1 Rev., xx. 11; xxi. 1. 1 Rev., xx. passim ; xxi. passim. 22 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. their only refuge. The word of God introduces the new and de¬ cisive element, which solves these terrible enigmas ; the universe is under the curse of God — but it has working in its frightful abyss of sin and misery, the promise of deliverance through God manifest in the flesh. This is the actual universe which Reve¬ lation expounds at the bar of reason and nature, and demands that they examine and believe. Salvation by Jesus Christ, is the irresistible conclusion of the high argument. 2. If it had pleased God to leave our race forever under the full force of the penalty annexed to the Covenant of Works, there is no ground on which his conduct could be impeached, without impeaching at the same time, all his preceding conduct in relation to man ; because — omitting the idea of sovereign grace — that would have been the unavoidable result, as far as we can see, of all the dealings of God with man, whether in creation, in providence, or in covenant. In like manner we should be obliged also to impeach all the subsequent dealings of God with man, even under the Covenant of Grace ; because whatever is absolutely elemental in God's dealing with man in creation, in the first acts of his providence, and in the Covenant of Works, is assumed and avouched by God in the very nature of the Cove¬ nant of Grace. If God had thus left man, there were various ways in which the destiny of the human race might have been wrought out, producing various results. God might have pro¬ ceeded at once to complete judgment and execution — have sent Adam and Eve to perdition — and blotted out the creation which, for man's sake, had fallen under the curse. Or he might have left the terrible penalty to execute itself upon a sinning and dying race, generation after generation, through an eternity of universal pollution and unmitigated wo. Or he might have left this terrific condition to manifest itself under the restraining and directing power of his providence, forever. Or he might have allowed that state of things, for a period limited in its duration ; and might have done this, with or without his restraining and directing providence. Or he might have limited or aggravated without limit, the evils of this condition, by lengthening or shortening the life on earth, either of all men, or of particular individuals ; or by applying in innumerable forms, the resources of his divine authority over his rebellious and depraved crea¬ tures, without implying in any case vengeance unworthy of God, CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. CHAP. I.] or indulgence undeserved by the creature. And these are but rude suggestions, but obvious possibilities of a condition at once fruitful and awful beyond our poor conceptions, which in the be¬ ginning of that estate of all created things now actually exist¬ ing, came before God to be solved according to the sum of all his infinite perfections, in such a manner as would be most for his own eternal glory. 3. What God actually did, what the effect of the course he took was upon all things, and what as the result the actual po¬ sition of man and the universe is, it has been the object of this chapter to exhibit in a general manner, according to the word of God ; which blessed word has for its main object to explain, to develop, and to enforce the counsel of God touching these im¬ mense realities, and as the great result, the glory of God in the salvation of fallen men. On the very ruin of the Covenant of Works, the existence of a better, a more ancient, a more en¬ during, and in all respects a divine Covenant of Grace was dis¬ closed. A covenant between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, by which provision had been made from eternity for the very casualty upon which God was then administering ; and upon every other casualty which could affect the stability of his unal¬ terable purpose to have a seed to serve him, or the glory of his sovereign administration of all things according to the good pleasure of his own will. When we contemplate the whole case together, and estimate our actual condition as affected by both covenants, and as explicated by the sentence of God already pronounced, and the final sentence which he will pronounce at the great day, and by his great promise before his first sentence, and his perpetual fulfilment of it even to his final sentence ; it is perfectly obvious that our condition as explained by God him¬ self, is one of actual sin and misery, threatening to end quickly in eternal perdition — but with the glorious promise of a Saviour, who has long ago come into the world, and through whom who¬ soever will come unto God by him, shall not perish, but shall have everlasting life. This is the divine explanation of the whole case. So much of it as relates personally to each one of us, we have as ample means of determining whether it is true or false, as we have of determining any thing whatever ; we may certainly know whether or not we are sinners, whether or not we are miserable ; we may certainly know whether or not we are pure, whether or 24 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. not we are blessed ; we may certainly know whether or not we have any apprehension of being damned, any desire to be saved. As to our whole race, nothing concerning it seems to be more manifest, than that the exact condition which God describes is precisely that which it has always exhibited, that through which it is now passing, and which, so far as we can comprehend, nothing can alter, till Christ who is our life shall appear once more — when all his followers shall appear with him — in glory, and all his enemies shall be swept into endless ruin. 4. In so far as the creatures to be benefitted by the Covenant of Grace, are in a different condition from what they were under the Covenant of Works, the two covenants are necessarily differ¬ ent from each other. But a careful scrutiny of the intimate na¬ ture of both covenants, makes it obvious that the Covenant of Works might well proceed from the divine mind, even under the eternal purpose to execute the Covenant of Grace ; and when the fall of man annulled the Covenant of Works as a Covenant of Life, every fundamental and indestructible element of it which tended in that direction, was gathered up and made full account of in the Covenant of Grace. The penalty of the Covenant of Works remains, indeed, in full force ; but the hu¬ man race received the promise of a Saviour even before their first sentence under that covenant ; so that, in effect, they have never been under the unmitigated fury of that penalty ; and never will be until the final sentence of God. No one was ever saved by that covenant, or ever will be ; anxious as the wicked, in their folly, pretend to be to commend themselves to God by their pre¬ tended good works. On the other hand, we are apparently taught, that no one ever perished eternally, or ever will, under the naked penalty of that covenant, and simply because of original sin ; for though it be real sin, and the source of all other sin in us, it is also that form of sin in us which stood side by side with the primeval promise — that sin of the world which the Lamb of God so took away, that none will perish eternally merely for it.1 I do not think any are warranted in saying that infants are damned ; that Satan will be permitted to exhibit in hell as a monument of triumph over Jesus Christ, a single soul dragged down to eternal despair, which was originally made in the image of Gocl, and which is free from actual transgressions of its 1 John, L 29. 25 CHAP. I.] CONDITION OF THE UNIVERSE. own. The divine remedy against such a catastrophe is com¬ plete. 5. The difference between the conduct of God towards Satan and his seed, and that towards the followers of the promised Seed of the woman, is infinitely great. It is not diffcult to see, why the grace of an infinitely merciful God might be extended to fallen man ; and why the full measure of his justice might burn against Satan. Indeed it is hardly possible for us to comprehend how Satan could have been left in the full possession of his ter¬ rible triumph over man, without its appearing, in some sort, to involve a triumph over God himself, in the absolute defeat of his purpose in the work of creation, and the frustration of his design in entering into covenant with man. The question be¬ comes far more difficult, when it is so applied as to divide the human race itself. There is no difficulty in seeing why men are finally lost ; none in seeing why they are finally saved ; none in solving all the intermediate questions — in each particular case of a lost or saved soul. It is perfectly clear that without divine grace none can be saved ; that through divine grace any — alb could be saved. It is here that all God has said concerning the seed of Satan on one side, and the followers of the promised Seed of the woman on the other side — confronts us ; yea, so confronts us, that to overlook it, or to explain it away, subverts every thing which is clear in itself, or which makes the condition of the uni¬ verse, or that of the human race, clear to us. It is, if I may so express it, that portion of the infinitely gracious dealings of God with man, in which his infinite sovereignty makes itself particu¬ larly manifest ; and the whole difficulty lies in the fact, that God really acts therein, and has plainly told us he would act, in a manner different from that in which we would act, if we were God. Be it so. He does that in all things. There is no alter¬ native but that we must confide in him, or that he must resign the throne of his universe to us. 6. Every thing depends on divine grace, and turns upon the willingness and sufficiency of the Lord Jesus. For sinners there can be no hope except in grace — for sufferers none except in mercy — for the helpless, none except in him who is able to save. It might be true, or it might not, that Jesus Christ, the sinner’s friend, is willing and is able to save us. But it is abso¬ lutely certain, so far as the reason of man can reach, and so far 26 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. as the history of man has preserved any record of the past, that no one else is, or ever was, either able or willing to do what must he done, in order to save us. Nor is the certainty one whit less, that God neither is, nor ever was, in the least degree in¬ clined to save us, or to allow us to be saved, in any other way, or by any other being, even if both had been possible. How over¬ whelming, therefore, is the interest of our fallen race — not that the Lord Jesus should be put to shame, and the blessed word which reveals him be confuted — ■which seems to be the chief de¬ sire of all the enemies of God ; but that the reality, the effi¬ cacy, and the glory of this great salvation should be established like the foundations of the everlasting mountains ! CHAPTER II. THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION: GENERAL STATEMENT OF ITS GREAT PRINCIPLES AND TRUTHS. I. 1. The Disclosure of this Covenant: Precise Conception of it. — 2. Jesus Christ the Mediator of this Covenant. — 3. The Covenant itself the Result of the Eternal Purpose of God, and the Eternal Counsel of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. — 4. The Relevancy of Divine Grace to the Mode of the Divine Existence. — 5. Em¬ phatic, with Relation to the Covenant of Redemption. — 6. The Scriptural Doc¬ trines of the Trinity and of Salvation by Grace, stand or fall together. — II. 1. The whole Subject one of pure Revelation — 2. The Revealed Mode of God’s Being, determines the Form of the Eternal Covenant. — 3. The Revealed Nature of Salvation does the like. — 4. The Relation of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, respectively, to Elect Sinners in the Eternal Covenant. — III. 1. Christ the Covenanted Head of the Redeemed. — 2. Otherwise, Salvation is neither promised, nor possible. — 3. Need of restoring a truer Method of Statement. — 4. Fatalism : Human Freedom : A free Gospel : Common Operations of the Spirit. — 5. The Senses in which Believers are in Covenant with God: Participa¬ tion of the Universe in Covenanted Blessings. — 6. Recapitulation of the Primary Conception of the Covenant, as between the Persons of the Godhead : and of its Secondary Conception, as embracing all the Redeemed in Christ, their Head. — 7. Practical Appreciation of both these Aspects, indispensable to Man. I. — 1. It is not to the universe, situated as ours now is, that the knowledge of a great deliverance is first disclosed by God ; but the actual condition of the universe, as we behold it, is the re¬ sult of that disclosure made to a universe over which absolute and universal ruin was impending, and in which that disclosure has been perpetually confirmed and augmented throughout the whole life of the human race. It was the infinite purpose of divine mercy, thus disclosed in the very sentence of God, which totally changed the condition of the created universe, as it lay under the penalty of the covenant of works. And what we now behold is the combined result of the fall of man, of the respite until the great day, of the full infliction of the penalty annexed to the covenant of works, of the actual sentence of God, of the great promise of deliverance through the Seed of the woman, of the complete development of that promise in the sacred Scrip- 28 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. tures, of the practical manifestation of Kedemption itself through every dispensation hitherto exhibited, and of the ceaseless conflict between sin and misery on the one side, and grace and truth on the other. What we have to consider in the survey of all these immense topics is the elemental nature of that eternal purpose of God, and that whole working of God unto the restitution of all things through Jesus Christ our Lord. We express, in its widest sense, the idea in which the whole survey results, by the phrase, The Covenant of Grace, because divine grace is the very foundation and significance of the whole : and also by the phrase, The Covenant of Redemption, because the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is the vital point of the whole con¬ ception of grace unto salvation. 2. If the sacred Scriptures are either the Word of God, or are intelligible to man, then is Jesus of Nazareth the Seed of the woman ; the Seed promised to Abraham, the father of the faithful ; the Messiah of the Old Testament ; the Christ of the New Testament ; the Son of God ; and the Saviour of the world.1 It is to the effect that Christ is the promised Seed that the whole Scriptures conclude ; and nothing was ever more dis¬ tinctly asserted by Christ himself than that he is the Messiah.3 This is the mediator between God and men. Mediator of what, and to what end P Mediator to the end that God and men may be reconciled ; to the end that man may be saved ; to the end that God may be glorified in the eternal manifestation of his sovereign grace by means of the everlasting blessedness of re¬ deemed sinners. Mediator of a scheme of eternal life proposed to sinners ready to be sentenced to eternal death ; of a plan of salvation for the guilty, and mercy for the suffering ; of redemp¬ tion for those lying under a fearful penalty, release for those ex¬ posed to a terrible curse ; Mediator, in one word, of a covenant of grace, which is also a covenant of redemption. It was to fit him to be the Mediator of this covenant that he became Im¬ manuel, that is, God-man, that he might mediate between God and men. It was as Mediator of this covenant that he was in¬ finitely humiliated, even to the cross ; infinitely exalted, even to the throne of the universe. And every office he executes, whether as the infallible Teacher of all truth, or whether as the i Gen., iii. 15; xii. 3, 7 ; xvi. 7; Job, vii. 14; Matt., i. 23-25; Luke, i. 31-35. 8 Gal., iii. 16; iv. 4; John, i. 41; iv. 26; ix. 37. 29 CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. great High Priest who redeems men, or whether as the sole King of saints, it is still as Mediator of the same eternal covenant. And when he shall come the second time to consummate his in¬ finite work, he will come as the glorified Redeemer, perfecting and then delivering up to the Father the kingdom which this same covenant had contemplated from eternity. 8. It would be wholly impossible to explain any part of the mediatorial office, or character, or worth of Christ, and, there¬ fore, wholly impossible to explain fully any part of the actual mode of salvation proposed in the Scriptures ; without being led immediately to the divine nature, and the divine purpose, and the result of both as exhibited in the conception and execu¬ tion of salvation by a Redeemer ; which result is, the covenant of redemption. This is inevitable in the nature of the case. But besides this, which the whole Scriptures not only recognize, but assert ; the Lord Jesus habitually and continually discloses the intimate participation of the Farther and the Holy Ghost in all his work, in all that preceded it, and in all its results. In all his teaching, nothing is more frequently reiterated than that in all things he was executing the purpose of the Father : in all his promises, nothing is more emphatic than that in all things the Holy Ghost would consummate his work. So deeply is this participation of all the persons of the Godhead imbedded in the scriptural conception of the way of salvation, that there is a most distinct passing over from one divine person to another, as the sacred record advances in its sublime disclosures of salvation itself. First, it is God simply considered ; then it is the Son, who does all in the name of the Father ; then it is the Holy Ghost, who does all in the name of the Son. Great, therefore, as is the certainty that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and the Saviour of the world ; the certainty is just as great that God the Father, and God the Holy Ghost co-operate in all his glorious work ; and that salvation is the result of the eternal purpose of God, and of the concurrence of all the persons of the Godhead. This is expressed by the phrase, The Covenant of Redemption. 4. There can be no doubt that, if salvation is of divine grace, it must be of him who is God, and can be of none else. What¬ ever is not God, is wholly impotent as a source of divine grace : whatever is God, is divinely competent as a source of divine grace. If there are three Gods, there must be three distinct 30 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK 1 sources ; if there be but one God, there can be but o*ne source. But if the inode in which the unity of the infinite essence of the only and true God subsists and acts be a threefold person¬ ality, then each of these three persons must concur in every act and purpose of this single and infinite essence, and, therefore, must concur in every act and purpose of divine grace. And whatever ineffable counsels, or mutual intuition, or inbeing, or intercourse with and between the three persons of the one God upon any subject whatever, or in relation to any purpose or act whatever, can be supposed to be real or to be possible ; the very same as a possibility and as a reality, lies at the foundation of the divine purpose and concurrence in that divine grace which saves sinners through a Redeemer. But this, again, is the Cove¬ nant of redemption. 5. It is easy to understand that every divine purpose and con¬ currence must conform to the absolute nature of God, and must be wrought out in a manner, answerable to that nature. What is thus true universally, must be true, in a most emphatic sense, of that sublime purpose and concurrence of salvation by grace, which the sacred Scriptures, through which alone we know any¬ thing about either grace or salvation, teach us is the highest manifestation of the glory of God, and therefore the highest ex¬ hibition of his nature and his perfections. If it is true, there¬ fore, that God exists in an absolute unity of essence, but that the mode of that unity is a threefold personality ; then it is in¬ fallibly certain, that if there are any sinners in the universe, and God should save any of them, he will do it in a manner answer- able to such a nature. How the Scriptures teach us that there are sinners in the universe, that God does save some of them, that he does this through a Covenant of Redemption, based upon that very mode of the divine existence, and that, in fine, such is the exact mode in which God does exist ; all of which I have proved at large in a former Treatise. This being true, upon the only authority which is infallible upon the question under con¬ sideration ; nothing is left but to admit the eternal purpose and concurrence of the one living and true God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, to save lost sinners through divine grace — which is the Covenant of Redemption ; or else to reject the sacred Scriptures, iu which alone is found either this great doc¬ trine of salvation, or this great doctrine of the divine existence. 31 CHAP. II. J THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 6. To that issue the earnest seeker after truth will always come, first or last. And if he he an earnest seeker after truth, that issue is soon settled. It is an issue I cannot follow here ; its consideration belongs to another department of our great sub¬ ject. I may observe, however, that the mode of the divine exis¬ tence which must be true, if the plan of salvation taught in the Scriptures is either divine or efficacious ; is a mode of that exis¬ tence which so far from being capable of taking its origin from human conjecture, is really riot capable of being taught or under¬ stood except in connection with the plan of salvation which is responsive to it. It is not systematically revealed except in con¬ nection with that plan ; it is not a speculation of philosophy capable of being thought out ; it is a sublime result set before us in a lost soul saved — and educed by God himself, concerning himself, teaching and saving side by side. Blot out all we know about salvation, and then see what it is we know about the doc¬ trine of the Trinity, and the eternal counsel of God. Or blot out the doctrine of the Trinity and of the Covenant of Redemp¬ tion, and then see what it is we know about salvation for lost sinners. It seems to me that such transcendent abstract truths, and such overwhelming practical results, with the intense and inseparable connection between them, make a system which tran¬ scends human imposture. II. — 1. According to the Scriptures, salvation is by the grace of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, by means of the work of the Holy Ghost within us.1 If the Scriptures be rejected, then there is no knowledge of the grace of God, nor any knowledge of faith in Christ, nor any knowledge of any work of the Holy Ghost, left upon earth. But in that case, we have also lost all true conception both of what salvation is, and of what is the exact nature of our own terrible condition ; and are left to the fearful dominion of sin and death, under which the goadings of our depraved conscience and reason, fleeing from despair, drive us to atheism or to superstition — the only refuges for man with¬ out the Bible. We cannot repeat it to ourselves too often, that sinners cannot be saved without a Saviour ; that man left to himself cannot even conceive a way of saving himself which his own reason will accept till, it is blinded by his consuming religious wants ; that the whole subject of deliverance for sinners lies 1 Eph., ii. 4-10; John, i. 1-20; 1 Cor., i. 21-24. 32 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I, merely in the bosom of God ; and that his divine revelation of the manner of it, and the fact of it, is a revelation of that which lies wholly out of the range of natural knowledge. We must accept the manner of the divine deliverance, and the fact of it together ; or we must reject them together. In one terrible sense they may be both rejected ; and I have just pointed out the result thereof. In a still higher sense, their rejection is no longer pos¬ sible. For these sublime ideas once revealed to man, cannot af¬ terwards perish. Their very existence among men is a decisive proof of a divine revelation ; the clearness with which, notwith¬ standing their vastness and their remoteness from human think¬ ing, they still make their way into the human understanding, is an equally decisive proof of their absolute truth ; and their transforming power in the soul of man raises up through all generations such living monuments of divine grace, that the fact of the divine revelation, the truth of its heavenly matter, and the efficacy of the great deliverance it makes known, become just as palpable as that man is a sinner, or that he will perish if left to himself. 2. The Scriptures being accepted as a revelation of the way of life, and their divine statements as to the manner thereof being accepted in their simple and full sense ; then grace, and faith, and a spiritual life, become the grandest realities, carrying us backward into eternity, inward to the depths of the human soul, and forward to endless glory. God considered in his es¬ sence and totality, and each person of the Godhead, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, sometimes either one, sometimes either two, sometimes all three Persons ; these, in endless repetition, become the themes of revelation touching the deliverance promised to man, and touching the way thereof. The poverty of all languages prevents the reproduction of the im¬ mense richness with which Jehovah has made himself known to the earliest ages, by means of the numerous names by which he revealed himself : that primeval form of permanent revelation of which I have treated specially in another place. Never¬ theless, the sacred word is so replenished with the knowledge of the living God, that the divine truth most deeply seated therein, is that the God of Israel is one God. And yet the very first recorded utterance of this glorious God concerning man was, Let us make man iu our image, after our like- CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 33 ness and he prefaced man’s expulsion from the Garden of Eden by the wonderful declaration, Behold the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil.2 Before either of those state¬ ments, the Spirit of God brooded over the chaos at creation ; and the omnific Word by whom all things were created, spoke before all great creative acts.3 Now it is not in order to prove the manner of the divine existence, nor the manner of the divine manifestation founded on that manner of existence, both of which I have treated at large elsewhere, that these great topics are made fundamental here. But it is to point out in that man¬ ner of existence, and that manner of manifestation, both of which are most conspicuous of all in the salvation of fallen sin¬ ners of the human race, and in the manner thereof ; the una¬ voidable needs be, either of a wholly independent action on the part of God, and then of each Divine Person in the Godhead — or else of that eternal counsel and concurrence in the whole God¬ head, of which the work of God, and of each Divine Person is the result. Bv the former alternative, there must be four divine wills, and therefore, four Gods, which, beyond all question, the Scriptures do not teach. By the latter alternative, there can be but one divine will of one living God, in whose undivided essence three divine Persons subsist ; which unquestionably the Scrip¬ tures do teach. But from this there results inevitablv, out of the revealed manner of the divine existence, and the revealed and actual manner of its manifestation in all things, and espe¬ cially in Kedemption, that eternal Covenant between the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost which is the outbirth of God’s eternal counsel, and whose outworkings are seen in the whole Plan of Salvation. 3. There are, therefore, two perfectly distinct lines of enquiry, by either, or by both of which, the reality and the nature of the Covenant of Redemption between the persons of the Godhead in eternity, and from eternity, are capable of being made just as certain as the reality and nature of salvation itself. One of these is the testimony of the Scriptures themselves ; wherein arc innumerable statements revealing to man the counsel, will, purpose, and Covenant of God concerning his salvation, and concerning the whole reason, caruse, design, ground, manner, end, and object thereof. The other lies in the facts distinctly 1 Gen., i. 26. 2 Gen., in. 22. 3 Gen., i. 1-26 ; John, i. 1-5. VOL. II. 3 34 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. held forth — the effects of that counsel and covenant distinctly produced and recorded as such, and the consequences, results, and products thereof reproduced upon the soul, and with the intimate knowledge of man ; from which effects, to wit, from the recorded acts of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost ; and from the results of those effects in us, for example, our re¬ generation, we are able to infer, and are obliged to infer, a cause antecedent to those divine acts, to wit, the counsel of God, and its product, the Covenant of Redemption. Both of these lines of enquiry terminate in the same manner, and upon the same conclusion, summarily exhibited in the following statements : The sole foundation of the sinner's hope lies in the sovereign grace of God : The word of God is a Revelation of that grace and of the manner of it : The manner of it in its first and most general form, is a covenant from eternity between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, to save, by the work of each, with the concurrence of all, every sinner of the human race, whom God purposes to save.1 It is a covenant infinitely sure,2 ever¬ lasting," absolute/ and filled with all spiritual blessings to true believers in Christ.5 4. In this Covenant of Redemption, the Lord Jesus Christ is the covenanted head of all the elect of God. Whatever grace they can receive in time, and whatever glory in eternity, both are lodged in this eternal covenant, and settled on them by its terms, only in him whose participation in it was the participa¬ tion of their head, their Lord, their Redeemer, their elder brother ; in like manner as the participation of the Father in it, was the participation of their God and Father ; and the parti¬ cipation of the Holy Ghost, was the participation of their New Creator, Comforter, and Sanctifier.6 God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.7. And it is this amazing love which the Father has bestowed on us, and through which God calls us his sons ; that is the remotest cause of our receiving in this world, all the privileges of sons of God, and in the life to come, the incomprehensible weight of glory which is 1 Ps. lxxxix. 3-28; Eph., L 3, 4; 2 Tim., i. 9. 2 Isa., iv. 3. 8 Isa., lxi. 8. 4 Jer., xxxii. 38-40. 6 Eph., i. 5. c Rom., viii. 28-39; xvi. 25, 26; Eph., i .passim; iii. 9-12; 2 Tim., i. 7-10; Titus, i. 2 ; 1 Peter, i. 20. 7 John, iii. 16. CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 35 involved in the fruition of the glorified Redeemer as he is, and in our being like him.1 The sum of the record is, that God hath given to us eternal life ; that this life eternal is in the Son of God ; that whosoever hath the Son, hath life ; and that he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.2 Such are the very words of God. On the other hand, the participation of the Son in this eternal covenant, and his concurrence alike in it, and in the coun¬ sel, the purpose, and the decree of God, and his whole work of Redemption as the consequence thereof, and as the Mediator of that covenant ; is the very burden of the sacred Scriptures.5 The grace which is held forth in this covenant is the grace of God, in which, as in the covenant itself, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost alike participate. The infinite Beneficence of God, which, as far as we can understand, or the Scriptures instruct us, is that divine perfection from which springs all divine grace to fallen sinners of mankind, is a perfection of the God¬ head in its essence, and, like all such perfections, it appertains alike and equally to each Divine Person. The same thing is true of the divine Wisdom and Power in their relation to this divine covenant, and its execution. At the same time, the Per¬ sonality of the Godhead is no more to be excluded with reference to that covenant, and its execution, than the Unity thereof is ; nay, it is in these sublime manifestations of God that we are so precisely taught that the mode of that Unity of essence is truly expressed only b}^ the subsistence of a threefold Personality therein. Specifically, then, the office of the Father in relation to this covenant, is the manifestation of that sovereign and eternal purpose of God to have a seed to serve him, which was exhibited concerning the whole race of man, by the Covenant of Works, and all that preceded it ; which was exhibited, in another form, in pronouncing sentence upon the breach of the Covenant of Works, wherein the distinction in the race itself is first set forth by God in connection with his promise of deliverance ; and which wTas fully exhibited in the form of eternal, unchanging, and elec¬ ting love, and in that form lodged in the bosom of this covenant, for the infinite glory of God and the endless blessedness of the inheritors of eternal life under the covenant itself. When we 1 1 John, iiL 1, 2. 2 1 John, v. 11, 12. 3 John, i. 1-14; Rom., y. passim; Luke, i. 26-55; 1 Cor., xv. passim; Gal., iv. 3-7 ; Phil., iL 5-13. 36 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. encountered the first manifestation of the eternal purpose of God to deal with devils and men differently — and to deal with the human race itself with reference to a final judgment in which that race would he eternally separated into two parts, I called attention distinctly to the overwhelming facts so deeply influen¬ tial upon the condition and destinies of the universe, and so fun¬ damental in the very structure of the Word of God. We en¬ counter once more a new proof, in a still more precise form, of this eternal purpose of God. For my own part, I am not able to understand the Scriptures otherwise ; nor am I able to under¬ stand upon what ground it is possible for us to assert that they would be more rational, more credible, more honourable to God, or more in accordance with all we know of him, of ourselves, and of the universe, independently of what we learn from them, if they had taught differently on these vast topics. Undoubt¬ edly there is an end of all salvation promised in the Scriptures, unless it is secured in the Covenant of Redemption. Undoubt¬ edly the eternal purpose of God, and the electing and unalter¬ able love of the Father, are as rational and as exalted motives and grounds upon which sovereign grace could be alleged to distin¬ guish its objects in a race of sinners, as any others which the poor cavils of men have suggested. So it is, that the Son does engage to take flesh — become Immanuel, and so Mediator be¬ tween God and men, under this covenant, and in all his work of humiliation and exaltation to bring in, and to work out, an ever¬ lasting righteousness ; not, assuredly, for the benefit of the seed of Satan, the finally impenitent, the just objects of the aversion of God and the Father; but, assuredly, for the benefit of all fallen sinners of the human race, whom God hath purposed to save, and whom the Father had loved with that wondrous love in Christ Jesus, from which neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate the objects of it.1 In the same manner the Holy Ghost, the third Person of the adorable Trinity, participating and concurring in all divine acts and counsels, has a special office with reference to the Covenant of Redemption. He is the Author of that New Creation of which Christ is the head, and of which every particular member is in covenant with God 1 Rom., viii. 33-39; Gal., iii. 16; Isa., lix. 21 ; Zech., vL 13; Luke, xxii. 29. 37 CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. through Christ their covenant head. It is the divine Spirit who enables them and inclines them, to believe to the saving of their souls, and to repent of sin, and forsake it. Whatever concerns the complete execution of this divine covenant, and the effica¬ cious application of it to the redeemed, appertains to the parti¬ cipation of the divine Spirit, in the covenant itself, and to his divine office with reference thereto.1 Precisely as the office of the Son herein has special relation to the office of the Father, so the office of the Spirit has special relation to the office of the Son. The objects of the Father's love are redeemed by the Son ; and those redeemed by the Son are regenerated by the Spirit. I have used the word special , because the Scriptures do not permit us to do otherwise with reference to the whole concatenation of this amazing exhibition of the nature, the counsel, and the grace of God.2 And thus, according to the revelation which God has given to man, salvation for sinners, so far from being that casual, uncertain, or indeterminate thing, which men are so prone to consider it ; is, in reality, the most wondrous manifestation of God. Whatever effect may be produced upon the universe, or upon devils or men, or upon particular portions of either indi¬ vidually considered, there, absolutely considered, is an exhibition of the divine nature, the divine character, and the divine plans, transcendently wonderful and efficacious — perfectly distinct after God has revealed all unto us, yet utterly remote from any thing which could ever have been suggested by the natural thinking of the human soul. In its sum, it is the revelation of the eternal Covenant of Grace for the Redemption of the elect of God, through Jesus Christ, by the work of the Holy Ghost ; of the whole of which natural thinking knows nothing, and to which nature furnishes no clue. So far as nature is concerned, it is a new, a distinct, and is indeed the very highest manifestation of the glory of God. III. — 1. I shall not repeat here the general discussion of the doctrine of covenants, which has been very carefully drawn out in treating of the covenant of works in the First Fart of The¬ ology. It becomes us, however, to be fully aware of what the Scriptures teach, and of the sense in which we understand their teaching, concerning the reality and the effect of headship of 1 Ezek., xxxvi. 26, 27 ; John, vi. 37-44; Gal., v. 22, 23. 2 John, xvi. 7-16; 1 Tim., iii. 16 ; Rom., i. 4; John, xv. 26. 38 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. tlie Son over the elect of God, in the Covenant of Redemption. The headship of Adam, both natural and federal, seems to me to he taught with perfect clearness in the Scriptures : and, moreover, if it were otherwise, the Scriptures would afford us no solution of the actual condition of the human race, and, there¬ fore, no complete solution either of the way of salvation, or of salvation itself. But the Scriptures, in innumerable places and ways, illustrate our recovery by our fall ; and do not hesitate to run parallels, for this purpose, between Adam and Christ by name ; nay, they expressly call Christ the second Adam, in their anxiety to make us comprehend how the first Adam, who was a living soul, was a figure of the second Adam, who was a cjuickening spirit and the Lord from heaven.1 The Son of God, therefore, is as really the Head of the redeemed, both by cove¬ nant and by a supernatural regeneration ; as the first man Adam was the head of the human race, both by covenant and by natural generation. It is of no consequence now, and to this proof, whether the human race, and the redeemed, be or be not, absolutely and numerically co-incident. If they are, all are re¬ deemed ; if they are not — as we know they are not — the lost are not redeemed. But if the redeemed are embraced in the cove¬ nant of redemption, in Christ their covenant and supernatural Head, as the whole race was embraced in the Covenant of Works, in Adam their covenanted and natural head : it is as wholly in¬ evitable that the redeemed must share the fate of their head, as that the race must share the fate of their head. Such is the overwhelming demonstration drawn out repeatedly by the Scrip¬ tures themselves ; confirmed by innumerable separate declara¬ tions scattered through the Word of God, and practically illus¬ trated throughout all generations, as the human race has ex¬ hibited its connection with Adam, and the redeemed of the Lord taken out of the bosom of that race have exhibited their connection with Christ. 2. It is no doubt very common to reject the teachings of the Scriptures, or to obscure them, concerning the Covenant of WT>rks and the fall of man. It is also very common to reject their teachings, or to obscure them, concerning the Covenant of Grace and the recovery of man. We ought, however, to reflect that our complete success in such undertakings could not miti- 1 1 Cor., sv. 45-50 ; Rom., y. passim. CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 39 gate a single evil of the fall, and could destroy nothing but the hope of the redeemed. Our very highest success terminates in this, that having abolished the Covenant of Redemption, we are left without Christ, and, therefore, without God, and without hope in the world. For how are we to be made partakers of Christ, except by means of his redeeming us ? And how is he to redeem us, except as Mediator between God and men P And how is he to mediate, when the very ground, authority, and power to mediate, as well as the chief end and object of the me¬ diation itself, are abolished by nullifying the covenant of grace and redemption ? Who has any right to talk about grace after God is refused the right to stipulate concerning his own sover¬ eign grace, and finds his veracity assailed when he says he has done so for his own glory ? Who has any right to make men¬ tion of redemption, after the Son of God is refused liberty to covenant for his own brethren in his own shed blood, unless he will treat all the seed of Satan precisely as he treats all the elect of God ? If it is said, there are no elect of God ; that is merely returning by a short way to the same subversion of the covenant, and of grace and salvation with it, only it is less respectful to God, who has said a thousand times there are elect of him : and it is immediately fatal to man, since it is certain that if God does not choose us, we shall never choose him. 3. There are questions which produce extreme embarrassment to our limited faculties, connected with every possible view we can take of the great problems of God and man. Many of these are questions which serious minds cannot escape ; many others are questions which candid minds cannot solve to their own entire satisfaction, much less to that of others. There is no need, however, to increase either the number or the difficulty of such questions by our own undocile ignorance and obstinate self- conceit. Concerning all such questions as rise high enough to exhibit a double solution — one when viewed from the divine side of them, and another when viewed from the human side of them — I have expressed my sense of their nature, their effects, and their proper treatment, at the close of the former Treatise. Those which merely present difficulties in reaching any clear solution, at all, are either such as in their nature are out of the range of our intelligence, or such as being within that range are not explicable in the present state of our knowledge. It is 40 TIIE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. under this last description, perhaps, that we should class most of those difficulties which we experience with regard to questions in¬ cidentally connected with the great topics discussed in this chap¬ ter. The whole subject, fundamental as it is, had passed away from the preaching, from the religious literature, almost from the dogmatic teaching of the first third of this century. No wonder that there should arise difficulties in restoring it to its fundamental position ; difficulties mainly produced by the errors which had occupied the place of these immense truths. And thus, whenever that state of case is present, such difficulties as the following naturally enough arise : Is not this fatalism ? Is there any room for human freedom here ? Any for a free Gos¬ pel ? Any for the common operations of the Spirit P Let us examine them. 4. If by fatalism we mean the uncontrollable dominion of an infinite personal God over the created universe, and the absolute dependence of man, both as a creature and a sinner upon God, both as his Creator and Redeemer ; then we have given a very absurd name to the system of the universe which actually ex¬ ists, and which is clearly exhibited in nature, in providence, and in revelation. When we conceive of fate as subordinate to God, what we mean by fate, if we mean any thing, is divine providence : when we conceive of fate as superior to God him¬ self, if we mean any thing, it is that fate is God, and that God is providence. The very idea of fate disappears from a spiritual system administered by an infinite, personal, sovereign God ; and although such a system might be conceived of as presented under innumerable aspects, and as administered in innumerable ways, the absolute dominion of God and the absolute depend¬ ence of the creature on God, are necessarily inherent in every aspect and every way. Of all conceivable systems, the one I have been attempting to develop most thoroughly excludes every conception of fate. — As to our personal freedom, considered in itself, there can be no question with man of the existence of that of which each one is conscious, and without which we are not able to conceive that virtue, morality, duty, reward, or, on the other hand, vice, sin, punishment, which are the highest re¬ alities, could exist at all. But it is a freedom which must con¬ sist with all the past, all the actual, all the future of our being : which must exist and operate in such a way as accords with our 41 CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. entire dependence on God, and his infinite dominion over us. Existing as fallen creatures, our moral freedom, as such, is re¬ cognized and respected in the whole manner of our restoration ; or more truly speaking, our moral bondage is broken and we are set free in Jesus Christ. To such as are not restored in Christ, assuredly no violence is offered : and they have the same evi¬ dence of moral freedom in rejecting the Saviour, that they have of the existence of moral freedom itself. It is remarkable that only they who reject Christ exhibit a sensitiveness about en¬ croachments upon human freedom in divine grace, from which the subjects of that grace are wholly free. They ought to reflect that the efficacy of salvation by grace within the human soul depends on the power of God, and not on the freedom of the depraved soul ; and that, in the nature of the case, it is obvious that when the nature of man is changed, all that appertains to that nature, whether intellect, conscience, will, or whatsoever, incurs a corresponding change, each after its own kind. So that the real difficulty is, not that our moral freedom is violated, which it never is ; but that God will not violate it so as to save us against our will ; but leaves us in our boasted freedom, to perish for our sins, or to save ourselves if we can. — Touching the freedom of the Gospel offer, nothing can he more certain than that salvation is to he freely, sincerely, urgently proclaimed to the whole family of man ; proclaimed as infinitely worthy of all acceptation, and as the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes it. But, at the same time, it is perfectly cer¬ tain that innumerable multitudes have always despised and re¬ jected it ; that they do so still ; and that doing so, they perish. Now in what manner can it affect all these questions, to ascer¬ tain and point out the grounds upon which men accept the Gospel, and are saved ; or those upon which they reject it, and are ruined ? Whether the explanation is true or false, is imma¬ terial to the other question. God reserves to himself the sover¬ eign power by which the Gospel is made efficacious : he also reserves, till the opening of the Lamb’s Book of Life, the pub¬ lication of the names of the redeemed. Through all time, they who will perish and they who will be saved, pass together through this state of trial : the Word of God, which is the in¬ fallible source of knowledge, and rule of faith and obedience to all, is open to all ; and all the means of grace and salvation ad- 42 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. ministered by men utterly ignorant of the sovereign purpose of God touching individual persons, are exhibited before all, and are accessible to all. It is unquestionably true that God knows from eternity the exact result of each particular thing, and of all things. Bat this is equally true of all possible systems ; so that absolutely considered, none could effect any thing but that which God designed it should effect : and, therefore, in the sense of the difficulty I am now considering, the real cavil is against God himself, for offering salvation generally when he knew it would be accepted only specially. But they who thus cavil ought to reflect that, after all, the offer of salvation in its freest form is always conditional, and the conditions always a part of the offer : that if these simple and unalterable conditions are performed by any, only because God inclines and enables them, that is one more proof of the nature and reality of that covenant which I have exhibited ; whereas, the inability or the refusal, no matter which, of men to believe in Christ, and to forsake sin, as the conditions of salvation, and their neglect or refusal, no matter which, to ask Christ for that inclination and ability which he has promised to give if they will ask him, clearly prove the utter futility of all mere offers of salvation to lost men. In effect, the real difficulty is the same as in the former questions ; the right of God to treat devils and men differently ; the right of God, having reserved his grace for fallen man, to make any dis¬ crimination between them ; the right, after being rejected by all, to save any through sovereign grace. It is not to be con¬ cealed that, if this can be denied to God, the sacred Scriptures can no longer be vindicated as a revelation of his will ; nor can the salvation in which his people rejoice be considered more than a vain and empty delusion. — The difficulty founded on what are called the common operations of the divine Spirit — those operations, whatever they may be, which come short of perfecting in the human soul the work of salvation wrought out by Christ ; arises from overlooking the intimate relation of the work of the Spirit to the work of Christ, which I have before pointed out. It is inconsistent with the nature of the Covenant of Kedemption, and with the office of each divine Person in it, and with innumerable statements of the sacred Scriptures, to rob the purpose, and counsel, and plan of God of its sovereign unity. The Son does nothing as Mediator irrespective of the CHAP. II.] T n E COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 43 eternal love of the Father ; and the Spirit does nothing as the author of the New Creation irrespective of the mediatorial work of the Son. Out of Christ, there is no grace of God for sinners, nor any work of the Spirit of God in sinners ; and sin¬ ners have no relation to the Covenant of Redemption irrespective of Christ their covenant Head ; the gift of the onlv begotten Son of God being the foundation of every other divine gift. All those representations, therefore, which set forth the work of Christ as indeterminate, and leave the grace of God to flow still more indeterminately, and the work of the Spirit to proceed in the same manner ; involve not only the subversion of the Cove¬ nant of Redemption, and the substitution of a way of salvation utterly repudiated by the Scriptures ; but they involve, logi¬ cally, the existence of three separate and independent divine wills, and, therefore, three Gods : or else the subjection of the separate will of the Son, and the separate will of the Spirit, to the supreme will of the Father, and, therefore, the existence of but one divine person, to wit, the Father. In effect, there are common operations of the Spirit ; but they are not irrespective of Christ : on the contrary, they are absolutely relevant to him. Every mercy of God does not terminate in salvation ; every ben¬ efit conferred by Christ does not ensure salvation ; every work of the Spirit does not fit us for salvation. It is the glory and blessedness only of such as love God, such as are the called ac¬ cording to his purpose, that all things work together for their good. Whatever comes short of salvation, may, without objec¬ tion, be called common ; and in the immense benefits of this kind which are conferred by Christ upon the unthankful and disobedient, and which do not secure their salvation, we have at once the key, the ground, and the measure, of those common operations of the Spirit which come short of salvation. Surely, there is no occasion either to deny their reality, or to undermine the foundations of our hope in order to allow them. 5. In our English version of the New Testament Scriptures, the same Greek word0 is rendered both covenant and testa¬ ment. The word of itself undoubtedly has both significations ; and when Messiah sealed with his blood the covenant to which, as the Son, he was a party in eternity, all the blessings of redemption which had always been in him covenant mercies * A iabriKi]. 44 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. to believers, became thenceforward testamentary devises of the Saviour to his followers. He gave the cup to his Apostles, and said, Drink ye all of it ; for this is my blood of the new testa¬ ment ( diaOj'jKiig ) which is shed for many for the remission of sins.1 There are also two senses in which this covenant is truly called a covenant between God and believers. For, in the first place, every believer was really embraced in it, in his covenant head, the Lord Christ. And, in the second place, every believer in his personal union with Christ, in his new creation by the Holy Ghost, wherein he accepts, receives and relies upon Christ for salvation, enters personally into covenant to take God to be his God, and Christ to be his Saviour, whom he engages, through grace by faith, to follow in a new obedience ;2 and God accepts him, in covenant, and seals to him the blessings and benefits of the Covenant of Redemption.3 Nor is the universe itself, which was cursed for man’s sake, to be excluded from its share in the blessedness of man’s redemption. The Lord Jesus declared in the most emphatic manner, that his crucifixion was the crisis of all things ; that by means of it the ruin of Satan, the judgment of this world, and the universality of his own dominion, would be established.4 And it is the constant doctrine of the Scrip¬ tures, that all things are to be restituted in Jesus Christ, and that the whole creation, which groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now, shall be delivered from the bondage of corrup¬ tion, into the glorious liberty of the children of God.5 There is no need of discussing cosmical questions of any sort here. He who created all things, will restore all things which have been deranged or polluted by the entrance of sin through the fall of man ; and that creation which he pronounced, in the survey of the whole of it, to be very good, will emerge from its long bond¬ age under corruption, purged by fire, a new heavens and a new earth, more glorious than the old. All the enemies of God shall be put under the feet of the glorified Redeemer ; death shall die, and hell shall be the prison-house of Satan and his seed. As for man, he shall be exalted inconceivably above his primeval condition, inconceivably beyond all to which it was possible for him to have attained under the Covenant of Works. In con- 1 Matt., xxvi. 28; Rom., ix. 4; Eph., ii. 12; Gal., iv. 24. 2 Isa., lix. 21; Gal., iii. 16-21. 3 Ezek., xxxvi. 26, 2 1; John, vi. 37-44. 4 John, xii. 23-33. 5 Acts, iii. 19-21 ; Rom., viii. 19-23. CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 45 nection with him, the highest glory of God in his being, his perfections, and his works, will be illustrated forever ; and his own blessedness and renown are carried so high as to be ex¬ pressed by saying, he shall be made partaker of the divine nature.1 As far as it is permitted that we should judge, the ob¬ jects which are embraced in this stupendous covenant are worthy of the means it employs; and it is impossible to doubt that those means are infinitely efficacious to their end. It is in the light of these means and their efficacy, these objects and their nature, this end and its transcendent glory — in one word, of this Cove¬ nant of Redemption, that the whole word of God, and our per¬ sonal share in the grace it reveals, become distinct to the humble follower of Christ. It is in the absence of that light that the children of God stagger through life under a load of tormenting doubts and fears, and are saved at last, as it were, by fire. 6. Primarily, therefore, and in its great elemental sense, the Covenant of Grace or Redemption is a covenant from eternity, between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, for the resti¬ tution of all things from the effects of the fall of man ; the realization, in thought, of the eternal purpose, counsel, and con¬ currence of the Godhead, and the three persons thereof, as the whole is revealed in the sacred Scriptures ; in general, for the in¬ finite glory of God and, in particular, for the eternal blessed¬ ness of sinners of the human race, chosen of God, redeemed by Christ, and effectually called unto salvation by the Holy Ghost. The plan of salvation revealed in the Scriptures is the complete realization, in time, of this eternal covenant. The Scriptures are a complete disclosure of it, so far as is needful for our salvation. The Kingdom of God in this world is the manifestation of it, from age to age, in time; and when time is done, the triumphant Kingdom of Saints in glory will manifest it completely and for¬ ever. Secondarily, and in a subordinate sense, it is a covenant between God and every sinner saved by grace : because all such were represented by Christ, their federal head, in the covenant itself ; and being, in due time, supernaturally regenerated by the Holy Ghost, they come actually into covenant with God, through Christ. It is they who make up the mystical body of Christ. They constitute that true Kingdom of God which is sometimes called the Messianic Kingdom, with reference to its head ; some- 1 2 Peter, i. 4. 46 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. times, the New Creation, with reference to its author ; most generally, the Church of God, with reference to themselves. They are the heirs of all the promises, and for them is laid up in heaven an inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled, which shall never pass away. 7. There are, then, two sufficiently distinct aspects of this amazing covenant. On the one hand, as it is divinely exhibited to us in the Mediator of it, working out our salvation ; preceded by the eternal purpose, counsel, and acts of God, which resulted in his incarnation and sacrifice ; and followed by the mission and work of the Holy Ghost, applying to men the whole work of Christ. On the other hand, as we behold man and the applica¬ tion to him of the blessings and benefits of that covenant. At first, wholly depraved, and a child of wrath ; yet still susceptible through the power of God of restoration to him. Then, awakened by the Spirit of God to a sense of his true condition ; yet still perverse, stupid, and rebellious. Then, born again, from above, and of the Spirit ; yet weak, frail, erring, and very slow of heart to believe. At last, closing his career of sin, and pardon, and deliverance, in peace, perhaps in triumph. Now it behooves us to realize these two distinct aspects of this great sub¬ ject — this divine and this human element of our destiny. Both of these are to be made full account of in all our endeavours to comprehend the ways of God towards man, in all our efforts to keep our hearts in his fear and love. If we exalt the human element too much, then we lose sight of the infinite need of di¬ vine grace, and fall into presumptuous estimates of our own ability to something good ; and if we weaken it too much, we lose that pungent sense of responsibility, and that deep impression of duty, which it is one of the noblest offices of the Gospel to en¬ lighten and to exalt. On the other hand, the least weakening of the divine element, no matter in what way, is immediately fatal ; and every error on that side immediately reacts and pro¬ duces a corresponding and fatal error on the other side. Nothing can be more absurd than to suppose that religion in its very na¬ ture, consists merely of emotions ; unless it is more absurd to suppose that such emotions as God would recognize as constitu¬ ting true religion, can exist independently of true knowledge of him. It is true that mere knowledge is not religion ; but it is CHAP. II.] THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. 47 more emphatically true that neither ignorance nor error is re¬ ligion. But what is most important is, that ignorance and error separate us from God precisely in proportion as they exist ; while God himself has told us, that to know him, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent, is eternal life.1 1 John, xvii 3. CHAPTER III. RELATION OF THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION, TO THE INNER LIFE OF MAN, AND TO HIS FUNDAMENTAL RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS. I — 1. The Will of God is the Rule of Duty to Man considered as a Creature. — 2. The Rule of Duty to Fallen Creatures for whom God provides a Saviour, is the Will of that Saviour. — 3. Precise relation of the Revealed Way of Salvation, to the nature of Religion, and of Man. II. — 1. Salvation for Sinners, through sover¬ eign Grace. — 2. Comparative Statement of their Condition — and the Remedy. — 3. Comparative Statement of the Moral Impotence, and the Moral Susceptibility of Fallen Man. — 4. This Condition of Fallen Man, the Covenant of Redemption, ■ and the actual Process of Salvation mutually illustrated. — 5. The Sovereignty of God and the Dependence of the Creature, universal in all things, are emphatic in Grace unto Salvation. — 6. Divine Grace rendered effectual, only through our personal Redemption. — I. That personal Redemption made available to us, not by our act, but by the work of God’s Spirit. III. — 1. The most remote reasons of our personal Salvation. — 2. The most remote reasons of the failure of personal Salvation to be universal. — 3. On one side an illustration of God’s infinite Per¬ fections beyond the Covenant ; on the other of his infinite Perfections within the Covenant ; on both the display of his infinite Nature. — 4. Restatement of Re¬ deeming Love, in its method, and in its results. I.- — 1. If there were no God, there could he no religion ; and, in that case, the existence of a moral conscience in man would je the most inscrutable of all the wonders of his being. It would be the precise response of our nature to our Creator ; when, in reality, there was no such thing as a Creator. To say that we have an understanding — and then deny that there is any such thing as truth — is less absurd than to say we have a conscience — and then deny the existence of the very object of that conscience. As to our having a religious nature, it is just as certain as that we have any nature at all. But the sense of our dependence on God, and the sense of our responsibility to God, are the deepest manifestations of that religious nature ; precisely as the fact of that dependence and the fact of that accountability, are the deepest foundations of religion itself. And so in the nature of the case, to which our own nature responds, we are to direct all CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. 49 our actions, not according to our own pleasure, but according to the will of God. And this obligation, which is in some sort the very essence of all religion, is equally binding upon every crea¬ ture of God, that is capable of knowing him. 2. Every thing which separates between God and man — sin in all its forms — is abnormal, that is, unnatural to man as he was created by God. Sin places man in a new relation to God ; but still leaving him the creature of God, it neither releases him from the dominion of God, nor from his dependence on God. The obligation to regulate all his actions by tbe will of God, still con¬ tinues in full force, while his ability and his desire to do so are both lost, and his sense of obligation to do so deprives him of all peace in his sins. The way of access to God for sinless creatures is open and clear, and they have light and strength to walk therein. But to sinful creatures, nature affords no access to God, and reason discloses none, except merely that they may come and be condemned. That any form of religion should be effectual in restoring a sinful creature to the favour of God, it must, therefore, be supernaturally revealed, it must contemplate him as a sinner, it must deliver him from condemnation for his sins, and it must restore to him both the desire and the ability to conform his ac¬ tions to the will of God. In effect, this has been done through a Saviour. A new relation has been established between God and fallen men, considered not merely as creatures, nor merely as sinful creatures, but as sinful creatures still capable of resto¬ ration and of salvation. It is a relation of grace on one side and faith on the other, superadded to the relation of dominion on one side and dependence on the other, which existed before. The fundamental principle of this religion for sinners must necessarily be, dependence on the Saviour revealed to him by God. And the essential principle which has been shown to lie at the basis of all religion assumes a corresponding form, namely, that all sinful creatures for whom God has provided a Saviour, are bound to regulate all their actions, not according to their own pleasure, but according to the will of that Saviour. 3. God the Father, the supreme ruler of the universe, requires of every creature that complete obedience which lies, as I have shown alike from the nature of God, and the nature of man, and the relations between them, at the base of all religion ; and by consequence, he demands against sinful man, satisfaction, to his VOL. II. 4 50 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. immaculate justice, to his broken covenant, and to his violated law. God the Son undertakes to render that satisfaction, and is ordained to the execution of that work. God the Holy Ghost applies to the redeemed, the satisfaction demanded by the Father, and rendered by the Son. The ineffable love of each divine Per¬ son in the Godhead to the others, prompts them all to manifest and to illustrate in this manner, the infinite glory of each in this sublime procedure. And thus in a line of thought suggested by the very nature of religion itself, which is the very highest neces¬ sity of man, we arrive at the most naked form of exact accord¬ ance between the fundamental conception of the Covenant of Redemption as revealed to us by God, and the fundamental nature of our own inner life as attested by our own conscious¬ ness. Now let it be considered that the form of spiritual life unto which fallen man is transformed, by all these acts of God and all these changes in us, is precisely that of which in our sins natural reason has no conception, and natural conscience no ability ; and then the divine reality of it all seems to reach abso¬ lute certainty. II. — 1. It is not the righteous — it is sinners whom the Sa¬ viour calls to repentance ; it is the sick, not they that be whole, who need a physician.1 As long as we do not realize our sinful¬ ness, neither can we realize our need of divine grace ; and as soon as we deny the misery which sin brings upon us, we re¬ nounce the necessity of divine mercy. It is, no doubt, common for men to fall temporarily into such a condition as this ; and ofttinies the conscience becomes so far seared and blinded, that this condition becomes permanent. The ordinary condition of impenitent men is, perhaps, one of ignorance, indifference, and inattention to divine things, and to their own spiritual estate ; and the more so in all Christian lands, where the light of God is sufficiently diffused, to make obvious the folly of such remedies for our fallen state, as man left to himself has been able to sug- gest. To arouse, to awaken, to engage, to enlighten the human soul, is the first practical necessity in saving it ; and then to quicken, sustain, and sanctify it, is to fit it for the acceptable service, and satisfying enjoyment of God. It is by the love of God the Father, the saving grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the application of both to our souls with divine light and power 1 Matt., ix, 9-13. 51 CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. by the Holy Ghost, that all this is accomplished. And in the process, the word and ordinances of God, together with his divine providence, and together with the whole forces abiding in the nature he has given us, are made tributary to the great work of our restoration. Countless millions of human beings have en¬ countered all the conditions embraced in all these statements ; countless millions denying and rejecting the remedy made known by God ; countless millions accepting it ; all of them on both sides, exhibiting some phase or other of the relation of the great truths and principles on which the Covenant of Redemption rests, to the fundamental religious ideas, convictions, and nature of man. Every human being who has been in reach of the word of God, has had the opportunity of knowing what it is God pro¬ poses, and the means he has provided for his great end. Every human being who has had the opportunity of seeing the children of God, has had the means of appreciating the effects of God's purposes and acts in restoring fallen man to his lost image. And every human being who has either accepted or rejected the Gos¬ pel, has had in his own mental experience the most intimate testimony of the relation between that Gospel and the soul, re¬ jecting or accepting it. The question, therefore, so far from being obscure, is one which nothing but voluntary ignorance, or sinful indifference, could prevent all the countless millions of whom I have spoken, from appreciating justly and determining with certainty. If it be alleged that other millions, perhaps as numerous, never heard of Christ or the covenant of which he was the Mediator ; 1 readily admit as to them, that the position in which the Scriptures place them is such, as to require a modifi¬ cation of the foregoing statements, to the whole extent of remit¬ ting them back to the position in which fallen man stood when he was driven from Eden — or to whatever intermediate position they may have a ttained through God's mercy. They must live, or they must die, according to their actual condition. But the more dreadful this condition may be supposed to be, the clearer is the evidence drawn from human nature itself, that there is no salvation for man except through the Covenant of Redemption ; and that it has always been administered, as it has always been revealed, in a way of sovereign grace. 2. Our actual condition, therefore, is capable of the most dis¬ tinct appreciation ; and so the elements of it are capable of the 52 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. most exact comparison with that glorious covenant through which we are saved. Depraved, but capable of restoration ; per¬ ceiving the true and the good — the false and the evil, but all in¬ distinctly and inadequately ; dependent and accountable, lying under the clear sense of duty even amidst its perpetual viola¬ tions, and the strong sense of blameworthiness which even the sense of our moral impotence sharpens instead of alleviating ; recalling vaguely, but yet powerfully, the great estate we have lost, and incapable of extinguishing a hope equally vague, yet not less powerful, of a still greater estate to come ; such are the outlines of that mysterious inner life, full of anomalies, wonder¬ ful in its ceaseless activity, the outworkings of whose consuming unrest even the most calm and thoughtful can neither perfectly regulate nor completely control. The word of God, revealing us to ourselves, points out all the realities, all the mysteries of our being ; and as often as w~e test its statements, we feel more and more how boundless its insight is. Then it explains to us the sources of all these mixed and wondrous things ; our creation, our primeval estate, our trial, our fall, the promise of a Saviour, the sentence of God, our mortal probation, and our eternal judg¬ ment ; and as we listen to its great and solemn utterances, and compare them with that inner life to which they constantly ap¬ peal, the darkness vanishes before those testimonies whose en¬ trance giveth light and giveth understanding. And then it takes up its wondrous parable of sovereign grace. What we are, it has already explained. How we came to be as we are, it had also explained. But now, it is deliverance — and the way thereof. The eternal love of God the Father ; redemption through the Son of God made flesh ; a new, holy, blessed, and immortal life, through the Holy Ghost ! And this sublime remedy is ad¬ dressed, point by point, to every element of the inner and the outward life of man, as the fall left him, and as sin has made him. The question is, the relevancy of the glorious remedy, to the fearful case ; the relevancy of the Covenant of Kedemption to the fundamental religious ideas, convictions, and nature of man. It seems to me that the universal judgment of all intel¬ ligent beings must be, that sinners who cannot be saved in this way, cannot be saved at all. And surely it cannot be doubted that any sinner saved in this way, will not only joyfully testify to the efficacy and the blessedness thereof, but will forever exalt CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. 53 and magnify that Saviour, whom he has found to he the way, the truth, and the life. 3. The Apostle Paul, in celebrating our deliverance through Jesus Christ our Lord, has recounted to us his own mental strug¬ gles, his weakness, and the nature of his victory, in a way level to the comprehension of every child of God, and probably real¬ ized in the experience of each one of them.1 The more we are enlightened to discern the holiness of the law of God, the more clearly do we perceive our present inability to keep it, and at the same time our just condemnation under it. The good that we would, we do not : but the evil which we would not, that we do. Well may we, with that great Apostle, cry out, on the one hand, Oh ! wretched man that I am ; and, on the other hand, Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord ! What can we do, of ourselves, to commend ourselves to God, as fallen sinners ? We cannot change our natures, even if we desired it, any more than an Ethiopian can change his skin, or a leopard his spots : and even if we could change it, if we desired to do so, we are abso¬ lutely incapable of forming such a desire, in our own strength. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God : for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.2 And, more¬ over, the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God ; for they are foolishness unto him , neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.3 However power¬ ful our religious impulses may be, it is absolutely certaia that, if left to ourselves, they can never conduct us to the true and living God. Impotent alike to render account of our past trans¬ gressions, or to atone for them ; it would be of little avail, even if we were competent to do both, so long as our depraved nature, which we cannot change, remains a perennial source of all ini¬ quity, and its pollution a complete disqualification while it lasts, for the service and the enjoyment of God. It is true, indeed, that the pungent knowledge of all this is derived, not from na¬ ture, or reason, but from God. But it is also true that the soul accepts this divine exposition of the significance of its whole condition, as soon as the Holy Ghost has quickened it to know God and itself. That great Apostle already referred to, has de¬ veloped, in his own experience, how it is that one who is a blas¬ phemer, a persecutor, and injurious, may be at the same time 1 Rom., vii. 7-25. 2 Rom., viii. 7. 3 1 Cor., ii. 14. 54 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. zealous towards God, even after a manner revealed from Heaven. Nor can the carnal heart understand how the chief of sinners could be aided in his transformation into the most enlightened and heroic of all believers, by a voice saying to him, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest.1 It is here precisely, we perceive so clearly that the world by wisdom cannot know God ; and that this is a result neither casual nor variable, but one in which the wisdom of God himself is involved.2 Here it is we realize, that unto them which are called, Christ crucified is the power of God and the wisdom of God ; and that he is made of God unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption !3 Every thing in us exacts precisely what God has done for us ; and as soon as he has accomplished it, every thing in us exults in the completeness and the fitness of it all. 4. I have already pointed out the obligation resting on us, con¬ sidered merely as creatures of God, to regulate our conduct by his will; and the corresponding obligation resting on us as offenders against God, to regulate our conduct by the will of the Saviour he has provided for us. In both cases obedience is the conception which is responsive to our estate — obedience of the creature to his Creator — obedience of the sinner to his Saviour. Under the Covenant of Works, the obedience of the creature must of necessity be complete, and be rendered by the creature. Under the Covenant of Grace, an imperfect obedience of the sinner may be accepted by God, for the sake of the perfect obedience rendered by his divine Saviour. To suppose that God can save us in our sins is both absurd and impious. On the other hand, we have lost by the fall not only the ability to render a complete personal obedience unto eternal life — but even the opportunity of making such an attempt, since the Covenant of Works as a covenant of life no longer ex¬ ists. That we are naturally neither able nor inclined to render that new obedience which God, through his grace, accepts from penitent and believing sinners, for the sake of Christ, is felt to be certain by every human heart ; and is, moreover, manifest in that natntally we are not penitent, and do not believe in the Saviour. Here, then, by our own impenitence and unbelief, we are cut off from Christ, and from the obedience of faith ; and if the matter is left there, we perish under the Covenant of Grace 1 Acts, xxil 1-16; 1 Tim., i. 12-17. 3 i Cor., i. 21. 8 1 Cor., i. 23, 24, 30. CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. 55 itself. What occurs is, that God imputes to us the righteous¬ ness of Christ which is the fruit of his obedience — that we re¬ ceive this righteousness through faith — that the faith whereby we receive it is a grace of the Holy Ghost resulting from the re¬ newal of the soul by him — that our new obedience, whether outward or inward, is the product of the acts and works of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — and that salvation is real, and wholly gratuitous. We are united to our Saviour, both to suffer with him and to reign with him : this has resulted from the work of the Holy Ghost in us : that resulted from the act of the Father imputing to us the righteousness of Christ : those acts and works were all immediately the fruits of the Covenant of Grace — and remotely of the eternal counsel, purpose, and decree of God. Now here is the Covenant of Eedemption, and the process of our actual salvation — face to face. It seems to me that their relation to each other is precise and complete. For so much as relates to that covenant, God is the witness : for so much as relates to our own souls, the testimony of our own con¬ sciousness is added to the declarations of God. 5. I have said repeatedly that the absolute dominion of God over man, and the absolute dependence of man on God, are the fundamental truths that control all the relations between God and man. Every conception we have of God's existence, nature, or works, every idea we can form of creation, providence, or grace — all terminate in the absolute dominion of God. On the other hand, every conception we have of our condition as crea¬ tures of God, no matter of w7hat degree, or in what estate, re¬ sults in our absolute dependence on him. And every conceivable relation between God and man, no matter how high man may rise, or how low he may sink, and no matter by what means in either case ; necessarily involves this dominion on the one side, and this dependence on the other. There is no escape from this, but by some means that will annihilate either God or ourselves ; as, for example, by atheism which annihilates God ; or by pan¬ theism which annihilates every thing but that which they call God. And what is gained by either result P Absolutely nothing. For our dependence on something — whether chance, or fate, or fortune, is just as real as it was before ; and the dominion of something — whether chance, or fate, or fortune, over us, is just as absolute as it was before. Whatever else we have gotten rid 56 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. . [BOOK I. of, we have not gotten rid of our absolute dependence, or of an ab¬ solute dominion over us. Why then should it be thought strange, that this infinite sovereignty of God should attach to his grace ? Or rather, of all things, is not his unmerited favour that in re¬ gard of which his sovereign disposal should be most absolute ? And why should it be thought strange, that our universal de¬ pendence should embrace dependence in the matter of salvation ? Or rather, of all things, is not saving grace that for which sinful creatures must be most dependent on an offended God ? If we suppose that this sovereignty attaches to divine grace, only in the original conception of it, then it is grace which can be of no avail to us ; for unless we be redeemed by the divine Saviour, we must perish. And if we suppose the sovereignty of divine grace may go that far and stop — then we are lost ; for unless we are renewed by the divine Spirit, we must perish. And every sup¬ position we can make, which comes short of bearing forward the sovereign grace of God, divinely and efficaciously to our personal salvation, leaves us as sinners in a condition of certain destruc¬ tion. In truth, the only effect of abrogating the divine sover¬ eignty touching the whole range of God's saving grace, is to ren¬ der it absolutely certain that no sinner will be saved. And all our attempts to lower and weaken our complete dependence on God, in our whole salvation, so far from being of any avail to the impenitent, tend only against the hopes of the children of God. Our nature and our condition are such, that grace may save us ; and if the sovereignty of God be brought to bear with divine efficacy upon our souls, it ivill save us. But if we be left to ourselves — released in any degree from our dependence on God and his dominion over us, in the matter of grace and salvation — we are lost ; and they for whose supposed benefit, the elect of God are fobbed of their covenanted interest in eternal life, are also lost. Eternal life, as St. Paul has expressly stated, is simply the gift of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.1 6. If we will exclude from our conception of salvation for sinners, the distinct scriptural idea of redemption, I suppose it is impossible to realize in thought, even with the Scriptures to instruct us, how it is possible for sinners to be saved. But as soon as we admit that scriptural idea of redemption, all that I have hitherto asserted becomes inevitable, and is all taught in the 1 Rom., vi. 23. 57 CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. Scriptures in direct connection with redemption. We cannot understand how, under the dominion of God, transgression can be passed over, without atonement ; nor is it possible to inter¬ pret one out of many thousand declarations of his word, so as to make out any thing else hut that the wages of sin is death. The claims of divine justice cannot be set aside ; the demands of God’s violated law cannot be resisted ; the penalty of his broken covenant cannot he disregarded ; the infinite majesty of God can¬ not be defied, and his infinite dominion assailed, and his infinite goodness outraged, without retribution. On the other hand, we ourselves have no certitude deeper, than the reality of our own blameworthiness in the sight of God ; we perceive nothing more clearly, than the necessity of retribution ; we can conceive of no impossibility greater, than that God should either approve our sins, or deny their existence. Utterly insuperable as this barrier is — there remains something more. For these terrible offences are the fruit of a polluted nature, which is no more fit for God’s reconciled presence, than the sinful fruits of it are fit for his ap¬ probation. It is only through the unsearchable riches of his love that God proposes to save such sinners ; and redemption through the blood of Christ is the method by which divine wis¬ dom and divine power, prompted by divine goodness, accomplish the proposals of divine love. The Lord Jesus, addressing him¬ self directly to the Father, said that the power over all flesh which he had received from him, was to the end that he should give eternal life to as many as the Father had given to him. These are they, he added, which thou gavest me out of the world ; thine they were, and thou gavest them me. I pray for them ; I pray not for the world, but for them thou hast given me.1 And to this purport is the whole of the wonderful passage, a few words of which I have quoted. It is for those whom God has given to him, that Christ has given himself to be a ransom, to be wisdom, to be righteousness, to be sanctification, to be re¬ demption.2 And so Christ Jesus having obtained eternal redemp¬ tion, by his own blood, has passed into the heavens ; and that blood of his who through the eternal Spirit offered himself with¬ out spot unto God, purges our conscience from dead works, to serve the living God.3 Well may we believe the emphatic dec- 1 John, xvii. 2, 3, 6, 9. 3 1 Tim., it 6 ; 1 Cor., i. 30 ; Gal., iv. 4, 5. 3 Heb., ix. 12-15 ; Dan., ix. 24, 25. 58 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. laration of Christ, All that the Father giveth me, shall come to me ; and him that cometh to me, I will in no wise east out. Well may we confide in his assurance, that it is the Father’s will, that of all he has given to the Son, he should lose nothing, but should raise it up again, at the last day.1 7. It is not a little remarkable that the natural heart easily contents itself with any general statements of God concerning his divine grace ; but is prompt to take offence as soon as those state¬ ments assume a specific and determinate shape. And yet it is extremely obvious, that if, after all, it was left wholly and abso¬ lutely to us, whether we would choose to be saved or not, — ad¬ mitting that in such a case any natural heart ever would choose to be saved, in the manner pointed out in the Gospel ; the final and decisive matter, in every case, would be an act of the human soul, and that in its unregenerate state — and not a work of the Spirit of God. And it makes no difference how this act of the soul is explained, so long as it is the final and decisive thing, whereby we live or whereby we perish ; for salvation is made to depend, at last, on some action of our depraved soul, and not on the power of God. No doubt the soul must consent, and does consent ; it believes and repents and it is saved. But it is the soul renewed by the Holy Ghost, which thus consents, believes, and repents ; these acts of the soul are all manifestations of its new life, not methods of obtaining that life. We are not chosen of God because we have chosen Christ, but we have chosen Christ because we were chosen of God. And in point of fact, however we may bewilder ourselves, this is the actual experience of the human soul. Not as distinct always as in the case of Abraham, or the case of Saul of Tarsus ; but real and inevitable in the case of every renewed soul ; and Christ may as truly say to every one of them, as he said to bis Apostles, ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.2 III. — 1. When we attempt to pass into the bosom of God, and to seek for the most remote reasons of our personal salva¬ tion — and the most remote reasons for the failure of personal sal¬ vation to be universal ; it becomes us to speak with the greatest reserve and modesty. It is perfectly certain that no reason known to any child of God, exists in him, upon which he could ground any explanation of God’s eternal love for him. Perhaps we may 1 John, vi. 37-39. a John, xv. 16. 59 CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. venture so far as to assert, that in our present state of being, no one could understand clearly, even if it were revealed to him, what the exact nature of that remotest reason was. And yet we dare not say that God, who is the fountain of all intelligence, can act without a sufficient reason ; nor can we venture to assert, that when we come to see light in the very light of God, as the Psalmist has expressed it,1 we shall not comprehend innumerable mysteries of God, of the very existence of the most of which we may now have no suspicion. We cannot, without denying the faith, hesitate to assert that God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life.2 Nor are we permitted to doubt that this free and special love of God is the ground of our being made heirs of God, according to the hope of eternal life ; for which we are fitted by the washing of regeneration and re¬ newing of the Holy Ghost ; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour.3 In that free and eternal love of God, we have found the most remote reason of our per¬ sonal salvation which is comprehensible to us, or revealed by God. And surely no object of it could conceive of any thing so enno¬ bling, as a motive to whatever is good or great ; any thing so as¬ sured as a foundation on which to rest ; any thing so affecting as an incentive to unqualified self-consecration ; any thing so overwhelming as a power within the soul, so irresistible as a force impelling the soul ! And the rapture of our brother Paul should find a response in all Christian hearts, in behalf of every one of which he has exclaimed, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord/ 2. The other aspect of a mystery so fearful in itself, and so obscure to us in its earliest stages, demands of us still more self- distrust in pursuing its remotest reason. It is clear to us that sinners perish for their sins. But this, under a dispensation ot divine grace, is scarcely a sufficient explanation ; because it is the glory of Christ that he is able to save to the uttermost, all who come to God by him : and indeed, he not only does save 1 Pa. xxxvi. 9. 3 John, iii. 10. 3 Titus, iii. 4-7 ; Eph.r ii. 4-10. 4 Rom., viii. 38, 39. 60 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. many of the chief of sinners, hut his salvation is exclusively for sinners. Going hack a step farther, it is clear to us that the re¬ jection of Christ, is the cause of our perdition ; hut we must hear in mind that all to whom he was ever offered, have rejected him — none more distinctly than many of the chief of saints — . and that all would persist in doing so forever, hut for the grace of the Holy Ghost. Still going back, we easily understand that it is by grieving and resisting the Holy Ghost, we remain obsti¬ nately in our alienation from Christ, and so perish ; but it must not be concealed that everv child of God would have done the W same thing, with the same result, if it had not been for the spe¬ cial, efficacious, and preventing grace of the Holy Ghost, enabling him, and inclining him, and fitting him to accept Christ. In another step backward, we encounter the source of all evil in all men, in their original depravity ; and at the next step we en¬ counter the cause of this natural pollution, in the fall of man ; but, as to both of these terrible realities, there is absolutely nothing which can distinguish the case of one human being from another ; for all are by nature equally the children of wrath, and the first man, Adam, was equally the progenitor and the repre¬ sentative — the root, of all. We have, therefore, traced the mys¬ tery to a point antecedent to the entrance of sin into the uni¬ verse, and have found the remotest reason of the perdition of ungodly men still eluding us — still passing back as we carefully followT it. At last we must pass into eternity, and put in a nega¬ tive form, what before we put in a positive form. We do not know, neither could we comprehend if it were explained to us, why the special and free love of God, did not select for its eter¬ nal objects the particular sinners which it did not select, any more than why it selected the particular sinners it did select. And yet we dare not say there was no reason for it ; that it w’as a mere caprice. What we know is, that both facts are asserted in the most distinct manner by God, in his holy word that the existence of the Covenant of Redemption involves them both ; that the personal history of every human being establishes one or the other of them ; and that the aggregate career of the whole race of mankind is inexplicable, unless both of them be true. Being true — every thing is explained — which we are capable of understanding ; but in a manner wonderful and overpowering. 1 Rom., ix. 22, 23 ; Eph., i. 5, 6 ; Prov., xvi 4; Matt., xxv. 34, 41. 61 CHAP. III.] THE COVENANT — AND THE SOUL. 3. The whole case terminates at last in the same sublime re¬ sult, whether we pursue it simply upon the word of God, or whether we illustrate the systematic theory of salvation by the course of divine providence practically developing it, or by tbe inner life of the individual soul personally exhibiting it. We cannot conceive that either creation, or providence, or grace, could exist without an end worthy of God, or in a manner con¬ trary to any of his infinite perfections. The illustration of his infinite being to an intelligent universe, and thereby his own declarative glory, and the highest blessedness of the universe compatible with the chief end of its own existence ; is the high¬ est end which we can conceive, and is the end declared by God, as the reason of creation, providence, and grace. Redemption belongs to that part of the case which we call grace ; and must incur the force of the end and reason of the whole case — and does so in the most explicit manner. Upon whatever ground sin exists in the universe, it is a ground which the infinite wisdom of God, and the infinite holiness of God respect ; and upon whatever ground misery exists, it is a ground which the infinite goodness and mercy of God respect. Addressing the re¬ sources of his infinite being, for the ends and upon the reasons already suggested, to the treatment of the tremendous questions of sin and misery, in such a universe ; most assuredly it ought not to surprise us, that one result should be the illustration, for¬ ever, of his immaculate justice, that another result should be the illustration, forever, of his infinite beneficence — and that both results should so occur as to display his nature and perfections in the clearest manner. Still less should it surprise us, that in such a case God should reveal to us these sublime procedures with the ends and effects of them ; that thus revealed, they should be found to accord with our own nature and condition, a nature created and then renewed in the image of God, and a condition to which these very procedures of God have relation ; or that, clear as all might be in its immediate personal ap¬ plication to us, it should all be overpowering, and much of it inscrutable, in its most remote analysis, and in its immeasurable compass. This appears to be precisely what has occurred. We shall comprehend it all the better, in a higher state of existence. In our present estate what we need is, a sufficient insight to com¬ prehend in what manner, and upon what principles, it may all G2 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. avail to deliver us from the wrath to come. And the more clearly we can see that we are exposed to that wrath, the more urgently does it become us to address ourselves to the remedy afforded by the blood of Christ. Nay, that very sense of our sin¬ fulness is at once a proof that we are like those Christ came to save, and a help to us in discerning him as the way, the truth, and the life. It is a true saying, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners ; and the assured way of being saved is to call on his adorable name.1 4. We are told that God has chosen us in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.2 And in immediate connection with this statement, the separate and the concurring action of each person in the Godhead, for us and in us, as well as the blessings and benefits which flow to us, and the glory which redounds to God, are distinctly set forth.3 It was the will of God that the Son should undertake our salvation ; and he did it with delight.4 As a part of his reward, he asked and received as his own, those whom he would redeem by his own most precious blood.5 And it was his unalterable love to the Father, and to the redeemed, which led him to undertake and perform all his work as Media¬ tor between God and men.6 It is, in divine love, through divine goodness, and with a divine satisfaction, that through the coun¬ sel, the purpose, and the will of God, we are chosen by him be¬ fore the foundation of the world, in Christ Jesus, in whose blood we have redemption, and in whom we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, unto the praise of the glory of God.7 This, let us re¬ member, is not stated as the conclusion of our poor reason, but is the detailed account given by inspiration to the saints them¬ selves, through the greatest human expositor of the mind of God : and therewith all the Scriptures concur.3 And therewith also the unalterable faith of the church of God agrees, and the spiritual life and experience of the children of God accord. The work of God confirms the word of God. 1 1 Tim., i. 15; Rom., x. 13. 3 Eph., i. 4. 3 Eph., i., passim. 4 Ps. 2d. 6-10. 5 Ps. ii. 6-9 ; Isa., liii. 10-12. 6 John, xiii. 1 ; xvii. 4-6. 7 Eph., i. 1-13. 8 John, iii. 15-17 ; Rom., v. 8 ; 1 Thess., iv. 8 ; 1 Pet., L 2 ; 2 Thess., ii. 13. CHAPTER IV. THE SPECIAL OBLIGATIONS LAID ON MAN, AS SPECIAL CONDITIONS OF THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. I. 1. Ultimate Truths concerning Human Nature. — 2. Influence of these Truths upon the Divine Means of Human Restoration. — 3. The Universal Relation of Obedience to God and Life in God : this Relation as exhibited through the Cove¬ nant of Redemption. — 4. The Universal Need of Special Divine Assistance, in order to Obedience and Life. — II. 1. Special Conditions of the Covenant of Re¬ demption considered as a Covenant between God and Elect Sinners. — 2. The Grounds of Separation between Men and God, and the Means of their Removal — with the Relations of all to the Conditions of this Covenant. — 3. Faith and Repentance, the Conditions of Salvation for Sinners. — III. 1. The double Office of both these Graces of the Spirit: their special Nature as considered here. — 2. Analogy between the two Sacraments which signify and seal, and the two Condi¬ tions on which we receive, all the Benefits of this Covenant. — 3. Saving Faith summarily explained. — 4. Repentance unto Life summarily explained. — 5. Re¬ pentance toward God considered as a Duty, in the neglect of which Salvation is impossible for Sinners. — 6. Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, considered in the same respect. — 7. Analogy of the two Covenants, with respect to the obligatory Force of their special Conditions. — IV. 1. Nature of the Impotence produced by Sin : and of Obedience performed in Sin. — 2. No conceivable Change in God or Ourselves, can make Salvation for Sinners possible, in any other way. — 3. It is effectual in this way, only upon the Allowance of Divine Assistance. — 4. The overwhelming practical Illustration furnished by all Sinners, whether Believing or Unbelieving, Penitent or Impenitent. — 5. The Means proposed by God, and their Result. I. — 1. There are elements in human nature, ultimate truths of our being, original data of consciousness, which neither the teacher of theology nor the preacher of the Gospel, can lose sight of for a moment, without giving up, at the same time, the very foundation of every appeal to man. The sense of duty, which touches on one side our sense of the true, and on the other our sense of the good : the sense of responsibility, commensurate exactly with the sense of duty, testifying continually both to our moral nature, and to the moral government which is, and which must forever be, over us : the sense of blameworthiness on ac¬ count of duty neglected and condemnation justly incurred, which 64 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. is the testimony of our conscience to our guilt : the sense of satisfaction on account of duty discharged and approval justly awarded, which is the testimony of our conscience to our recti¬ tude : these are indestructible conditions of our moral constitu¬ tion, which must exist, so far as we can understand, while our nature exists, under every possible form of the divine adminis¬ tration over us. Any fundamental change in them applied to our whole race, would immediately change the relations of the whole race to Adam, to Christ, and to God, as well as the rela¬ tions of the individuals of the race to each other ; and any such change applied to any individual of the race, would im¬ mediately break in two the chain of his own continued conscious existence, and destroy his personal identity. 2. Whatever, therefore, may be the nature of the Covenant of Redemption, considered as a covenant in eternity between the Persons of the Godhead, having any applicability to man ; in all the obligations it may lay on him, and all the conditions of it which may have special relation to him — these fundamental peculiarities of his moral constitution will be made full account of by him who is the author alike of human nature, and of the infinitely gracious covenant by which that nature is to be restored and exalted. In like manner, only still more clearly, when in that eternal covenant, Christ is considered as the head of all believers, or it is considered as being manifested in time as a covenant between God and the soul of the believer ; this moral constitution of man, deduced not only from his own intimate consciousness, but also from the statements of God concerning it in his blessed word, must, in a manner, be decisive in its in¬ fluence on the infinite remedy, so far as it is to be applied to his own inner life. It is hardly worth while to discuss questions which seem to be so obvious. I, therefore, content myself with repeating, that in every act and work of God, he respects, in the most exact manner, every other act and work of his ; every de¬ parture from this method being indeed strictly miraculous. And as to his covenant dealings with man, the fundamental principle on which they all proceed, is the special bestowment of new and higher mercies : and the specifio difference between God’s Cove¬ nants with man, considered as of Works and of Grace, lies in the transcendent mercy of the way in which grace is bestowed, as well as in the transcendent grace itself. It is under the light of CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 05 truths such as these, that whatever conditions and obligations are annexed to the Covenant of Redemption, are to he contem¬ plated ; as on the one hand they are exalted in their relation to the glory and love of God, and on the other magnified in their relation to the sinner they would save and advance. The idea of their being obstructions which the sinner must overcome, difficulties thrown across the entrance of the way of life, is wholly inconsistent with the nature and objects of Redemption, and wholly subversive of our hope of deliverance thereby. 3. It has been abundantly shown, that if God had not made the Covenant of Works with man, every duty obligatory on man in his primeval estate, would have been a condition of life : and that any breach of any obligation imposed on him by that estate sufficiently grave to require redress, would have necessarily for¬ feited the favour of God. Everywhere under the dominion of God, obedience and life go together. The universal obedience of all, in all things, under our primeval estate ; the restricted and covenanted obedience of Adam, under the Covenant of Works ; the universal and covenanted obedience of Christ, under the Covenant of Grace ; and the new obedience of the elect under the same covenant. Everywhere it is obedience and life. Do and live: do that others may live: do that sinners may live, and living may do in Christ. These are the successive forms in which the universal conception of obedience and life is developed in the word of God, and the spiritual progress of man. The duty of universal obedience unto life in man's first estate, or that of special obedience unto life under the Covenant of Works, could be no clearer, no more binding, no more indispensable to the re¬ ward, nor its breach any more attended by loss of the favour of God : than the duty of the new obedience under the Covenant of Redemption, and the loss of the favour of the Saviour with¬ out it. There is this grand difference, that Adam fell, and that Christ triumphed; so that in Adam it is the consequences of the breach of duty that we encounter ; while in Christ it is the con¬ sequences of all righteousness fulfilled that we encounter. But this instead of making more obscure makes more clear, the obli¬ gation of our new obedience in order to the favour of the Saviour, and the recovered favour of God, and therewith our recovered and better life through him. And so with relation to that new obe¬ dience, and in order to our fitness for it, are those special condi— 5 66 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. tions and obligations of the Covenant of Redemption, through which our ability to that new obedience is either obtained or manifested. And this is but another way of saying, those spe¬ cial conditions and obligations are with relation to our union with Christ, and our restoration through him to God; and are in order to enjoy and manifest that union and that restoration. And if no such special obligations and conditions were annexed by God to the Covenant of Redemption ; what would occur would be, that every duty and every obligation of man under that covenant, would become a condition of life to us, under it. That is, in effect, the Covenant of Grace would be most signally changed to our total undoing. For now, by means of these special condi¬ tions and obligations, we are so united to Christ, that our imper¬ fect obedience is accepted on account of his perfect obedience : whereas, but for them, our new obedience would have to be per¬ fect in all things, in order to be accepted. 4. Nor does it alter the case at all, under either covenant, that man, on account of his fallibility under one, and his de¬ pravity under the other ; stood in constant need of divine help, in order to perform the special duties imposed on him, as condi¬ tions of obtaining the blessings held forth in either covenant. For he needed the divine aid, under both covenants, to enable him to discharge every duty possible under each of them, as really as he needed it to perform the special duties designated as special conditions of them, and special tests of his condition be¬ fore God. His dependence on God is absolute, both as a crea¬ ture merely, and as a sinful creature. His moral constitution, once fallible only, is now fallen : but it is otherwise the same moral constitution. Life and immortality, now brought to light in a new, perfect, and glorious form by the Gospel for sinful men, were offered to be confirmed and augmented to man in his estate of innocence. The grand difference is, that under the first covenant, special divine aid was not promised and was not given, and therefore fallible man did not discharge the special condition of that covenant — but fell : while under the second covenant special divine aid was promised and is given, and therefore fallen man does discharge the especial conditions of that covenant — and is restored. And the whole ground of.this differ¬ ence is, that the first covenant was one of Works, while the sec¬ ond covenant is one of Grace and Redemption. I have explained CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 67 at large, in another place, the merciful nature of the special condition of the first covenant. It is still more obvious, that the special conditions of the second covenant, namely, Repentance toward God, and Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, are mani¬ festations of divine mercy so special and so distinct, that with¬ out them the perdition of all sinners is as inevitable, after the publication of the Covenant of Grace, as before. It is by deal¬ ing simply and thoroughly with the great truths of God, and keeping before our minds and hearts the sublime proportion of faith, that we escape many errors, and solve many difficulties, and receive light and comfort as we walk humbly before God. II. — 1. The Covenant of Redemption as a covenant in eter¬ nity, between the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, absolutely con¬ sidered ; as a covenant also, in which all the redeemed were rep¬ resented by the Son of God, their covenant head ; and finally, as a covenant between God and the soul of every believer, mani¬ fested in time ; has been already very carefully set forth. And then the perfect accordance of that covenant, in whatever light, with our own intimate spiritual life, nature, and convictions, has been exhibited at length. Considered more especially as a cove¬ nant between God and the soul of the believer, and as a covenant in which our divine Redeemer represented all the elect of God ; the special conditions and obligations of it, concerning which we now particularly enquire, assume their most distinct form. And as we make application of these aspects of it, in the light of the great truths I have just been attempting to set forth, we shall see how completely it is the foundation of our hope, and how thoroughly it provides for our salvation. 2. The Scriptures plainly teach, as I have repeatedly pointed out, that there are two grounds of separation between God and our souls, and two things required in us in order that we may be restored to the favour of God. Our actual transgressions, in thought, word, and deed, terrible as they are, must be disposed of in such a manner as will satisfy divine justice : and while they remain as they are, they present an insuperable barrier between God and the sinner. Our polluted natures, the source of all actual sins, must be purified ; for while they remain as they are, they render us utterly unfit for the service and en- ioyment of God. Here are the two terms between every sin¬ ner and God : the two necessities preliminary to any possible 68 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. restoration of any sinner to God. Now how it is that Jesus Christy the Mediator of the Covenant of Grace, removes directly, by his own satisfaction for us, all such barriers and difficul¬ ties as lie in our actual offences ; and how by the purchase and gift of the Holy Ghost, he indirectly removes all such as lie in our polluted nature ; I have largely exjfiained in a former Treatise. And how, in the practical application to us by the Holy Ghost, of the benefits of Christ's whole work as Mediator, we are led on from one degree of grace and strength to another, through the whole Christian experience and the new life, to end¬ less glory and blessedness ; will he set forth in order, in this Treatise. The point immediately before us is, those conditions of the Covenant of Redemption, directly responsive to our actual and our original sin, our practical and our inward pollution ; those special obligations upon us, immediately responsive to par¬ don and purification ; those special duties under the Covenant of Grace, which respond to the special duty laid on Adam under the Covenant of Works ; those special graces immediately connected with our new life in Christ, which are analogous to the special aid which would have been given to man, if Adam had obtained the promised reward, and his seed had obtained it in him. I have already said, they are Faith and Repentance. 3. The Apostle Paul, in his solemn and final appeal to the Elders of the Church at Ephesus, when by his request they met him at Miletus, as he went up bound in the Spirit, to Jerusalem, to encounter bonds and afflictions ; plainly told them that he had kept back nothing that was profitable unto them, but that show¬ ing and teaching, not only publicly but from house to house, that which he had testified both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, was Repentance toward God , and Faith toivard our Lord Jesus Christ*1 And then he solemnly adjured them, that having so taught, he was pure from the blood of all men, because, said he, I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God.f2 Faith and Repentance, therefore, — Repentance toward God and Faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ — on the part of man, sum¬ marily express the whole counsel of God concerning our salva¬ tion. These are the grand obligations resting on man under the Covenant of Redemption. These are the grand conditions of * Tr/v kig tov Qedv fxeruvoiav , icai ttlgtlv ri)v eif tov icvpiov r/vtiv ’ Irjcovv XpioTov. 1 Acts, xx. $1. f TLuoav rrjv (3ovhj}v tov Qeov. 3 Acts, xx. 27. CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 69 CHAP. IV.] that covenant^ as propounded to us by God. Unless these con¬ ditions are performed — unless these obligations are discharged, salvation by that covenant is impossible for man. By that cove¬ nant, therefore, they who never were sinners cannot be saved ; for, in the scriptural sense, they can exercise neither Faith nor Repentance. It is not the righteous, but sinners, whom Jesus came to save. In like manner, the unbelieving and the impeni¬ tent, though they be sinners, cannot be saved. It is the precise and explicit purpose of God, to save penitent and believing sin¬ ners ; and this is perfectly elemental in the Covenant of Re¬ demption, and in the way of its practical administration. From the commencement of the ministry of John the Baptist, onward through all ages, the cry has continually sounded in the ears of lost men — Repent ye.1 From the moment that Paul and Silas, in the jail at Philippi, proclaimed for the first time to the race of Japhet, the Gospel of the Grace of God, every soul desiring to know what it must do to be saved, has received for answer, Be¬ lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.2 And Jesus himself, preaching the Gospel of the King¬ dom, and proclaiming that the time was fulfilled and the King¬ dom of God at band, laid the foundation of all his teaching, and of all salvation through him — in the great command, Repent ye and Believe the Gospel !3 III. — 1. Faith and Repentance, it is necessary to observe, oc¬ cupy a double position, in the matter of our salvation — and per¬ form a twofold office therein. They are in a peculiar sense, not only graces themselves, but means whereby other graces exist or grow ; acts, also, of the soul — and moreover means and aids to other acts of the soul, and therefore, in both respects duties. Being graces of the Holy Spirit, they can be nothing else than exercises of the renewed soul ; manifestations of the new life begotten in us by him, even the life of the second Adam, who was a quickening spirit and the Lord from Heaven, — of which all the Redeemed are made partakers. And in this respect they partake of the nature of every Christian grace. But besides this, as we derive every thing through Christ, and Faith in a pe¬ culiar manner unites us to him, and has a peculiar relation to him ; it becomes the means by which all that Christ bestows on us is received. In like manner, as we receive pardon of sin fiom 1 Matt., iil 2. 2 Acts, xvi 31. 3 Mark, i. 15. 70 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. God, together with all that is immediately involved therein, and Repentance has a peculiar relevancy to him on one side, and to our sins on the other ; it becomes one means of all our growth in grace and in conformity to God. These functions of Faith and Repentance are manifestly different from those which they both perform when we consider them as the special conditions of our being Christians at all. In the former aspect, they will both be considered carefully, in another connection ; it is in the latter aspect we are considering them now. 2. There is a wonderful analogy in all these mysteries of grace. In the two Sacraments of the Christian Church — Bap¬ tism and the Lord’s Supper — we have represented, by the former, our cleansing through the work of the Holy Ghost, and by the latter, our pardon and acceptance through the sacrifice of Christ. And this pardon and purification, as I have before shown, are all that is necessary to our salvation. In like manner, in the two great offices of the Covenant of Redemption — namely, Faith and Repentance — we have set before us, in the former, the only means of union with Christ, whereby alone can we obtain any grace at all — and whereby we can obtain all grace ; and in the latter the only means of our deliverance from sin, either outward or inward, either original or actual. Nothing can be more cer¬ tain, as I have repeatedly shown, than that every benefit we de¬ rive from Christ is made to depend, in some way, on our Faith in him ; while all pardon of sin is directly connected with Re¬ pentance, and all increase in holiness is beyond our power, ex¬ cept as we see and hate sin on one side, and see and strive after holiness on the other. And thus we have multiplied corrobora¬ tions of the mystery of Godliness. The twofold barriers to God, in our offences and our pollution, removed in our pardon and purification, through the work of Christ, and the work of the Spirit ; and all this set forth alike, in the sacraments of the Covenant of Redemption, whereby its benefits are signified and sealed to believers ; and in the conditions of that covenant as they are held forth to penitent and believing sinners, and as they are actually imparted to us, in proportion as these great condi¬ tions are fulfilled in us — -these great obligations discharged by us. An infinite order and fulness, as well as a divine simplicity and power, pervade the whole counsel of God for our recovery. And though the carnal mind cherishes only enmity to the things CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 71 of the Spirit, and though flesh and blood cannot inherit them ; yet the renewed soul that is docile and earnest, will find cease¬ less comfort and strength, as it advances in the nearness and the distinctness of its vision of them. 3. Passing by all scholastic distinctions, the faith of which I speak continually, is Saving Faith: the act of those who believe to the saving of the soul.1 The object of it is the Lord Jesus Christ.*2 The rule of it is the word of God.3 The author of it • is the Holy Ghost.4 It is in the soul of man, a living power,3 which works by love,6 which purifies the heart,7 and overcomes the world 3 And the aim and end of it is the salvation of the soul.9 Now what is intended to be asserted is, that it is a fundamental condition of the Covenant of Redemption, that the soul of fallen man in order to partake of its benefits, must first of all incur the benefit of exercising this Faith in Jesus Christ: and that, under the dispensation of divine grace in Jesus Christ, it is the duty of all men to possess and exercise this habit of the soul. 4. In like manner, passing by all scholastic distinctions, the repentance of which I speak continually, is Repentance unto Life : the act of those who turn unto God, sorrowing for their sin.10 The object of it, is God himself, whose mercy in Christ Jesus, the penitent apprehends.11 The author of it, is the Holy Spirit.12 The rule of it is the word of God, in all that it has commanded and all that it has forbidden.13 The subject-matter of it is, on the one side, ourselves as sinners, and ail our sins, from which we turn with holy hatred ; and on the other, every good thing, and God in Christ as the chief good, to whom we turn with set purpose of heart after a new obedience.14 The fruits of it, are all good works.15 And the end and aim of it, are pardon, acceptance with God, and eternal life.16 Now what is asserted is, in this as in the preceding case, that it is a funda¬ mental condition of the Covenant of Redemption, that the soul of fallen man in order to partake of its benefits, must first incur this benefit, of exercising Repentance toward God, along with Faith in Jesus Christ : and that under a dispensation of divine 1 Heb., x. 39. 2 Acts, xx. 21. 3 Rom., x. 14, 17. 4 Eph., i. 17-19. s ip 20. 6 Gal., v. 6. 7 Acts, xv. 9. 8 1 John, v. 4. 9 1 Pet., i. 9. 10 Acts, xi. 18; xx. 21. 11 Ps. exxx. 3-7. 12 Zee., xii. 10. 13 2 Cor., vii. 9-11 ; Deut., xxix. 29. u Ps. li. 5, 6 ; Acts, xxvi. 18. 15 Matt., iii. 8. 19 Mark, i. 4; Luke, xiii. 3-5; Acts, xi. 18. 72 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. grace in Jesus Christ, it is the duty of all men to possess this penitent, as well as the preceding believing habit of the soul. 5. It is, as I have already said, in the sense of the second of the two statements annexed to both of the two immediately pre¬ ceding paragraphs, that Faith and Repentance are to be specially contemplated at this point. It is a duty which we owe alike to God and to our own souls, to repent of our sins and to forsake them : a duty perfectly clear in itself, on the ground of its own evidences, and which cannot be denied without denying the being of God, or denying the moral nature of man. It is a duty, the neglect of which renders salvation simply impossible, if by sal¬ vation we mean any thing different from depravity. On the other hand, the duty of honouring and obeying God, of seeking his favour, and regulating our conduct according to his will, is also perfectly clear upon the ground of its own evidences. And while it is neglected, salvation, if it means any thing different from alienation from God and unfitness for his service, is incon¬ ceivable. It is apparent, therefore, that if the Covenant of Re¬ demption had failed to make Repentance toward God an absolute condition of salvation for sinners, that omission would have been inconsistent with the nature of God, of man, of sin, and of sal¬ vation, as far as we are capable of understanding. Except ye repent, said Jesus, ye shall all likewise perish.1 6. That it is the duty of all men under a dispensation of divine grace, to believe in the Saviour provided by God for their deliverance from sin and misery ; is also, of itself and upon the ground of its own evidences, perfectly clear. In this case, the obligation resting on sinful creatures to regulate their conduct by the will of the Saviour ; is precisely of the same nature as the obligation resting on man considered merely as the dependent creature of God, to regulate his conduct by the will of his Crea¬ tor. But it is sufficiently plain that it is impossible for sinners to regulate their conduct by the will of a Saviour, while they neither obey him, trust him, nor believe in him : that is, it is self-evidently plain, that the first duty of a sinner is to believe unto salvation in the Saviour whom God has provided. Just as the duty of Repentance toward God, results directly from the two facts that there is a God and that man has sinned : so the duty of Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, results directly from the 1 Luke, xiii. 3, 5. T3 CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. two facts that man is a sinner and that Christ is the Saviour of sinners. And to have omitted to make this first duty of the sinner, a fundamental condition of the Covenant of Redemption, would, as far as we can understand, have utterly subverted the spiritual system of the universe disclosed to us in nature and in providence, revealed to us in the word of God, and confirmed by our inner life. And so the Lord Jesus has said, if ye be¬ lieve not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.1 7. If we will admit, or if it can be proved, that the scriptural account of the creation and fall of man and of the offer of sal¬ vation through the blood of Christ, is true ; then the condition of man as a sinner, under the requirements of the Gospel, and the condition of man as no sinner under the requirements of the Law, is, as to the obligatory force of those conditions, respectively, that is, as to the nature of duty, essentially the same condition. The Gospel is as perfectly suited to the condition of fallen man, as the Law could be to the condition of unfallen man. The whole question is, in the first place, whether man owes any obligation to God ; and, secondly , whether, admitting that he does, it can be a conceivable end or way of salvation to release that obliga¬ tion. St. Paul has told us plainly that if Faith released the obligation of man to God, this would be a fatal objection ; but that, on the contrary, Faith establishes that obligation.2 It is no part of salvation to show favour to sin — but to sinners : the very height and object of that salvation, as a mercy to sinners, being involved in their complete deliverance from sin. But it has been shown that the sense of duty in man, though obscured and depraved, cannot be obliterated without destroying his ra¬ tional and his moral nature — and rendering every conception of salvation absurd as to him. It remains, therefore, that of two possibilities one must occur. We must reject the way of salva¬ tion offered in the Scriptures, and remitting ourselves to Nat¬ ural Religion, accept the only provision it makes for sin — namely, death : or we must accept the duties of Repentance toward God, and Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, as unalterable conditions of salvation for sinners through the Covenant of Re¬ demption. IV. — 1. It is made the ground of a cavil that we are not able to perform these conditions and discharge these obligations : 1 John, viii- 24. 2 Rom., iii. 31. 74 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. and, strangely enough, of an opposite cavil, that we are able to do both. The first cavil is in order to deny the binding force of that which exceeds our ability: the second cavil is in order to deny the supernatural aid whereby ability is conferred on us. As to the first, if we will reflect that what we mean by our inability, is neither more nor less than our depravity ; then it is tantamount to saying that depravity is in its owm nature justifi¬ able ; which is a contradiction in terms. As to the second , that which we boast of having accomplished, and that ability in our¬ selves by which it was achieved — whatever it may be — can be neither more nor less than the natural result of our depraved powers; but if this can be truly called either Repentance toward God or Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, then, obviously, the Covenant of Redemption is wholly insignificant. Both cavils are founded on a general misconception ot* the nature of sin : to which is added, in the first one, a special misconception of the nature of duty ; and in the second one, a special misconception of the nature of salvation. A sense of the impotence which de¬ pravity begets, is inseparable from the sense of depravity itself: a sense of the reality of our Faith and Repentance is inseparable from a sense of self-abnegation and self-condemnation : a sense of deliverance from the wrath of God, is inseparable from the sense of a new illumination and a new life within us. 2. It is impossible to conceive how we could be made par¬ takers of the blessings of salvation, otherwise than as the Scrip¬ tures propose, without producing the most prodigious results. For, on the one hand, any serious change in the nature of God, of sin, or of holiness, would make what we now call God, sin, and holiness, perfectly immaterial to us, and us to them. But, on the other hand, any change in us, corresponding to the change just supposed, so as to bring us into sympathy with that new state of things : would separate our existence into two portions having no relation to each other, would destroy our personal identity ; and would convert all God’s dealings with us into acts of mere power, regardless of all moral distinctions. So that whatever imaginaiy difficulties we may create in order to evade the necessity of Faith and Repentance ; the insuperable difficulty is, to save sinners in any other way. 3. These conditions of salvation, then, do not discharge in any degree, the infinite dominion of God over us, or release our CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 75 absolute dependence on him ; since the fundamental and unal¬ terable relation we bear to him is that of creatures to their Cre¬ ator. Nor can the performance of these conditions give us — no matter how we came to perform them — any strict or any merito¬ rious claim upon God for any recompense or any reward ; because to believe what is infinitely true, to regret what is infinitely wrong, to embrace infinite mercy, and to avoid infinite ruin, proves nothing except that he who so acts is not a madman. Nor are these conditions of such a nature, that they either preclude divine assistance, or render it unnecessary, in order to their per¬ formance. Man, when fallible, needed divine assistance, to pre¬ vent his fall. Man, when fallen, needs divine assistance, in order to his recovery. The creature depends upon his Creator — the sinner depends upon his Saviour — 'every dependent being needs, and must eternally need, each according to his kind, divine grace to help him in his time of need. But this of which I constantly speak is the Covenant of Grace itself, whereby Redemption is provided and is applied to fallen man. And so close is the con¬ nection between the nature and exercises of the human soul, and the scriptural account of the creation, fall, and recovery of man, that the pungent exhibition of the mystery of Godliness, in all the power and fulness thereof — though it be foolishness to them that perish, yet unto them which are saved, it is the power of God.1 4. In every part of this great subject the remotest point of our enquiries always presents the most serious difficulty. We come always to the same profound certainty which affects every thing else, that salvation is not absolute and universal ; to the same inscrutable union and separation of the finite and infinite, at the foundation of all ; to the same tendency to opposing re¬ sults, one human and the other divine, in the last solution. On the other hand, nothing could be more immense and more over¬ whelming, than the practical demonstration which everywhere exists, to put beyond doubt the final shape of those truths whose remotest forms may so perplex us. Without one single excep¬ tion, every human soul that embraces Jesus Christ as its Saviour, does so by Faith in his name — and every one that returns to God, does so by Repentance for sin ; and every one openly and ioyfully confesses that he has done both, through divine grace 1 1 Cor., i. 18. 76 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. and yet that, so far from being put in bondage either in the pro¬ cess or the result, he has done it freely, and has been set free therein. On the other hand, every human soul that lias failed or refused to believe in Jesus Christ, is fully sensible that Christ is not his Saviour ; and every one that will not repent of sin, is fully sensible that Christ is not the ground of whatever hope he may suppose he has before God ; nor is one of them able to sug¬ gest any reason why God is not his God, and Christ his Saviour, which would not be completely removed and confuted by Faith and Repentance. But this, in its whole extent, is just the mani¬ festation of what God has said — just the universal illustration of the truths I have been endeavouring to state, to classify, and to enforce. Again I repeat, the whole work of God confirms his word ; and our nature in its inmost life, and our reason in its utmost power, and our experience in its whole compass, each de¬ livers its distinct confirmation. 5. On account of the extreme importance of the matter, it may be proper to note in a special manner, how complete the means are which God has provided to lead men to Faith and Repentance. Truth is the very aliment of the soul ; and God has made the belief of divine truth, made known bv himself, concerning his infinite glory, and his eternal love for us, and con¬ cerning our own endless blessedness ; the very point in which our souls embrace J esus Christ, and pass over from death to life. A sense of our blameworthiness is a most complete and pungent manifestation, at once of our moral nature and of its present con¬ dition— on the one side God and his nature and dominion, on the other our creatureliood, and our depravity and shame therefor ; and in this very point God locates the first movements of our discharge from the bondage of the law of sin and death, and of our freedom through the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus.1 And thus, all the outward means of grace and salvation, by which the knowledge of ourselves and of God is so continually, so ur¬ gently, and so completely delivered to our rational and moral faculties ; find in the very depths of our nature, the very con¬ ditions to which they can most effectually appeal. According to the structure of our nature, and the character of the means used by God, how is it possible to doubt, that the result which ought to follow is, that we believe and repent P But this result does 1 Bom., viii. 2. CHAP. IV.] CONDITIONS OF SALVATION. 77 not follow. And the result which does follow, so long as we are left to ourselves, is absolutely incomprehensible, except as we ac¬ knowledge that the carnal mind is enmity to God, not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.1 Wherefore, there can be no remedy but that proclaimed from heaven, namely, that we put off the old man, which is corrupt ; and be renewed in the spirit of our mind ; and put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.3 1 Rom., viii. 7. 2 Eph., iv. 22-24. CHAPTER V THE (ECONOMY OF THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION. I. 1. Transition from the Objective to the Subjective Consideration of the Knowledge of God. — 2. General appreciation of the (Economy of Grace. — 3. Method pro¬ posed here. — II. — 1. The Four Estates of Man, and the Relations of the two Covenants thereto. — 2. The absolute Unity of the Way and Method of Salva¬ tion, under .all Dispensations. — 3. Divine Grace, through the Mediator. — 4. Per¬ petual Development thereof. — 5. Perpetual Sufficiency thereof. — TIL — 1. The Es¬ sence of the Covenant of Grace. — 2. Fundamental points of Agreement between the Covenants of Works, and Grace. — 3. Fundamental points of Difference be¬ tween them. — 4. What is involved in this comparison, and what results from it. — IV. — 1. Gradual disclosure of the Covenant of Redemption. — 2. Universal prin¬ ciple and result of this progress. — 3. Unity of the Counsel of God and of the Essence of the Covenant of Grace ; variety of Dispensation. — V. — 1. Dispensa* tions of tire (Economy of Redemption. — 2. Our own posture in this vast adminis¬ tration, perfectly distinct. — 3. The Adamic Dispensation. — 4. The Noacic Dispen¬ sation. — 5. The Old World and the New — Adam and Abraham, connected by Noah. — 6. The Abrahamic Dispensation, and Covenant. — 7. The Institutions of Moses. — 8. Their career and their catastrophe. — 9. Christ: the Gospel Church. — 10. The future Dispensations of the Covenant of Redemption. — 11. The nature and the power of the Knowledge thus attainable. I. — 1. The aim of this first Book of this Treatise of the Know¬ ledge of God Subjectively Considered, is to point out the method by which, in its widest sense, the objective Knowledge of God becomes subjective ; the relation between the mere outward knowledge of divine things, and the method and power and ef¬ fects of that divine knowledge in the soul and upon the life of man. The preceding chapters might perhaps be considered as having sufficiently accomplished that purpose. For the Cove¬ nant of Grace and Redemption, which is the expression of the whole purpose and power of God manifested in our salvation, has been carefully considered in its nature, its relations, and its force, up to the point of the effectual, internal application of its bene¬ fits unto and within the soul of man : to which we might now pro¬ ceed. That is, I have endeavoured to exhibit the first utterance by God of the existence and nature of this covenant, and to point out CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 79 the influence thereof upon the catastrophe produced by the Fall of Man, and the entrance of sin ; then to state as clearly as I could, the origin, the object, and the great principles and truths of this covenant ; then to disclose the intimate relevancy of it to our own intimate nature, and to our fundamental religious ideas and convictions ; and then to exhibit and to illustrate the unal¬ terable conditions on which its benefits can be applied to fallen men, and the corresponding special obligations resting on them. What would immediately follow would be the exhibition of sal¬ vation in the human soul, in the actual present posture of grace on one side, and man on the other. 2. It occurs, however, that the actual present posture both of divine grace and of sinful men, with respect to salvation through the Covenant of Redemption, is related in a manner so intimate, to all that has gone before, and to all that is to follow, touching both the development of grace and the career of man ; that a right understanding of the actual and present, is greatly promoted by a clear perception of the relation of that present to the past even to the beginning, and to the future even to the end. The administration of the Covenant of Redemption has been an immense and continual development of the grace of Gfod in the salvation of fallen men ; and the point at which our race now stands is one of rest, so to speak, in that grand progress, and we have reached it only after incurring the whole force of divine providence up to this point. And before us, both in grace and in providence, both in time and in eternity, are other immense developments, .other immense cycles. It is nothing that these rests are long or short, compared with each other, whether in the past or in the future ; they all influence each other — they are all parts of one whole ; and some insight into all of them, into their relations to each other, and into the grand wdiole they all make up, is necessary to the clear knowledge of any part ; as, for ex¬ ample, the part now appertaining to us, and in connection with which we must be saved, or must perish. It is this total admin¬ istration of divine grace in its whole progress, and in its whole connection, which I call the (Economy of the Covenant of Re¬ demption, and whose general appreciation seems to be the neces¬ sary conclusion of the foregoing chapters of this Book, and to be necessarily preliminary to the exhibition, in the next Book, of the work of salvation within us. 80 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. 3. In attempting to sketch in a very narrow compass, an out¬ line so vast, in which questions so immense occupy an area ex¬ tending from the beginning to the end of time— and stretching both ways into eternity ; it behooves, not only, that we walk very carefully in the light of God, but that every step be taken very humbly before him. Recognizing the whole as a manifes¬ tation of God, I have exhibited aspects of it, more or less exten¬ sive, in various parts of the Treatise of The Knowledge of God Objectively Considered ; and especially in the Fourth Book of that Treatise, which is devoted expressly to the consideration of those manifestations of God whereby all our knowledge of him is obtained. I have occupied a considerable portion of the chap¬ ters which treat of Divine Providence, of the New Creation, and of the Sacred Scriptures, with various illustrations of this great topic. What I shall further say will be in the way of completing and generalizing the subject, with special reference to its use in this place ; praying the reader who will honour me so far, to ex¬ amine what I have advanced in the chapters just alluded to. II. — 1. The condition of man is represented to us in the Scriptures in a fourfold aspect. His original condition was per¬ fect, but fallible ; in which our first parents alone existed — and from which they fell by transgression. By that fall the whole race came into its second condition, which is one of weakness and depravity ; in which it underlies the sentence of God pronounced at the fall, and awaits the final sentence of the great day. The third condition of man is one of begun recovery ; regenerated and partially sanctified by the Holy Ghost, and enjoying union and communion with the Saviour Christ Jesus ; which condition is not universal of all men — but only of all penitent and believing sinners. The fourth condition of man is one of perfect restoration and eternal glory and blessedness ; which is the final estate, not of all men, but only of just men made perfect, through the complete fruition of God in Christ. The impenitent and the unbelieving perish in their sin — endless perdition being the final condition of ungodly men. The original condition of fallible perfection, was the one to which the Covenant of Works applied ; and the object of that covenant was to relieve man from the peril arising from the fallibility of his nature, to invest the human race with the absolute possession of a life at once perfect and immortal, and to secure to it the perpetual augmentation of glory and blessedness CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 81 therein. The Covenant of Grace applies to the second condition of man, namely, to his fallen, weak, and depraved condition ; and its object is to restore man, through a Saviour, and by means of a new creation, to the image, the service, and the enjoyment of God in this life, and to the complete and endless fruition of him in a better life to come. It has therefore no relation to man except as he is considered, first, in his sins, then as penitent and believing, then as carried forward through his new life to his im¬ mortal inheritance. Grace and glory for fallen men, are the sum of its proposals. 2. However various the aspects of God's merciful dealings with sinful men may seem, there never was but one divine way of salvation revealed ; and there never was but one divine method of making that way of salvation effectual. That method always was and needs must be, as it regarded man, by divine assistance through divine love ; granting to us pardon for our sins on ac¬ count of the satisfaction of Christ, and renewing our nature by the Holy Ghost, so that we might, by Faith, accept the right- eousness of Christ imparted us, and by Repentance turn from Satan unto God. Any thing short of this would leave salvation wholly out of our reach ; while any thing essentially different from it would be wholly inapplicable to our condition. The divine way of salvation to which this divine method appertains, the fruit of infinite beneficence, wisdom, and power — -always was and needs must be, by the incarnation, the obedience and sacri¬ fice, and the glorious resurrection and ascension of the Son of God ; and by the application to us by the Holy Ghost of all the benefits of the work of Christ, secured to us in the Covenant of Redemption ; and as a consequence, our deliverance, restoration, and endless perfection and blessedness. Therefore the whole administration of the Covenant of Redemption necessarily em¬ braces all that God has vet done, and all that he will ever do, in the way of grace and glory for fallen men. There never was any way of salvation for sinners, but through a Mediator ; there never was, nor will be, but one Mediator between God and men ; and the man Christ Jesus, is that Mediator.1 3. Whatever is unto salvation, under whatever aspect, at whatever period, and by whatever means, is therefore ot mere grace : yea, free, sovereign, efficacious, special, eternal grace. 1 1 Tim., ii. 5. 6 VOL. II. 82 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. This grace is absolutely and exclusively in, by, and through the Lord Jesus Christ, the Mediator of the Covenant of Grace ; out of whom there is no grace of God unto the salvation of fallen men. This grace and salvation, are unto all the redeemed through Faith and Eepentance, covenanted through the blood of the Son of God ; both in that he was a party to the eternal covenant, in that he represented them as their head therein, and in that God renews the covenant with each one of them upon his actual union with Christ. And all the blessings and benefits of all this covenanted mercy, are actually applied by the Holy Ghost, in time and eternity, to every soul saved out of our lost race, from the fall of Adam to the end of time.1 4. The progress of divine grace in the soul, is represented by the Saviour to be like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till the whole was leavened.2 God re¬ veals himself in the hearts of his people by little and little ; leading them powerfully, but almost imperceptibly, from one de¬ gree of grace and strength unto another, until all of them in Zion appear perfect before him. It is in this way also, that he has developed the plan of salvation, and led his Church across the ages with a constantly increasing light. One dispensation has emerged from the bosom of another, as each in succession accom¬ plished its own special end ; all tending in the same direction — all constituting portions of one great (Economy of Grace. A covenant from eternity was proclaimed for the first time as a practical remedy for sin, in God’s sentence upon Satan for his part in the fall of man, even before he passed sentence upon man. Its development through all time is the most glorious manifestation of God to the universe. Its consummation will occur at the delivery up of the Kingdom it has created, by the Son to the Father, upon the Lamb’s Book of Life ; and God will be all and in all. But from that jDoint a new and higher glory for eternity will begin — the precise nature of which, eter¬ nity itself must unfold. 5. It necessarily follows, and the Scriptures expressly teach, that the Jewish system was as really a dispensation of the Cov¬ enant of Redemption as the Christian system is :3 and that from Adam to Moses the same covenant, though differently adminis- 1 1 Cor., iii. 31-33; Ileb., vi. 13-20; Rom., viil passim. J Matt, xiii. 33. 3 Ileb., viil, ix., x. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 83 tered, was as really administered as it was during tlie personal ministry of Christ, or is now.1 The Saviour promised to Adam, was the same Saviour promised more explicitly to Abraham, to Moses, and to all the Prophets ; the same who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, who is now preached unto the Gentiles, and who will judge the world in righteousness. It also follows of neccessity, and the Scriptures expressly teach, that however the administration of the covenant maybave varied, from period to period, in its outward application to the elect ; yet, under every successive dispensation of it, the means provided were suf¬ ficient and effectual for the comfort and salvation of those who . received them, under whatever form, and in whatever stage of the divine (Economy.2 For the Spirit of God was always in the Church of God, and with the redeemed of God, making effectual application of the existing means of grace to the souls of all be¬ lievers.3 Nor must it be overlooked, that the extraordinary deal¬ ings of God with his people, in the way of divine guidance and support, were always great and striking in proportion as the ordi¬ nary means of grace existing under the particular dispensation were, as compared with other means of grace, either small or ob¬ scure. Nothing is more striking than this : and we need only compare carefully the present condition of the Church in these respects, with its condition under any former dispensation, to appreciate the importance of the truth stated. III. — 1. The whole (Economy of the Covenant of Grace thus contemplated, suggests two aspects which, taken together, pre¬ sent for our consideration a complete outline of it. The first of these exhibits the covenant considered in its essence, in its analogy with the Covenant of Works ; and discloses to us the agreement, and the difference between the two — and therein the nature and the state of man under each. The second opens before us the whole progress and development of God’s mercy unto the salva¬ tion of fallen men, under all the successive dispensations of the Covenant of Redemption ; and furnishes us with the means of appreciating distinctly our actual position in this divine admin¬ istration. What is meant by the essence of this covenant, which on one side is to be compared with the Covenant of Works, and on the other side is to be traced through a manifold 1 Horn., iv. 2 ; Gal., iii. 7-14. 2 Heb., xi., passim. 3 John, viii. 56 ; 1 Cor., x. 1-4. 84 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. progress of its own ; is that wherein its own nature and unity consist. For what it provided was always the same eternal life, under the same peculiar form of life, namely, that of fallen men restored to the lost image of God. And the way in which this was provided was always through a Mediator between God and fallen men, and always through the same Mediator, to wit, Im¬ manuel — the Messiah of the Jewish Scriptures — the Christ of the Christian Scriptures — the author and the giver of that eter¬ nal life. And the method by which that eternal life was always bestowed on fallen men, was in that they were divinely enabled and inclined to exercise Repentance toward God, and Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. However various may be the manifestations of this covenant, however distinct its successive dispensations, or however wide the difference between the first and the last aspect of its vast (Economy ; its absolute oneness cannot be disputed, when the same grace reigned, the same sal¬ vation is propounded, the same Saviour is held forth, the same method of union with him is exhibited for the rescue of the same fallen race, throughout. 2. The most fundamental points of agreement between these two covenants may, perhaps, be stated in the following manner : (ci) Both of them are the product of divine wisdom and love, and are addressed with divine authority and power to the particular conditions of human nature, which they respectively contemplate : while both of them were proofs of infinite con¬ descension on the part of God, and proposed unspeakable and eternal mercies to man. ( b ) Both of them propose an identical, and peculiar method on the part of God, of dealing with his creature man ; a method we express by the word Covenant. Whereby God, in order to confirm and augment the blessedness of man before he fell, and in order to restore, increase, and perpetuate that blessedness after man had fallen ; propounded to man the attainment of an in¬ finite reward, upon conditions which, while they were obligatory on God, were so full of goodness to man, that nothing could pre¬ vent his reaping the promised reward, except deliberate rejection of his Creator before the fall, and deliberate rejection of his Sa¬ viour after the fall. (c) And as touching these conditions themselves, both cov- CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 85 cnants agree in this, that the head of those to he benefitted under each, to wit, Adam under the first, and Christ under the second, so stood for and represented them, that the triumph or failure of that head should he decisive concerning every one he represented. Upon this great and identical principle the condi¬ tion and the reward of the first covenant, to wit. perfect obedi¬ ence and endless perfection, became by its breach by Adam utterly impossible under it; and the conditions and reward of the second covenant, to wit, Faith and Repentance, and salvation as the re¬ sult, became infallibly certain by the execution of it by Christ. (d) Both of them demanded on the part of the creature a righteousness that would satisfy a divine law and a holy God ; and both of them required the same, and a peculiar kind of righteousness, to wit, that which is manifested by the perfect love of God and of our neighbour. And both of them proposed to secure to every one represented in them respectively, the abso¬ lute certainty of possessing this righteousness in a peculiar and an identical manner, to wit, by means of their union with him who was their head. On the one hand, having the righteousness of Adam, had he stood, imputed to them ; on the other hand, having the righteousness of Christ imputed to them. In like manner, on the one hand having the righteousness of Adam’s nature, had he stood, inherited by means of a natural genera¬ tion ; on the other hand having the righteousness of Christ wrought in them, by means of supernatural regeneration. In both instances, the righteousness to be obtained by the head under each covenant, and to be manifested as above set forth, was a divine righteousness in this, namely, that it was the right¬ eousness of perfect conformity to a divine law. ( e ) Both covenants proposed to deal with men in two ways, very dissimilar in themselves and extremely difficult to be per¬ fectly reconciled with each other ; yet both absolutely inherent in the nature of man and of both covenants. That is, they pro¬ posed to deal with men considered as a race — which they are ; and also considered as individual persons, which they are. Both of them in the development of this double aspect of humanity, and of the divine mode of dealing with it by covenant; provided, as has been shown, a common head. In each of them successively our destiny as a race was so decided, as that our personal respon¬ sibility was nevertheless secured, and our individual freedom pre- 86 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. served. If we were to conceive of either covenant as annihilating the total influence of the other, in that case the reign of one — - either one — would he absolute and universal : all saved — or all lost. Except in that way, we cannot conceive of any other re¬ sult, than a mixed one, founded upon the existence of both covenants, and upon their peculiar and identical manner of con¬ templating and dealing with humanity. (/) In effect, therefore, both covenants agree in this also, that neither of them had an absolute and universal efficacy, unto a specific result. To a certain intent both of them had : to a certain intent neither had. They limit each other — in a peculiar way, difficult to express, but practically perfectly obvious. Through Adam — ultimately — some men — not all men — perish : through Christ — ultimately — some men — not all men — are saved. As there is but one human race, and that determinate before Gfod in the total number of its individuals : the saved and the lost are its two factors — each diminishing the whole by its own amount ; each representing the finality of one covenant in the respect now considered. On the other hand, it will be forever true that all men were once sinners, and the whole of our uni¬ verse polluted ; and it will be equally true that in a certain sense the whole universe will be retrieved from sin, and that death itself shall die. Still the universality is peculiar, and is respon¬ sive in both cases. But these mysteries are very high, and should be handled with the dread of God upon us. 3. The most fundamental points of difference between the two covenants, may, perhaps, be stated as follows : (a) As the conditions of humanity to which the two cove¬ nants were respectively addressed were wholly different, the im¬ mediate object of them, respectively, was also different. The first covenant found man perfect, but fallible ; and what it im¬ mediately proposed was to deliver him from the peril of that fal¬ libility, and to confirm and augment forever his existing perfec¬ tion. The second covenant found man fallen and depraved ; and its immediate object was to extricate him from his condition of ruin, and from the endless perdition to which he was hastening ; and to confer on him endless glory and felicity, by restoring him in this life to the lost image of God through a new creation, and by bringing him through death and the resurrection to an im¬ mortal existence with God. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 87 ( b ) They necessarily differed in the way of accomplishing their object respectively. Though it was unto life, and through divine goodness, and by way of covenant, in both instances ; in the first, it was from God to his creature who was already perfect, in the second from God to his creature fallen from his perfection and wholly depraved. The whole way of the first covenant, there-, fore, was through the headship of a mere man ; while the whole way of the second was through the headship of the God-man. The way of the first was thoroughly natural ; the way of the second was thoroughly supernatural. And this is a difference stupendous in itself, and decisive throughout. (c) They differed, utterly, in the inherent force of each, and thereby, in the result to which each tended. The exact execu¬ tion of each would produce precisely that to which it was compe¬ tent — no more, no less. But the first had in Adam no resources except such as existed in human nature, perfect but fallible ; while the second had in Christ all the resources ever possible in human nature — and all the resources of the divine nature be¬ sides. To say the very least, the first tended to failure as strongly as to success ; for it actually failed, and that, as far as we know, under the first temptation. Nor, according to any mode of judging, competent to human reason, or revealed to us by God, are we able to understand how such a covenant could have avoided the equal hazard of failure at every trial, and therefore, apparently, failure at last. On the other hand, it is wholly in¬ conceivable how the second could fail : and the Scriptures plainly tell us, it cannot. (d) The first covenant was founded, so to speak, upon what was already known to man, either as written on his heart by God, or as added in the great acts of God toward man in his primeval state, anterior to the existence of this covenant ; to which its own explicit and merciful, but brief statements, were added. But it neither promised, nor provided, nor gave any additional strength to any who might seek to perform its conditions and reap its reward. The second covenant in its whole foundation and compass propounds a new creation for man — an additional revelation to man, every part of which is of transcendent import to him, and for the boundless glory of God. And this covenant promises, provides, and gives to every one who seeks to perform its conditions, and reap its rewards, all grace, and light, and 88 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. strength, for every time of need. And the divine revelation which discloses it, is so completely the power of God unto salva¬ tion to every one that believeth, that the very sum of the cove¬ nant is, that God will be their God, and that they shall be his people.1 (e) The first covenant secured to us life, upon condition that retaining the righteousness we had already, we should first secure the additional righteousness to be obtained by the further perfect obedience required in it. The second covenant secures to us both life and the righteousness required in order thereto ; it does this while, having no righteousness of our own, we were dead in sin ; it does it by making the obedience of faith, instead of any perfect obedience of our own, the method of the righteousness which God accepts.2 United in a Covenant of Works, with our covenanted and natural head — -who was a mere man — we can be made partakers of nothing higher than his estate, and can be made partakers of a righteousness like his only in our perfect obedience. United in a Covenant of Grace with our covenanted and supernatural head, who is the Lord from heaven, we are made partakers of his grace and his glory, through no righteousness at all of our own, nor through any obedience of ours, except that of faith ;3 but through the righteousness of God, by faith in Jesus Christ, unto all, and upon all them that believe.4 (/) As these two covenants relate to sin and to sinners, the difference between them is absolute. The first revealed sin and rebuked it, and left sinners to endure its fearful penalty ; the second reveals the pardon of sin and the deliverance of sinners, through the Mediator, whom it provides. The one is a dispen¬ sation of wrath and death to fallen men ; the other is a dispen¬ sation of grace, mercy, peace, and eternal life even to the chief of sinners. The one has no remedy for any sin — but death ; the other glories most of all, that it is able to save to the utter¬ most all who come to God by Jesus Christ. The one grounds all its proceedings against every one who underlies its terrible pen¬ alty, upon the personal condition of the culprit, individually considered ; the other grounds every thing upon Christ alone, and upon the personal condition of each individual considered merely i Jer., xxxi. 33; Rom., i. 16. 2 Rom., iii. 21, 22 ; v. 1 ; Eph., ii. 8. * Rom., xvi. 26. 4 Rom., iii. 22. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 89 with reference to liis relation to Christ. As so profound and per¬ vading in the Covenant of Grace is this idea of Mediation and Redemption, of which the Covenant of Works knows nothing, except that when it encounters Christ its claims are ended and its power broken ; that the whole church of the living God, the whole Messianic Kingdom, the entire New Creation, will be de¬ livered up to God the Father, at the consummation of all things, merely upon the Lamb’s Book of Life.1 4. This survey, imperfect and condensed as it is, exhibits an outline of the entire dealings of God with man, in the way of covenant ; and except in the work of creation, and in those great providential acts of which I have spoken so often, which immediately followed it and preceded the Covenant of Works — God’s entire dealings with man have been of that kind most dis¬ tinctly set forth under the idea of a covenant. Moreover, it is by comparing the two covenants through which God has disclosed his purpose in the creation of man, with each other, as has been done, that we obtain the clearest general conception of both of them ; just as it is by following the gradual and steadfast devel¬ opment of the one which now involves all the hopes of the human race, which I am about to attempt, that we obtain the clear¬ est general conception of the precise point in its sublime pro¬ gress, which touches our actual and individual position. Such a survey as I shall briefly attempt, would be at once useless and impossible, but for the unity of this second covenant thus va¬ riously administered, and but for the divine unity of the Scrip¬ tures which disclose it, and of the infinite intellect and will from which those Scriptures proceed. And it seems impossible to doubt, after any serious comparison of that covenant with the one which preceded it, that both of them proceed from the same divine source, and have reference to the same race of creatures. Contemplating that race from a widely different point of view, but directed alike to the securing and advancing its felicity and glory, they necessarily provide a way peculiar to each. Agreeing in all that is covered by its being the same God, the same race, and the same great object ; differing in all that is covered by one of them being a Covenant of Works for the advancement of a perfect but fallible race, while the other is a Covenant of Grace for the recovery of the same race fallen, but susceptible of resto- 1 Phil., iv. 3; Rev., xiii. 8; xx. 12 • xxi. 27. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD 90 [book I. ration, and for its advancement beyond what was possible if it bad never fallen. IV. — 1. He whom God distinguished above all mortals in the gift of wisdom, has warned us with great emphasis that it is the glory of God to conceal a thing.1 Long before Solomon, the greatest of all the men of the East, a man perfect and upright, as we are divinely told, had taught that God holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it.2 And long after Job, he who was not a whit behind the chiefest Apostle, exclaimed in the wonder of his marvellous insight of divine things, Oh ! the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God !3 If there be any thing which can be sub¬ jected to human scrutiny, which is above all other things calcu¬ lated to beget the state of mind thus variously expressed by men so great, so illustrious, and so taught of God ; it is undoubtedly, this very progress of the saving grace of God in its amazing movement along the course of time. How slight and indistinct are the first obscure promises of the Saviour, compared with the light and majesty of his personal ministry ! Yet how indistinct was his veiled glory in his estate of humiliation, compared with the unutterable glory in which every eye shall see him, and all the kindreds of the earth wail because of him ! W e must bear in mind, however, that it is not the purpose of God which is in¬ distinct ; but it is the knowledge of it by man which from ob¬ scure beginnings, is increased under each successive dispensation, like the path of the just, a shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day. And the greatness of that glory which God conceals, and the majesty of that dominion over whose face he spreads his cloud, and the unsearchable riches of his divine wisdom and knowledge, are in nothing more dis¬ tinctly proved, than in the vastness of the force which is seen to reside in this mighty power of God unto salvation, even when it is most indistinctly proclaimed to man. When God said to Satan that the seed of the woman should bruise his head — the simple utterance involved a total change in the posture of the human race, and of the whole universe. Yet how have sixty centuries developed that utterance ! 2. As we attempt to follow this great (Economy of the Cov¬ enant of Grace, and to compare its several aspects at its several 1 Prov., xxv. 2. 2 Job, xxvi. 9. 3 Rom., xi. 33. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 91 stages, with each other ; we find one clear and universal princi¬ ple running through the whole process. The more perfectly this covenant is developed, the greater is the distinctness given to the points in which it differs from the Covenant of Works. The farther hack we go, concealing as we go back the knowledge we leave behind us, and which did not appertain to the ages we pass over, the less distinctly do we see the Saviour and his cross : while, contrariwise, the more each successive dispensation rises in the bosom of this great (Economy of salvation, the more distinct is the vision of the Messiah, and the more conspicuously is he the centre of all grace. Everywhere, as I have already shown, the essence of the covenant is present, and is exhibited more or less distinctly. But as we find the natural life of men gradually shortened and degraded, we find the reality and the peculiar na¬ ture of immortal life which is to supplant it, more clearly dis¬ closed. As the utter inability and unwillingness of fallen men to know God by their own wisdom, or to retain the knowledge of him when it was divinely imparted to them, became more des¬ perately confirmed ; the full knowledge of that Saviour who is the true God and eternal life, is more plainly exhibited. And as the total inefficacy of any law, any rite, any type, any shadow, to supply completely the place of grace and truth in leading fallen men to believe in the Saviour unto life everlast¬ ing, was more copiously exhibited ; the real power whereby sin¬ ners do believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, is more explicitly held forth in the demonstration of the Holy Ghost. And so this greatest work of God exhibits the same method which is dis¬ closed in all other works of his : and this most glorious of all the parts of the eternal dispensation of the Son of God, is char¬ acterized by the same sublime progress, after the same divine method, as all the other parts. Cycle after cycle — ineffable repose and then divine work — the omnific Word and the life-giving Spirit — exact concatenation of every part and majestic assent of the whole to an infinite consummation ! And herein is that dispensation* of the fulness of times wherein God will gather together in one, all things in Christ, both which are in heaven O 7 0 7 and which are on earth — even in him.1 3. Throughout the whole (Economy of the Covenant of Grace, in all its dispensations, there is present every mark of 1 Eph., i. 10. * O LKovofua — (Economy. 92 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. that enduring unity which distinguishes every part of the deal¬ ings of God, and which has been already pointed out as mani¬ fested by a comparison of this with the preceding covenant. At the same time we encounter the widest variety of application : a variety demanded, as between the covenants, by the changed nature of the creature ; and as between the various dispensa¬ tions of the latter covenant, by the constant and progressive changes in his condition, and by the successive manifestations of divine grace. The more carefully we explore all these dispen¬ sations — the antediluvian — the patriarchal — the Jewish — the Christian ; the more deeply we consider those secondary varia¬ tions to which these dispensations are subject within themselves, or the eternal results to which they all conduct; the more do we everywhere behold the stedfast and unshaken progress of God's eternal counsel for the manifestation of his own glory, in bring¬ ing fallen men to the saving knowledge and endless fruition of himself All the glory and blessedness reserved in heaven for them that love God, is more than can be fathomed by us now — more than flesh and blood can comprehend, much less inherit. But as we behold the deep foundations which God has laid, and as we trace them back into eternity ; it is not presumption, it is simple faith, which prompts and sustains the profound assurance, that these are the very foundations upon which our souls rest, and that we may safely follow them into the world to come, and rest eternity upon them. V. — 1. Adam — Noah — Abraham — Moses — Christ — the Gos¬ pel Church — the Millennial state — the Glorified state ; to which add the second coming of the Lord — the Kesurrection of the dead — and the eternal Judgment — in some connection with the last two states of the Church. These are familiar words to the children of God. Do they not know that he who understands all they imply, understands all that is involved in creation, providence, grace, and glory ? Let us pause at the sixth phrase — the Gospel Church : it is there, now eighteen centuries from its origin, that we stand to-day. Before its origin, five distinct epochs covering forty centuries. Until our period shall close — who can tell how long P The five phrases which follow are con¬ stantly on the lips of Christian people, in some sense or other : but in what sense exactly, or even in what supposed order and connection as to most of them ? Whatever all these phrases CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 93 may express, when fully understood — this much is certain, that all of them relate, in the most distinct manner, to the Covenant of Redemption — that, taken together, they express the whole progress and result of it — and that separately, or variously com¬ bined, they indicate not only the reality, but the nature of all its great successive dispensations. It is not to ascertain par¬ ticular truths, but it is to illustrate the great career of truth, that I employ them here : that immense administration which in the chapters of a former Treatise specially cited in an earlier part of this chapter, I have already briefly exhibited under three distinct aspects. Once in treating of the relations of divine providence to the Messianic Kingdom ; once in developing the progress of divine knowledge through the Kew Creation ; and once in treating the whole career of the Kingdom of God con¬ templated alike in its head, in its author, and in its members. In the present chapter — as in this First Book throughout — what is specially important is the clear appreciation of the inti¬ mate and necessary connection between the Objective and Sub¬ jective Knowledge of God ; that is, between the inner life of men, and by consequence their outward condition, whether con¬ sidered as individuals or as a race, and the knowledge they pos¬ sess of the true God and of Jesus Christ whom he has sent. 2. The present stand-point of the human race with reference to this glorious administration of God, is capable of a perfectly distinct appreciation, in every aspect of the whole subject, and in everv relation of it to us. Of course, it is not meant that all men can know, or that any one does know, all the present, much less all the past, and least of all the whole future, touching any aspect of the Covenant of Kedemption. But all men may know with infallible certainty, and immense multitudes do know, that the present condition of the human race is neither the patri¬ archal, nor the millennial condition of man ; that the present posture of Redemption is not the one it occupied before the Incar¬ nation, nor the one it will occupy after the second coming of the Lord ; that from the remotest past the causes of whatever ex¬ ists are made obvious to us by God, together with their constant working, and their present state ; that all that is actual to us now is manifestly full of all future results ; and that multitudes of those results, in all their overwhelming vastness, aie so ic- vealecl to us by God that the knowledge of them and the effects 94 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. of them are really and effectually, though not perfectly and com¬ pletely appreciable by us. The very thought and the very illus¬ tration used by the Apostle Paul, still apply as distinctly to us as to those he personally addressed ; for, if I may illustrate the work of grace by the work of creation, the evening and the divine repose of the Gospel day, which we call long and God calls short — still continue, and the millennial morning and work which may complete that Gospel day are not yet come. There¬ fore said Paul, and we may repeat, But now we see not as yet all things put in subjection under the feet of the Son of Man. What we have seen is, that Jesus was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death ; that he by the grace of God has tasted death for every man ; and that he has been crowned with glory and honour. And we have seen, and still see, many sons of God brought to glory ; we see that Christ is not ashamed to call them his brethren; and we see how infinitely it became God, to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through suffering. And what we may be sure of is, that it is wholly impossible for us to escape perdition, if we neglect this great salvation, which has been spoken by the Lord, and con¬ firmed unto us by those who heard him ; God himself bearing witness both with signs and wonders, and the Holy Ghost with divers miracles and gifts.1 3. From this point, looking back to the fall of man, we hear the promise of the Seed of the woman, and see man sentenced and driven from Eden. This promise ; the consecrated rest of the Sabbath day ; the sacrificial recognition of God, of a Sa¬ viour, of sin, and of deliverance ; the knowledge of the moral law ; and the miraculous ministration of God personally and by his angels ; these unitedly exhibited the antediluvial aspect of the Covenant of Redemption. The condition of human society answerable to it was characterized by the immense length of hu¬ man life — by the great extent of families — by the total absence of any organization civil or sacred except that of the household — and by the universal prevalence of a single language. This was the antediluvian condition of mankind, secular and religious. It survived the catastrophe of the universal deluge — and received its first great shock at Babel in the land of Shinar, by an imme¬ diate act of God confounding the language of all the earth, and 1 Heb., ii. passim. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 95 scattering the human race abroad upon the face of all the earth.1 Nor did the great increase of divine knowledge vouchsafed to Noah and to Abraham by God, concerning which I have treated in another place ; put an absolute end to a state of the Church so remarkable ; and to a state of society which still prevails in a form somewhat modified, so extensively upon earth ; embracing the greater part of the descendants of Abraham himself. 4. Nothing can be more distinctly asserted than God has as¬ serted in his blessed word, that the whole human family, except the eight persons who composed the household of Noah, were drowned in the flood ; and that the whole human race afterwards existing, is descended from these eight persons ; that is, except his own wife and the wives of his three sons, from Noah himself, who is the second progenitor of the race.2 It is in the covenant which God made with this preacher of righteousness, as the Scriptures call Noah,3 that the nature and foundation of civil government, more extensive than that of the household, and as a divine institution, are first intimated, and in connection there¬ with the purpose of God touching the destiny of the earth and of the human race considered as inhabitants thereof, and concern¬ ing the stedfastness of nature while man and the earth shall exist in their present relations to each other ; in confirmation of which he set his how in the cloud, that man might see it and trust God. It can add nothing decisive to the matter imme¬ diately before us, to discuss those permanent physical changes, real or imaginary, upon the earth itself, and upon its relations to our solar system, over which the learned have disputed ; which I therefore joass in silence. But it is important to observe that the second great shock to the unity of mankind, in the establishment of distinct varieties of the race, has, even to the present mo¬ ment, permanent relations to the family of Noah. It is a new world of which he is the head. Its life is shortened, its language is confounded, its unity is disturbed, a new condition of society is divinely provided for, and initiated under Nimrod in Shinar, and Asshur at Nineveh : and all these things are before our eyes, after so many centuries, in forms unspeakably aggravated. The (Economy of Redemption alone advances. The lines of Shem, and Ham, and Japhet, and even Canaan the son of Ham, are traced far enough to show all coming ages the origin of all nations and 1 Gen., xi. 1-9. 2 Gen., vL — xi. 3 2 Pet., ii. 6. 96 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. peoples.1 Then, dropping all the rest, the line of Shem is traced to Abraham,2 and through him to Christ ; in whom, after so many ages, those omitted Gentiles are to be restored to God ; in whom, rejected by his own to whom he came, it is this day preeminently those omitted Gentiles to whom God has granted repentance unto life, and out of whom he is taking a people for his name.3 5. The patriarch Abraham was the lineal descendant of Shem in the tenth generation ; and of his life on earth of one hundred and seventy-five years, one hundred and ten years coincided with the latter part of the life of his great ancestor. Leaving the ark when he was about a hundred years old, Shem lived about five hundred years in the post-diluvian world — and may have been for more than a century, perfectly familiar with the father of the Faithful ; about thirty-five years of which period were after the divine call, of which I have now to speak.4 But Shem had passed a hundred years in the antediluvian world, the whole of which he may have passed in the company of Methuselah who wras his father’s grandfather ; and above two hundred and forty years of the entire life of Methuselah coincided with the later years of Adam, his sixth lineal ancestor.5 Two persons, one of them the great grandfather of the other, separate between Adam and Abraham ; these two companions, it may have been, for a century ; the first a companion of Adam for two centuries and a half ; the second a companion of Abraham for more than a cen¬ tury. Moreover, the interval between Adam and Noah was but a century and a quarter, and that between Noah and Abraham was less than half a century : the two lives of Adam and Noah covering eighteen hundred and eighty years of the whole period from the creation to the birth of Abraham — and leaving a com¬ paratively short interval before, and a still shorter one after Noah. It is Noah, therefore, in reality, who connects Adam with Abra¬ ham — the first man with the father of the Faithful. His mar¬ vellous life, resting for five centuries on the world before the flood, and for four and a half centuries on the world after the flood ; constituted an astonishing epoch in the (Economy of Ke- demption, and at the same time afforded the means of transit between the Adamic and the Abrahamic epochs, each of them as illustrious as itself. 6. The dispensation which extends from the call of Abraham 1 Gen., x. 2 Gen., xi. 3 Acts, xi. 18 ; xv. 14. 4 Gen., xi. 5 Gen., v. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 97 and God’s covenant with him, to the Exodus from Egypt under Moses and the giving of the Law, occupied according to the re¬ ceived chronology, for which we have the authority of the Apostle Paul, a period of four hundred and thirty years.1 The greater part of the Book of Genesis, and a considerable portion of the Book of Exodus, are devoted to it ; and it is a subject of continual allu¬ sion and explanation throughout the Scriptures. The distinct accounts we have of Melchizedeck, who was cotemporary with Abraham,2 of Jethro, who was cotemporary with the earlier min¬ istry of Moses,3 and of Balaam, who witnessed almost its close ;4 give us clear intimations of the existing state of divine knowledge, and of human affairs ; and these are confirmed by multitudes of al¬ lusions and incidents found in the sacred narrative — and rendered certain by the Book of J oh, who was, it is probable, earlier than Moses and later than Abraham. The call of Abraham, was in effect the rejection of the whole race besides ; and the tendency of the whole race, as such, has been continual and decisive against God. The sacrament of circumcision given to Abraham, created for the first time a precise, visible separation between those in covenant with God, and all beside ; and the sacrament of the passover, whose institution signalized the close of this dis¬ pensation, as circumcision did its commencement, made this sep¬ aration still more complete, by exhibiting still more clearly, the ground, the nature, and the object of it. These sacraments en¬ tered in a fundamental manner, into the next succeeding dis¬ pensation ; and passing under new forms, by the ordination of Christ himself, into the bosom of the Gospel Church, they still survive as signs and seals of the Covenant of Redemption. The covenant which God made with Abraham, to whom he appeared seven or eight times,5 was manifold in its aspect. It was a cove¬ nant personally between God and the patriarch, embracing him¬ self and all his posterity, and stipulating for great blessings temporal and spiritual to him and to them. It was a Covenant between God and Abraham, embracing after a peculiar manner, his descendants through Isaac, which embraced all the Jewish people, and the land of Canaan as their inheritance. It was a covenant between God and Abraham, wherein the patriarch was accepted as the father of all believers, and all of them received 1 Gal., iii. 1Y. 2 Gen., xiv.; Heb., vii. 3 Ex., xviii. 4 Num., xxii. — xxiv. 5 Gen. xii. — xxiii. VOL. II. 7 98 THE KNOWLEDGE OE GOD. [BOOK I. unspeakable promises in him. And above all, it was a covenant between God and Abraham wherein the patriarch was accepted as the representative of humanity itself ; and as such received promises for all the kindreds of the earth, and above all promises, that of the Saviour of the world, as his seed.1 In all these as¬ pects, this amazing covenant has accomplished its stipulations through all succeeding time. In the promised line of the family of Abraham, the visible church of God became immediately con¬ spicuous. In the form of a great people it came in contact with all the great world-powers developing themselves in the post¬ diluvian world, according to the purpose of God revealed to Noah. And their deliverance from Egypt, their abode in the wilderness, and their triumphant settlement in the promised land — all miraculous and all typical of things far greater than themselves ; were made the occasion and the means of organizing that theocratic commonwealth of the Jews, which constituted so remarkable an epoch in the (Economy of Grace. 7. The institutions of Moses, established about twenty-five centuries after the creation, continued with divine authority for about fifteen centuries. They are capable of being considered in a threefold point of view ; once in their purely civil aspect — once as a system of actual religion and positive morality — and once as a typical system involving and exhibiting more or less distinctly, a spiritual system far higher than itself. These three elements are, indeed, combined in the most intimate man¬ ner : for the system they jointly composed was to be practically administered over the most enlightened nation in the world, as at once their only temporal government-, and their only way of eternal salvation. Still, from the point of view we occupy, it is not difficult to separate these elements. We readily understand that as a system of positive religion and morality, these institu¬ tions would combine and would exhibit, all that God had made known until then of the way of salvation ; and that they would be fitted to receive and to preserve all immediate and all further communications of his grace. Thus we find them grounded upon the Moral Law, which God had written on the heart of man when he created him, and which he now wrote on tables of stone ; we find the revelation of divine grace, of a Saviour from sin, and of life through him, the burden of the entire system ; and we find 1 Rom., iv. passim ; Gal., iii. passim j Rom., ix. passim. CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. 99 tlie sum of all the past history of Redemption reduced to a written form, and the continuance and perpetuity of that sacred record made one of the chief distinctions of a dispensation, at¬ tested by so many and such stupendous miracles, and replen¬ ished with such fulness of divine inspiration. Omitting the Book of Job which is probably a monument of the Abrahamic dispen¬ sation, the whole of the Old Testament Scriptures belong to this era. In like manner, we easily perceive, that all that was purely typical in the institutions of Moses, was exhausted and can¬ celled when that became actual which it only signified ; and we perceive as well, that institutions replenished with such types of better things to come, bear in their own bosom at once the proof and the cause of their own weakness and decay. Touching the Mosaic institutions considered as a purely civil polity, my impression is that men have never adequately conceived either their nature or their design. Civil institutions higher than the household, had no existence amongst men, and no revealed au¬ thority from God, before the flood. The purpose of God to organize society, and to organize his own kingdom in the world, both more completely than before — was first made known to Noah and to Abraham ; and both parts of the purpose in its earliest development, were exhibited in this theocratical com¬ monwealth. There are interests of mankind absolutelv tern- V poral, and there are evils to which man is unavoidably subject in a state of sin: the former inseparably incident to his mortal exist¬ ence, the latter to his mortal existence as a sinner. What seems to me to be taught by the civil institutions of the Jewish people, and that upon the authority of God himself — is the great princi¬ ples and truths which underlie the most successful treatment of all such interests, and all such evils. Human civilization, human progress, human liberty and security ; property in its own nature, use, and liability ; rights and duties of the citizen, whether public, social, or personal ; misdemeanours, crimes, and punishments; the great problems which connect themselves with national independence, and with the public force, and general prosperity ; those vast and intricate questions connected with trade, money, pauperism, and servitude. These are the topics to which Moses addressed himself : and while I am obliged to admit that no competent annotator known to me, has expounded his wonderful conceptions ; I do not hesitate to assert that what THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 100 [book I. he has taught, seems to me to be replenished with divine wisdom. 8. This Jewish state preceded the existence of all those uni¬ versal world-powers which the post-diluvian principle of human society developed. In its career it came in contact with all four of them, and perished finally under the blows of the last and greatest of them all — after Messiah had come, and been craci- tied. Daniel, its great apocaliptic Prophet, in his captivity at Babylon under the first of them, revealed the career and fate of them all, and especially of the first three : and J ohn, the great apocaliptic Prophet of the Christian dispensation, in his captivity at Patmos under the last of them, took up the sublime vision where Daniel left it, and made it complete. Nothing is so as¬ tonishing as the catastrophe of the Jewish state, the Jewish institutions, and the Jewish people. The Messiah, in whose name the theocratic commonwealth had been founded and always administered, to whom every thing tended, and of whom every thing was full, came at last, only to be rejected and set at nought. They said, Let his blood be upon us, and upon our chil¬ dren ! Fearful words — fearfully accomplished ! Their divine commonwealth utterly subverted — their divine institutions sup¬ planted by the still more glorious institutions of the Saviour, whom they caused to be crucified — and themselves, the seed of Abraham, the children of the covenant, and the chosen people of God, wanderers for eighteen centuries, the wonder and the op¬ probrium of mankind. Solemn and true are those words — The wild dove has her nest, and the fox has his cave ; mankind have their country ; what has Israel but the grave P 9. The Word was made flesh, says the Apostle John, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.1 This is the great parable which, from the beginning of time, has been on the lips of all the redeemed : the Word made flesh — grace and truth — the glory of the only begotten of the Father ! This is the significance of the incarnation, the crucifixion, and the as¬ cension, the second coming of the Lord. This is the meaning of that great day of Pentecost — this is the sum of our Christian Kevelation — this explains the Gospel Church throughout its whole career — this is the intent of this dispensation of the Holy 1 John, i. 14. 101 CHAP. V.] (ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION. Ghost with power. The glory of the only begotten of the Father — grace and truth— the Word made flesh ! This is the cry with which the tribes and kindreds of mankind rise from the dust and look abroad upon the day, and return to the brightness of Zion and the glory of her rising. This is the burden of the hymn of every soldier of the cross, whether it be a hymn of vic¬ tory, or of martyrdom, on earth — or of hosannah in the highest, in the realms of light. This, therefore, is our posture this day : the Gospel Church — the dispensation of the Holy Ghost — the great parable of the Word made flesh — grace and truth — the glory of the only begotten of the Father ! 10. If it can be thought sufficient, after all that has been said, to pass over, with a brief general statement, the glorious epoch of the personal ministry of Christ, and that of the out¬ pouring of the Holy Ghost, the founding of the Gospel Church, and its progress until now : it could hardly be excused, in this connection, and considering how much it may be needful to say hereafter, to enter particularly upon those great dispensations which are still future. It is not indeed the particular object of this Treatise, to trace the career of the Church of God ; but to exhibit the truth of God, in its simplicity and power, subjec¬ tively in its effectual working upon and in the soul of man, and the effects which necessarily result therefrom. To a certain ex¬ tent, as has been shown, the whole preceding (Economy of Re¬ demption is involved in the just appreciation of what is now actual, and of its effects : to a certain extent, all its future (Economy is involved in like manner' — but is involved more generally, and more distinctly as a consequence than a cause of our union with Christ — as results rather than means of salvation. The future of that great (Economy, therefore, except as it helps to deter¬ mine our actual position, falls more naturally for its precise con¬ sideration, towards the close than towards the commencement of an inquiry into the Knowledge of God Subjectively consid¬ ered. For the present it may be sufficient, in addition to the general statements already made, to say, that what is actual, or what is past, is not more certain nor more distinct in its great outline, than is all the future of this vast (Economy. Nor is that which exists connected with what has gone before more strictly, than what is to come is connected with both. Nay, it never can be made as certain, that when we were enemies, we 102 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK I. were reconciled to God by the death of his Son ; as it is, that being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.1 And so of all the rest. 11. The Scriptures warn us with great emphasis, that divine truth constitutes a sublime system, and that it behooves us to comprehend and respect its divine proportion — not less than to possess with clearness its separate parts. In like manner, as I have repeatedly shown, the administration of this system of truth unto salvation — constitutes a sublime (Economy, whose divine proportion is as real and as intelligible as any particular portion of the stupendous scheme. And in both cases that which is general and that which is particular, mutually affect each other; and the two divine systems mutually influence each other ; and there results from their union a third and more exalted general¬ ization, which is the highest form of knowledge ; perhaps too high for us now, but which we perceive to be real, and to con¬ tain solutions, which are, as yet, beyond our reach. How con¬ tinually are we obliged to reiterate the outlines of the plan of salvation, in order that we may feel the highest foroe of each part of it? In the same way the parts of this perpetual admin¬ istration of salvation enter into its whole (Econom}L It is not merely names, and dates, and epochs, and helps to the memory: it is the recognition of an unbroken concatenation of God's working, the appreciation of a stedfast progress of that working in the development of his eternal counsel, that the words Adamic, Noacic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, signify when applied to ancient dis¬ pensations. And the very same thing is intended when we speak of the personal ministry of Christ — of the dispensation of the Spirit and the Gospel Church state ; and again the very same touching the millennial and heavenly states, with all their won¬ ders, which are still to come. What I urge is this insuperable concatenation between all the parts of this infinite (Economy — this sublime progress of the whole ; the overwhelming grandeur and efficacy of the Knowledge of God attainable in this manner: and the intense relation of the whole aspect of divine things, thus exhibited, to the Covenant of Kedemption as it involves, on one side, the glory of God, and as it reveals and applies, on the other side, the power of God unto salvation. 1 Rom., y. 10. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. ARGUMENT OF THE SECOND BOOK. This Second Book is devoted to the exposition of the work of God, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, in the personal and direct application of the Know¬ ledge of God unto the Salvation of individual men. It is the very action and crisis of the subjective consideration of the saving Knowledge of God. Every thing that has gone before, not only in the First Book of this Treatise, but in the whole of the preceding Treatise, is unto the work developed in this Book. Every thing which can follow is essentially determined by what is settled in this Book. Errors, even grave errors, heretofore or hereafter, might not be fatal : but any fatal error here is wholly destructive. For if our souls can but be saved, the rest is only secondary : but if we miss the way in the actual mat¬ ter of being saved, the rest is utterly worthless. The reader can desire of me no better token, than that I take my own soul in one hand, and the light of life in the other — and bid him if he will bear me company, watch earnestly for the life of his own soul. In the First Chapter of this Book, which is the Sixth of this Treatise — the endeavour is to point out the exact manner in which we be¬ come personally interested in the salvation covenanted in J esus Christ, and indi¬ vidually reap the benefit thereof, in being actually saved. Passing over much that is proved in this Chapter, the main thing established is, that a real and spir¬ itual union is indissolubly established between the human soul and the Person of the Son of God : that, on our part, this is by means of Faith in the Divine Re¬ deemer crucified for us — which Faith is the product of the work of God’s Spirit in our soul — which work of God’s Spirit is the result of our personal redemption by Christ: and that the invariable fruit of this union of the soul with Christ is our fellowship — communion — with him in Grace and in Glory — by means whereof we participate in all the blessings and benefits of the Covenant of Re¬ demption. The Seventh Chapter, which is the Second of this Book, explains in a general manner the nature and effect of that great and decisive work of God in man, which is commonly expressed by the terms — Effectual Calling. In doing this, various incidental questions of the highest importance are discussed , such as the Natural Ability of fallen man to what is spiritually good — the nature of Free Will — the Gospel Call — what is required of man, and what he can do — the relation of certain states of the unrenewed soul to certain states of the re¬ newed soul — the relevancy of the work of God and the nature of man to each 104 ARGUMENT OF THE SECOND BOOK. other; and the like. The main object being to demonstrate the reality, the na¬ ture, the manner, and the effects of a gracious, and effectual vocation by God of the soul of man unto Jesus Christ by the Holy Ghost, through the divine Word; wherein our mind is savingly enlightened, our will is renewed, our conscience is sanctified, and a new heart is given to us ; the result being our present reconcili¬ ation to God, and our endless salvation. The Eighth Chapter, being the Third of this Book, is devoted to the exposition of the scriptural doctrine of man’s Regen¬ eration ; wherein the teaching of Jesus Christ on this subject is carefully consid¬ ered, and the relation of the doctrine taught by him, to the spiritual system of the whole Scriptures, and to human experience, is pointed out; and various incidental questions, such as the state of the soul in Regeneration — the instrumentality of divine Truth therein, and the applicability of this way of salvation to infants, are discussed. The chief matters established being — that fallen men must perish un¬ less they are restored to the image of God : that this restoration is accomplished by a spiritual and personal renovation of , our fallen nature — by the Holy Ghost through divine Truth, in and for the sake of Jesus Christ the Mediator of the Cov¬ enant of Redemption, after the model of God himself : that man incurs this change, being passive in it, after a peculiar manner: the whole being a most sovereign and gracious act of God the Creator of man, and Saviour of sinners, the most remote known reason for which in the case of each individual, is God’s free,*- special, and eternal love for his elect. In the Ninth Chapter, winch is the Fourth of this Book, the doctrine of Pardon and Acceptance of Sinners is disclosed. Its position in the Plan of Salvation is settled — its special office is disclosed — the relations of each Person of the Godhead to the matter are explained — and God shown to be most just and righteous in his gracious, complete, and gratuitous jus¬ tification of regenerate sinners, for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ whose right¬ eousness imputed to us by God, is shown to be the sole meritorious ground of the act of the Father setting us free : and Faith in Christ crucified, wrought in us by the Holy Ghost, to be the sole channel and manner of our receiving that im¬ puted righteousness. In the course of the general argument all the main ques¬ tions of an incidental kind are examined ; and at the close of it, the doctrines of Covenant, of Headship, and of Imputation, are discussed in their mutual rela¬ tions, and their fundamental relevancy to Salvation by Grace. The Tenth Chapter, which is the Fifth of this Book, is employed in setting forth the man¬ ner in which all regenerate and justified sinners become by Adoption, sons and heirs of God : the nature, grounds, and effects of that most gracious act of God : and the relation of the whole matter to us — to the plan of Salvation — -to the Persons of the Godhead — and to the Covenant of Redemption. The analogy between the treatment of the divine Attributes, and the Graces of the Spirit in us, is disclosed : the method of explaining our salvation pointed out by the Apostle Paul in Romans viii., is expounded and applied: our relations to sin, to the law, to God’s providence, and to God himself, are shown to be wholly changed by reason of his adopting us as his sons : our inheritance of all the promises of God is exhibited: our heirship of God, and our joint heirship with Christ — are proved to embrace an indefeasible title, and a present partial posses¬ sion and enjoyment of the whole work and glory of God as Creator, and as Re¬ deemer — and of God himself as our crowning inheritance. And the great sub- ARGUMENT OF THE SECOND BOOK. 105 ject is concluded with some brief statements concerning the principles both gen¬ eral and personal, and the method both abstract and practical, involved in it, and settled by it. The Eleventh Chapter, which is the Sixth of this Book, dis¬ cusses the whole doctrine of Sanctification under four general divisions: in the first of which the relation of the work of Sanctification to the Plan of Salvation, and that of this grace to the great graces before explained, is disclosed : in the second, the nature and characteristics of this crowning grace, and the progress of it in the human soul, with the general exercises of the soul therein, and par¬ ticularly with reference to Faith, to Repentance, and to our Love of God — are traced : in the third, the divinely appointed means of our progressive Sanctifica¬ tion are pointed out, and the manner of their use and influence explained : and in the fourth, the power of God in this dying unto sin, and renewing more and more in entire conformity to Christ, is vindicated — the relation of the Godhead, and each Person thereof to this work in the souls of the children of God is set forth — and the special relevancy of the death and resurrection of Christ to the perfection of the divine life in man, is proved and illustrated : the whole being an attempt to state and sum up the nature, manner, and extent of that complete conformity to God, for which all Christians are commanded to strive. In the Twelfth Chapter, which is the Seventh and last of this Book, the consummation of our communion with Christ in Grace, and the consummation of our commu¬ nion with him in Glory in this life are explained, and the crowning benefits of the Covenant of Redemption bestowed on the children of God in this life, are set forth in their order, and in their connections. The attempt is made to trace the life of God in the soul of man — wholly through the domain of grace into the domain of glory; and to demonstrate the nature, reality, progress, and eternal results of the whole. In this way the First Fruits of Glory — the Earnest of the Spirit — the Sense of God’s Love — Peace of Conscience — Joy in the Holy Ghost — Rejoicing in Hope of the Glory of God : also the nature and extent of the evidence which the soul may obtain and rest on: Spiritual Weakness — Distrust — Doubt — Indifference — Backslidin g — Self-delusion — Perseverance — Assurance ; together with the relation of death, and the resurrection, to the saints, and to the final triumph of the Mediatorial Kingdom — are brought suc¬ cessively under review. In this Book, therefore, Union and Communion with Christ — Effectual Calling — -Regeneration — Justification — Adoption — Sanctifica¬ tion — and the consummation of Grace in the First Fruits of Glory, are dis¬ cussed ; and the Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered, is traced in its divine effects upon and in the human soul, from its first awakening to the con¬ summation of grace : and the whole progress of the soul itself thus exercised, is disclosed, according to the measure of the grace given to me. The grand truths supposed to be established in this Book, stated systematically and in the most summary manner, are those which follow, namely : — That through the applica¬ tion of the benefits of the Covenant of Redemption, by the Holy Ghost, to sin¬ ners redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, they are united by Faith to the divine Saviour — and being so united to Christ, have Communion with him both in Grace and in Glory : — That by a work of divine grace, executed by divine power towards us and in us, which is the result of God’s special and eternal love for us, God draws us by his Word and Spirit, to Jesus Christ his Son our 106 ARGUMENT OF THE SECOND BOOK. Saviour, thus reconciling unto himself by him, all who are redeemed by the Lord Jesus Christ : — That by a saving work of God’s Spirit in the soul, through the instrumentality of divine Truth, and for the merits’ sake of Jesus Christ, our fallen and depraved nature is renewed in the image of God, and the elect of God are thus Born Again : — That by a most gracious act of God, he sets all re¬ generate sinners free from sin and death, accepts their persons and services as righteous, and declares their full right to eternal life, solely on account of the righteousness of Christ imputed to them, and received through Faith alone: — That all sinners thus regenerated and justified, are by a most gracious act of God the Father, for the sake and on the designation of Jesus Christ, Adopted as Sons of God, made heirs of all the promises of God, heirs of God himself, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, the Son of God: — That all these Adopted Sons and heirs of God are, through a constant and increasing Sanctification, fitted for the use and enjoyment of their boundless inheritance: which ocours through the virtue of the death and Resurrection of Christ, by the indwelling of the Word and Spirit of God in their hearts: they being enabled more and more through Repentance toward God and Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, to die unto sin, to be renewed in the spirit of their mind, and to live unto right¬ eousness : — That the children of God saved by Grace, led and taught by the Word and Spirit of God, besides enjoying all the Benefits of the Covenant of Redemption, which are bestowed on them through their Communion with Christ in Grace ; may also enjoy, in this life the First Fruits of Communion with him in Glory, whereby they possess the earnest of their boundless and eternal in¬ heritance, in a settled sense of God’s love, in peace of conscience, in joy in the Holy Ghost, rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. \ CHAPTER VI. THE APPLICATION OF THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION TO INDI¬ VIDUAL MEN : UNION AND COMMUNION WITH THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. I. 1. Man’s Alienation from God, and Perpetual Shortcoming. — 2. Perpetual Neces¬ sity for Special Divine Grace. — 3. These two Facts Combined and Applied : the Result — 4. Special, Determinate, Effectual Salvation. — IT. 1. Prerogatives of the Regenerate : Apostles’ Creed : — ( a ) Communion of Saints : — (5) Forgiveness of Sins: — (c) Resurrection of the Body: — ( d ) Life Everlasting. — 2. Divine Sum¬ mary concerning these Prerogatives: — (a) We are in Christ, and he is made unto us Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption: — (b) This is o/God, and by God: — (c) Thus we are Divinely United to Christ, and have Communion with him : — ( d ) We are Specially Called and Chosen of God hereunto : — (e) And that in Special Contemplation of our own Vileness: — (/) And to put an End to all Glorying, except in him. — III. 1. Immediate Effect of the Application to us of the Benefits of Redemption in our Union and Communion with Christ. — 2. The Mystical Body thus created. — 3. Matters involved in our Union with Christ: — (a) God gives Christ to us, to be our Saviour : — (b) He gives us to Christ, to be his People: — (c) Christ’s Consent to this Union: — ( d ) Our Consent thereto: — ( e ) Un¬ avoidable Certainty of the Result of this Union. — 4. The Spiritual Means whereby this Mystical Union is effected : — (a) On the part of Christ, it is his own Spirit — the Holy Ghost : — (b) On our part, Saving Faith in the Divine Redeemer cruci¬ fied for us: — (c) Infinite Efficacy of these Means. — IV. 1. Fellowship with Christ. — 2. Fruits of our Communion with him. — 3. Communion with him in Grace. — 4. Communion with him in Glory. — 5. Clearness and Certainty of the Results reached. I. — 1. In considering the results of God’s dealings with the human race, nothing is more obvious than the utter shortcoming of man in every condition in which he has been placed. The original fall of man under the Covenant of Works ; the apos- tacy of the race under the first dispensation of the Covenant of Grace, and its almost total destruction by the flood ; the new and nearly complete rejection of God by the whole race during the Noacic dispensation, and the fearful acquiescence in that result manifested by God in the call of Abraham ; \the entire condition of the race thus rejecting God, as exhibited to us during the whole period covered by the Abrahamic and Mosaic 108 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK II. dispensations ; the whole career of the Old Testament Church itself, terminating with the rejection and crucifixion of the Son of God ; and now under the Gospel Church for eighteen centu¬ ries, the deplorable persecutions that Church has endured, the unspeakable evils of which its own corruptions and apostacies have been the cause, and the ceaseless triumph of every form of wickedness, in one immense portion after another of the whole race, through all these centuries ! What are all these but over¬ whelming exhibitions of the utter shortcoming of man — the whole constituting one boundless proof of his alienation from God ? 2. It has been equally manifest throughout the whole career of the human race, and throughout all God's dealings with it, that there has been a perpetual necessity on the part of God, to supplement the ordinary divine helps bestowed by him on man, with special divine aids, in order to secure to man the complete enjoyment of whatever mercies were given to him, or to obtain from him the complete discharge of whatever duties were re¬ quired of him. The more perfectly we understand the condition of all things under the Covenant of Works, the more wonderful it is that man fell ; and in like degree the more clear it is that it was the lack of special divine help — grace — which it was im¬ possible for God to give consistently with the nature of the trial through which man was passing, which made that trial fatal. And the very conception of the Covenant of Grace, and its promulgation after the Fall of man ; and all the successive dispensations of it from Adam to Christ; and the advent and whole work of Christ; and the outpouring and whole work of the Holy Ghost ; and all the dealings of God with men under the New Testament Church: all constitute one unbroken series of the most illustrious proofs that special divine aid — grace — is the one grand and unalterable condition of duty completely discharged, and of mercy completely enjoyed. And if any thing could make the shortcoming of man more distinct, and the need of special grace more conspicuous ; it would be the fact that this being, so impotent to the true and the good, is distinguished most of all by his ineffaceable convic¬ tion of the reality of truth and goodness ; that this being, so averse to God, the only object of all true religion, has no impulse in his nature so deep and so stedfast as his religious impulse, 3. That all men do not participate of the blessings revealed CHAP. VI.] UNION AND COMMUNION WITH CHRIST. 109 in Christ, and embrace the conditions of that eternal life which is brought to light through him ; is therefore no more than a new illustration of the whole career of a race, whose evil deeds show that they love what God calls darkness more than what God calls light.1 That any of them heartily embrace that mercy and completely attain that life ; proves, on the other hand, that special divine aid — grace — has been given to them by God. And that God reveals and applies his merey, not to reprobate vessels of wrath fitted for destruction, but to the objects of his free and special love, making them possessors of the unsearchable riches of his grace ;2 is but the continued manifestation of his entire mode of dealing with man. However we may cavil at this, which is but a way of showing our terrible alienation from God; or however we may justly stand in awe as we behold it : we ought to be fully aware that but for this special grace of God, it is infinitely certain that not a single sinner ever would be saved. At any rate, we cannot deny the reality of this divine way of dealing through special grace, without at the same time rejecting the Scriptures as the word of God, discrediting the whole course of divine providence, refusing all credence to the total history of our race, denying the moral government of God which is administered before our face, disbelieving the testimony of every renewed soul, and silencing alike the voice of conscience and the voice of God's Spirit within us. Tie who can do all this, will have for his pains only this, that he is a living proof of the truth which he denies ; for if grace were not special, he might not have been what he is. 4. The Word was made flesh : they that believe on his name become the sons of God : for they are born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.3 They are born again, born from above, born of the Spirit.4 For the sons of God are as many as are led by the Spirit of God.5 By his own blood Christ has obtained eternal redemption for us.6 And all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him are amen unto the glory of God by us.7 God according to his mercy saves us by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through J esus Christ our Saviour ; that being justified by his grace, we should 1 John, iii. 19. 2 Rom., ix. 22, 23; 1 Cor., ii. 8-16. 3 John, i. 12, 13. 4 John, iii. 3 -7. 5 Rom., viii. 14. 6 Heb., ix. 12. 7 2 Cor., i. 20. 110 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK II. be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.1 All that the Father giveth me, saith Christ, shall come to me ; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.2 Such statements as these — and the number of them throughout the Scriptures is past computation — -cover the case in all its possible bearings, and hardly admit of being wrested out of their clear sense. Touching the present matter, their simple and naked declaration is, that the elect of God, being redeemed by the blood of Christ, are made partakers of all the benefits of that redemption, by the Holy Ghost. Every thing is special, every thing is determinate, every thing is effectual. Nor is it possible for us to conceive how it could be otherwise, viewed from the divine side of such questions : nor viewed from the hu¬ man side of them, how it could be possible for any sinner to be saved, if it were otherwise. If we could prove that God does not choose us- — what we would gain would be our infallible per¬ dition. If we admit that he does choose us, then he must have changed his mind concerning us, or his purpose to choose us must be eternal. But he tells us plainly not only that his choosing us — our election by him — is of grace, and according to his own pur¬ pose ; but that our salvation and the holy calling which fits us for it, are not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.’"' II. — 1. The earliest, the most comprehensive, and the most universally accepted of all the summaries of faith which have existed among Christians — that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed — has recapitulated the chief prerogatives of which the elect of God, by the specific application to them of the benefits of redemption by the blood of Christ, are made par¬ takers through the Holy Ghost.3 That ancient symbol states first the faith of all Christians concerning God the Father, sec- ondly concerning the Son ; thirdly concerning the Holy Ghost ; and fourthly concerning the Church. In this last division the great prerogatives of believers are stated under four heads, thus : 1 Titus, iii. 4-7. a John, vi. 37, 39. * Kar’ iK?iOyrjv Horn., XL 5. — Kar’ iK’Xoyrjv tt podecug. Rom., ix. 11. — Kar’ idiav npoOeoiv Kai x^PLV T*)v ^ odeloav ijp.lv iv XpLvru 'Irjcov tt pb XP°VU v clluvluv. 2 Tim., i. 9. 3 John, L 12, 13. CHAP. VI.] UNION AND COMMUNION WITH CHRIST. Ill (a) The Communion of Saints. For we are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God ; and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cor¬ ner stone.1 And we are come unto Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innu¬ merable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the first born, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than the blood of Abel.2 ( b ) The Forgiveness of Sins. For there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not alter the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.3 Moreover, as God not only foreknows and predestinates his children, but also justifies and glorifies them, who can gainsay these things ? If God be for us, who can be against us P If God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things ? Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect, when God himself justifies them ?4 (c) The Kesurrection of the Body. For the declaration of Christ is express that the hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of Man, and shall come forth ; they that have done good, unto the resurrec¬ tion of life ; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.6 For the Lord Jesus Christ, if he be our Saviour, will change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things to himself.6 Children of the first Adam who was made a living soul, and was of the earth, earthy, we have borne the image of the earthy : children of the second Adam, who was a quickening spirit, and the Lord from heaven, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly : and thus we shall possess the kingdom which flesh and blood cannot inherit — and wherein death is swallowed up in victory.7 (d) Life Everlasting. For God will give eternal life to them 1 Eph., ii. 19, 20. 3 Heb., xii. 22-24. 3 Rom., viiu 1, 2. 4 Rom., viii. 29-33. s John, v. 28, 29. 6 PhiL, iil 20, 21. 7 1 Cor., xv. 45-54. 112 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK II. who by patient continuance in well-doing, seek for glory and honour and immortality.1 And though sin hath reigned unto death, even so shall grace reign through righteousness unto eter¬ nal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.2 For while the wages of sin is death, the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.3 Yea, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for those who are kept by the mighty power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.4 2. A summary, still more thorough and complete, of the benefits secured to us in the Covenant of Redemption, together with the ground of their bestowal on us, and the manner in which they are effectually applied to us, is furnished in a single sentence given by inspiration of God. But of him — namely, God — are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us Wis¬ dom, and Righteousness, and Sanctification, and Kedemption.5 That is to say : (a) We bear to Christ Jesus such a relation as God expresses by saying, JVe are in him : and Christ Jesus bears such a rela¬ tion to us as God expresses by saying that he is made unto us Wisdom, Kighteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption. (h) In both respects this relation between us and Christ Jesus has occurred in such a manner, as God expresses by say¬ ing that we are in him of God , and that he is made unto us by God. (c) We being so in Christ Jesus of God, as to possess by him, and to partake through and in him of Wisdom, Righteous¬ ness, Sanctification, and Redemption : and Christ Jesus being so made by God unto us, Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption ; we are actually united to Christ Jesus, and that by a divine work ; and actually have communion with him in grace and in glory. (A) To this, let it be added as distinctly taught in immediate connection with the summary we are considering, and as exple¬ tive of it, that we were called of God unto this fellowship of his 1 Rom., ii . 1. 2 Rom., v. 21. 4 1 Peter, L 3-5. 5 1 Cor., L 30. 3 Rom., vi. 23. CHAP. VI.] UNION AND COMMUNION WITH CHRIST. 113 Son Jesus Christ our Lord r1 that to those thus called of God, Christ crucified is the power of God ana the wisdom :2 that the grace of God which is given them by Jesus Christ, enriches them in every thing :3 and that waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, he will confirm them unto the end, that they may be blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ/ (e) That God, in this whole procedure of his grace, chose and called his saints in contemplation of their being foolish things of the world, chosen to confound the wise : weak things of the world, chosen to confound the mighty; base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things which are.5 (/) And, finally, we are plainly told, that it was in the wis¬ dom of God that the world by wisdom knew not God, and that it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe:6 that this very preaching of the cross which is the power of God to them which are saved, is to them that perish foolish¬ ness :7 and that the whole procedure of God in the choosing, calling, and saving his saints, was precisely and eternally de¬ signed to stop all flesh from glorying in his presence, and to cause that all that gloried should glory in the Lord :8 every thing being the result of that favour which God shows towards us, and of those gifts which he bestows upon us, which are the two chief senses of the phrase, The Grace, of God. III. — 1. The immediate effect upon us of the application to us of the benefits secured for us by the Covenant of Kedemption, and of the bestowment upon us of the first fruits thereof ; is, as has been already intimated, our Union and Communion with the Mediator of that Covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ. And what immediately results from that, is our Communion with all saints — which is the first benefit stated in the Apostles’ Creed ; the truth of which I have before shown, and the full exposition of which will occupy us hereafter. United to our covenant Head by faith, our persons are beloved, and our services are accepted in him, and we receive all grace and all good from him.9 And united to all saints by love, we have a participation in all that distinguishes them and us, as partakers of one common sal¬ vation. 1 1 Cor., i. 8. 3 1 Cor., i. 24. 3 1 Cor., i. 4. 4 1 Cor., i. I, 8. 6 1 Cor., L 21, 28. 6 1 Cor., i. 21. 7 1 Cor., i. 18. 8 1 Cor., i. 29-31. 9 John, i. 16, 17 ; Eph., ii. 4-13. VOL. II. 8 114 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK II. 2. In the contemplation of God, as I have shown fully in a previous chapter, the Covenant of Redemption in its most funda¬ mental sense, had relation to the elect of God ; and each person of the Godhead stood related therein to the special work he would perform — the special part he would take in their salvation. This is so emphatic concerning the Son, who, besides being a party to that covenant, became the Mediator of it between God and men; that all the redeemed became parties in interest to it as repre¬ sented by him, who as their covenant head engaged for their re¬ demption and received them as his : and they became actually his in their regeneration in a personal covenant with him. That body of which Christ is the head is mystical, that is it is both real and spiritual, and is made up of elect sinners, redeemed by him, and all united to him by faith, and to each other by love ; as I have before said. Innumerable statements of the Scriptures relate to this universal and invisible Church of Christ, and to his relation to it as Lord, and Ruler, and Redeemer, and Head, and Husband, and all in all : and one whole Book (Can¬ ticles) is devoted to the elucidation, by means of the most sacred and intimate of all human relations, of the ties between the Sa¬ viour and his elect Bride. The union of this whole bod}^, and of every member of it, with the person of Christ, is a mystical union, that is a real and spiritual one ; and the manner of its oc¬ currence is also mystical, but yet real and spiritual ; so that the body itself, and its union with Christ, and the manner in which that union is effected, are all of one and the same nature. There is nothing metaphorical in the case, much less any thing imagi¬ nary: neither is there any thing physical or corporal. But never¬ theless it is real, regard being had to the things united: for while the Apostle admits it to be a great mystery, he asserts the fact that our nature, soul, and body, are united to the soul and body of Christ, for we are declared to be members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones 2 nay, in a certain sense, the church is the very body of Christ, and each saint a particular member of that body 2 and they are all made partakers of the divine nature.3 When we have regard, on the other hand, to the means whereby the mystery of this union is wrought, they are all spiritual means, and will be pointed out directly. And so the union between Christ and the believer, which immediately results from the ap- i Eph., v. 29-32. 2 1 Cor., xii. 21. 3 2 Peter, i. 4. CHAP. VI.] UNION AND COMMUNION WITH CHRIST. 115 plication to us of the benefits of Kedemption, is a union at once real and spiritual ; and is, therefore, properly called mystical. 3. This union with Christ involves immediate and boundless results ; and that so fundamentally, that we cannot conceive properly of its occurrence, without conceiving of those matters thus indispensably connected with it. For examjfle, (a) In this act, God gives Christ to us to be our Saviour ; thus accomplishing the very purpose of his free and special love. For, said Christ, God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.1 And so Christ said again, I have man¬ ifested thy name to the men which thou gavest me out of the world : thine they were, and thou gavest them me ; and they have kept thy word.2 (< b ) In this act, also, God gives us to Christ, to be his peo¬ ple, and to be saved by him ; thus accomplishing the most fun¬ damental stipulation of the Covenant of Grace, and the unal¬ terable purpose of God to have a seed to serve him. For it is written, that both he that sanctifieth and they who are sancti¬ fied are all of one : for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name unto my breth¬ ren. And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.3 And Christ has explicitly told us, that he is entirely and exclusively the Master of all who are united to him.4 (c) It was in contemplation of this very union between Christ and all believers that the method of the grace of God by way of the Incarnation of the Son, became the way of salvation for fallen men : and in full view thereof, that the Son covenanted to redeem us, and to receive us as his, thus united to him. For in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren.3 And forasmuch as the children which God had given him, are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil ; and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.6 And so he consented to become Immanuel, which is, God with us, and to be called Jesus, which is, Saviour.7 1 John, iii. 16. 2 John, xvii. 6. 3 Heb., i. 11-13. i Matt, xxiii. 8-10. s Heb., i. 17. 6 Heb., ii. 14, 15. ' Isa., vii. 14; Matt., i. 21-23. 116 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK II. (c£) Our consent to this union with Christ, is the very foun¬ dation of our taking him to he our Lord — the very essence of our professing his name — the very expression of our taking his yoke upon us — the very proof of our divine call. For, said Christ, no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.1 And the burden of the song of the Bride is, I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.3 And his children express their delight in him by saying, I am the Lord’s ; and by calling themselves after his name.3 And the rest thev find unto their souls, is by taking his yoke upon them, and learning of him.4 (e) It may be readily conceded — -and is theoretically unques¬ tionable, that even after all this, the sinner if left to himself would certainly apostatize from Christ, and perish : the grounds of which statement being numerous, and chiefly very obvious, need not be recapitulated here, out of their place — farther than to note the general fact, that however far the restoration of fallen man may proceed in this life, it is not perfected here. But we are to bear in mind that the union with Christ is an inseparable union ; that the act of God giving Christ to us, and the act giv¬ ing us to Christ, are irrevocable, covenant acts ; that Christ has actually performed his part of the covenant, and the Father, and the Holy Ghost, have commenced the performance of theirs, and gone a great length therein — all which has been proved : and then, it appears to me, that the whole grounds of the theoretical possibility, much less certainty of the perdition of a soul once united to Christ, vanish at once. Now let us add, point by point, that the love of God is everlasting, and the love of Christ un¬ changeable :5 that the Covenant of Redemption is an everlasting covenant ordered in all things and sure :6 that Christ’s interces¬ sion for his people is continual and effectual :7 that the divine seed and Spirit of God abide in every one that is born of God :8 that they have the explicit promise that they shall not depart from him, and the distinct assurance of Christ that they shall never perish :9 and finally that there is an inheritance, incorrupt¬ ible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for those whom God hath begotten again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto which they are 1 John, yi. 65. 2 Song of Sol., ii. 16; vi. 3; vii. 10. 3 Isa., xliv. 5. 4 Matt., xi. 20. 5 jer., xxxi. 3 ; John, xiii. 1. 6 15 . j0hn> Xy. 5, 6. 7 Matt., xvi. 17 ; 1 Thess., v. 23. s isa., lxiy., 6 ; Eph., i. G. GOOD WORKS. 309 CHAP. XVI.] Works. Indeed in its widest sense it embraces, in some sort, under the name of Charity the very sum and essence of our New Obedience, as manifested towards each other : while in its nar¬ rowest sense, as Alms , it is a recognition at once of the common brotherhood of mankind, the common salvation through Christ, and the common Fatherhood of God : and in all its manifesta¬ tions, it is the expression of that communion with each other in Love, which results from our mutual communion with Christ through Faith. Behold, said the angel of the Lord to the shep¬ herds of Bethlehem, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour, wdiich is Christ the Lord. And then a mul¬ titude of the heavenly host burst forth in praise : Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.1 And this is the sum of the mission of the Saviour of the world — su¬ preme glory to God — boundless peace between God and men and between man and man — supreme complacency from God to men and from man to his brother man. The sublime principle which underlies the performance of our duties to each other, as a remedy against the sin and suffering and sorrow of this life ; is the divine restoration in Christ and the powerful working through the Spirit, of the brotherhood of man. A glorious truth — defaced in man’s soul by the fall — unspeakably weakened and perverted by the degradation into which actual sins sink the soul — never utterly lost as an original element of our being, and completely restored as a living power, in the life and doctrine of Christ, and made effectual in us by the work of the divine Spirit. 4. The same word* which is used to express the love of God for us, and our love for him, is used to express both the state of our soul and our outward act, both in our endeavours to glorify God, and in our endeavours to do good, both to the souls and the bodies of our fellow-men. Our English words love and char¬ ity, are both used to translate the one Greek word. It is this wide meaning of the Greek term, and the very near resemblance between the meaning of the two English words in their evangeli¬ cal use ; which throws some occasional obscurity over them, with regard to matters so distinct as God’s feeling toward us, our feel¬ ings toward him, and our feelings toward our fellow-creatures. Love to us, by God, is the very foundation of his eternal purpose * Ayanrj. 1 Luke, ii. 8-14. 310 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IIL to save us, for the glory of his own great name : and that same love to us, is the moving principle throughout the whole process of our salvation : and its fruition by us is the measure in which grace is accomplished in us, and glory is bestowed upon us. Our love to God — taking our whole being together — is the one deci¬ sive mark — the one unmistakable distinction between his servants and his enemies. It is this deep, practical fact — them who love God — upon which the whole theory and practice of salvation is divinely explained to men. For it is for them that all things work together for good — it is they who are eternally known of God — they who were eternally predestinated to be conformed to the image of the Son of God — they who are in time called of God and justified — they who are glorified for evermore : and they are they whom nothing shall ever be able to separate from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.1 In like manner, the love of man, naturally, for his fellow-men ; parent, child, hus¬ band, wife, friend, brother, kinsman, neighbour, countryman, fellow-creature ; this is the very testimony of our nature to our unity as a race — and to our common Father, Benefactor, Creator. And Christian love in the renewed soul, is precisely that wherein they who are united to Jesus Christ by Faith, and so have com¬ munion with him ; have also communion wTith all others thus united to him. Our English word charity expresses a peculiar type of Christian grace ; that, namely, in the exercise of which our love for God and man, prompts us to promote the glory of God, by promoting the good, both temporal and spiritual, of our fellow-creatures. 5. It is not surprising, therefore, that our divine Master, in his office of Teacher of men, and his inspired Apostles following him, should have explained and enforced this greatest of all graces, with so much fulness. In his Sermon on the Mount, which embraced every thing, every leading aspect of this grace is pre¬ sented.' The same great Apostle who has written a treatise on Faith, already considered, has also written one on Charity.3 Hav¬ ing taught us immediately before it,4 the excellence of all the special gifts of the Spirit, and yet that all the graces of the Spirit are more excellent even than miraculous gifts : and teaching us immediately after it, that the grace whereby we may be of benefit 1 Rom., viii. 28-39. 2 Matt., v. 21-26, 27-32, 38-42, 43-48 ; vi. 1-4. 3 1 Cor., xii. passim. 1 1 Cor., xiii. CHAP XVI.] GOOD WORKS. 311 to others in the knowledge of the Lord, is that which charity leads us to desire most of all :* between these two conceptions he enforces, in detail, the nature and the preeminence of this crown¬ ing grace. The conclusion he reaches is thus stated : And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three : hut the greatest of these is charity.2 Greater than faith, by which the just live, and without which it is impossible to please God : greater than hope — by which we are saved : greatest of all is charity — charity that never faileth ! The life of God in the soul of man, nourished by that faith which is the evidence of things not seen — the substance of things hoped for — •rejoicing in the hope of the glory of God — is habitually manifested in, this life, by that love of God which prompts us to seek his glory and the good of our fellow-men. Still more exclusively in the life to come, is this abounding love the very substance of our eternal life. For the time will come when all that is now realized to us only through faith, will be immediately realized in the presence of God ; and when every pure and earnest hope will be fulfilled in the endless fruition of God. But to all eternity — our love for God and for each other — • and our rejoicing, through this love, in the glory of God and the blessedness of each other — can know no change, unless to be eter¬ nally increased. 6. It is this exalted and imperishable Christian love, which in a peculiar form of it receives the name of charity — that re¬ ceives in a lower form of it the name of Almsgiving. Between these two hums of it, or blending with one or other of these, there is nothing in the way of personal offort, or sacrifice, for the glory of God or the good of our fellow-beings, that could bo called a Good W ork, that does not find its place. The exposition and en¬ forcement of this immense and blessed department of the Christian Offices, belong especially to the ministry of the word : to teach all nations to observe whatever Jesus has commanded — being the very duty he has laid upon them.3 The practice of these Christian Of¬ fices, in all simplicity, all strictness, all fulness, is, so far as this life is concerned, the very thing for which we are fitted by that workmanship of God, wherein we are created in Christ Jesus unto Good Works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.4 And the blessed hope which we cherish of the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, 1 1 Cor., xiv. 2 1 Cor., xiii. 13. 3 Matt., xxviii. 20. 4 Eph , ii. 10. 312 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. can never be separated from the conviction that he gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of Good Works.1 It will not do for us to say — Thou hast faith, and I have works ; the Gospel of God admits of no such dislocation ; for, on the one hand, faith without works is dead ; and on the other, by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified.2 That which espe¬ cially wearies God with the wickedness of those who profess to obey him, is that they should call such as do evil, good in the sight of the Lord — and say that he delighteth in them.3 That which peculiarly provokes him with all false teachers, he ex¬ presses by saying, Because ye have made the heart of the right¬ eous sad, whom I have not made sad, and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, by promising him life.4 Many, said the blessed Saviour, will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name have cast out devils, and in thy name have done many wonderful works ? And then will I profess unto them — I never knew you : depart from me, ye that work iniquity.5 7. I have already said that every leading aspect of this great grace was presented in the wonderful Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the merciful, said Christ ; for they shall obtain mercy : and teaching us how to perform the duty, every where commanded in the Scriptures, he bids us perform our alms in secret ; and our Father which seeth in secret shall reward us openly.0 The very word we translate Alms , means mercy :* and the act intended — that act of Christian love wherein they who have this world's goods bestow thereof on those who are in want — is constantly recognized as a Good Work. It is both a duty and a grace. God loveth a cheerful giver : and his children with a free purpose of heart — not grudgingly, or of necessity, but abounding in every Good Work, perform this act of their New Obedience through the grace of God.7 Considered as a duty, none is more strictly commanded. From of old God has said, The poor shall never cease out of the land : therefore I command thee, saying, thou shalt open thy hand wide to thy brother, to 1 Titus, ii. 13, 14. 8 Rom., iii. 20; James, ii. IT, 18. 3 Mai., ii. 17. 4 Ezek., xiii. 22. ' Matt., vii. 22, 23. 6 Matt., v. 7 ; vi. 1—4. * UXerj/ioowT) — misericordia. 7 2 Cor., ix. 6-15. GOOD WORKS. 313 CHAP. XVI.] thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land.1 To do good and to communicate are sacrifices, under the Gospel Dispensation, and with such God is well pleased.2 At our highest estate we are hut stewards of the manifold grace of God ; and as good stewards we ought to minister one to another, according as every man has received from God. Above all things, therefore, we are exhorted to have fervent charity among ourselves : for charity shall cover a multitude of sins. And in stewards the first thing required is, that a man be found faithful.3 Nay, of him who dispenseth to the poor, it is written, that his righteousness endureth for ever, and that his horn shall be exalted with honour.4 And so strongly does Christ enforce almsgiving as a Christian duty, that in his caution to us to take heed that we do not our alms* before men to be seen of them, and thereby lose our reward with our Father which is in Heaven ;5 the word he uses means righteousness : and then follows his special direction touching alms,f as one depart¬ ment of the righteousness required of us. The Mosaic institu¬ tions provided for nothing more carefully, than to alleviate all the ills of poverty : and in the Gospel Church, a class of perpetual office bearers was ordained of God — whose functions relate di¬ rectly to the temporal sorrows, afflictions, and necessities of men.6 The great declaration of the Lord, descriptive of his kingdom — The poor have the Gospel preached to them — is not more precise than his great command to all his followers, Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.7 II. — 1. Considering the mixed and confused state of things which this life exhibits to us, we are able to reduce its fearful chaos of events, and actions, and motives, and vicissitudes, to any comprehensible order ; only when the light of the past history of our race, and the light from a future world, are thrown upon a scene of things otherwise so full of contradictions and enig¬ mas. If we accept the evil as the result upon a glorious exist¬ ence, of the shock which it incurred in the loss of the image and favour of God by the Fall ; and the good, as the result of that divine grace which has brought to light salvation through a Be- 1 Deut., xx. 11. 2 Heb., xiii. 16. 3 i pet.? iv. 8-10 ; 1 Cor., iv. 2. 4 Ps. cxii. 9. * A LKaoavvT] — sequitas — justitia — pietas. s Matt., vi. 1. f E?.erjfioovvTj — misericordia. 6 Deut., xv. passim*; Acts, ,vi. 1-*. 7 Matt., v. 42 ; xi. 5. 314 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. deemer : then the key of the frightful paradox is placed in our hands, and a principle of order passes with irresistible force through the whole life of the world, and through the boundless and confused mass of human actions. What we behold is a preparation for a future state of existence — a probation, cease¬ less and manifold — with reference to an endless state of being, widely different from this. Who are on the Lord's side ? And who are on the side of Satan ? Of the former, what mansion will they inhabit in that world of light — what crown will they wear there ? Of the latter, how near will they approach the gate of Heaven before they turn downward to the pit ? How much wrath will they heap up for themselves against the day of wrath ? Concerning all, how long and how far will the grace of God endure towards each one of them ? To what height of perfection will he carry some before he takes them to himself? After what fatal grieving of his Spirit, will he leave others to make their bed in hell ? A manifold probation — a perpetual preparation — not only of the whole race, but of each individual of it : from the distant past and from the distant future, a light divinely shed upon the mighty struggle which makes its nature clear : the result, as to our personal knowledge of it, adjourned to the judgment of the great day. This is wdiat we behold : of this we are, each one, a part. Into this chaos thus expounded to us of God, his infinite grace, which has done so much besides, casts this divine element of Good Works, such as I have tried to describe it. The nature, the use, the efficacy, the result of such a remedy, in such a world : all this is peculiar to Messiah. It is his conception, his work : his glory is staked upon the result : and having sealed his purpose, and his conviction with his blood, he will not shrink from the perfect execution of his plan. 2. Do men desire to be happy P Do they desire to be holy ? Weary and heavy laden with the burden of sin, do they sigh for rest, and yearn for deliverance from the bondage under which they groan ? There is one way — and there never was any other — whereby we may get peace unto our souls. God has said there is no peace to the wicked. Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly before God. Fear God, and keep his commandments. This is the whole duty of man : and therein is his whole blessedness. It is the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all sin : it is his Spirit that leadeth into all truth : it is his precepts, in the keep- GOOD WORKS. 315 CHAP. XVI.] ing of which there is great reward, even a hundredfold in this life of all we have forsaken to follow him, and in the world to come eternal life. The evil propensities of our natures languish and die, as we walk by the side of the Son of Man : and all pure desires, and all right emotions, and all good thoughts, spring up in the soul in which bis image dwells. If we will obey his com¬ mandments, we shall know his doctrine, whether it be of God. If men did but understand that it is more blessed to give than to receive : that to confer happiness is itself the noblest form of happiness : that to be good, we must do good ! It is Jesus who has conceived the sublime idea, that instruction and persuasion, in opposition to violence and force, are the real foundations of universal dominion. It is he alone who has taught us, that good¬ ness, and love, and mercy, cherished in our hearts, and mani¬ fested towards our sinning and perishing fellow-creatures, are the true sources of what felicity is attainable on earth. 'Vengeance is mine, saith God ; I will repay. For us, not vengeance, but Good Works, is what he requires us to pursue, if we would glo¬ rify him, or have peace in our own soul. 3. Would men be useful, as well as happy ? Indeed, can we conceive of happiness on any other condition ? Then let us rather say, are men willing to be happy on condition of being useful to their fellow-creatures, and therein accepted of God, the fountain of all blessedness P Then let them look abroad upon a world lying in sin — upon a countless race of one blood with them¬ selves, sunk in misery : and then let them consider what the Sa¬ viour of this ruined world and this suffering race means by Good Works, and by all his loving appeals to us to practise them. He means edification to every living soul : he means comfort alike to the soul and body of every one whose nature the Son of Man has taken, every one whose nature we ourselves share. Our own household first : then our kindred, friends, neighbours : then our countrymen : then all the world. Above the rest, but not to the exclusion of them, the household of faith. To save them from hell, to lead them in the way of eternal life, to alleviate the evils of their present estate, and to promote their edification and com¬ fort with' reference to this life as well as to the next : such is the conception our Lord has of what our duty both to him and to each other requires ; of what our own hearts will prompt us to do, in proportion as his Spirit dwells in us. The whole is the fruit 316 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. of our New Obedience : the whole is expressed when we say, Good Works. There is a wisdom which descendeth not from above : but the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.1 4. That which so intimately concerns our happiness, our holi¬ ness, and our usefulness in this life — which so conclusively deter¬ mines the reality and the extent of our consecration to Christ ; will, in the life to come, and in the eternal judgment which stands between this life and that, reappear in all its overpower¬ ing force. In this mixed, probationary, preparatory state of things, the righteous and the wicked dwell and struggle to¬ gether : and God's sun shines upon the good and the evil, and he sendeth his rain upon the just and the unjust, and he openeth his hand and satisfieth the desire of every living thing. Never¬ theless, it is appointed unto men once to die, and afterwards to be judged : and that God hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained, he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.2 Behold, I come quickly, is the solemn warning ; and my reward is with me, to give to every man accord¬ ing as his work shall be.3 And I saw the dead, says the Apostle John, small and great, stand before God : and the books were opened : and another book was opened which is the book of life : and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.4 Then has fully come the time for the unjust to be shown to be unjust, and the filthy to be filthy ; and for the righteous to be shown to be righteous, and the holy to be holy : and for each one to receive a just recom¬ pense of reward.5 The wheat and the tares shall no longer grow together : the end of the world will have come, and the Son of Man shall send forth his angels to reap the harvest of this world, and .the good seed are the children of the Kingdom : the tares are the children of the wicked one, and the enemy who sowed them the Devil : they shall be cast into a furnace of fire, and there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth : then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.6 i James, iil 15-17. 3 Rev., xxii. 12. 5 Rev., xxii. 10, 11. 3 Acts, xvii. 31. 4 Rev., xx. 12. 6 Matt., xiii. 36—13. CHAP. XVI.] GOOD WORKS. 317 This is the exposition made by Christ of one of the most remark¬ able of his parables. 5. The Scriptures do not teach that the question whether we are brethren of Christ or children of the Devil, will be decided by the nature of our works in the day of judgment ; in any other sense than as making judicially manifest that which had been accepted of God on widely different grounds, and acted on by him, as already determined, in every preceding part of our exist¬ ence. Nor, indeed, is the general judgment itself in order to de¬ termine who are the followers of Christ, and who are the children of the Devil : for that is already determined before the judgment is set, in the very nature of the resurrection which precedes it, as well as in every act of God towards man since the Fall. But in the great day, and in the general judgment of all men, according to their works ; the special relation of our works to our eternal destiny, is the settlement of the exact reward to each child of God, and his exact position in the glorified kingdom, and the settlement of the precise condemnation, and the grounds thereof, of each child of the Devil : and on both sides, and in every indi¬ vidual case, the illustration to the universe of the infinite per¬ fections and glory of God. Therefore, say the Scriptures, other foundation can no man lay than is laid, which is Jesus Christ.1 Christ — not our own works — is the sole cause of our salvation. But touching our works and our reward, the Apostle immedi¬ ately adds, Now if any man build on this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble : every man's work shall be made manifest : for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire ; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built there¬ upon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss : but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.2 Christ has taught us in one of his parables, the utter exclusion of all who rest on any other foundation : and in another he has explained to us how perfectly our own mistakes concerning ourselves will be rectified when he passes judgment on our Good Works. To one the King said, Friend, how earnest thou in hither not having a wedding garment P Bind him hand and foot and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness : there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.3 To another, when 1 1 Cor., iii. 11. 2 1 Cor., iii. 12-15. 3 Matt., xxii. 11-13. 318 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. a man more honourable than he had come, he said, Give this man place. And to a third he said, Friend, go up higher.1 The Saviour's conclusion of both of these parables is remarkable. To the former, he adds, For many are called, but few chosen : and to the latter, For whosoever exalteth himself shall he abased ; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.2 It is, therefore, the doctrine of Christ, that the reward of the righteous and the punishment of the wicked, will be according to their works. He that gained ten talents, will he rewarded above him that gained five ; while he that gained nothing, hut hid his Lord's money in the earth, will see the one talent committed to him, taken from him and given to him who had ten, while the slothful and dis¬ obedient servant will be cast into outer darkness. For, adds Christ, Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance : hut from him that hath not, shall he taken away even that which he hath.3 6. The moment we couple the idea of reward with the idea of Good Works, which the Scriptures do continually ; we pass at once out of the domain of law, into that of grace. Law knows nothing about reward to those who keep it. It gives protection, it offers redress, it approves, it punishes. He who has gained ten talents is protected in their possession and enjoyment, or is made to account to him whose steward he was. But the law says nothing about making him ruler over ten cities. That is favour — reward — grace. That is the act — not of the law — but of the Lawgiver : nor is it his act as lawgiver, but as sovereign and bountiful ruler — patron — friend. But this case, obvious and naked as it is, is far stronger than any we can ever present : since the conduct of him who gained the ten talents was blameless, as under the law whereas all our Good Works are of themselves imperfect, and become doubly imperfect as soon as their charac- tei is detei mined by our nature as sinners. When we say, there- foie, that om Good Works will be the measure of the reward graciously bestowed on us by God — we must go farther even than we have already gone, when it was shown that they must be built upon Christ as the only foundation that is, or can be laid. Oui persons and oui works must not only be accepted in him — and oui ability to perform such as will be accepted, derived from him , but our paiticulai imperfection in every work we attempt, 1 Luke, xiv. 8-10. 3 Matt, xxi. 14; Luke, xiv. 11. 3 Matt., xxv. 29. GOOD WORKS. 319 CHAP. XVI.] and the particular imperfection of every work of itself, when we and it are judged by an infinitely holy God, according to an in¬ finitely holy law ; make it impossible for us or our works to be approved, much less rewarded, except as Christ covers them and us with his infinite righteousness. As under grace, our Good Works are the measure of our reward : and so they find a place under the Covenant of Redemption — and so our imperfect obe¬ dience is accepted as if it were perfect, on account of the perfect obedience of the Saviour with whom we are united, and who pre¬ sents us and our works faultless before God. And in this sense it is written, God is not unrighteous to forget your work and la¬ bour of love, which ye have showed towards his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints and do minister.1 And so the sub¬ lime exhortation of him that hath the key of David is, Behold I come quickly, hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.2 7. Seeing the relation of our Good Works to our own comfort and usefulness in this life, and to our eternal state in the life to come ; we see therein abundant reason for the prominence given to them by the word of God. But there are other aspects of the subject, to which I can only allude, which present other grounds, not less decisive, concerning the nature and necessity of these fruits of our New Obedience. I will suggest but two : namely, that it is by them alone we can adorn the doctrine we profess — and it is through them alone we can glorify God upon earth, with our bodies and our spirits which are his. The end of our faith is, indeed, the salvation of our own soul : and the good of others, whose salvation and comfort we have the means of promoting, is the obvious matter to which our efforts should be directed. But this is not the whole of our vocation — the sum of our mission as children of the King Eternal. God permits us — desires us — fits us, to love him. Our love is the return he asks for all he has done for us. To be very jealous for the glory of his great name, well becomes those whom he has made heirs of the glory of tho work of creation, of providence, and of grace ; to whom, having given all else, he gives himself, to be enjoyed by them for ever. The Saviour Christ — has given himself for us. Above all that he does for us — there is himself — the God-man : the perfection of all the glory of the Godhead — the perfection of all human ex- 1 Heb., vl 30. 3 Rev., iii. 11. 320 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. cellence — united in one being — and presented to us as the object of supreme desire. If it were not for the stupidity which sin be¬ gets, what should prevent our joyful, rapturous consecration to the Son of Man ? And then, if any doctrine can be conceived to be capable of filling the souls of men with boundless confidence and admiration : if any system can be supposed to fasten itself with all power upon the understanding and heart of men : if there is any thing which can be taught, apprehended, and made effica¬ cious, so as to lead captive the intellectual and moral nature we possess : surely all these transcendent conditions will be allowed by every renewed soul, to unite supremely in the way of life re¬ vealed to men. Now this glorious God, this loving Saviour, this divine doctrine, are to be glorified, illustrated, adorned by us. The one way of doing this they all express alike ; it is by those fruits of a New Obedience which they call Good Works. Who shall wonder that true, loving, and heroic spirits, full of the powder of divine grace, comprehend this voice from heaven ! Who shall wonder that they who are sold under sin, believe them to be mad ! III. — 1. I have shown in another place, that the will of the Creator, and not his own will, is the rule by which every crea¬ ture is obliged to regulate his conduct : and that the will of the Saviour, and not his own will, is the rule by which every sinner is obliged to regulate his conduct. The only living and true God, is both the Creator and Saviour of the sinful creature man : and therefore, his revealed will is the absolute and infallible rule, ac¬ cording to which all that he can accept as a Good Work, must be performed by us. This revealed will of God is the highest, and the only perfect expression to us, of that eternal and inef¬ faceable distinction in things which we intend by the words Good and Evil : and the faculty which he gave us, in creation, to dis¬ cern and to be influenced by what was good, and the Moral Law which he wrote on our hearts, afforded us the means of discern¬ ing his will and the rule of obedience to it. The difficulty which now exists, is produced by the shock our nature received in the fall of man : whereby, both our ability to discern good, and the law within our hearts prompting us to pursue it, are so deeply and fatally deranged by the entrance of evil into the essence of our being. What we need, therefore, to enable us unto perfect Good Works, is to recover a perfect knowdedge of the will of God, and a perfect ability to regulate our conduct by it. Neither of GOOD WORKS. 321 CHAP. XVI.] these is possible in this life : so that perfect Good Works are impossible to us. But through Jesus Christ revealed to us, and revealed in us, the knowledge of the will of God, and our ability to discern and keep it, are so far restored to us, that our imper¬ fect endeavours to regulate our conduct by it, are accepted of God, as Good Works, for Christ's sake. All idea of a sinner gaining salvation, wholly or in part by Good Works, is, there¬ fore, utterly absurd. It is true that what remaining knowledge we have of the will of God, by nature — as just explained — is so far good : and what we can gain further by meditation, and through the diligent use of our rational and moral faculties, turned upon ourselves, is also good : and what we can gain fur¬ ther still, by the careful observation of the conduct of God, whether in creation or providence, is also good. I do not exclude any source of the knowledge of the will of God : and I have en¬ deavoured, in the previous Treatise, to demonstrate every source of this knowledge. It is, however, the word of God, revealed to us in the sacred Scriptures, which is the complete expression of his will to us, as the rule of all Good Works, and as the way of life unto us. And passing by the insurmountable difficulties which beset every other rule of conduct, by which we hope to please God ; the perfection and simplicity of the one afforded in his blessed word, leave us without excuse for any shortcoming. The majesty of him who gave it — the blessedness of those who keep it* — and the glory and felicity to which it conducts us — make the sin, the folly, and the ruin of all who reject it, alike sure and just. It is Jesus Christ who has abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel.1 2. There are many questions of the highest practical impor¬ tance, and of the most pregnant force in all scientific enquiry into systematic truth touching divine things ; which connect themselves in a decisive manner-with the foregoing statements. Some of them may be mentioned and briefly disclosed, but not discussed here. (a) At the head of these we may place Christian Liberty, and Liberty of Conscience. The Church of the living God is the Bride of the Lamb, and her freedom from the bondage of Satan, of sin, of the law itself, much more of the commandments, tra¬ ditions and devices of men ; has been purchased by the blood of. 1 2 Tim., i. 10. 21 VOL. II. 322 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. her divine Husband and Lord. That freedom, in its very essence, consists in her deliverance from all her enemies, that she might consecrate herself to the service and love of her Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness throughout all generations. The God she serves and loves, is the only Lord of the conscience of her children : he alone can penetrate its depths, he alone can cleanse and sanctify it, he alone can give it peace : and every at¬ tempt, even when made in his own blessed name, to bind it or to loose it otherwise than by his word and Spirit, is an atrocious usurpation of his prerogatives. (i b ) Nearly related to these great topics is all that belongs to what is called Implicit Faith, and to the just claims of tender consciences. Whatever hath for it the explicit authority of God, and whatever flows by necessary consequence from that which hath the explicit authority of God; all this is of explicit faith, be¬ cause it is clearly the Will of God. But nothing else is of faith at all : and to imply the Will of God without warrant from him, is in effect to substitute our own will, or the will of those to whom we render a blind obedience, for the Will of God : by either method dishonouring God, and putting our own soul in peril. The folly of doing this ourselves is no greater than the cruel impiety of forcing upon the consciences of others, what nothing but bigotry, fanaticism, or superstition, could make endurable to our own. The right of private judgment is not only sacred in its own nature ; but the idea of Good Works is wholly absurd, unless they be performed with the full and free approval of the soul. To disregard the scruples of our own conscience, is to assail the very citadel of our spiritual life : while to contemn that of others, is to violate the very life of Christian charity. (c) The power of the civil magistrate in things sacred, and the authority of synods and councils with regard to faith and morals, are the last of these great associated topics which seem to demand a certain recognition here. Of human affairs, some are wholly spiritual, some are wholly temporal, and some are mixed, participating of both. There ought to be no question, and in all societies that are tree and Christian there is no question, that things purely temporal appertain, by the Will of God, ex¬ clusively to the civil power. There is just as little, that things purely spiritual do not appertain to the civil power, but to the kingdom of God, now under the form of the Gospel Church. All GOOD WORKS. 323 CHAP. XVI.] real difficulties concern things that in their nature are mixed. Concerning these, the most obvious general solution is, that the civil and the spiritual powers being both ordained by God, each in its own sphere and for its own ends, it follows, that of things mixed, that part which is temporal appertains to the civil power, and that part which is spiritual appertains to the kingdom of God. What remains subject to both jurisdictions, after such principles are applied to them, must he accepted as remaining so by the Will of God : and in what cases the decision of one juris¬ diction shall draw after it consequences that may appertain to the other, must be determined by the prevailing nature of each particular case ; respect being had to the liberty of the Church on one side, and the authority of the State on the other. ( d ) The authority of synods and councils, like the authority of the State concerning things spiritual, has been a most fruit¬ ful source of evil to the kingdom of God ; and yet the former topic, like the latter, is singularly clear in the general principles on which it rests. Supposing a government, no matter of what kind, to be divinely established in the bosom of the kingdom of God on earth ; it follows that the authority of this government is precisely as extensive as God has declared, neither more nor less. But God has made no declaration on the subject, except in the sacred Scriptures. The question, therefore, is one of pure revelation. Meeting it in this incidental manner, I will only state its great foundations. It is obvious that revelation being admitted, they who presume to add any thing to it, or take any thing from it, must he themselves inspired, and must prove this in the first instance. It follows, that all uninspired synods and councils are absolutely limited to the exposition of what is already revealed : and that all ecclesiastical power is absolutely limited to the explication, enforcement, defence, and extension of revealed truth. But I have already shown that it is only of things purely spiritual, and of things mixed, so far as they are spiritual, that spiritual authority can he predicated at all. Whence it follows, in the first place, that the sanctions of spiritual authority must be exclusively spiritual : and in the second place, that they must have outward force exclusively upon those who voluntarily sub¬ mit themselves to them. Their validity depends absolutely upon their ratification by Jesus Christ, the only Lawgiver, Buler, and Judge of his Church : and that ratification will, except in cases 324 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. of miraculous interposition by him,. be openly declared in the day of judgment. The result, therefore, is this : synods and councils, lawfully constituted in the name and by the authority of the glorified Redeemer, may, with divine authority, and at the peril of their souls, expound, declare, and teach the revealed Will of God unto salvation : every human being lawfully related to them, who comes to the knowledge of their deliverances and acts, must obey them if they are true, or refuse to obey them if they are false, on the peril of his soul : and whether they be true or false, must be determined according to the word and Spirit of God, by each child of God for himself, at his own proper peril. There is a government in the kingdom of God : but the kingdom itself is made up of those, all of whom are both kings and priests ; and the government over them is under Christ their Lord, and its acts are valid only with the Word and through the Spirit of God. 3. After what has been said, a few general statements may suffice. Absolutely considered, the cause of our New Obedience, and of all Good Works flowing from it, is the grace of God dwell¬ ing in us, by reason of our New Creation by the Holy Ghost.1 Considered instrumentally, it is through Saving Faith and Re¬ pentance unto Life that all Good Works are wrought. For it is through Repentance that we turn from all evil which God hates, unto all good which God commends : and it is through Faith, which works by love and purifies the heart, that the just live and overcome the world. The great end of all Good Works is the glory of God.2 To which are to be added, as the very manner of glorifying God through our own Good Works, two ends sub¬ ordinate only to the great end ; namely, our own salvation, and the comfort and edification of all around us.3 The intimate na¬ ture, therefore, of the New Obedience and Good Works may be summarily stated, thus : (a) It is the motive with which all these acts are performed, which is the first element in determining; their real nature. The same outward act might, according to the motive which prompts it, be a heinous sin, or an exalted proof of holiness. The offering up of Isaac is a just illustration. (5) No work can, therefore, be Good, in the sense here in¬ tended, unless it be in accordance with the known will of God. 1 Gal., v. ID— 2 5 ; Heb., xiii. 20, 21. 2 1 c0r., ^ 20 ; x. 31. s Matt., v. 13-16; Phil, it 12-16; 2 Pet., i. 10, 11. GOOD WORKS. 825 CHAP. XVI.] For Good Works are the exercise of our New Obedience — and where there is no will of God there can be no motive to obey it — and, therefore, no New Obedience. This puts an end to all works of supererogation — of voluntary humility — of will-worship — and of obedience to the commandments of men. It also shows why the virtues of men, naturally considered, being wholly discon¬ nected with the New Obedience, have no adequate motive in us, and no adequate relation to the will of God. (c) None who are out of Christ can perform Good Works, in the scriptural sense. Neither the persons, nor the services of sinful men, can ever be accepted of God on their own account, because of their manifold imperfections : and for these imperfec¬ tions there is no remedy but the righteousness of Christ. Out of Christ, there can be no love of God in the heart of a sinner — no saving light in his understanding — no holiness of conscience or will. In default of these things New Obedience and its fruits are impossible. ( d ) Good Works must be directed to an end approved of God ; by means right in themselves, and suitable to the end ; and in a manner proper in itself, and answerable both to the end and the means. For if the end is not lawful, it is sinful even to desire it, much less to seek it. If the means are unrighteous, it is an attempt to serve God with the wages of iniquity, and to make him a partner in our guilt. And if the manner is contrary to the end and the means, it is seeking to make God the author of confusion and disorder, and tempting his miraculous power in support of our folly. (e) These multiplied limitations unite in a single point : the heart must be right in the sight of God. Then the children of God need have no slavish fears of going astray. For the New Covenant which God makes with their souls, and under which all their New Obedience is rendered, is a covenant wherein his laws are written on their hearts, and put into their minds by God himself; and wherein, from the least unto the greatest, they all know the Lord ; and in the light and power of that knowledge strive after the things commanded in that law.1 1 Heb., viii. 8-12; Jer., xxxl 31-34. CHAPTER XVII. THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. I. 1. The conflict involved in our New Obedience and Good Works. — 2. Its Nature and Necessity. — 3. Its Existence necessarily implies the Truth of the Spiritual System Revealed to us, and in us. — 4. Our perpetual Witness-bearing for Christ. — 5. Our incessant Working together with God. — 6. Our continual Suffering to¬ gether with Jesus: Outward Fellowship — inward Participation thereof. — 7. Sub¬ lime Efficacy of this Warfare — with the Cause and Manner thereof. — 8. Intimate Relation between the divinely appointed Means of Grace, and our Spiritual War¬ fare. — 9. The Chastenings of the Lord : his Fatherly Discipline : the Hidings of his Face. — II. 1. Our Spiritual Enemies: Nature of their Enmity to us: Im¬ placable Hostility between them and Christ. — 2. All of them resolved into three: Their Union with each other: Vanquished by Christ — vanquished through Christ by us. — 3. Our Warfare with the Flesh. — 4. Our Warfare with the World. — 5. Our Warfare with the Devil. — 6. The Armour of Light. — 7. The Victory. I. — 1. The existence of each human being is, indeed, iden¬ tical and uninterrupted from the moment of its personal com¬ mencement, onward through time and eternity. But what vast changes does it incur at death, and at the resurrection ! Not inferior in its importance to either of them — and perfectly de¬ cisive of the character of both of them — is that wonderful spiritual change which our Saviour calls the New Birth — and which he plainly tells us must occur before we can realize or enter the kingdom of heaven.1 Each one of these immense changes — regeneration — death — resurrection — while it leaves our personal existence identical, self-conscious, and continuous, pro¬ duces on us results the most profound, and is followed by conse¬ quences to us which are absolutely eternal. The results and consequences of death and the resurrection can be realized, in this life, only through faith, even by the regenerate ; they can be known in their absolute nature, only after we shall have died —after we shall have risen. Those which follow the New Birth are not only realized by us in the same way as the others— namely, through faith ; but to the whole extent that 1 John, ill. 3-5. we are CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 327 actually made partakers of them in this life, their absolute nature is made known to us, just as the others will be when we shall have personally incurred them. For it is in this life only, that men are born again, and it is between our New Birth and our death that the change produced on us by that New Birth alone, manifests itself simply and in its peculiar manner. I have en¬ deavoured, with the greatest care, to explain in the two prece¬ ding Books, the nature — the reality — the cause — the author — the manner — the instrument — the results — the consequences, of this great change — under the continual exhibition of the work in us : and in the preceding chapters of this Book, I have endea¬ voured to point out distinctly, the chief offices, both towards God and towards our fellow-creatures, which are relevant to it, and which are imposed by it. But in the manifestation of all these offices of Christianity by us — in every part of our New Obedience — in all our Good Works — in all our endeavours to lead lives of Faith and Penitence — -we find ourselves constantly exposed to perils, surrounded by temptations, and beset by difficulties. We are not, so to speak, left free to follow the Lord, whom we love : we are hindered in the course in which, for his sake and at his command, we have resolved to walk : we are compelled to let go our hold on eternal life, or to take up arms and do battle for our crown. This is a new phase in our Christian life : one we had, perhaps, never anticipated : one, as we soon find, universal, un¬ avoidable, full of peril on one side and blessedness on the other. It is this which Christians call The Spiritual Warfare ,! and which I am now to explain as briefly as I can. 2. The one great condition of the offer of salvation is, that he to whom it is offered should be a sinner of the human race. The one great motive presented to that sinner is, on the one side that he may escape the wrath to come — -on the other that he may ob¬ tain eternal life ; the sum of all being salvation — which is the very end of his faith. Having won Christ — that is being found in him ; then the perpetual exhortation of the Gospel to us is, that forgetting the things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, we should press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.2 The object set before the child of God is manifold. He is to guard, as he wrould guard the life of his soul, that which God has 1 1 Tim., L 18 ; vi. 12; 2 Tim., iv. 1 ; 1 Cor., ix. 25-2 7. 2 Phil., iii 3-14. 328 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. already given to him — an interest, namely, in the blood of Christ. He is to strive, also, with all his might, to increase the treasure which the Lord has committed to him. And he is to labour, in season and out of season with all diligence, to make sure the eter¬ nal possession of this boundless riches of grace. In the whole process of this great work of salvation it must necessarily occur — nay, it is the very manner of the work itself — that the children of the kingdom glorify God, and bless their fellow-creatures, as step by step they advance in their own career. In like manner and in like degree — to vanquish Satan — to overcome the world — and to crucify the flesh — are as real necessities of their victorious progress, through grace, as the treasures of wisdom and love which they defend, accumulate, and secure, are proofs of the bounty of the Lord. And the personal result is, that fighting the good fight of faith — warring a good warfare1 — striving for an incor¬ ruptible crown, they are more than conquerors, through him that loved them.2 3. It is indeed a warfare : yet the Holy Ghost declares it to be good. It is a fight we cannot escape : yet a good fight, even that of faith. And how much does its necessity, its nature, its existence, involve and explain ? How could an estate of this kind exist for us, except upon the precise conditions of our being, revealed by God? Once innocent, then fallen, now regenerate, and struggling upward toward our original perfection, the necessary phenomena are the very incidents of this warfare. How could such a conflict occur, except amidst a confused, probationary state of things, where good and evil are inextricably involved, each striving for the mastery ? What would it signify, if the state in which it reigns were final : if it did not lead immediately to another state, and if the relation of this state to that, and the relation of this warfare to the coming retribution, were not ab¬ solute and decisive ? On the other hand, with the word of God revealing to us endless glory and perdition, a divine Saviour, and an eternal judgment ; what is there that this Spiritual Warfare may not signify, may not involve and explain ? 4. We are witnesses for Christ through all ages, and unto the uttermost part of the earth :3 and we are compassed about with that great cloud of witnesses who have gone before us, and 1 1 Tim., i. 18 ; vi. 12. 2 1 Cor., ix. 25 ; Rom., viii. 37. 8 Acte, i. 8. CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 329 who testify around us.1 He for whom we testify, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. He is the finisher, as well as the author of our faith : he who endured such contradiction of sinners against himself. Constant in our testi¬ mony, as well as in faith and godliness, we have only to consider him, and then lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and run with patience the race that is set before us.2 Christ himself condescends to be called the faithful witness.3 And the more prompt the children of the wicked one are to cry out against every faithful witness for Christ, Away with such a fellow from the earth, for it is not fit that he should live ;4 the more solemn and emphatic is the response from heaven, The world was not worthy of them !5 Whether men will hear or whether they will forbear, it is equally the duty of the followers of Christ to testify unto them the will of God.6 Adding nothing to the testimony of God, unless they would have added to them¬ selves every curse written therein ; taking nothing from that testimony, unless they would have their part in every promise written therein taken from them :7 they who name the name of Jesus are set forth as living epistles, known and read of all men, wherein Christ has manifestly declared his Gospel, written with the Spirit of the living God in the tables of their heart, even as God wrote his law on tables of stone.8 The way of the wicked is as darkness, and they know not at what they stumble : but the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day !9 This whole witness-bearing is a spiritual martyrdom for Christ — a perpetual confession of him — • the daily warfare of our good fight of faith. 5. In like manner, as it is the will of God concerning us, that having had our eyes opened, and having recived the Holy Ghost from him, we should be his witnesses unto all men of all that we have seen and heard ;10 so, also, every one, according to the grace of God which is given unto him, becomes a labourer together with God, a worker together with him, both in planting and in watering every part of God's husbandry amongst men.11 Or, as 1 Heb., xii. 1. 2 Heb., xii. 1-3. 3 Rev., i. 5. 4 Acts, xx. 22. 5 Heb., xi. 38. 6 Ezek., iii. 11— 27. ^ Rev., xxii. 18, 19. 8 2 Cor., iii. 2, 3. 9 Prov., iv. 18, 19. 10 Acts, ix. 17 ; xxii. 13-15. 11 1 Cor., iii. 9 ; 2 Cor., vi. 1. 330 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. it is sometimes expressed, we become soldiers of Jesus Christ, whose fidelity is tested by the manner in which we bear hard¬ ness, and do valiantly for the Captain of our salvation, who was himself made perfect through sufferings.1 One of the most heroic of our fellow-soldiers, when the time of his departure was at hand, and he was ready to be offered, at the close of a life that has no parallel, calmly and trustfully said, I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith : henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day : and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearings.2 But all these services, glorious as they are, and infinite as is the reward which attends them, are of that nature that no novice, no sluggard, none who are self-indulgent or self-seeking, can perform them at all : of that nature, that in a world like this, the most enlight¬ ened and the most devoted cannot discharge them, except as he¬ roes do battle, where all is risked upon every conflict. And we ourselves are of that nature, that the severest toils of all, are those which fit us for our great labour of love ; the most perilous conflicts of all, those which are waged within our own souls. See what that heroic soldier of Jesus Christ, that sublime labourer together with God, to whom I have alluded, says concerning the matter and the manner, wherein he approved himself a servant of God in this Spiritual Warfare : In much patience, in afflic¬ tions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings ; by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report ; as deceivers, and yet true ; as unknown, and yet well known ; as dying, and behold, we live ; as chastened, and not killed ; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing ; as poor, yet making many rich ; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.3 Here are thirty-six categories of our Spiritual Warfare fought through by one soldier of the Cross, under the single and all-engrossing pro¬ position of the Lord, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.4 And he i Heb., ii. 10 ; 2 Tim., ii. 3 ; Psalm lx. 12. i 2 Tim., iv. 6-8. 3 2 Cor., vi. 4-10. * Matt., xvl 24. 831 CHAP. XYXI.J THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. has said to us, under inspiration of the Holy Ghost, Be ye fol¬ lowers of me, even as I also am of Christ : followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.1 6. One more great and unavoidable necessity is laid upon every child of God ; one more aspect of our Spiritual Warfare, in addition to our witness-bearing for him, and our participation as fellow-labourers with him. We must be sufferers together with Jesus. I will show him, said the Lord to Ananias when he told him Saul was praying, and bade him go to him, how great things he must suffer for my name’s sake.2 Many years after¬ wards, as Paul went bound in the Spirit to Jerusalem, after bearing the name of the Lord before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel ; he said to his brethren whom he had collected at Miletus, that he knew not what would befall him, save that the Holy Ghost witnessed in every city that bonds and afflictions waited for him.3 Yea, said he, in one of his last testi¬ monies, all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer perse¬ cution.4 And the Lord had plainly said to his Apostles, Ye shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake.5 When we reflect on the contents of the Christian Scriptures, and on the nature and design of the Gospel Church ; the history of the human race fur¬ nishes nothing more decisive concerning the moral nature of man, than his cruel hatred of Jesus and his disciples, and his ferocious prostitution of the name and doctrine of Jesus to ends the most opposite from those he commanded. There is no form of human so¬ ciety, no stage of human civilization, no aspect of human thought, which has not, within the past eighteen centuries, polluted itself with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. Jew and Pagan, infidel and heretic, Mohammedan and Papist and Hindoo — all alike — hate the only Saviour who pities them, the only Redeemer who can deliver them. To pass by every form of persecution, except the very highest, there can be no doubt that all the governments in the world united have not executed capitally the hundredth part as many malefactors, as Papal Rome alone has caused to be murdered of true followers of Jesus, merely because they were his true followers ! Drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus, is the fearful description which God gives of her, The mother of harlots and abominations 1 1 Cor., xi. 1; Heb., vi. 12. 2 Acts, ix. 16. 3 Acts, xx. 22, 23. 4 2 Tim., iii. 12. 5 Matt., x. 22. 332 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. of the earth.1 But besides this liability to outward sufferings, even unto blood, for Christ's sake, which enters so conspicuously into the warfare of his followers : there is a sense, altogether spir¬ itual, in which their participation in all his Humiliation, is an indispensable preparation for their participation in all his Exalta- - tion. Those outward sufferings with him, Christ will compensate a hundredfold even in this life, when that is good for us ; and in the world to come, will repay them with eternal life.2 But our inward participation of his sufferings, is the very method of pre¬ paring us for the inward participation of his triumph ; and the very heat and fury of the great war lie precisely there ; there the victory is won or lost ! To know Christ, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, we must be made conformable unto his death.3 Wherefore, the exhortation is, Gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ ; because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy.4 7. It is mere folly to go to Christ, if our desire and purpose are to live in sin. On the other hand, if through grace we are resolved to crucify sin, we need not dread the warfare which must follow. The Holy Ghost, as we have seen, declares the fight of faith to be good — the Spiritual Warfare to be good. That being so, it matters not if the battle be fought to-day on our faithful testimony for Christ — 4ind to-morrow on our earnest labours for his cause — and the third day on our patient suffering for his name : or whether it be joined, fierce and decisive, on all at once — and won like those great victories which decide the fate of nations and of races. It matters not : for, either way, the Lord is strength in the day of trouble — yea, in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength.5 And every one in Zion that appears be¬ fore God, goes from strength to strength ; and every one that with open face beholds the glory of the Lord, is changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.6 Every grace — every truth — every gift, has a power pecu¬ liar to itself : and the more it is cherished the more powerful it is. Sec how sublime even the gift of preternatural strength to Sam¬ son was — and how terrible it made him as long as God was with him ! Then every grace will unite with every other grace : every 1 Rev., xvii .passim. 2 Mark, x. 28-31. 3 phi] iii. io. 4 l Pet., i. 13-16. s Nahum, i. 7 ; Isa., xxvi. 4. ® Ps. lxxxiv. 7 ; 2 Cor., iii. 18. 83B CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. truth with every other truth : every gift with every other gift : and we see how one can put a thousand to flight ! And then all grace will unite with all truth : and all truth will unite with all duty : and all duty will unite with all grace : and how can ten thousand stand before two ! And then when all are united in one — as they are in the man of God thoroughly furnished for every good work ; what can we say less, than that this is accord¬ ing to the working of the mighty power of God in them that be¬ lieve — and that among all gods there is none like unto Jehovah, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders V 8. Nowhere, more than in this aspect of our relation to divine things, does the importance to us of all the means of grace ap¬ pear. Nothing is more distinctly urged upon us in the Word of God, than that we should grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ :2 nor is any thing taught more clearly, than that this growth is the product of the true knowledge of God through his Word and Spirit — and the result of our union and communion with Christ.3 It is of the very na¬ ture of man, and of all his faculties, that he cannot be absolutely stationary in any thing. With him, it is always progress or de¬ cay. The finest emotions vanish — the noblest attainments be¬ come obscure — the most exalted powers lose both their temper and their grasp, under habitual neglect and disuse : while im¬ proper indulgence can end only in distortion. On the other hand, nothing but the finiteness of our being, can be imagined as capable of setting bounds to the healthful growth of a re¬ newed soul, which, by the grace of God, addresses itself with all diligence and fidelity to him. In doing this, the whole instrumentality which God himself has provided is embraced under the phrase — the Means of Grace ; and I have had re¬ peated occasion to mention, in their order, and to explain the use of the chief of these. In every part of our Spiritual War¬ fare, it is through their use that we are fitted for the discharge of the duties that devolve on us, and it is in their use that we may expect to be victorious through grace. It is not true that any of them — not even the inspired word — have any more than an instrumental efficacy with reference to salvation — that is an efficacy when used by God for our spiritual good : but neither is it true that any of them appointed of God, are destitute of this 1 Epli., L 19 ; Ex., xv. 11. 3 2 Peter, iii. 18. 3 1 Peter, ii. 1-12 ; Eph., iv. 1-24. 334 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. instrumental efficacy — nor that any thing else not thus appointed of him, has any efficacy at all towards our growth in grace. To neglect them, is to tempt God : to rest in them, is superstition : to use them prayerfully, diligently, and trustfully, is the heavenly discipline of the soldier of the Cross. Nothing holy, nothing lovely, nothing gentle, nothing tender, nothing heroic, can he conceived of him to whom the ordinances of God are not delight¬ some : while he to whom they are, has found the way to he strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. 9. Immediately connected with our growth in grace, and with the peculiar method of that growth which attends our Spiritual Warfare ; there is a mode of God’s dealing with his people, which is utterly remote from all human thinking. Sometimes for the trial of our faith — sometimes to reveal to us more clearly what is in our hearts — sometimes as a means of more complete deliverance of us — sometimes as a preparation for some special work for which he is fitting us — sometimes to recover us from backsliding, to wean us from besetting sin, or to deliver us from besetting temptation • — and very generally as a way of advancing us to higher spiritual attainments, or bestowing upon us very special mercies : God himself seems to enter into conflict wTith his children. The arrows of the Almighty' — said Job — are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit : the terrors of God do set them¬ selves in array against me.1 And David, in his anguish, cried out, 0 Lord rebuke me not in thy wrath : neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure. For thine arrows stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore.2 Will the Lord cast off for ever, and will he be favourable no more ? Is his mercy clean gone for ever, and doth his promise fail for evermore ? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?8 Lord why castest thou off my soul, why hidest thou thy face from me ? Thy fierce wrath goeth over me ; thy terrors have cut me off.4 And besides thus hiding his face from us, and with¬ drawing his presence from us, and striking our souls with his ter¬ rors ; he habitually exercises his children under the cross and yoke of outward trials. Ye have forgotten, says the Apostle Paul, the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, M}7- son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him : for whom the Lord loveth he 1 Job, vi. 4. 2 Ps. xxxviii. 1, 2. 3 Ps. lxxvii. 7-9. * Ps. lxxxviii. 14, 16. CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 335 chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.1 So universal is this that it is immediately added, If ye he without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. And no indication of God's indifference to a sinner can be greater, than that he allows him to prosper in his iniquity ; unless it be, that having commenced to chastise him, he lifts his hand off him, while he continues impenitent. And so in imme¬ diate connection with the declaration, As many as I love, I re¬ buke and chasten : he adds, Be zealous therefore, and repent.3 The wisest of mortals, therefore, had divine authority when he said, He that refuseth correction despiseth his own soul : but he that heareth reproof getteth understanding.3 Though he slay me, yet will I trust him : yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil : for thou art with me ; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.4 Such is the cry of faith — even under the sorest outward trials. And the answer of the Lord is, Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.6 It is by humility, and obedience, and patient waiting on the Lord, and fervent prayer to him, that the penitent and believing soul prevails with God in all these extremities. Yea, God shall bring forth the righteousness of his children as the light, and their judgment as the noonday.6 He who gave to Jacob, after his great wrestling with him, his rich blessing and a new name, will not only give to every one that overcometh, a new name — but will write upon him the new name of him that sittetli upon the throne !7 II. — 1. Having explained the nature of our Spiritual War¬ fare, and pointed out the special duties toward the Captain of our salvation which it involves, together with the influence of the whole upon ourselves : it remains to speak briefly of the en¬ emies with whom this warfare is waged by all who follow Jesus Christ in the Regeneration. They are enemies who resist us in all our attempts to turn to God at first, and in all our endeavours to lead lives of New Obedience afterwards : enemies to our de¬ liverance from sin, and to our growth in holiness : enemies to our very highest and to all our eternal interests. They are still more the enemies of him who loved us and gave himself for us — between i Heb., xii. 6, 6. 2 Rev., iii. 19. 4 Job, xiii. 15 ; Ps. xxiii. 24. 5 Rev., it 10. 7 Gen., xxxii. 24-29; Rev., ii. 17 ; iii. 12. 3 Prov., xv. 32. 6 Ps. xxxvii. 6. 336 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. whom and the whole of them the antagonism is so complete, that they require of us, as a condition of their friendship, that we shall renounce his service — and that he considers our friendship with them enmity to him. The very warfare itself is based on our identification with the Son of God : it is fought by us as soldiers of the Cross : and the victory won, however blessed for us, is for the glory of his grace ! The possibility of such a state of case in the universe of God, grounds itself on the twofold fact of the existence of sin in that universe, and of the purpose of God to retrieve the universe from its pollution. Sin is that accursed thing which God hates, and upon which he cannot look with the least allowance. It was that which made us his enemies : it is because we turn from it to him, through Christ by grace, that every enemy of his assails us : it is because our recovery from sin is only begun, not perfected in this life, that this warfare involves the salvation of our souls, as well as the glory of God. And thus the actual state of all things, in every part of the existence of every human being, considered as it actually is, and considered as the word of God declares it to be, presents us with a perpetual demonstration of that Gospel whereby life and immortality are brought to light. 2. As I have intimated before, the Spiritual Warfare of which I speak here is predicated only of the followers of Christ. It is the means whereby they vindicate their New Obedience : the means whereby they win from their enemies the freedom to per¬ form every Good Work : rights — all of them — as I have before shown, for which countless multitudes have suffered the loss of all things, and counted that loss gain. Doubtless there is a war¬ fare between these same enemies and every human soul that is not given over to believe a lie, that it may be damned : for though they he transcendently enemies of Christ and his disci¬ ples, they are also enemies of whatever Christ, or the natural conscience, or reason itself will approve as true or good unto salvation. But it is the high, fierce, decisive warfare between the children of God and the flesh, the world, and the Devil, of which I speak continually in this chapter. These are the great enemies of our souls. Under the banner of one or other of them, every foe to divine grace assails us : nay, it is one or other of these, no matter how cunningly disguised, that we find discomfited after every victory we win, that we find mocking us every time we CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 337 are overcome. And such is their fidelity to each other, and so inseparable is their union with each other, that every triumph either of them wins, is shared by all, and every decisive blow in¬ flicted upon one wounds them all. These are the enemies whom our Lord has conquered, led captive, and openly triumphed over. And now, in the way of the complete deliverance of the children of the Kingdom, and the perfect fitting of them for the right service and enjoyment of God in this life, and the eternal service and enjoyment of him in the life to come ; he leads forth every one of them, fighting by their side, and wins for them victories analogous to his own. 3. I will add a few words concerning each of these implaca¬ ble enemies of all Gospel holiness, and concerning our warfare with each of them. Considering our race one, with a common nature, and of one blood, which the Scriptures continually assert, each individual of that race is, nevertheless, a separate person ; and, since the fall of the first parents of the race, and *>y reason of it, the common nature is depraved, and every indi¬ vidual participating of that nature by ordinary generation, neces¬ sarily participates in its depravity. The New Birth, which is wrought by the Holy Ghost in the soul of the elect of God, who have been redeemed by the blood of Christ, is a new creation of the individual soul, and its restoration to the image of God, lost by the fall of man. Restored, in that Regeneration, to the image of God in knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness, every ad¬ vance of the soul in this divine life is an advance in its conformity to God : and every endeavour to maintain the posture any soul may have reached, or to advance from one degree of grace and strength to another, is contrary to the desires, devices, lusts, and impulses of its depraved nature, that is, of the flesh ; and sub¬ jects it, on one side, to the necessity of a new victory over the flesh, and, on the other, to the peril of a victory by the flesh over it. I am aware that the reality and the nature of the dealings of God with man in creation, providence, and grace, are involved in these brief statements ; but I insist that these statements ac¬ cord precisely with all those dealings, as revealed by God to man, and in man. Seeing that the carnal mind is enmity against God, not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be ;* and that the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of 1 Rom., viii. 7. 22 VOL. II. 338 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. G-od, which are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned f it follows, not only that the flesh cannot be amended, but that, if we are Christ's, we must crucify the flesh, with its affections and lusts ;2 and that our old man must be crucified with Christ, if the body of sin is to be destroyed, or we are to be delivered from the service of sin.3 To walk in the Spirit, and to fulfil the lust of the flesh, are so completely opposites, one of the other, that the Scriptures declare the Spirit and the flesh to be contrary the one to the other, and utterly antagonistic to each other. As our English version has it, the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.4 And the Apostle proceeds to illustrate that universal truth, by declaring to us the works of the flesh, and the fruit of the Spirit, in contrast with each other. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these : Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, re veilings, and such like. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.4 Touching all these things, on one side and the other, this profound distinction is to be always borne in mind, namely, that no fruit of the Spirit is possible in the unrenewed soul, whereas the renewed soul, still dwelling in sinful flesh, is liable to be assailed through every work of the flesh, and is liable to fall under every assault. Receiving the first fruits of the Spirit at our Regeneration, and growing afterwards through the continual increase of them ; the divine power which dwells in us, and increases through grace, may indeed continually subdue every work that lusts against it ; and the final triumph is sure, through him who loved us and gave himself for us. But who ever saw a soldier of the cross, who marched from victory to victory, never overcome, and bearing no scars from this life and death struggle, with that native depravity of which sinners make so light P On the contrary, how innumerable are the triumphs of the flesh over the followers of Christ ; and how certain is it, that but for his grace these triumphs of the flesh over his followers would be uni¬ versal and final ! 4. In a peculiar sense the Flesh is our inward enemy. The 1 1 Cor., ii. 14. 3 Gal., v. 24. 4 GaL, v. 16, 11. 5 GaL v. 19-23. 3 Rom., vi. 6. CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 339 other two, and especially the World, are more particularly out¬ ward enemies. If we had crucified the Flesh, the sorest part of our warfare would be accomplished. As things are, with our own hearts but imperfectly sanctified, and surrounded by fellow-crea¬ tures the great mass of whom are such as we were when we were servants of sin, and all the remainder are nearly as imperfectly sanctified as we are ourselves ; the advantages we derive from our fellow-soldiers who cannot protect themselves, can offer to us no adequate security — while the perils with which our fellow- sinners threaten us, are instant, fatal, and innumerable. By the allurements of vice — by the pollution of evil example — by the seduction of all sinful indulgences — by the perversion of all false teaching— by flattering every unruly passion — by opposing and discouraging us in all duty — by threats, by violence, by robbery, by persecution, by death itself ; alas ! by how many countless and nameless ways, are God’s children put in jeopardy by the enmity of the World ! Be ye not conformed to this world — is the express command of God — but be transformed by the renew- ing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and ac¬ ceptable, and perfect will of God.1 If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.2 The friendship of the world is enmity with God : whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.3 And our Saviour explains the reason of statements which seem so remarkable to the chil¬ dren of the world. I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you ; ye know that it hated me before it hated you.4 The actual posture of the world is, that it is in universal revolt against God — that it lies under his wrath and curse — that it has crucified his Son whom he sent to redeem it, and murdered his saints of whom it was not worthy — and that it is kept in store by God, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.5 The actual relation of God’s children to it is, that they constitute a Kingdom under Messiah the Prince, which, though in the world, is not of it ; a kingdom which, through grace, they are appointed to maintain and to ad¬ vance through all ages, while God shall remove every diadem, and take off every crown, and exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high, and overturn till nothing that can be shaken i Rom., xii. 2. 2 1 John, ii. 15. 3 James, iv. 4. 4 John, xv. 18, 19; xvii. 19. 5 2 Peter, iii. 7. 340 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. is left, and shake heaven and earth : and then he whose right it is shall come — and God will give it him.1 Wherefore our very faith is the victory that overcometh the world :2 which, by the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, is crucified unto us, and we unto it.5 Considered in this light, our Spiritual Warfare with this great enemy of our salvation, has two aspects, both of which are eminently peculiar to us as soldiers of the cross. The first is, that our duty to Christ obliges us to discharge with perfect simplicity and fidelity, every obligation binding upon us with reference to our relations in this ruined world ; thereby at once acquitting our own souls, and adorning the doctrine we profess. The other is, that the same duty obliges us to acquit ourselves as good soldiers, in our endeavours to recover the dominion of our Lord over our rebellious fellow-creatures, to their unspeakable blessedness, and to the glory of his great name. Bo that, through the unsearchable riches of the grace, knowledge, and wisdom of God, the salvation of our own soul is grounded in our Spiritual Warfare with the Flesh ; and in like manner the salvation of others, through our endeavours, is grounded in our Spiritual War¬ fare with the World. 5. It is under the banner of Satan, that the Flesh and the World both assail the followers of Christ. He is called the god of this world, and is declared to be the author of that blindness of mind of those wdio believe not the glorious Gospel of Christ, through which they are lost.4 The Lord Jesus, speaking of the effects of his crucifixion, declared that one of them would be the casting out of the prince of this world :5 and we are told it was he who put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot to betray him he whom Jesus led captive when he ascended up on high, openly triumphing over him.7 This great and wicked Spirit, the leader of the revolt in heaven — the seducer of our first parents — the im¬ placable enemy of the Saviour of men — is represented through¬ out the Scriptures as having thrown off* all allegiance to God, and as being actuated by relentless hate against the whole family of man, and most especially against God's Elect from amongst our fallen race. By the fall of man — of which his temptation was the procuring cause — he acquired dominion over the world 1 Ezek., xxi. 26, 27 ; Heb., xii, 26-28. 2 1 John, v. 4. 3 Gal., vi. 14. 4 2 Cor., iv. 3, 4. 5 John, xii. 31. J John, xiii. 2. 7 Eph., iv. 8 ; CoL, ii. 15. CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 341 and over the human race : a dominion defeated and absolutely annulled by the sentence of God, so far as his Elect were con¬ cerned — and limited by the same sentence so far as the world was concerned — but left untouched so far as related to all the obstinately impenitent.1 No portion of this wonderful sentence of God, rendered after the breach of the Covenant of Works — and to be reviewed at the day of judgment — was more precise, than the decree of eternal enmity between Christ and his follow¬ ers on one part, and the Devil and his children on the other.2 Quenchless hate and deadly warfare between this primeval mur¬ derer, liar, and seducer, and every soldier of the cross of Christ, is as much a part of that soldier's divine vocation, as it is a part of it to follow the Captain of his salvation. And he may as con¬ fidently expect the Devil to torment him with temptations, to assail him with accusations, to overwhelm him with terrors and alarms, and to stir up the flesh and the world against him ; as he sincerely endeavours to follow Jesus in the regeneration. Nor is there any security for us, but in open, manful, and universal combat. To have peace with the flesh, it must be crucified : to have safety with the world, it must be overcome : the Devil flies from us only when we resist him, stedfast in the faith.3 In all these things it is through him that loved us, that we are more than conquerors.4 And they who lift up the song of triumph, when Michael and his angels finally cast out the great dragon and his angels ; are they who overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony ; and they loved not their lives unto the death.5 6. In this warfare for our souls, Repentance toward God, and Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, are as conspicuous as they are in every other part of our salvation. Here, as everywhere, these great graces of the Spirit, these fundamental Offices of the Christian life — decide our destiny. With a living Faith in Christ, the Flesh, the World, and the Devil can do no more than hurry us to our Father's house, or secure for us there a brighter crown. For such ends, the loss of all things may well be counted gain. Or if they cleave us down — our courage and our strength return with the first pang of true Repentance : and then our armour of light blazes again in the thick of the fight. Where- 1 Gen., iii. 15-19; Rom., viii. 19-23. 2 Gen., iii. 15. 3 1 Pet., v. 9 ; James, iv. 1. 4 Rom., viii. 37. 5 Rev., xii. 11. 342 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. fore, let us take unto us the whole armour of God, that we may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand. Having our loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness, and our feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace ; above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith we shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked : taking, also, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God : praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. For we wrestle not in a Warfare that is carnal — but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places : and so the weapons of our Warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.1 7. It is the universal principle of our Christian life, that in proportion as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so also our consolation aboundeth by Christ.2 It is not surprising, therefore, that we should even glory in tribulations, since we know that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and expe¬ rience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed ; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.3 My grace, said our Lord, is sufficient for thee : for my strength is made perfect in weakness.4 The first response of his servant was, I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me :5 his habitual response was, I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me :6 and his ma¬ tured and final testimony was, Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.7 This is the career of a true soldier of the cross : the path of the just, like the shin¬ ing light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day. Though there be few who even approach very near to this sublime standard, none apparently, who are not many times discomfited by their spiritual enemies, many needing from mere weakness to be borne in the bosom of the good Shepherd of our souls, and nearly all to be led gently along by his hand : nevertheless there is not one of the innumerable multitude, wdio will be finally van¬ quished and destroyed by God's enemies and theirs. It is not 1 Eph., vi. 13-18; 2 Cor., x. 4. 2 2 Cor., i. 5. 3 Rom., v. 3-5. « 2 Cor., xii. 9. 5 2 Cor., xii. 9. 6 Phi]., iv. 13. 7 1 Cor., xv. 57. CHAP. XVII.] THE SPIRITUAL WARFARE. 348 possible for us to understand bow, as the result of sucb a career, such a probation as I have attempted to trace, any should escape destruction, except upon the conditions which actually exist, and by means of the forces which are actually applied ; nor yet, upon those conditions, and under the application of those forces, how any could perish. Without the divine support continually given to believers and accepted by them, even they must be destroyed. When judgment begins at the house of God, what shall the end of them be that obey not the Gospel of God ? And if the right¬ eous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear P1 And yet, how can the righteous perish, when they have a throne of divine grace to which they may always come boldly, and at which they may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need ?'2 Nay, when God himself is their refuge and strength — a very present help in trouble ?* To him that overcometh, is the glorious promise of the exalted Saviour, I will give to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his throne.4 1 1 Pet., iv. 17, 18. 2 Heb., iv. 16. s Psalm xlvi. 1. 4 Rev., iii. 21. CHAPTER XVIII. THE INFALLIBLE RULE 01'. FAITH AND DUTY. I. 1. Relation of the divine Word to the divine Life in the human Soul. — 2. All Law implies the Existence both of the Author of it, and the Subject of it. — 3. Infinite Lawgiver : Discovery, Comprehension, and Use of any and whatever Law of God. — 4. Regulative Principles of Universal Morality: their Nature, Certainty, Origin, and Obligation. — 5. Supremacy of the Moral Sense in Fallen Man : Supremacy of the Moral Law in the Universe: The Saviour. — 6. Relation of the Moral Law to the Matter and the Form of Salvation: Infinite Grace. — 7. Indispensable Neces¬ sity to Fallen Man of divine Guidance and Support in the Way of Life. — 8. Su¬ preme Relation of the Revealed Will of God to Salvation : Infallible Rule of Faith and Obedience. — II. 1. The true End of our Existence, and the Mode of attain¬ ing it, taught only and taught fully in the Sacred Scriptures. — 2. What we ought to believe concerning God, considered as the Saviour of Sinners, is matter of pure Revelation. — 3. That Revelation the Infallible Rule of Faith: Its Completeness and Efficacy. — 4. Relation of Righteousness to Faith — Truth to Duty: the Word of God the Infallible Rule of the New Obedience. — 5. Divine Restatement of the Moral Law, and divine Regeneration of the human Soul : The Power of G od unto Salvation. — 6. All the Work and all the Institutions of God, have Relevancy to the Faith and Righteousness revealed by him, and to the Rule thereof. — 7. The Saviour of the World the central Object of all Truth revealed to our Faith, and of all Duty required by the Moral Law. — 8. The Sum and Scope of the Moral Law, considered with direct Reference to Christ, and to those who believe on him. — 9. Mediatorial Work of Christ — Universal and Unalterable Law of God — Infallible Rule of Faith and Practice — Infinite Righteousness and Grace of God. — 10. Posi¬ tion of the Sacred Scriptures as thus ascertained. I. — 1. It has been proved, and repeatedly stated, that man created in the image of God, and abiding in that condition, would have perceived habitually what was true, and chosen what was good, and thus would have found the habitual service and enjoyment of God, his natural and his blessed condition in a universe free from sin. It has also been proved, and repeatedly stated, that even in that condition of sinless purity, unclouded reason, and abounding felicity, man, being fallible, and dependent on God in every sense, could not, of himself, and if strictly tried, have perpetually maintained his condition, much less risen to a higher state of being. God, who was the fountain of his being, 345 CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. must also have been the fountain to him of light and strength. We cannot conceive of a created being who is not dependent upon God, and, as compared with him, imperfect and fallible ; nor can we conceive that an imperfect and fallible creature, can dispense with the perpetual presence and fruition of God in the pursuit of what is true and good, any more than a created and dependent being can dispense with him and live. How much more obvious is this necessity for divine light and strength when, instead of being merely fallible, we are actually fallen and de¬ praved ! Dependent, in our first estate, upon those communi¬ cations of God's grace whereby his image should be maintained in a fallible soul which had been created in his likeness, and had not yet lost it ; how much more are we dependent on him now, in order that we may know with certainty what is true and what is good, and may embrace them both with fervour and constancy ! Creatures of an infinite God, we cannot, if we would, extricate ourselves from his infinite dominion. Objects of the love of an infinite Saviour, why should we consummate our ruin, by reject¬ ing him who provides for us an ability in itself divine ? It is in him alone that lost men are furnished at once with the ability and the way of eternal life. And the immediate object of this chapter is to point out the supreme relation which his blessed word bears to the support and guidance of that life of God in our souls, which manifests itself in nothing more decisively, than in accepting that word as the only Infallible Buie of all Faith and all Duty; that is, of all Truth and all Good unto salvation. Verily, verily, I say unto you — these are the words of J esus — he that heareth my word, and believetli on him that sent me, hath ever¬ lasting life, and shall not come into condemnation ; but is passed from death unto life.1 2. Independently of those permanent and regulative principles which we call laws , which the human mind, by its very constitu¬ tion, is constantly impelled to search for and to accept in all things there could exist no permanent relation between one thing and another — nothing which could be called science ; knowledge could never have increased, if indeed it could have existed in any proper sense — -and the very idea of duty would disappear. They belong so decisively to the very essence of the whole order of the uni¬ verse, and enter so fundamentally into the constitution of our; 1 John, v. 24. 346 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. own nature, that they are manifested in every thing that ex¬ ists, and in every act of our lives their existenee is implied, and thought itself is regulated by their irresistible control. These permanent and regulative principles, in one form or other pervading all things, are in the strictest sense — laivs : nor does it alter the case at all to call them laws of nature — laws of thought — laws of morals — laws of this or that particular science. They are laws whose existence implies, on one side, the existence of him who gave them, and, on the other side, the existence of the subject of them, the object upon which they operate. Our ability to discern, to classify, and to use them, implies the exis¬ tence of our own rational nature : and our total inability to create, to produce, or to impress a new one upon any subject, or with reference to any existing thing, implies the complete de¬ pendence of our own being. In themselves, and in their relations to us as rational and dependent beings, they demonstrate a Cre¬ ator and Ruler of the universe, distinct from the universe itself. They do this in the most general and absolute manner, altogether beside any question of their own special nature. For, while it is true that the special object and mode of operation of the law, may be a conclusive evidence of the character of him who gave the law ; it is the existence of the law itself, that puts beyond dispute the existence of him who gave it. These laws are the product of an intellect, a will, and a power competent to produce them, and the universe, from whose essence and operation they are inseparable. Arid operating under an unchangeable purpose, for definite, unalterable, and illimitable ends, through all time, upon all existence, throughout a boundless universe : we are not only warranted, but forced, to attribute them to a lawgiver and ruler who is infinite and eternal. The whole universe, all exis¬ tence upon which these laws operate, is shown by the fact of that operation, to be dependent and created : it is all regulated by those laws — but produced and sustained, not by the laws, but by him who gave them. The moment we conceive of independent and uncreated existence, the idea of law, in the strict sense, regulative of it — disappears : because, otherwise, something is before and above independent and uncreated existence — which is absurd, since whatever is independent and uncreated, is eternal. In like manner, if we could think either the author of law, or the .subject of law, out of existence, the idea of law itself neces- CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 347 sarily vanishes. If we can be certain that any thing exists in the universe, which we can properly call law, and which we know exists as a permanent, regulative principle in the universe ; then it involves a direct contradiction to deny the existence of the maker of that law — and another contradiction to deny the de¬ pendent and, therefore, created existence of the subject of that law. In effect, we cannot construe to ourselves the existence of the universe of which we form a part, or the action of any thing we behold in it, without an infinite lawgiver and Creator result¬ ing on one side, and our own dependence and accountability re¬ sulting, on the other side.1 Such considerations are completely decisive with reference to our own relations to God, whether considered with regard to what we ought to believe concerning him, or to what duty he requires of us. Nor does it affect their conclusiveness in the smallest degree, whether we regard them from the point of view of Natural Religion or that of Revealed Religion — from our stand-point as creatures, or from our stand¬ point as sinners. It is impossible to deny the existence of per¬ manent and regulative principles, pervading the universe with an intimate, uniform, and irresistible force : but the moment we admit their existence, what follows concerning ourselves is, the absolute certainty that we must seek in the author of those laws for the rule of our own conduct, and find in him the portion of our own souls. 3. The discovery and full understanding by us, of these great laws imposed upon all things by the Infinite Creator and Ruler of them all, is a matter altogether different from the nature and significance of the laws themselves. Their existence and opera¬ tion, in most things, are completely independent of us — and in all things the utmost extent of our ability, in our highest state of knowledge, is a certain conformity, either instinctive or vol¬ untary, unto them — and thereby a certain use and application of them. The discovery, the comprehension, and the voluntary use of them, are amongst the highest distinctions of our spiritual and rational nature : and yet the slow and irregular progress of these conquests of our highest intelligence, is one of the most de¬ cisive proofs of our utter insignificance, when compared with the great lawgiver. There is not a single department of knowledge in which our discoveries can be said, with confidence, to have 1 Rom., i. 18-24; ii. 13-16. 348 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. reached the end ; while in most, our course of discovery and use is only fairly begun, nor has our total progress carried us far enough to enable us to say we are even aware of the existence of all. Moreover, how small is the proportion of our race that keeps pace with this slow and irregular progress of the race in know¬ ledge ; how marvellously limited has been the number of those who have either permanently advanced the boundaries of know¬ ledge, or maintained it in the position it had reached ; and how constantly has this small number been indebted for the glory of being benefactors of mankind, to the special providence of God, or the peculiar endowments with which he has distinguished them ! Let it be borne in mind that this whole progress is a progress in truth , and towards truth , and by means of truth ; a progress conducting us farther and farther from ignorance and error — and nearer and nearer to the fountain of ail truth. No matter how various may be the methods resorted to — or how di¬ verse the subjects to which our enquiries are directed — truth is the one great object of discovery in all — truth is the one great rule of belief in all — truth is the one great relation in all, be¬ tween us as knowing, and all things as capable of being known. Upon our ability to perceive the true, to comprehend it as mani¬ fested, and to use it according to its owm glorious nature, every issue of our rational and moral nature depends. Knowledge, culture, power, advancement — each according to its kind, and after its manner — ought to follow the reception of its natural ali¬ ment by the soul, as health, and beauty, and strength follow the proper nourishment of the body. And these triumphs of feeble man, as he discovers, and comprehends, and accords with the lawgiver ot the universe, ought to increase his dominion over na¬ ture — ought to advance his power in all that is good, and great, and useful, and beautiful — ought to secure his high personal de¬ velopment and public freedom and civilization — ought to fit and incite him to higher endeavours for the good of his fellow-men and the glory of God — ought to bless, and purify, and exalt him, both in this life and in the life to come. It is not by denying God and casting him off — that progress is possible : it is by dis¬ covering him and being conformed unto him. To be lawless , is, to us, not freedom, but perdition— and to the universe it is an¬ nihilation. 4. It is when we extricate ourselves from every thing but the CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE, 349 consideration of the moral aspect of our being, that these uni¬ versal truths apply with the most intense emphasis. It is in the moral relations of truth, that the true becomes the good, and reaches the highest elevation attainable in such a condition as ours. And in what respect do those great regulative principles of universal morality, which the Creator and lawgiver of the uni¬ verse has established, differ, as to their origin, their perpetuity, and their unalterable nature, from all other laws according to which he has created the universe, and under which he sustains and governs it ? That there are such laws of universal morality, we have all the evidence we have that any other laws exist in the universe ; and that they are of perpetual force, we have all the evidence we have concerning all other laws of God, which enter fundamentally into the essence of things ; and that man as the peculiar subject of these laws is unavoidably obliged to recognize and obey them, we have all the evidence we have that the pecu¬ liar subjects of all other laws of God are absolutely bound and controlled by them. But in this case, besides having all the evi¬ dence that exists with respect to every other universal law of God — and all the means of ascertaining what these laws are, that exist with reference to the rest ; there are other sources of evi¬ dence concerning the existence, the nature, and the obligation of these, altogether peculiar to them, and altogether overwhelm¬ ing. In the first place, God in the very creation of man, wrote these laws in his nature so ineffaceably, that the ruin of the race by the fall did not wholly efface them. In the second place, the very object of the Covenant of Works was to exalt man into a condition in which the whole race, by a covenanted right, should live in the perpetual security, felicity, and purity of a perfect conformity to these law's. In the third place, the existence of these laws is a fact of positive and repeated revelation by God to man — -a summary of them, as written in man’s nature when he was created, was afterwards spoken by God, and written on tables of stone by his own finger, and made the basis of his written revelation of his will — and the whole way of life whereby it was ever possible for man to have peace with God always involved them as the rule of it. In the fourth place, God has endowed man with a conscience accusing or else excusing him, with refer¬ ence exclusively to his moral conduct and nature — and in con¬ nection with the state and operations of this moral faculty, the 350 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. relations of every human being towards God are determined — and are felt by every one to be so both really and righteously. In the fifth place, the work of New Creation in man by the Spirit of God, has direct relation to the Moral Law — and the renewed soul has no characteristic more decisive of its increased conformity to God, than the restoration to it, through divine grace, of con¬ formity to his moral image.1 If then, upon the evidences which are common to all the laws of God, and under which no one is capable of disallowing any of the rest — -we are forced to allow the existence of his Moral Law, which is his transcendent law — and to admit our unavoidable subjection to it : how incalculable, may I not add how sublime, does the certainty of it and the glory of it become, when we consider those proofs and manifestations of it, which are peculiarly its own ! Thou hast magnified thy word — says David — above all thy name !2 Surely such renown was never put on any thing besides — that the Son of God should die upon the cross, to magnify it and make it honourable !3 5. The supremacy of the moral sense in fallen man, and the supremacy of the moral law in the universe, constitute that fear¬ ful problem of a guilty race hastening to deserved perdition — * manifesting its sense of its guilt by every invention through which it seeks to propitiate God, and yet continually heaping up for itself wrath against the day of wrath. It is God who has found a way to solve this problem, in such a manner as to secure at once the highest glory of his name, and the highest blessed¬ ness of his fallen creatures. Not by changing, in the slightest degree, the nature of his righteous law, or reducing in the small¬ est particular its claims upon us, and its dominion over us. Not, on the other hand, by mitigating in the least the enormity of our guilt, or reversing the just judgment of our conscience against ourselves. But by bringing in and working out for us, through the incarnation, obedience, and sacrifice of his only begotten Son, an infinite and everlasting righteousness — transcending all that his law demanded of us ; and by restoring us through his Spirit, by a new and heavenly birth, to a higher participation of him than we possessed before our fall. It is we that are changed in our nature and in our estate : God has not changed — the supremacy of conscience abides, the supremacy of the moral law abides; but i Gen., i. 27; ii. 8-17 ; Exod., xx.; Bom., ii. 11-16; Epk., iv. 17-32. a Psalm cxxxviii. 2. a Isaiah, xlii. 21. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 351 it is conscience enlightened and purified by the Spirit and word of God — it is the law satisfied by the obedience and sacrifice of Christ, whose righteousness is both imputed to us and wrought in us — it is the supreme triumph of infinite rectitude and grace combined. 6. In all this, two things are pre-eminent : our restoration to the moral image of God as the matter of our salvation, and the work of redemption by Jesus Christ as the method of it. In both, the existence, the perfection, the supremacy of the moral law are fundamentally involved, and the moral perfections of God are those which are conspicuously exhibited. The form, therefore, in which universal morality has been always binding upon our fallen race, had direct relation to the Son of God as the Saviour of the world ; the supremacy of that law, independently of him, necessarily involved the destruction of the transgressor, and the supremacy of conscience availed only as the testimony of our soul to the righteousness of our condemnation. In like manner, the only form in which conformity to the moral law was ever possible to fallen man, and the purity and felicity which attend upon obedience to it were ever attainable by any trans¬ gressor, was through our union with him who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.1 The keeping of the commandments of God, the New Creature, and that faith which works by love, have always been inseparable :a and the righteousness which is of God, by faith in Jesus Christ, is the only righteousness attainable by fallen man, which is com¬ patible with wisdom, sanctification, and redemption.3 If, there¬ fore, the knowledge of what is at once unchangeably true and unalterably good, and the practice of what is at once universally right, obligatory, and blessed, be any part, much less the sum, of that universal morality of which God is at once the fountain and the lawgiver ; then it is inconceivable that dependent creatures, who are also fallen and depraved sinners, can adequately know or adequately do what is required in order to their acceptance with God ; unless they be furnished by God himself with an in¬ fallible rule of all truth and all duty needful for their salvation, and unless they be provided by God himself with light and power adequate to the discovery, the comprehension, and the use of 1 Rom., iv. 25. 2 1 Cor., vii. 19; Gal., v. 6 ; vi. 15. 3 Phil., iii. 9 ; 1 Cor., i. 30; 2 Cor., v. 21. 352 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. that divine rule of truth and duty. And from the first promise of the Saviour of the world, through the wliole life of the human race, this has been the need of man, and the supply of that need the course ..of divine grace. Instead of obscuring these simple and august truths, it magnifies and exalts them, that the cost at which they have been practically wrought out has been so amaz¬ ing — that the divine perfections have been so illustrated, and the divine glory so augmented by the display of those perfections to the universe — and that the redemption, the purification, and the everlasting glory and blessedness of lost sinners have been the fruits of God’s sovereign grace ! T. In the treatise on the Knowledge of God, Objectively Considered, I have devoted one Book to the consideration of the sources of our Knowledge of God, and to what was designed to be an exhaustive statement of the manifestations which he makes of himself to man. Except as God manifests himself to man, he is not a subject of human knowledge : in whatever manner he does manifest himself to man, we are under the high¬ est obligations to use all diligence that we may apprehend him, and become conformable unto him as known. Supposing him to be known — and I think I have proved that he may be known with infallible certainty unto salvation — then, as I have also proved, his will made known to us considered simply as he is our God and we are his creatures, and still more his will con¬ cerning us considered as he is our Saviour and we are his sinful creatures — becomes an absolute and infallible rule of all duty to us, as the knowledge derived from him, through the manifesta¬ tions he makes of himself to us, is supreme and infallible truth. In God himself, therefore, the sum of all truth and all goodness, and the fountain of both to all creatures, we his sinful creatures are to seek, and may find, an infallible rule concerning all that man ought to believe concerning him, and also concerning all duty required by him of man. It is easy to be understood that the very multiplicity of the ways in which the Knowledge of God is attainable by man, may be abused by us in our blindness, our ignorance, our inattention, and our depravity, to our own confu¬ sion and perplexity — setting one manifestation of God against another, confronting one exhibition of his nature and will against another, arraying one record of eternal truth against another. It is easy to understand how this should be done with design, through THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 853 CHAP. XVIII.] the wickedness of man, and how it should he done through igno¬ rance and mistake even with the design of honouring God ; and the history of all human conduct, belief, and speculation, is crowded with examples in both kinds. That we may go astray even when we profess to take God for our teacher, need not be denied ; but that we need not do so in the matter of salvation, seeing how God has taught us, is equally sure. What we practi¬ cally need is the reduction into a form — divinely certain and divinely authoritative — of this knowledge of God concerning the true and the good, unto our own salvation ; a rule in this sense, whereby we may assuredly believe according to the infallible teaching of God, assuredly live according to the infinitely right¬ eous and omnipotent will of God ; and so believing and living, may have peace with our own conscience and with God, and may obtain everlasting life. Thanks to the infinite faithfulness and condescension of God, we have such a form, such a rule, of truth and duty ! 8. Supposing the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be what they purport to be — they contain a divine revelation, and are themselves a divine revelation, of all that man needs to know, and all that man needs to he and do, in order to escape punishment for his sins, obtain the favour of God, and inherit everlasting blessedness.1 That these divine records are what they claim to be, has been accepted as unquestionable by every right¬ eous man who ever came to the knowledge of them, from the first uttering of them to the present moment. That they are so, I have incidentally advanced, throughout this Treatise and the one preceding it, many considerations which seemed to me con¬ clusive — and I purpose, in another place, to condense the proof into a formal statement. In them, therefore, is that absolute truth unto salvation, besides which no truth unto salvation exists — and that absolute and unchangeable morality, besides which God requires of man no moral act. In them, the will of God concerning fallen men in the matter of salvation, is revealed to our faith with absolute certainty, infallible truth, and divine au¬ thority. Whatever knowledge of God is attainable by man. through all other manifestations of himself to man, so far as any. of it is indispensable to salvation, is reiterated in these inspired writings : and creation, and providence, and the human soul, 1 Isaiah, viii. 20 ; 2 Tim., iii., 15, 16 ; 2 Pet., i. 19, 20. VOL. II. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. nay, even the Word made Flesh, and the author of the New Creation — which I have proved are, besides the inspired word, the remaining manifestations of God, are therein fully explicated by God, with reference to the matter of our faith, our duty, and our salvation. This is the aspect in which the question of a per¬ fect rule of faith and obedience — in other words the question of truth and goodness— of knowledge and of moral duty— presents itself, under the Gospel Church State, to a race of fallen men, of whom the grand necessities are declared to be, Repentance toward God, and Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ.1 This is the as¬ pect in which that same supreme question is presented to peni¬ tent and believing sinners, followers of the Son of God, to whom the constant exhortation is, Grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.2 It seems to me impos¬ sible to doubt, that under the principles discussed and the facts proved, the result is demonstrated. There are laws pervading the universe — amongst the rest moral laws : these laws imply God the lawgiver and man the self-conscious subject of them : these laws are the infallible and unalterable rule of all moral con¬ duct — and all transgressors must perish under them : but if all men — being fallen — are transgressors, and God in infinite mercy reveals a Saviour to them — and therewith restates his Moral Law, and makes plain its relation to the great salvation, and to Faith in the divine Saviour : then that permanent revelation becomes the perfect rule, at once of Faith and of Obedience to fallen men: it is the exclusive and infallible guide in all divine truth and all morality, unto salvation. What makes the point demonstrated as efficacious as it is clear and precise, is that these same Scrip¬ tures reveal to us a divine interpreter of their sense, a divine enforcer of their power, a divine agent in their effectual and saving application to our souls, a divine witness to their truth and to the blessedness they not only reveal, but convey. Im¬ pregnable in their outward evidences, irresistible in their inward evidences — we pass to a still higher domain of certainty and con¬ viction, when through the Spirit of God abiding in the renewed soul, the truth of God becomes the very life of it, through the unction, the demonstration and the power of the Holy Ghost.3 IT.— 1. These blessed Scriptures, thus shown to be the Infel- i Acts, xx. 21. 2 j Poter; iU> 18> 3 Ezek., xxxvi. 26, 27 ; Rom., viii. 9-17 ; John, xiv. 15-27. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 355 lible Rule of our Faith and Obedience, teacli us with great clear¬ ness that being the dependent and fallen creatures of an infi¬ nitely good, wise, powerful, holy, just and true God — our Cre¬ ator, benefactor, lawgiver, redeemer, and judge, the chief end of our existence is, to glorify him and to enjoy him for ever.1 That he will glorify himself, one how or other, by us and by all the works of his hands, he has told us plainly — nor can any one imagine any other result to be possible.2 But there is an amazing difference between being made through our sins monuments of the infinite justice of God, to the praise of his glory ; and, on the other hand, illustrating the riches of his glory as vessels of mercy, by such lives as become penitent and believing followers of his only begotten Son.3 Nor is it a light thing to note, that the enjoyment of God by us is indissolubly united with that ser¬ vice of him and that conformity to him, whereby his glory is il¬ lustrated and promoted. The knowledge, therefore, which we need in order to accomplish the chief end of our existence by glo¬ rifying and enjoying God ; is summarily comprehended in know¬ ing what is true concerning God, and in knowing what his will is concerning us. It is this which the Scriptures principally teach • — their very sum being, what man ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man.4 That we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God, and are sunk into blindness and ignorance of divine things, and are naturally de¬ praved and averse to what is spiritually true and good, and are under the dominion of divers lusts and many evil passions ; are but terrible facts, making more clearly manifest our need of such a light and such a power, as God has provided for us in his blessed word. However miserable our estate and our way may be — here is a lamp unto our feet, a light upon our path, the man of our secret counsel : and it is a true saying, and worthy of all accep¬ tation, that Jesus Christ, whom those Scriptures reveal, came into the world to save sinners — even the chief. Nor does the helpless guilt into which we are plunged — disabling us in our own strength, either to accept the divine teachings which would make us wise unto salvation, or to reap that great reward which attends the keeping of the divine commandments ; shut us out from the hope of glorifying and enjoying God, except as we reject i Rom., xi. 36 ; 1 Cor., x. 31 ; Ps. lxxiii. 20-26; John, xvii. 22-24. 3 Prov., xvi. 4. 3 Rom , ix. 22, 23. * John, xx. 31 ; 2 Tim., i. 13 ; Ps. cxix. 106. A 356 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. him who is the end of the law itself for righteousness, and who is the way, the truth, and the life.1 It is he alone who has glo¬ rified God by a perfect obedience : it is he alone who is the truth : it is in him alone that the true and the good are made available to us. As long as his words remain, All that the Father giveth me, shall come to me ; and him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out ;2 every true disciple of his should be ashamed of his unworthy doubts and fears, and every humble seeker of him should blush at his unbelief. 2. Considering the Scriptures as the perpetual and infallible rule, in general, of what all men ought to believe concerning God, and in particular, as a similar rule of the faith of all Chris¬ tians ; the light in which they present themselves would seem to be too clear to allow the possibility of doubt — if the world had not been filled with dishonouring allegations of their insufficiency for such a purpose. I omit to say any thing here, of the ability of God to make himself intelligible to man : I omit all proof that he himself exhorts and commands us to accept and believe his word, as a way of life perfectly clear and sure : I omit any use of the overwhelming demonstration, that from the beginning of time this way of life has been accepted and understood in ex¬ actly the same sense, as to every thing these Scriptures declare to be essential to salvation, by every human being who, there is any reason to believe, was ever saved.3 What supersedes, in this place, the necessity of urging any other consideration — is the subject-matter itself, viewed as an object of human know¬ ledge. The teachings of the Scriptures, touching faith and touch¬ ing morals, are widely distinct in their essential nature. The Moral Law, as has been shown, was written on the soul of man at his creation : the sacred writings, as has been shown, do not change this law — they restate it, enforce its obligation by adding the express to the natural authority of God, and explain its rela¬ tions to the plan of salvation — the relations of morality to grace. But the grace — the faith — the salvation with which the word of God is replenished — every thing that makes it a Gospel — the power of God unto salvation : none of them were written on the soul of man at his creation — none of them were embraced even dn the Covenant of Woeks. All— absolutely all— are matters of pure Revelation. Touching the whole Plan of Salvation by Jesus Rom., x. 10; John, xiv. 6. 2 John, vi. 37. 3 2 Tim., iii. 14-17. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 357 Christ — touching all that is known concerning God by means of the Revelation of this plan — -touching the entire relations of sal¬ vation by grace to the moral law, as well as to every thing else in the universe ; all the knowledge that man ever possessed, is revealed knowledge — and is contained in the sacred Scriptures. It is all knowledge which transcends human knowledge ; God alone possessed it — he alone could reveal it. Of two things, therefore, one is unavoidable. Either the whole of what purports to be a divine Revelation of a new and living way, whereby life and immortality are brought to light through the word of God, and all the pretended knowledge of God and of salvation con¬ nected therewith, is one vast and absolute imposture ; or, being true, real, and divine, it is itself the absolute and infallible rule of belief in all that it reveals, and all men, in general, must ac¬ cept it as such, and Christians, in particular, must receive it as the sole ground and rule of Faith unto salvation. It is true there is an infallible interpreter of it : but he is the Holy Ghost, who is the author of it all. It is true, each rational being, using his best endeavours, and seeking the promised divine assistance, must determine, for himself, the sense of the word. But this he would have to do, if God spoke to him face to face ; this, he will be obliged to do concerning the final sentence which will be passed on him ; this, he cannot avoid, without abnegating his rational and moral nature — and staking eternal life on a creature like himself, rather than on the God who created him, the Sa¬ viour who redeemed him, and the Spirit who sanctifies him. 3. When we reflect that the very possibility of religion de¬ pends on the existence of our personal intelligence and accounta¬ bility, and consider that truth is the natural aliment of the human understanding, and that the pursuit, the acquisition, and the en¬ joyment of it, are the fittest occupation and chief glory of our nature ; how greatly should we magnify the name of God, for that he has opened to us the very fountain of eternal truth, and revealed it to us in himself, so that there — precisely where we were most in darkness, and where it most behooved us to get knowledge, the soul is delivered from its bondage, and God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. That we have this treasure in earthen vessels, only makes it the more evident that the excellency of the 358 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. power is of God, and not of us. This manifestation of the truth ought to commend itself to every man's conscience, in the sight of God. But if our gosjoel he hid, it is hid to them that are lost : in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine into them.1 To believe any thing that is not true upon any subject whatever, is always a manifold evil to us, and is always a proof of the weakness of our fallen nature. But to believe what is false concerning God himself, wrho is the sum of all truth, is an evil the whole extent of which we do not state, when we say that in this way the very end of our being, in glorifying and enjoying him, is most thoroughly frustrated.9 On the other hand, This, says the Re¬ deemer, is eternal life, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.3 These Scriptures, therefore, the repository of that saving knowledge, and the record of that eternal life to which it conducts us, are the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth.4 And concerning their efficacy in making us wise unto salvation, he who judged himself to have been the chief of sinners, and whom God has made one of the most illustrious channels of conveying divine knowledge to man, declares that the word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and mar¬ row, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.5 They who, in the greatness of their gifts and their attainments, perceive the most clearly those boundaries within which human knowledge is circumscribed, are the readiest to acknowledge our need of the revelation which God has given us concerning divine things : and they who have searched the deepest into this ex¬ haustless store of divine knowledge and wisdom, are the last to claim that without it thev could have found the wav of life, or that without it they can now walk in the way it has disclosed. What marvel is there that the Christian loves his Bible with a fervour, which not even an enthusiast in his devotion to any other truth can comprehend ? Has it not made God, of whom he had some dim conceptions before, perfectly known to him, as the fountain of all truth, all goodness, all glory, all blessedness, and 1 2 Cor., iv. 2-7. 2 Psalm L. 21, 22; Frov., xiv. 12 ; xvi. 25. 3 John, xvii. 3. 4 John, v. 39; Rom., i. 16. 5 Ileb., iv. 12. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 359 as such his God in Christ ? Has it not made Christ, of whom, independently of revelation, he knew nothing, and in whom at first he saw no beauty that he should desire him, perfectly known to him as the Saviour of his soul, and his satisfying and eternal portion P Has it not taught him truths so high, so precious, so full, so certain, so wonderful, that all things are become new, and that in their mighty working in him by the power of the Holy Ghost, he also himself has become a new creature ? Has it not been unto him as the sword of the Spirit, by which mighty victo¬ ries have been won in him, and won through him, and by which mighty victories are still to be won — conquering and to conquer? Surely there is no marvel in such confidence and love : but there is wondrous proof therein. Whether this divine word be the in¬ fallible teacher as to what we ought to believe and do, let the countless millions of redeemed souls attest, whose faith and new obedience it was the instrument to beget, the means to nourish, and the rule to direct. And then let the universe be searched for a single soul, that knows the true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent, irrespective of the divine truth herein revealed ; or whose faith and life, guided by any other rule, availed to save him from the wrath to come. 4. It is not possible to conceive of any thing as good, irre¬ spective of its nature as true also ; so that evangelical righteous¬ ness has its root in revealed truth, no less really than universal morality has its root in truth cognizable to man as he was cre¬ ated. The performance of duty cannot precede knowledge — knowledge cannot precede truth — obedience cannot exist inde¬ pendently of belief. Without holiness no man shall see God but yet it is after God that the new man is created in the holi¬ ness of truth :2 and, therefore, it is through the righteousness of faith that sinners are saved, and become heirs of all the promises :3 and that is a righteousness which is itself revealed, from faith to faith.4 Hot only, therefore, are the Scriptures the rule of all belief touching divine things, as has been proved ; but, explicitly, both from the nature of the case and from their own express statements, the truth they reveal, and the faith they require, un¬ derlie the whole of that New Obedience they exact, and are the foundation of it. In the perfect state of man, to say, do and 1 Heb., xii. 14. 2 Eph., iv. 24; ii. 10. 3 Rom., iii. 22; iv. 13. 4 Rom., i. 17. 360 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. live, might bring eternal life within reach of him who already knew God. But to man, fallen and ignorant of God, no other wray of life is possible, except that the just shall live by faith.1 The dis¬ tinction involves the whole difference between the Covenant of Grace, on one side, and the Covenant of Works and the primeval state of man, on the other. To the sinner, obedience to God neither is, nor can be, the ground of his interest in God : it is the fruit and evidence of that interest.2 I am the Lord thy God,3 are the words with which God prefaces the Moral Law, which is the rule of all obedience : it is because God is the Lord, and our God and Redeemer, that we are bound to keep all his command¬ ments. The part of sinners is to accept the Saviour sent of God, and the eternal life revealed in him ; and then the obedience which is of faith — embracing every commandment of God, is to be accomplished throughout their whole life of faith, repentance, the new obedience, good works, and the spiritual warfare. Faith, so far from making the law void, establishes it.4 For it is Christ Jesus our Saviour, who alone has perfectly kept the law — it is the Holy Ghost our Comforter and Sanctifier, who inspired it all, and it is the new creature alone who is conformed to it. The connection between the true Knowledge of God and true obedi¬ ence to his holy law, between the faith and the duty, of both of which the Scriptures are the perfect rule — is in its very nature such as to make the true obedience — the duty — wholly impossi¬ ble irrespective of the true knowledge — the faith. Greatly, there¬ fore, as we err if we imagine true religion to be possible, independ¬ ently of the strict observance of all morality ; the error is not less grievous, to suppose that any obedience to the moral law, which will avail in the sight of God, is possible to us, independ¬ ently of that knowledge of him which is revealed in Christ Jesus. In effect, it is the Scriptures alone which teach us this — and through them, both ways, we are complete in him who is the head of all principality and power.5 By union and commu¬ nion with him, we are made partakers of the riches of the re¬ vealed grace of God, in the knowledge of his adorable name, and the holiness of his blessed law. It is thus that the riches of Christ are indeed unsearchable.® 4 Rom., iii. 31. 5 Col., ii. 10. 6 Eph., ii. 8-12; i. 3-12; Col., i. 24-28. i Gal., iii. 8-14. 3 1 John, ii. 3-5. 8 Exod., xx. 2. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 361 5. Manifestly, where no law is, there is no transgression.1 Manifestly again, whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law : for sin is the transgression of the law.2 And yet once more, manifestly, all unrighteousness is sin.3 These propositions, each one of which is precisely asserted by God, and clear to hu¬ man reason and conscience, are decisive of the whole subject. Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.4 But whether we be considered as the creatures of God, or as sinners redeemed by the blood of Christ, it is mockery of God to suppose we can enjoy his favour while we lie under the curse of his law ; and it is mockery of us to say we can have any fruition of him while our nature revolts at that which he requires of us, and is prone only to that which is forbidden by him. Always, therefore, and under all possible estates, the law of God is the rule of life and death, the rule of sin and holiness, the rule of happiness and misery unto us. It avails nothing to say we are fallen and cannot keep the law : that only renders more obvious our necessity for union with Christ, who did perfectly keep it on our behalf. It avails nothing to urge that being united to Christ, it is the righteous¬ ness of faith whereby we are saved : for the New Creature, who alone can exercise faith in Christ, has the law of God written anew on his heart, and loves that law and abhors himself for every transgression of it, and every want of conformity unto it, exactly in proportion to his growth in grace. The restoration by revela¬ tion from heaven of the knowledge of that law effaced in man by the fall, was an act of God, with reference to the law, responsive to his act restoring man to the lost image of himself. Both acts appertain to the Covenant of Grace — both have direct relation to true religion and the salvation of the soul — and the impiety is no greater to deny the new birth, than to assert that the new birth is irrespective of our moral nature and obligations. Now it is in the divine word that all these truths are made known unto us — this divine restoration of man, this divine restatement of the moral law, these divine relations between the one and the other wonderful work of God : and in it they are so made known, that, in their glorious fulness, they become the Gospel of Christ— - which is the power of God unto salvation. There only is a divine Saviour made known to us, in whose incarnation, obedience, and sacrifice, a divine righteousness is attainable by us, through which 1 Rom., iv. 15. 2 1 John, iii. 4. 3 1 John, v. It. 4 Heb., xii. 14. 362 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. oar imperfect obedience is acceptable to God ; there only is a divine agent revealed to us, by whom a righteousness fitting us for the service and enjoyment of God is wrought in us, these very Scriptures being, as has been proved, the instrument of the sanc¬ tifying work of the Holy Ghost. If, therefore, any reliance is to be placed on the express declarations of these sacred writings — - or on the knowledge they impart to us concerning God, and man, and the relations between them ; then there is no room to doubt that the invariable judgment and experience of all souls truly enlightened in divine things are just, and that herein is delivered to us infallibly, the sum as well as the rule both of obedience and faith. It may be added with confidence, that the clear accep¬ tation of the divine truths revealed to our faith, and the living y O conformity to the duties divinely required of us, are the very measure of the power of the divine life within us. 6. I have spoken with particular reference to the moral law — and more generally of the whole will of God no matter how we may come to the knowledge of it — and very specially of the written revelation of the divine will, as containing all that God requires man to believe concerning him, and the whole duty that God requires of man. Those positive commands and ordinations of God which he has at any time made known to man, and those intimations of his will through his infinite providence, which con¬ tinually attend the progress of our whole race and that of every individual of it, and that working of his divine Spirit in the souls of men, which is so specially the life of all God’s children and so universally the scoff of every form of unbelief : all these will be found to have the most intimate relations with each other, and a perpetual relevancy to that unalterable faith and morality, the claims of which and the rule of which I have been urging. This renders it needless, at this time, to enter upon the discussion of topics so numerous and so great, whose special exposition belongs to the regular ministrations of the pulpit, and to treatises whose form and object are different from the present one. I have shown in a previous Treatise, that the institution of the Sabbath day was coeval with the creation of man * and that the consecra¬ tion by God of man, to his special service and enjoyment, and the consecration of the seventh day with special reference thereto, were the primeval acts of God’s sovereign goodness in the way of dominion over the exalted being he had just created in his own 363 CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. image.1 When, so many ages afterwards, God spoke and re¬ corded with his own finger on tables of stone, the law which he had first written on man’s heart ; it is not strange that he placed in the midst thereof that law of a blessed Sabbath, which was from the beginning of time and of human existence, indepen¬ dently of which in some form man had never known any moral law, nor had any idea of his own consecration to his Creator. Nor is there the least cause of surprise, when we consider these things, that the Lord Jesus should have made his exercise of lordship over the Sabbath day, one of the crushing proofs of his own divine authority ; and that he should have taught with so much emphasis that in its very nature and existence it had, like the law written on the heart, relation to the very being and blessedness of man.2 With that restoration of the moral law by God, moreover, commenced the written revelation of his will — and everv word he has caused to be revealed and written since, stands in indissoluble connection with it. It lay at the basis of the ceremonial, political, and Levitical, as well as religious system erected by Moses at the command of God : and the Gospel Church founded on the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ him¬ self being the chief corner stone, is so far from being independent of this unalterable rule of right, that every member of it is cre¬ ated in Christ Jesus unto Good Works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.8 Nor is the New Birth itself more inscrutable to us, than is the power of God in creation by which the law written in man’s heart should be reproduced in us through endless generations, just as it stood in the first fallen man ; nay, reproduced with the record also of its primeval violation, in the same terror of God’s presence in every child of Adam, which Adam himself felt as soon as he had fallen ;4 a terror from which nothing can deliver us but faith on the Son of God.5 In every direction all these sublime truths illustrate and fortify each other : and each one of these great topics may be taken in succession, and made the centre from which all the rest may be displayed. In itself, not one is more distinct than this of God’s unalterable moral law ; and however the exact nature of particular duties may sometimes perplex us, nothing can be more certain than the nature of duty itself — nothing more assured 1 Gen., i. 28; ii. 3. 2 Matt., xii. 1-8; Mark, ii. 23-28. 3 Epb., ii. 10-22. 4 Gen., iii. 10; 1 John, iii. 20, 21. 5 Rom., v. 1, 2. 364 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. than its infallible sum and rule. A law emanating from God himself — written on every human heart hy nature — restored by the finger of God — incorporated with all revealed religion — illus¬ trated throughout the whole sacred Scriptures — perfectly fulfilled and complete satisfaction made to it hy the divine Redeemer in our room and stead : we are born again hy his Word and Spirit into the lost image of God and a new conformity to his holy law — the love of that blessed law the very fruit of our new life as we increase in conformity to God, and in fitness for his service and enjoyment ! Well may God's prophet declare, He hath showed thee 0 man what is good ; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God ? 1 Well may the inspired preacher pro¬ claim the conclusion of the whole matter to be, that we should, Fear God and keep his commandments : for this is the whole duty of man.2 It is Jesus who crowns all : I am the way, the truth, and the life : no man cometh unto the Father but by me : all that the Father giveth me shall come to me : and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.3 T. Thus connecting all duty with all faith — thus uniting all the good with all the true — thus laying in the very nature of man an original ability, and in his fallen state a susceptibility of restoration, to the service and enjoyment of God — thus founding in God himself, the author and first cause of all things, the root, and course, and end of all the mysteries of nature and of grace — thus accepting the Son of God as the Saviour of the world, in whom all these mysteries are solved, and all things are reca¬ pitulated and redressed : we turn to the written word of God, the repository of all these sublime truths, and confessing it to be the infallible source of knowledge, whereby we may be enabled to glorify God and enjoy him for ever, which is the chief end of our existence — we seek in these Scriptures, in order to that end, spe¬ cifically what we ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires ol us. They give us, specifically, that knowledge — line upon line, precept upon precept : they give it with divine authority as to the matter, and with divine certainty as to the form : through them, we receive, by the Spirit of God, a divine illumination wherein a true insight of them is attainable — a divine regeneration and sanctification wherein a continually in- 1 Micah, YL 8. 2 Eccles., xii. 13. 3 j0hn xiv. 6; vi. 3t. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 365 creasing conformity unto them is attainable : and as the founda¬ tion, at once, and consummation of all, we receive the Saviour of our souls, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteous¬ ness, and sanctification, and redemption.1 Touching all duty, he has himself laid down the universal and unalterable rule, Observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.2 And thus all that has been written of him, was in order that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God : and that believing we might have life through his name.3 And thus repentance and remission of sins have been preached in his name among all nations, begin¬ ning at Jerusalem.4 So that beyond all doubt, if there be no other name under heaven, given amongst men, whereby we must be saved, but the name of Jesus ; there can be no other rule of salvation given under heaven amongst men, but that which Jesus gives us ; and there can be no other infallible assurance that we possess either the Saviour, the salvation, or the rule, except that which is grounded in the word inspired, and the work wrought in us, by the Spirit of Jesus. 8. If we would know with certainty that the things com¬ manded by Jesus touching all duty, are the very things embraced in that unalterable law of God which he himself perfectly ful¬ filled, and under which he shed his most precious blood to redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zeal¬ ous of good works ; we have but to hearken to his own emphatic words, Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets : I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled.5 As re¬ stated by God, the first four commandments, composing the first table of the law, comprise a summary of man’s duty to God, and the last six commandments, composing the second table of the law, comprise a summary of man’s duty to his fellow-man.6 That we shall accept the true God and renounce every other God : that we shall avoid all idolatry even in the worship of the true God : that we shall avoid all irreverence towards God : that we shall devote six days to the diligent pursuit of our lawful business, and keep the seventh day as a Sabbath consecrated to God : this, a human interpreter would give as the general sense of that 1 1 Cor., i. 30. 2 Matt, xxviii. 20. 3 John, xx. 31. 4 Luke, xxiv. 47. 5 Matt, v. 17, 18. 6 Exod., xx. 866 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. first table, which our Lord sums up in the one sentence, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind.1 That we shall honour our parents, that we shall not kill, that we shall respect the property of others, that we shall preserve our own and their chastity, that we shall adhere to the truth, and that we shall be content with our lot : this is what, according to human thinking, would be the general sum of the second table, whose sum our Lord teaches us is, That we should love our neighbour as ourselves, and that All things whatsoever we would that men should do unto us, we should do even so to them.2 The republication of this universal law was in the form of a cove¬ nant, entered into at Mount Sinai, between God and his peo¬ ple ;3 wherein was recognized the Covenant of Redemption, and the moral law as the law of Christ, and a rule of life to his seed ;4 and wherein was recognized, also, the binding obligation of the penalty of the Covenant of Works, to be inflicted on the wicked in the great day, and to be borne by Christ for his peo¬ ple.5 Let us remember, also, that God has declared this law to be perfect, to be spiritual, and to be exceeding broad :8 and then we shall easily realize the propriety of those perpetual exposi¬ tions of its irresistible penetration and force, its illimitable depth and completeness, its all-pervading compass and energy, its divine rectitude and majesty, which pervade the sacred Scriptures. And when we consider the relations of this law to God, to the nature of man, to the Covenant of Grace, to the Mediator of that Covenant, and to salvation as wrought out by Christ, and explained in the Scriptures, and actually and trium¬ phantly applied to fallen man ; the exposition of its sum as being love to God and love to our fellow-men — the love of a renewed soul- — -the love by which faith works — so far from being an ex¬ aggeration, is perceived as soon as Christ utters it, to be the unavoidable consummation of the sublime argument involved in the sublime data.7 9. It is impossible to address ourselves to any particular man- 1 Luke, x. 27; Deut., vi. 5. 2 xxii. 39; vii. 12. 3 Deut., v. 2; Exod., xxxiv. 28 ; Deut., ix. 9. < Rom , vii. 4; Gal., iii. 16, 17. 5 Psalm lxix. 4; Deut., v. 22, 26; Heb., xii. 21. 6 Psalm xix. 7 ; Rom., vii. 14 ; Psalm cxix. 96. 7 Rom., xiii. 10; Gal., v. 6; Deut., xxx. 6; Rom., xii. 9; Isa,, xxvi. 8, 9; Matt., x. 37, 38 ; Psalm lxxiii. 24-26. CHAP. XVIII.] THE INFALLIBLE RULE. 367 ner of analysing the law of God, considered in itself and in the great relations of it which have been suggested, and to accom¬ plish this in a manner as exhaustive as our faculties allow ; without continually arriving, by one process after another, at those clear and grand results, which Christ has declared to us, and which I have endeavoured to state and estimate. Thus, if we consider the law under its successive aspects of preceptive on the one side, and penal on the other ; it is only as Christ, in our nature and in our stead, has perfectly kept every precept of it, that we in him can be considered and treated as if we had kept those precepts ; and only as he, in our nature and in our stead, has paid its penalty and endured its curse, that we in him can escape the wrath to come. While all this involves the whole mediatorial office and work of Christ, and our union and com¬ munion with him ; it involves, at the same time, the complete recognition of the law as being the holy, just, and unalterable law of God ; it involves the complete recognition of the sacred Scriptures as the repository of that law and as the infallible rule both of our faith in Christ and our obedience to the law : and it involves the complete recognition of the infinite righteousness and grace of God, as the giver both of the law and the Saviour. The result is still the same if we endeavour so to analyze the law, as to consider separately, what duty it requires of us to¬ wards God, what towards ourselves, and what towards others ; and then, passing farther, consider under the last of these three divisions, the multiplied subdivisions which the order and pro¬ gress of nature and society beget — the relative duties of parents and children, husbands and wives, masters and servants, chil¬ dren of the same family, citizens of the same commonwealth — nay even members of the same fallen race. Passing by all but the last and most universal relation — how immeasurable in its influence upon that, is the idea of a divine Kedeemer for lost men, when added to the idea of a divine law for them, which he comes, in their common nature, to obey, to satisfy, and mag¬ nify for them ! Taken as a race, under the law, with and with¬ out the idea of their brotherhood in Christ Jesus, with and without a common Saviour and a common salvation — how im¬ measurably different in the two cases, is their condition and their destiny ! We must never permit ourselves to forget that law¬ lessness, everywhere and in every estate, signifies ruin, to every 368 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK III. dependent creature : and that law means death as well as life — life and death being the only alternatives that are possible, when God, and man, and a moral law, are the elements from which a conclusion must flow. Under the law, we are already lost sin¬ ners. To alter, to abolish, to evade, or to keep the law — are all impossible. A Saviour is the sole remedy — 'the sole alternative against perdition. Therefore it is, that Faith, Bepentance, New Obedience, Good Works, Spiritual Warfare — have such immense significance — and the Infallible Buie of them all such boundless importance. 10. Such is the relation of the sacred ScrijDtures to the human race, and more especially to the Messianic Kingdom, from the point of view occupied in the present inquiry. The truth contained in them is the only truth whereby we can be made wise unto salvation — the duties revealed in them are the only duties which a soul thus made wise admits — the Saviour who is their centre and sum is the only Mediator between God and man, the only Bedeemer of God’s Elect. They are, therefore, the revealed, the unalterable, and the universal Buie of Faith, and of Morality ; and in them, being divinely taught what we ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of us, we are plainly, powerfully, and completely guided by the Holy Ghost to the chief end of our existence, in glorifying God and enjoying him for ever. 1 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. ARGUMENT OF THE FOURTH BOOK. What maybe called the purely individual and personal aspect of the Religion of Cod, in its influence upon the soul and life of each particular Christian, was concluded in the preceding Book. The fundamental conditions of what may be called the purely social and organic effects of that Religion, with regard to those whose separate experience has been traced to the end, are disclosed in this Fourth Book. Our relations are direct with the Lord Jesus, in our Union and Commu¬ nion with him ; they are also direct with all our brethren in Christ, in the sense that all of them have communion with each other, by reason of their mutual union with Christ. That union with Christ, is the immediate basis of grace and salvation, personally considered: communion with each other, the immediate basis of organized Christianity — the Church. — Christ is equally the head, supreme and exclusive, of every particular Christian having communion with him ; and of every organic union of Christians, having communion with each other, in consequence of the previous union of all of them with him; and this is equally true, in every conceivable state of the developement of this Christian brotherhood. The extent to which these truths are used in producing an organism, is different under different dispensations. The Kingdom of Cod is exhibited to u.s in the Scriptures in such a manner as to involve perpetually a threefold aspect ; namely, from its head Christ, it is exhibited as the Kingdom of Messiah — from its author the Holy Spirit, as the New Creation — and from its members the Children of Cod, as the Body, the Bride, the Fulness, the Church of Christ. It is this last aspect of the Kingdom of Cod, now militant in its gospel state, which is the direct effect of those dealings of Cod with men in the matter of salvation, which is now to be discussed, in tracing the Subjective Knowledge of Cod into, and afterwards through, that divine organism. In the Nineteenth Chapter, there¬ fore, which is the First of this Fourth Book, it is shown that the fundamental conception ot the Church of Christ, considered as the Kingdom of Cod, is that it is the body organized of those, whom the Mediator redeems as their Priest, teaches as their Prophet, and rules over as their King ; and that the supreme and exclusive Headship of Christ, and the Communion of Saints, are the two elemental principles of the divine Organization thus conceived ; this being a 24 370 ARGUMENT OF THE FOURTH BOOK. Peculiar Kingdom, not commensurate with the human race, but created by the Holy Ghost out of those chosen out of all kingdoms, by God’s free and sover¬ eign Grace : and the divine procedure, in the gradual and permanent organiza¬ tion of the Visible Church, is traced through all past Dispensations — the effects of every successive act of God are stated — the result reached and the principles yielded to us in the Gospel Church are demonstrated — and the great conception and elemental principles pervading all, are shown to be unchangeable, in all future, as in all past dispensations. The Twentieth Chapter, which is the Second of this Book, is devoted to the disclosure of the Nature and Ends of this King¬ dom of God, and the exposition of the means of estimating the one and the other : these means being supremely, the word of God, in its historical, its pro¬ phetical, and its ethical teachings, with direct reference to the special matter ; in illustration of which, is the actual Church, since the Canon of Scripture closed, historic and present: the nature of this Kingdom being, that it is spiritual, ever¬ lasting, and universal — witnessing for God in time, and through eternity : the immediate object of its divine organization being its own Perfection and Exten¬ sion — therein saving sinners, perfecting saints, illustrating its own nature and end — and the nature of God’s Being and Grace : the obligatory force of its divine organism — its own relation to Faith and Duty — and the resources given to it by God, being all complete. The Twenty-first Chapter, which is the Third of this Book, is occupied with an attempt to deduce and to explicate this Kingdom of God, in its intimate Nature and fundamental Principles, considered as the Visible Church of the Lord Jesus Christ: wherein the gracious Interposition of God, and the Probation of the human race, are considered in their actual, their theoretical, and their revealed results; and God’s manifold dealings with the human race — responsive to these manifold results, and the concatenation of his Providence and his Grace, are traced to the separate and visible organization of his Kingdom, and the simultaneous visible rejection of the world : the relation between the Nature of Man, the Nature of Society, and the Nature of the Church Visible of Christ, is carefully traced — the fundamental principles com¬ mon to all are disclosed — the relevancy of all to God, and to each other, is pointed out — the peculiar and divine distinction between the Church and the Body Politic is explicated — and the strict definition of the Church, thus demon¬ strated, is given. The Twenty-second Chapter, which is the Fourth of this Book, is devoted to the Demonstration of the Freedom of the Church of the living God ; which is shown to consist outwardly, in its total separation from the Civil State, and inwardly in its absolute consecration to Christ: to the establishment of the first element of this Freedom, it is shown that the Household, the State, and the Church, are all equally ordained of God — that they alone are ordained of him — that unitedly they exhaust the social susceptibilities of man — that the sphere of each, where all exist, is both naturally and divinely incompatible with that of both the others — that all tendency to the union of the Civil State and the Church, is destructive alike of the freedom of Nations and of the Nature of the Church — and contrary to the Will of God ; most especially in that any such union obscures the Visibility of the True Church, by confounding it with the world whose rejection by God, is an elemental part of that Visibility : to the ARGUMENT OF THE FOURTH BOOK. 371 establishment of the second element of the Freedom of the Church, the relation of the Glorified Redeemer to his Church and that of his Church to him, and her Blessedness in his infinite Dominion over her, are disclosed; and her true inward Freedom, without which she can have no outward Freedom, nor be his Church at all, is shown to result from her union and communion with him, and to be ex¬ pressed and exercised in her absolute consecration to him, as the true and high¬ est expression of her Spiritual Freedom. The Twenty-Third Chapter, which is the Fifth of this Book, starts from an advanced point in the enquiry ; the funda¬ mental Idea of the Church and its elemental Principles — the Nature and End of it — the deduction and solution of its great Problem — and the Spiritual Freedom of it in Christ, having been disclosed, and a fixed and complete conception of it obtained. This Chapter, therefore, proceeds to settle the principles upon which, at the end of so many centuries and vicissitudes, we may practically and infalli¬ bly determine the True Church Visible of the Lord J esus Christ, amongst innu¬ merable religions and sects. It discusses the elements of the Question of the Church, showing that there are three of them, to wit, the Historical, the Logi¬ cal, the Supernatural — explicating all three, demonstrating their use and relative importance, and the supremacy of the Supernatural element over both the others — and that of the Logical element over the Historical: all possible forms of re¬ ligion are then reduced to three, which are stated, discussed, and the only true one demonstrated ; and then the principles upon which the infallible Marks of the True Church are to be settled, are demonstrated with reference to the only true form that is possible to Religion. The three remaining Chapters are devoted to the discussion of the three divine Marks by which the true, visible, universal Church of God is infallibly determined — one Chapter to each infallible Mark. The Twenty-Fourth Chapter, which is the Sixth of this Book, is occupied with the demonstration that Purity of Faith is the first of those infallible Marks. The causes of the alleged difficulties in ascertaining the True Church, are designated — and the nature and design of the impostures resorted to are disclosed : — the state of the renewed soul — the nature of revealed salvation — and the religion of the True Church, are shown to be absolutely correlates of each other — the fun¬ damental characteristic of the whole being Faith in the divine Mediator, through whom is all Grace : the divine word which reveals the Saviour, the Faith, and the Church — is shown to be the infallible Rule of Faith in that Saviour ; and the infallible Arbiter of every Church that can be his — and the question of salvation being settled, no matter how, the questions of the Church — of the Rule of Faith — and of the Judge of Controversies follow, as necessary Corollaries, the nature of the salvation — the whole of which are discussed: the relation of true Faith to all Christian graces is explained — and the saving work of the Holy Ghost is shown to be the vital fact with reference to Faith, and by consequence to the life of God in every believer, and in the Church — which is the Body of Christ : and in the end, the nature and ground of our judgments concerning true Faith and the True Church — the nature and force of the symbolical statements of the True Church — and the hatred of God towards corrupt and apostate churches — are pointed out. The Twenty-Fifth Chapter, which is the Seventh of this Book, is devoted to the explication of the Idea of the true and spiritual Worship ol 372 ARGUMENT OF THE FOURTH BOOK. God, as revealed in the sacred Scriptures ; showing that it is elemental and all pervading, in the religion therein revealed to man; the recognition, service, wor¬ ship of the true God, through the only Mediator, by the divine Spirit, being the very method of the fruition of him — and of the manifestation of his glory, both by his children individually, and by his organized Visible Church, of which it is an Infallible Mark : in the demonstration of which, the relation of the word of God, and tire life of God in the soul, to each other, and to the worship of God ; the relation of the Plan of Salvation, the work of the Spirit, and the divine Idea and organism of the Church, to each other, and to the Worship of God ; the re¬ lation of Worship, to Religion, and to God; the relation of the Priesthood, and Sacrifice of Christ, and of his Ascension Gifts, to the Idea of true Worship in the Church of God ; the Royal Priesthood of the Peculiar People ; and the special, revealed Worship of the Christian Church; are all briefly considered — and closed with a summary demonstration of the infallible certainty of this Mark. The Twenty-Sixth Chapter, which is the Eighth and last of this Book, is devoted to the exposition of Holy Living, as the third Infallible Mark of the True Church : the relation of all righteousness in man to the law of God — and of all gospel holi¬ ness to Christ, to Faith, and to the spiritual Worship of God, is disclosed: the reality of Moral Distinctions, and the demonstration they afford of God, and of his nature as the fountain of all Goodness, is pointed out : the neglect and the perversion of these as fatal — the indissoluble connection between Blessedness and Holiness — and the nature of the Ploliness which distinguishes the True Church — are explicated, and the unity of that Holiness, with each of the pre¬ ceding Marks of that Church is proved : then the unity of the Mystery of God¬ liness is pointed out, and the perfection of Knowledge, of Duty, and of Grace, is shown to coincide with Goodness : the Chapter and the Book close, with an exhibition of the true life of the Church, as the power of the Holy Ghost — of the conclusive effect of the supremacy of the Supernatural Element in the Ques¬ tion of the Church — and of the Majesty and Glory of that Church. This brief synopsis of a somewhat extended attempt to demonstrate, upon the divine word, the precise nature of the Gospel Church, independently of the great Gifts of God to his Church, which will be discussed in the next Book, and which make every¬ thing more specific ; is itself capable, perhaps, of being reduced to a more con¬ densed, and still intelligible statement of the leading truths. Thus — God has a Visible Church in this World, which is held forth in his regenerate children, or¬ ganized by him upon the twofold basis, of the Union and Communion of Christ, its only Head, with every member of it — and the communion, through Christ, of all the members with each other : The Means, divine and human, of appre¬ ciating the Nature and End of this Visible Church, are complete; and they clearly demonstrate that it is the manifestation, in time, of a Spiritual, Universal, and Eternal Kingdom, whose End is the illustration of the Glory of God, in the salvation of fallen men : This Church, visible, universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ, now militant in its Gospel state as shaped by his inspired Apostles — is deduced through all God’s Acts of Providence and Grace touching the salvation of man, from the beginning of time and the creation of man ; and is unchangeable in form and substance, until the second Coming of the Son of Man : It possesses ARGUMENT OF THE FOURTH BOOK. 373 a peculiar divine organization, separate from tlie world, and not commensurate with the human race ; — whoso functions, based on principles inherent in human nature, and common to all forms of society; are, in their exercise, limited, boundedj^ and directed, by the Will of God revealed in the sacred Scriptures — which are its infallible Buie, in all things : By the Will of God, this Church is Free; made Free, inwardly, by the Holy Ghost, its inward Freedom depends upon and is manifested by its consecration to Christ, its only Head ; made Free, outwardly, by the command of God, its outward Freedom depends upon its com¬ plete organic separation from the. world ; thus Free, the subject-matter of its mis¬ sion is — all things whatsoever Christ has commanded — all things that are to be addressed to the Faith of men: This Church is perfectly manifest to all men who come in contact with it, and is incapable of being mistaken, when duly consid¬ ered, by God’s children ; there being but one possible form of true Religion, namely, that which is the sum and result of God’s Revealed Truth ; there being but few Elements in the Question of the True Church, and they simple and de¬ cisive, and the supreme one being Supernatural ; so that the Marks which the Church of the living God has, are few, clear, and infallible : These Infallible Marks of this True Church of Christ, are the constant and inevitable product of the Grace of God in every renewed soul, and of the life of God in his Church ; they are responsive to the whole nature, end, and power, of Revealed Religion ; they are correlates of the fundamental divisions of the scienee of the Knowledge of God, namely, God, man, Godman ; they are expository of the mode of God’s existence, and of the way of man’s salvation ; and finally, they are distinctly and verbally revealed to be, Faith in Christ Jesus, the Worship of God in Spirit and in Truth, and Holiness of heart and life; which being absent — there is no Christian — no Church. CHAPTER XIX. THE CHILDREN OF GOD UNITED INTO A VISIBLE KINGDOM FOR CHRIST. FUNDAMENTAL IDEA AND ELEMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF THE CHURCH OF GOD. I. 1. Communion of the Saints with Christ through Faith, and their Communion with each other in Love. — 2. The Idea of the Church based on the Headship of Christ and the Communion of Saints. — 3. Nature of the Bonds which are involved in this Divine Institute. — 4. Absolute and Supreme Relation of Christ to each Saint, and to the great Brotherhood of Saints. — 5. The Church of Christ and the Human Race are not commensurate with each other. — II. 1. The Divine Procedure in the gradual and permanent Organization of the Visible Church. — 2. The Saints desti¬ tute of a Visible Organization before the Call of Abraham : Effects of the Sacra¬ ment of Circumcision — 3. Giving of the Sacrament of the Passover: Its Relation to Christ, to the Organization of his Kingdom, and to the World. — 4. The Institu¬ tions of Moses ; Complete Rejection of the World, and Organization of a Kingdom for Messiah out of God’s Covenant People. — 5. Appreciation of the Church under its Mosaic Form, in itself, and in comparison with preceding and succeeding Forms. — 6. The Advent of Christ : New Form of the Church : Call of the Gentiles : The Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper: Authority and organizing Work of the Apostles. — I. The Gospel Church State : Brief Appreciation of it. — 8. The Future of the Church : The same Principles under more glorious Forms. — 9. Re¬ statement of elemental Truths. I. — 1. The Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered, may be divided into two great portions, tbe first of which would em¬ brace what has gone before, and the second would begin here. For, considering everything to result from our union with Christ, the distinction would be between such things as are personal and individual, and such as require a general and aggregate treat¬ ment : that is to say, such things as result to the individual be¬ liever united to Christ, by reason of his communion with Christ ; and such as result to all believers by reason of their communion with each other, resulting from their mutual union and commu¬ nion with Christ. What has been done thus far being, that I have endeavoured, in the First Book, to disclose that eternal Covenant of Grace through which all mercy comes to us as sin¬ ners ; in the Second Book, to explain the chief blessings and 376 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. benefits which, by this means, we individually receive ; and in the Third Book, to point out the great offices which every fol¬ lower of Christ is individually obliged and enabled to discharge : what remains, would belong more especially to the aggregate consideration of these followers of the Lord, contemplated in the various aspects they present as composing the Kingdom of Mes¬ siah — the people and Church of the living God. It is, first, the nature of the covenant itself, together with the method of its application to individual persons, and the personal results which uniformly follow : and then, it is the social and public results, which follow with the same uniformity, together with their me¬ thod and effects. Throughout, it is the absolute and unlimited Headship of the divine Redeemer ; throughout, it is the union of the believer with him ; the difference is between personal effects and results, flowing to us individually from our commu¬ nion with him by Faith ; and the social, general, organic ef¬ fects and results, flowing to believers in common, by reason of their communion with each other in Love. It is, first, the indi¬ vidual Christian ; then, it is the Church of Christ. And though it is impossible to treat either aspect of the subject wholly dis¬ regardful of the other — still there is an obvious distinction be¬ tween the two ; a distinction which I have hitherto constantly regarded, in treating the question of religion in its eminently personal aspect ; and which I shall henceforth equally regard, in treating the more corporate and public aspect of it. It is as re¬ ally true that Christ has a Kingdom, as that he has disciples ; but the former is composed out of the latter ; and while the outward form of the one has changed and will change again, the terms of true discipleship never did, and never can change. Christ's kingly office, in its strict sense, has relation to those only to whom his priestly sacrifice and intercession, and his pro¬ phetic teaching have relation ; and. in the order of thought, as well as in that of practical development, he is first our Priest to redeem each one of us, and then our Prophet to teach each one of us, and then our King to rule over us, not only indi¬ vidually, but unitedly as constituting his Church— his King¬ dom. 2. God’s dealings with us as individual persons, our duties and relations to him as distinct and separate beings — each one acting for himself, and with God * this is the manner in which 377 CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. God knoweth from eternity them tliat are bis/ the manner in which the work of Grace is begun in our souls, the manner in which we shall give account to God in the last day. Created in the image of God, restored by Grace to that lost image, each separate, self-conscious, ever-living personality, is a shadow of the infinite personality of God ; just as the wonderful method of the unity of the whole race, is a shadow of the infinite unity of God ; and as the reproduction of the race upon itself, in an endless unity, of endless fathers and sons, is a shadow of the infinite relations between the unity and the personality of the incomprehensible God.2 So God does not deal with men ex¬ clusively as individual, separate personalities : hut he deals with the whole race as one — and he deals with the great subdivisions of that race, which his own providence has created and sustained: and he has by divine ordination, organized those permanent and universal institutions which we call households, and common¬ wealths, which touch us so nearly, and affect our destiny so deeply. Above all, there is that divine fellowship, and the divine institute erected upon it, springing immediately and universally from our mutual fellowship with our common Lord ; that com¬ munion with each other, of all who are united to him, and the Kingdom of Messiah as the result, instantly dependent upon our common union with Messiah himself. Thus new relations and duties, other blessings and benefits, further manifestations of Faith and Obedience, additional developments of the life of God in the renewed soul, open widely before our advancing footsteps and urge us forward to higher efforts and wider attainments. The fellow-citizens of the saints are builded together for a habi¬ tation of God through the Spirit / and every one of them as a spiritual stone is built up in that spiritual house.4 3. As all our relations to God, as sinners saved by Grace, are through the Lord Jesus Christ by whom alone we have access to the Father / so all our relations to each other as the children of God, are through his only begotten Son our Saviour.6 We be¬ come heirs of God by becoming brothers of the Lord Jesus :7 and we become brethren to each other, in the bonds of the Spirit, by 1 2 Tim., ii. 19; Rom., viii. 29 ; Rev., xiii. 8. 2 Gen., i 26—28; ii. 7. a Eph., ii. 19-22. * 1 Pet., ii. 5. 5 John, xiv. 6 ; Col., i. IS. * Matt., xxiii. 8—10; Eph., iv. 15, 16. 7 Gal., iv. 4, 5 ; Ileb., ii. 11, 12. 378 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. becoming brethren of the Saviour of sinners.1 In neither case is this spiritual bond the exclusive bond which binds us to God and to each other ; for God is our Creator, Lawgiver, and Ruler, as well as our God in covenant ; and we are brethren by nature as well as through grace. But this spiritual bond unites us to God and to each other by a common salvation, whereby a new, spirit¬ ual, and eternal life common to us all, is added to all other bonds which unite us to God and to each other ; — this bond depending for its efficacy — nay for its existence — upon the truth as it is in Jesus, taken in its fullest sense. We may, in our ignorance, deny — or in our spiritual pride, reject the claims of Christ's brethren upon us, as our brethren ; or we may, in our folly and unfaithful¬ ness, admit the claims of those who deny Christ. But in neither case, can our conduct change the eternal nature of things. If we are the children of God, every true follower of Christ is our bro¬ ther ; and in the sense of divine things, no one else can be. We may make schism in the Church, which is the body of Christ, by rejecting our brethren ; but they are our brethren still. We may waste and defile our inheritance, by acknowledging as joint heirs such as have no title ; but this does not make them sons of God. It is God who made them his sons by adoption, through their brotherhood with Jesus Christ ; it is not we, who by calling them our brethren, can constitute them brethren of Christ and sons of God. 4. This is that great brotherhood which is described so vari¬ ously in the Sacred Scriptures. Unitedly, they are the Church of the living God — the Bride of the Lamb — the General Assembly of the First Born— the Innumerable Host whose names are writ¬ ten in the Book of Life. They are the objects of the eternal love of the Father, of the redeeming love of the Son, of the renewing and sanctifying love of the Spirit. It is in Christ their Head and Lord — their Priest and Prophet and King — their Redeemer — their Saviour, that they must always be considered ; whether in¬ dividually as he was given for them and as they were chosen in him ; or as gathered into one body and so sustaining new rela¬ tions to each other, to the universe, and to God. They are Christ's people, given to him from eternity, and purchased with his blood ; and from that grand truth all their fitness to be a people arises, and all their relations as such are controlled by it. The portion 1 Eph., ii. passim ; iv. 1-7. CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 379 of them at any time on earth, constitutes Christ’s Kingdom at that time in the world ; and in that conception all their fitness to he members of a spiritual Kingdom is grounded, and all their duties as such find both their form and their foundation. Upon any other basis, the whole subject is liable to be involved in end¬ less difficulties : upon this clear, divine, and eternal foundation, it is susceptible of a simple and complete exposition.1 5. The Kingdom of God on earth under the Covenant of Grace, is not commensurate with the whole of mankind, as it proposed to be under the Covenant of Works ; and this great distinction lying at the foundation of the subject, is felt in every subsequent part of it. The first Adam being the natural head of his race, was constituted the federal head of all that race de¬ scending from him by natural generation : the second Adam is the head of those supernaturally united to him — they being, as the Scriptures plainly teach and as universal experience shows, only a part of the human race. The Church of Christ is a King¬ dom, taken out of all other kingdoms, and existing in the midst of them all. It is a Kingdom creating itself by divine means, out of the members of all kingdoms in whose bosom it exists, maintaining with the whole of them a perpetual conflict of life and death. These great truths modify every other part of the subject ; and it is idle for us to evade the most distinct recogni¬ tion of them. However free the Gospel offer may be — however infinite the riches of the Grace of God — however boundless the merits of Christ ; nothing in the history of the world is so pal¬ pable, as that the whole race of mankind has not followed Christ, or constituted his Church ; and the Scriptures teach us nothing more plainly, than that this great fact was as fully recognized in the eternal Covenant of Grace, and the eternal purpose and de¬ cree of God connected therewith, as it is in the all-pervading course of his providence, and the practical manifestation of his grace.2 II. — 1. Having thus obtained a precise and elemental concep¬ tion of the Church of the living God, as regards the members of it — the fundamental principles of its existence — and the absolute relation of Christ to it ; we turn from this analysis to behold the 1 Eph., i. 10, 21-23; 1 Cor., xii. 12, 13. 2 Matt., xi. 25; xiil 15; John, iii. 19; vi. 44; Acts, vi. 44; xiv. 18; Rom., ix. 22, 23; 1 Cor., ii. 8. 0 380 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. universal brotherhood itself, realized in successive ages, and strug¬ gling under all outward conditions, through a world from which they were inwardly separated by their divine calling, and out¬ wardly by their divine organization. W e have in the divine record, every step taken by God — slowly, distinctly taken, through long ages, whereby his individual children were visibly separated to himself, and visibly united with each other — and the world itself by the same slow and reiterated process, more and more visibly rejected by God, as forming no part of the Kingdom of Messiah. We have the consummation of the whole in the Gospel Church State, founded and ordered by the Apostles of the Lord. God has declared to us the principles on which he acted, and the end he had in view ; he has narrated to us the successive steps he took ; he has set before us the result reached, when the volume of Inspiration closed ; and his people have had in their hands for eighteen centuries, his word to guide them, as they compared what he had caused to be so plainly written for their guidance, with all the vicissitudes which the Christian Church has endured. Situ¬ ated as the present generation is, we are as completely without excuse when we pervert the ordinances of God, touching our du¬ ties and our blessings considered as members of the Church of God, as when we do the like considered merely as personal fol¬ lowers of Christ. 2. For a long course of ages, it does not appear that there was any visible mark of separation by which the people of God were distinguished from his enemies round about them ; further than their more reverent observance of the Sabbath-day, their more godly lives, and their more habitual and sincere offering of sacrifice to God, may be considered as having thus distinguished them. The Church, as such, seems to have had no outward or¬ ganization ; further than those immense households, which sup¬ plied for so many ages the place of the civil State, may have supplied also the place of the spiritual commonwealth, during the patriarchal times. This ancient state of society, both as it regarded the civil and religious state of man, was extremely re¬ markable when compared with what we behold now ; and yet it lasted largely more than a third part of the past life of the hu¬ man race. For about twenty-two centuries after the Fall, God appears to have forborne to organize his Visible Church in any special outward manner ; allowing his people to occupy such a CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 381 relation towards the human race, as if, by any means, through his great mercy, the whole race would accept him for their God and Saviour, and thus avoid the necessity of any special organiza¬ tion of his Church, distinct from society itself. It is striking to note that this long forbearance of God to reject the race, and organize his kingdom as one separate and distinct, was attended by two apostacies of mankind, both almost universal. For it was not till the old world, except the family of Noah, had for¬ saken God and perished in the deluge — nor until the new world, four centuries after the flood, had forsaken him again ; that he called Abraham to be the father of the faithful, and placed in his flesh the mark which typically, visibly, and sacramentally divided between God's people and his enemies.1 Thenceforward an outward and perpetual separation of the people of God from all people besides, was openly ordained of God. God has visibly begun to reject the world — by the same act of sovereign grace and love whereby he signalizes all the mercy yet in store, not only for his elect, but for the world itself, through the seed of Abra¬ ham, and whereby he commences the new condition of the King¬ dom of Messiah, as a visible Kingdom which is to subvert all kingdoms. And yet, after how many ages of sin was it, on the part of the world, and of long-suffering on the part of God, that he thus rejected it ! How little did the world, thus permanently rejected of God, take heed of what was done P How small a part of the elect of God were privy to this act — and how small a part of all it signified and sealed was then comprehended ? 3. For more than four hundred years longer, God bore with the sins of man, and with their oppression of his Chosen people, upon whom he had placed his name and his love, and to whom he had hound himself afresh by covenant. Then lie interfered again, organizing still further the Kingdom of Messiah, and by a new and visible mark of separation between his people and all other people, sealed unto himself afresh the seed of Abraham at the darkest hour of their long bondage in Egypt. Amidst the universal lamentation of their oppressors, wailing for their first born in every house, he bestowed on Israel the second Sacra¬ ment of his ancient Church, setting forth their true deliverer and the manner of the deliverauce itself.2 By Circumcision they had been organized as a distinct people, rejecting all other peo- 8 Exod., xii. passim. 1 Gen., xii. 1-3; xvii. passim. 382 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. pie. and cut off from them : and in the light of this great truth they walked four hundred years. By the Passover they were still further separated and organized, and sealed over to the Saviour crucified for them — 'Christ their Passover1 — the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world :2 and in the light of this still more glorious truth, they walked as a people for fifteen cen¬ turies, till the fulness of the time had come, that Christ should be offered up. This sovereign act of God in Egypt, full of mercy to his people, and the forerunner of overwhelming ruin to his enemies, was pregnant with intimations of his eternal purpose concerning his Church, on which it rested — and of the wonderful manifestations thereof which succeeding ages have witnessed. But we must bear in mind that the long-suffering of God had waited more than twenty-five centuries, before his people were brought, in this miraculous Exodus from Egypt, into complete, visible, organic consecration to him ; and before the world, as such, was utterly, and finally, and sacramentally rejected, from all hope of participation in the Messianic Kingdom. And the amazing event was signalized upon the Seed of the Serpent, by the ruin of the greatest nation then existing, and followed by the slaughter of many inferior but still powerful communities ; and then it was confirmed and illustrated by the miraculous pilgrim¬ age of Israel, passing through forty years of wonders, from cen¬ turies of bondage on the Nile, to longer centuries of glory beyond the Jordan. 4. Until Israel pitched their tents in the wilderness of Sinai, the people of God on earth had no written revelation of his will, unless the Book of Job may be supposed to be of earlier origin than the writings of Moses ; neither had they any separate, and visible organization, as such, earlier than that produced by the sacrament of Circumcision given to Abraham, and the sacrament of the Passover given to his Seed according to the promise, in Isaac ; nor any settled Church State, nor any outward bond dis¬ tinct from that of the household, nor any ordered spiritual com¬ monwealth cognizable by the world . What, precisely, may be inferred from the extremely ancient existence of Elders amongst the people, and from the tribal form to which all ancient society had a necessary tendency, and which entered so early and so per¬ manently into all the societies formed amongst the descendants J 1 Cor., v. 7. 2 John, i. 29. CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 383 of Abraham ; is too remote in its nature, and too indistinct in its immediate bearing upon the present statement, to need particular enquiry. Everything shows that a new dispensation of the Church of God commenced with the calling of Abraham. And whether we consider the state of the ancient Church before his call, and after it as long as any traces of it remain amongst peoples not de¬ scended from him, or even among those actually descended from him except through Isaac : or consider the covenants made with him by God ; or the providence of God towards him and his seed by promise ; or the history of the Church in his family down to the complete establishment of the Jewish commonwealth : nothing is more distinct than the gradual organization of a visible Church, bv means of outward divine ordinances, in their nature sacramen- tal, and outwardly preclusive of all who were not God’s people in covenant. It was in the wilderness of Sinai, and by the hands of Moses the servant of God, that this great conception of a visible Church outwardly distinct from the world, and of the rejection of the world, had its perfect realization. It is of no consequence to the present matter, that the visible Church of God and the Hebrew commonwealth, were identified in so many respects, by the insti¬ tutions of Moses. Indeed the thorough organization and visibility of the Kingdom of God, and its complete rejection of the world, became only the more distinct in this manner. It is Jesus Christ who completes the realization of this conception, as he does of all divine conceptions ; and when he opened again the Kingdom of Heaven to the Gentiles, and opened up to the brotherhood of the saints the natural and universal brotherhood of man — it was by presenting the unqualified rejection of the world in every aspect it could bear, and the absolute completeness of his own Kingdom, as perfectly distinct from it. The more the Headship of Christ, and the communion of his saints with each other through their universal union with him, are realized in outward forms, the more completely do we find the Church organized, and the world re¬ jected. Nor is it from human reason or human authorit}q much less from the accidents of time and events, that these things take their rise, and make their progress : they spring from the imme¬ diate command of God, and proceed under his immediate guid¬ ance. Whether by Abraham, or by Moses, it is by God himself that his Kingdom passes into new forms, and assumes more per¬ fect outward states. It is this which is everywhere uppermost, 384 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. in the writings and the institutions of the great Jewish Lawgiver. And what he really did was, in obedience to the divine command to erect under a peculiar form, a visible Kingdom for God, founded on the total visible rejection of the world, and the complete visi¬ ble organization of a people in covenant with God ; the two ele¬ mental ideas of it being, the absolute Headship of Messiah, and the communion of all the members with each other, through their union and communion with him. 5. That wonderful dispensation continued for fifteen centu¬ ries, as the outward form of the Church ; and eighteen subse¬ quent centuries of persecution, dispersion, and the hidings of God's countenance, have not sufficed to obliterate from the minds of the ancient people of God, the fixed idea that Messiah has a distinct people, and that their organization springs from their mu¬ tual oneness in him ; which I have shown was the elemental foun¬ dation, in this aspect, of the organizing work both of Abraham and Moses. It was a dispensation perfect of its kind : and if any dispensation of its peculiar type could have achieved the whole purpose of the grace of God, this would have done it.1 Under it, the canon of the Old Testament Scriptures was com¬ pleted, and the system of divine truth unto salvation, thus per¬ manently embodied and held forth, was advanced to the highest point short of the personal teaching of the Son of God, and the perpetual indwelling of the Holy Ghost with the new power which began at Pentecost. By means of it, the Church of God, how¬ ever peculiar and temporary in its general aspect, had developed in its bosom those great constitutions concerning her rule, her in¬ struction, and her worship — the Elder, the Prophet, and the Syn¬ agogue, which survived the civil, and ceremonial, and sacrificial systems, and became the basis of the form of the Gospel Church. And I venture to add, that whenever it was administered in its purity, the most perfect form of the administration of the tem¬ poral interests ot society ever known on earth, was exhibited through all the vicissitudes to which a great people can be ex¬ posed, during the longest national career. Yet the great Apos¬ tle of the Gentiles, while he lauds that dispensation, considered of itself and considered with reference to its real design, as worthy of all reverence ;2 allows himself to call its elements weak and beggarly, and its service a bondage,3 when compared with the d is- 1 GaL, iii. 21. 5 Gal., iii. 19, 24. 3 Gal., iv. 9. CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 385 pensation of Christ himself, and with the efficacy and glory which attended it. It was as if God would show that no legal, no sacri¬ ficial, no typical, no ritual dispensation can suffice. He had al¬ ready shown, before he rejected the world and separated his people visibly from it, that no long-sutfering would move it to serve him ; and now he would show, that even those consecrated to himself must have that which is more effectual than laws, and sacrifices, and rites, and types, in order to their due service and adequate enjoyment of him. However long the delay may be, the Son of God must come in the flesh. It had been seen from eternity that there was no other remedy ; and everything else was in order to this. 6. At length the Saviour came. Emptying himself of his glory, made of a woman, made under the law — he who, being in the form of God, thought it no robbery to be equal with God — being found in fashion as a man, humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.1 He gave him¬ self for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.2 For him¬ self, he was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God ; for which the two reasons assigned are, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers, and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy.3 But his Kingdom, neither limited by the call of Abraham, nor by the institutions of Moses, both of which had been only stages of its development ; wras to embrace, henceforth, those who loved him, whether Jews or Greeks, circumcision or uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond or free.4 And so he expressly directed, that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusa¬ lem :5 the very mission of his Apostles being, to teach and to bap¬ tize all nations.6 Thus he said directly to Peter, that he gave unto him the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, and that what¬ soever he should bind on earth should bo bound in heaven, and whatsoever he loosed on earth should be loosed in heaven ;7 and he said as expressly to all his Apostles, whatever ye bind or loose on earth, shall be bound or loosed in heaven.8 And there is re¬ corded in detail, the opening of the Kingdom so long closed to 1 Phil., ii. 8-11. 2 Titus, ii. 14. 3 Rom., xv. 8-12. 4 Col, iii. 10, 11. 5 Luke, xxiv. 47. 5 Matt., xxviii. 19. i Matt, xvi. 19. 8 Matt, xviii. 18; John, xx. 23; 1 Cor., v. 4. 25 VOL. II. 386 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. all except the descendants of Abraham, by the hands of Peter, in the case of the Gentile Cornelius i1 concerning which matter, we have Peter’s own repeated assurance, that he acted by the express call of God ;2 and concerning the grand truth then real¬ ized, we have the general judgment of the Apostles and Elders.3 Touching the general power to bind and loose, vested in the Apostles — the power to take down all that was temporary in the ancient institutions — to transfer all that was permanent, even from the creation of man, into the new dispensation — and to erect that form of the Kingdom which we have in the Gospel Church State ; it is one chief design of one entire Book of the Scriptures (the Acts of the Apostles) to teach us what was done, and in what manner : and throughout all the subsequent portions of the New Testament, this is one of the great matters in which the will of God is continually revealed to us. Amongst the last acts of Christ before his crucifixion, was the institution of that sacra¬ ment which commemorates his sacrifice in our stead :4 and amongst his last commands after his resurrection, was that in all nations all his disciples should receive that other sacrament of Baptism, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.6 That the Kingdom erected in this form, was to be a visible Kingdom, not of this world but wholly separate from it — that the glorified Redeemer was the only Head, King, and Lord of it — that membership in this Kingdom depended on union and communion with the Head and Redeemer of the Kingdom — and that all the members of it are members one of another, by virtue of their being all members of Christ : these are the common and constant doctrines of the Scriptures, which it is needless to prove again in this place. The whole work of Christ discloses, every¬ where, the ideas I have been stating. The world so far from re¬ ceiving him, crucified him. His own knew and accepted him. And what events attended and followed this new and glorious development of God’s purpose concerning his Church ! What is the silent rejection of the nations in the gift of circumcision to Abraham, or the fearful catastrophe of Egypt at the institution of the Passover, or the slaughter of many nations which signal- 1 Acts. x. passim. 2 Acts, xl 1-18; xv. 1. 3 Acts, xv. 23-31. 4 Matt, xxv L 26-30; Mark, xiv. 22-26- Luke, xxii. 19, 20; John, xiii. 1, 2; ] Cor., xi. 23-29. 5 Matt., xxviii. 19; Mark, xvi. 15, 16. CHAP. XIX.] COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 387 ized the establishment of the Jewish dispensation ; what are such things, to the crucifixion of the Son of God, and to all that followed it of mercy and of wrath — and to all of both, that is yet to come ! 7. It is this Gospel Church which we now behold, with its Sabbath, its Sacraments, its divine Scriptures, its pure faith, its spiritual worship, its holy life, its Elders, its Teachers, its Con¬ gregations, its assemblies, its divine Lord ! Upon us, after so many centuries, has come this dispensation of the Kingdom of God with power, which succeeded the Ascension of the Lord. The followers of Jesus are gathered out of all nations. The promised Comforter abides with us.1 The last days still con¬ tinue ; the last manifestation, and the most complete, of God’s grace in saving sinners.2 And they shall all continue until he whose light it is, shall come and shall take the Kingdom. And while they continue, whosoever will call on the name of the Lord, shall be saved. Here, as in each preceding case, it is a new de¬ velopment of the same Kingdom, as distinct from all that went before, as they were from each other; and here, as always before, the same fundamental characteristics are not only preserved, but are more and more distinct. Assuredly it is more obvious now, than it could have been under any former dispensation, that it is the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ ; that this Church is not coincident with the world, but is taken out of it ; that each suc¬ cessive dispensation as it gives new grace, new duties, and new powers, at the same time makes the Church more distinctly sep¬ arate, and consecrates it more completely to Christ Nor does the history of mankind since the establishment of the Gospel Church, permit us to doubt, that the steadfast power with which the providence of God conducts all things, has made the career of his Church the most distinct element in the career of man, and has made the destiny of all things dependent on hers. In the fate of Egypt, in the fate of the nations cut off by Israel, and in the fate of apostate Israel herself, all men may read the fate of all the nations that forget God, and of every power that exalts itself against Christ. 8. We need not be in doubt concerning that sublime future of the Church of God, which is hastening upon us — for which 1 John, xiv. 1G, 26; xv. 26; xvi. I. 2 Joel, ii. 28-32; Zech., xii. 9-12; Acts, il. 16-21. 388 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. the world is so little prepared, and of which it takes so little thought. It will come in its appointed time— it will not tarry. The whole analogy of all the past dealings of God, and the con¬ stant declarations of his word, teach us sufficiently that while the great principles which underlie the whole scheme of his grace and providence, will he preserved in all their fulness, and applied with increased distinctness and force ; it might — and since he has said so it will — be under new and still more glorious forms, that these sublime principles will foe exhibited and applied. They who sit calmly and silently by, listening to that wonderful discourse in which Jehovah disclosed to Abraham the nature and extent of his covenant with him, and sealed all his promises with the sacrament of circumcision : must needs make an almost in¬ finite progression, before they can hear and realize those loud hallelujahs, which will fill the universe, when the Kingdom is delivered up on the Lamb’s Book of Life. Still it is the very same Kingdom ; and the grand principles which distinguished its feeblest beginnings, are the same which will be illustrated in its supreme consummation, and its eternal glory. Forevermore it will be Christ, and his saints, and a Kingdom composed of them. 9. What I have attempted is, to appreciate the fundamental idea of the Church of the living God, and to that end to disclose its elemental principles, and then to trace in an unbroken course, the divine procedure wdiereby these principles have yielded to us, the Gospel Church as it this day stands before us. The people of God, considered in their union with Christ, and in their com¬ munion wfith each other through their mutual communion with him, on one side ; and the Lord Jesus Christ, the Bedeemer of God’s Elect, the only Head, Lawgiver, and King in Zion, on the other ; these are the two terms upon which the great problem rests. Between them are the will, and power, and providence of God, developing these two elements through a long course of ages, and a succession of dispensations ; and the result is the Gospel Church State, a distinct, divine institute. Of this, Messiah is the Prince, and all his brethren, brethren to each other, are the mem¬ bers. Separate from the world, its mission is the reconquest of the world. Its end is the illustration of the perfections of God, to his own infinite glory, in the everlasting blessedness of the re¬ deemed. CHAPTER XX. THE NATURE AND END OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD: WITH THE MEANS OF ESTIMATING BOTH. I. 1. The Perpetuity of the fundamental Ordinances of the Church of God. — 2. His¬ torical Means of appreciating the Nature and End of the Kingdom of Christ. — 3. Practical Means. — 4. Prophetical Means. — 5. Ethical Means. — II. 1. The Church of Christ is a Kingdom whose Nature is exclusively Spiritual. — 2. The peculiar Form of that Spirituality: Sinners saved by Grace. — 3. It is an Everlasting King¬ dom. — 4. It is to be a Universal Kingdom. — 5. Witness Bearing for Christ, the special Mission of the Gospel Church. — 6. The immediate Object of this is, the Extension and Perfection of the Kingdom itself. — 7. Infinite Freedom and Fitness of the Gospel Offer. — 8. The Form and Action of the Church in extending and perfecting itself, illustrates its own Nature and End, as well as the Nature of God’s Being and Grace. — 9. The obligatory Force of the divine Organization of the Church thus developed: Its Relation to Faith and to Morals. — 10. Resources of the Church in perfecting and extending herself: These are Marks of her Na¬ ture and End. — 11. The Position of false Professors and Sects, with reference to the Visible Church. — 12. The Relation of the Infant Seed of Believers to the Visible Church. I. 1. — I have shown that the entire organization of the Church of God is produced from within outwardly, and has been obtained under the successive and special ordinations of God, by the direc¬ tion which he gave, from time to time, to the elemental principles which constituted his own idea of his Kingdom. I have also pointed out more incidentally how the Church, under each suc¬ cessive form of it, casting off whatever was peculiar only to the preceding dispensation, has preserved through all dispensations every outward mark responsive to its own absolute nature, which was ever bestowed on it by God. The Sabbath ordained by God at the creation,, and ordained afresh as part of the Moral Law at Sinai, endures in its divine force. The worship of God by bloody sacrifices statedly practised from the fall of man, observed by all the patriarchs, erected into the form of a sacrament in the Pass- over, and thoroughly incorporated with the daily life of the Church under the Mosaic dispensation : so found its consummation in the 390 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV sacrifice of the Son of God, that the one offering of himself by which he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified, is the living way whereby alone we can enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus.1 The sacraments, though their form be changed, are even more distinctly signs and seals of the Covenant of Grace than they were when first given to the Church. The will of God made known to us by his most holy word, is just the same infal¬ lible rule of our faith and our obedience, as when it was person¬ ally addressed by God to the ancient saints, or when it was com¬ municated in visions, made known by heavenly messengers, or spoken by inspired Prophets and Apostles. Divine ordinances of worship, of instruction, and of rule, however their form may vary under successive dispensations, have always been of the very es¬ sence of the visible Church — have always sprung from God him¬ self — have always been grounded in the exclusive headship of Christ in the Church, in the union and communion of his saints with him, in their communion with each other, and in his rejec¬ tion of the world and their separation from it. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil, were the emphatic words of the Lord Jesus ; Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.2 2. We possess in the sacred Scriptures a plain account of the progress of this divine Kingdom on earth, from the fall of man till about the close of the first century of the Christian era, cov¬ ering a period of forty-one centuries. The subsequent progress of this Kingdom for seventeen centuries and a half, to our own day, is preserved in its own annals, in the records of those who have hated and sought to destroy it, and in the testimonies of those nations which have lived side by side with it through all generations ; some of which also precede the advent of Christ by many centuries, and some were coincident with his life, and with the first ages of the Gospel Church. We have its history from the origin of time and of man to the present moment : and of all that has existed on earth this is true concerning it alone. In the age of the Apostles themselves it seems to have penetrated the mass of all human society, and to have found its way to the ends of the earth ; and through innumerable vicissitudes, in de¬ fiance of perpetual persecution, and notwithstanding its own ter¬ rible corruptions and apostacies, it finds itself recognized, after i Heb., x. 10-20. 2 Matt., v. 17-20. CHAP. XX.] THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 891 eighteen centuries, by the predominant nations and races of man- bind, as a divine Kingdom upon which are staked the highest interests of man and the greatest glory of God. We have means thoroughly complete of estimating its nature and its progress. 3. Invested with such a history, it is living before our faces, the most important and the most wide-spread of all existing in¬ stitutions. Rent, indeed, in many ways, when casually observed ; manifested under various forms, more or less inconsistent with each other ; exhibiting in its separate parts an extreme variety of condition, from one of fierce persecution by the world up to one of pampered luxury — from one of earnest struggling for the truth down to one of hopeless indifference concerning Christ. But this diversified state of things affords us the more ample materials for an enlightened judgment, concerning that true and wonderful commonwealth of the saints, which has survived the endless convulsions in which all other institutions have perished, and which seems not only to he established in the heart of all existing civilization, but to he the very parent and nurse of it all. 4. Moreover, to enlarge and rectify our appreciation, alike of this vast history both divine and human, and of this boundless existing manifestation, we are furnished in the Scriptures with the prophetic history of this city of God to the end of time. If we choose to allege that the prophecies which constitute so large a part of the divine word, are wrested and misapplied by the most of those who have expounded them ; this only leaves to us a greater mass of history yet to he enacted, the whole of which we must take some account of, in forming our judgment of the abso¬ lute nature, the total progress, and the ultimate destiny of the Messianic Kingdom. In every such attempt we have this immense advantage, that besides knowing what is past, and seeing what exists, we are instructed also concerning what is to come.1 5. There are, however, means still surer than those already pointed out — complete as they appear to be — of estimating the nature and end of that Kingdom of God whose divine idea and elemental principles I have endeavoured to trace in the prece¬ ding chapter. God has himself defined everything for us. He has not only caused the detailed history of his Church for four 1 2 Peter, i. 19-21. 392 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. thousand years, to be written by inspired men, and the prophetic history of it to the end of time to be added in like manner — causing also the whole history and the whole prophecy to be a perpetual and mutual commentary upon each other ; hut he has explained clearly the motive and end of that Kingdom whose de¬ sign, progress, and final triumph, all this history and prophecy concerned. To what end he set up such a Kingdom, and under what inducements ; the precise nature of the Kingdom itself — what objects exactly it was designed to accomplish — and by what means ; these are the very things which invest the progress of the Kingdom with such importance, and lend so much glory to the prophecies, which foretell, and to the histories which record its career. The Lord God said unto the serpent, I will put en¬ mity between tbee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.1 How widely separated in knowledge as well as in centuries, is this earliest form in which the nature and design of the Kingdom of Messiah is expressed, from the form in which its triumph is ex¬ pressed — Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world : Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels !2 But that vast interval of time is not more com¬ pletely filled up with the progress of the Church, than that vast interval in knowledge is filled up with divine instruction concern¬ ing her nature and end.3 II. — 1. In attempting to disclose, briefly, that which I have just shown we have such abounding materials for appreciating justly ; the whole current of thought which distinguishes this Treatise, and the special care which has been taken in explain¬ ing the doctrines of grace and salvation, render it unnecessary to prove afresh that the Kingdom of Christ is exclusively a spirit¬ ual Kingdom. Separated unto God by an eternal election,4 sep¬ arated unto Christ by the effectual calling of his word and Spirit during their earthly pilgrimage,5 separated unto eternal glory and blessedness in the world to come ;6 whatever Kingdom these children of God may constitute — to the exclusion of all others — is as necessarily a Kingdom created and held united by the Spirit i Gen., iii. 14, 15. 2 Matt., xxv. 34, 41. 3 Eph., v. 25-32; Matt., xvi. 18; 1 Cor., xii. 12, 13; Rom., xv. 8-17. 4 John, xi. 51, 52. 3 1 Cor., i. 9. 6 Rey., vii. 9, 10. 393 CHAP. XX.] THE KINGDOM OF GOD. of God, as it is one whose Lord is the Lord of glory. And so the Saviour said plainly to Pilate, My Kingdom is not of this world.1 Nor in all his wondrous teaching is anything made more clear, than that in order to see his Kingdom we must he horn again — in order to enter into it we must be born of water and of the Spirit.2 That which is born of the flesh is flesh ; and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit.3 Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God : neither doth corruption inherit in¬ corruption.4 But the Church of Christ is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all ; and God, in giving him to be its head, hath put all things under his feet, and given him to be the head over all things to the Church.5 2. This spirituality thus disclosed is, however, of an exceed- ingly peculiar kind. For what is demanded is, not only fitness for a Kingdom altogether spiritual, but a spiritual fitness created by a new and divine generation of a human soul dead in tres¬ passes and sins.6 This Kingdom is composed exclusively of peni¬ tent and believing sinners, who are saved by divine grace. Christ loved the Church, and gave himself for it :7 but it is sinners, and not the righteous, whom Jesus calls to repentance.8 They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.9 Utterly different from any Kingdom which could be formed of fallen men, who are unregenerate, the Kingdom of Messiah is also wholly dif¬ ferent from any which could have been formed of men who had never fallen. At the foundation of this latter difference lies the sublime reality, that saved sinners share a common nature with the Son of God, in a twofold manner ; namely, by his assumption of their nature in his incarnation, and by their participation of his nature through their regeneration.10 3. This is also an everlasting Kingdom. For Immanuel's throne and dominion are forevermore, and the increase of his government and peace shall have no end :n and the Kingdom of the saints of the Most High is an everlasting Kingdom.12 How¬ ever the world and Satan may have appeared to prevail against the Kingdom of God, under the antecedent forms of it ; as soon as there was written upon its immovable foundation — Christ , the 1 Jolin, xviii. 36, 37. 4 1 Cor., xv. 50. 7 Eph., v. 25. 10 John, i. 14 ; 2 Peter, i. 4. 13 Daniel, ii. 44; vii. 27. 2 John, iii. 1-13. 3 John, iii. 6. 5 Eph., i. 22, 23. 6 Eph., ii .passim. 8 Matt., ix. 13. 9 Matt., ix. 12. 11 Isaiah, vii. 14; ix. 6, 7. 394 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. Son of the living God ; — from that moment the gates of hell lost all power to prevail.1 However it may have repented God when he saw the exceeding wickedness of man, that he had made him on the earth ;2 the gifts of God to his Church and his saints, and his calling of his saints into his Kingdom, are without repent¬ ance.3 If God spared not his own Son, hut delivered him up for ns all, how shall he not with him freely give us all things ?3 And if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more being reconciled, we shall he saved by his life.6 Always, everywhere, even unto the end of the world, Christ is with us :6 and when time, and earth, and sin, are done with forever, infinite glory and blessedness await the Kingdom and the saints of him who hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King of kings , and Lord of lords V 4. This Kingdom is to be universal, even upon this earth. So far is it from being possible that it should fail, the assured end of the conflict which so many ages have already witnessed will be, that the kingdoms of this world are to become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ ; and he shall reign forever and ever.8 The followers of Christ differ widely, as to the times and the seasons of bringing to pass this great purpose of God : they differ also as to the form and as to the substance of the event itself: nor is it under such circumstances the part of wisdom to assert, as of faith, peculiar dogmas concerning this glorious hope common to us all, which is admitted to be not yet realized. As to the general truth involved, no one may call himself a Christian and deny that God manifest in the flesh is to be believed on in the world, any more than he may deny either of the other incon¬ trovertible elements of the mystery of godliness.9 It is no more certain that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now ;10 than it is that the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children of God ;u than that there shall be new heavens and a new earth wherein shall dwell nothing but right- eousness, and none but they whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life ;12 and that the saints shall live and reign 1 Matt., xvi. 13-18. 2 Gen., vi. 6. 4 Rom., viii 32. 5 Rom., v. 10. 7 Rev., xix. 16 ; xxii. 1-5. 8 Rev., xi. 17. 10 Rom., viii. 22. 11 Rom., viii. 21. 12 2 Peter, iii. 13 ; Rev., xxi. 1, 27. s Rom., xi. 29. Matt., xxviii. 20. 1 Tim., iii. 16. 8 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 895 CHAP. XX.] with Christ upon earth.1 The stone that was cut out without hands shall not only break in pieces and consume every earthly Kingdom, but it shall become a great mountain, and fill the whole earth.3 Behold, saith God, all souls are mine ;3 as I live, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue confess to God.4 5. The children of this Kingdom have an unspeakable mis¬ sion. Nor is this more remarkable in anything, than in their re¬ lation to the method by which the Kingdom itself is perfected and extended. Almost at the moment of Christ's final ascension to heaven, his Apostles, encouraged by the condescension and distinctness of his parting instructions to them, ventured to in¬ quire particularly concerning the very subjects I have been dis¬ cussing. They asked him, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel ?5 His answer was clear and deci¬ sive. It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. But ye shall receive power, after the Holy Ghost is come upon you : and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.6 To be wit¬ nesses for Jesus, both in the testimony they bear, and in the war¬ fare they carry on, is the especial mission of every member of his Kingdom in its present form, involved in the very nature and end of the Kingdom itself. Each one, no doubt, in his place and according to his lot and the grace given to him ;7 but every one of the chosen generation, the royal priesthood, the holy nation, the peculiar people, showing forth the praises of him who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light.8 The Gospel Church, in the form given to it by the Apostles, is the fruit of their divine vocation and authority received from the Lord, and of their anointing with the Spirit on the day of Pen¬ tecost ; and the dispensation of the Spirit with power and the militant state of the Gospel Church, both lie between the anoint¬ ing and the fit time and exact season reserved by the Father ex¬ clusively to himself.9 Our fitness to bear the testimony required of us as members of Christ and members one of another,10 de- 1 Rev., xx. 4—10; 2 Tim., ii, 11, 12. 2 Daniel, ii. 35, 44. 3 Ezekiel, xviii. 4. 4 Rom., xiv. 11; Pliil., ii. 10, 11. 5 Acts, i. 6. 6 Acts, i. 7, 8. 7 Eph., iv. 1-16. 8 1 Peter, ii. 9. 9 Matt., xxiv. 30; Mark, xiii. 32 ; 1 Thess., v. 1, 2. 10 Eph., v. 30 ; iv. 25 ; Rom., xii. 5. 396 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. pends upon our own communion with Christ through faith, and with each other in love : and both of these depend immediately, as I have shown, upon the power and the illumination of the Holy Ghost shed abroad within us. The promise of the Father, the crowning proof of the glorification of the risen Saviour, and the final unction of the Apostles of the Lord, all agree in one, and all have direct relevancy to the infinite Spirit whose peculiar presence is our great heritage in these last days, by whose power all our witness-bearing is accomplished, and all who call on the name of the Lord are saved.1 6. This glorious witness-bearing for Christ, under the support and guidance of his own Spirit, brings us in the special dispen¬ sation allotted to us, face to face with all the powers of this world, in all our endeavours to extend the Kingdom of God ; and it brings us face to face with our brethren in Christ in all our en- deavours to perfect the Kingdom in itself. But to extend the Kingdom of Christ, and to perfect it — by both methods hasten¬ ing it forward to its glory — are our chief duties, stated in the most general manner, and considering ourselves as of the House¬ hold of God, and as fellow-citizens with the saints.2 This is the form in which the Lord himself has put it : Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; teaching them to observe all things, whatsoever I have commanded you.3 And the entire nature of Christ's Kingdom is involved in this brief statement. Its mission is to teach : to teach all nations : to teach them all, everything commanded by the Saviour. Here is the immense compass of our duty, and the exact limit of our authority, in winning souls to Christ. And when they have been won, they must be gathered into his fold, and baptized in the name of the Triune God, and taught to observe every command of the Lord. They must be as his children are, and do as his children do. And thus new conquests are made, and thus the Kingdom is perfected within, and thus it grows both in the breadth of its reign, and the power of its life, and thus by both methods our witness-bearing hastens the glory which is to be revealed in us.4 To keep alive in our hearts an interest corresponding with the work we are called to perform, the Lord Jesus has set before us the most * Joel, ii. 28-32 ; Acts, it 16-21 ; Rom., x. 12-15. 2 Eph., ii. 19-22. 3 Matt., xvviii. 19, 20. 4 Rom., viii. 18. CHAP. XX.] THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 397 overwhelming motives, derived from his own glory and presence with us, and from the infinite reward he will bestow on us. All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life.1 7. Thus composed and marshalled, this Kingdom proclaims continually its readiness and its fitness to receive every penitent sinner of our lost race, and to train him in the exalted and eter¬ nal service and enjoyment of God. Its banners have no legend more broadly inscribed on them than that faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation — Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.2 And so its efforts to extend itself, are made in the widest sense of the freedom of the Gospel offer ; and against the ranks of its fiercest enemies, its message of defiance is, Whoso¬ ever will, let him take the water of life freely !3 Amongst its highest obligations, it seeks to keep alive in the hearts of all men, a sense of the infinite perfectness of God's claim upon the whole universe ; sounding through all lands the edict of Jehovah — All souls are mine ;4 and warning every creature that God hath ap¬ pointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteous¬ ness bv that man whom he hath ordained, and therefore he com- mandeth all men everywhere to repent.5 Nor is its duty at all affected, whether men will hear, or whether they will forbear. The infinite fitness and freedom of the offer of salvation, and the infinite right and authority of God by which that offer is enforced, may not, indeed, commend our message to the hearts of men. Some may receive it after many repetitions, some may reject it fiercely and contemptuously, some may turn and rend those who bring it. In general, men will be brought one by one into the Kingdom ; in times of great awakening they will come like the countless drops of dew from the womb of the morning : and in the day of glory, a nation will be born at once. He who made his soul an offering for sin, shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied.6 And the children of God insufficient as they may be, yet in all their endeavours are unto God a sweet savour of Christ in them that are saved, and in them that perish : to the one the savour of death unto death ; and to the other the savour of life unto life.7 i Matt, xxviii. 18-20; Rev., ii. 10. 2 1 Tim., i. 15. 3 Rev., xxii. 17. 4 Ezekiel, xviii. 4. 6 Acts, xvii. 30, 31. a Isaiah, lii. 10, 11. 7 2 Cor., ii. 15, 16. 398 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. 8. Every one of the heirs of this Kingdom, thus gathered into it, thus perfected in it, and thus in turn extending and perfect¬ ing it, stands related to God in such a manner that not only the infinite grace, hut the unsearchable being also of God, is mani¬ fested upon them all. What is more, their former ruin, and the perfection of their eternal blessedness, are both kept continually before their hearts, in the whole method of their recovery. It is the eternal electing love of God the Father, which is the founda¬ tion of their divine call into this Kingdom. It is their redemp¬ tion through the infinite sacrifice of God the Son, that is the ground of their actual participation of this Kingdom. It is by the work of God the Holy Ghost, that their fitness for this King¬ dom and their faithfulness in it, are produced. It is through the influence of the divine Word, and the communion of the saints with Christ and with each other, in their mutual co-operation for perfecting and extending this Kingdom, that the love of God the Father, the saving grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, make themselves practically man¬ ifest in the Body of Christ. All the heirs of the Kingdom stand also in such a relation to each other, as is expressive of the nature and extent of the supernatural change which has been wrought in them all. Children of God and brethren of each other — not rebels against God, and aliens from each other — as they were be¬ fore ; heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ, inheritors together of crowns of glory — not outcasts, and accursed, and hastening to perdition, as they once were. This immeasurable transformation is expressed by saying, they are brethren — being all brethren of Christ and sons of God. In the very mode, therefore, in which the Kingdom of God is constituted, in its most elemental aspect, we find the expression of its very nature and end, and the ex¬ pression also in a concrete form, of the chief truths which enter into the plan of salvation. 9. It is this Church of Christ that has received from God a particular outward organization, suited to its nature and end, by means of which it may accomplish in the most complete manner, the immediate object of its existence, namely, the gathering and perfecting of the saints, in this life, to the end of the world.1 If God had given to it no outward organization, no sacraments, no office-bearers, as he appears for many centuries after the fall, not 1 Eph., iv. passim. CHAP. XX.] THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 399 to have done ; the Church has no power to ordain them. If God has given any to the Church — as indeed he has — -her whole duty and authority in that respect are exhausted, in accepting and fulfilling his divine ordinations. To presume, in either case, to depart from the revealed will of God, is as really to set aside his divine authority, as it would he to change the doctrine, strictly so called, which he has revealed to our faith, or the precepts of mo¬ rality which he has made the rule of our obedience. Such at¬ tempts deliberately made, concerning human sovereignties, are treason, rebellion, revolution : in the Church, they are direct as¬ saults upon the majesty of God, upon the headship of Christ over the Church, and upon the freedom of the Church itself. How far they may be carried, on either hand, without destroying the nature and defeating the end of the visible Church, is a ques¬ tion precisely analogous to similar questions concerning faith and morals. In all three cases, certain departures from the revealed will of God, may be treated as endurable ; others must be con¬ sidered fatal. Assuredly it is one of the most distinct character¬ istics of the Gospel Church, that it is the Kingdom of Christ under a visible form, divinely bestowed on it. Its organization is expressly so created and distributed by God, as on the one hand, to make full account of the nature and end of a Kingdom so remarkable ; and on the other, to enable it to move and act, within itself, with the greatest freedom and perfection, and to exert its force without, in a manner the most constant and efficacious. If it were otherwise, both the methods by which it accomplishes its divine mission would be obstructed, or de¬ stroyed. 10. It is thus that the Church of the living God, is fitted for her great work on earth. In her hands are all the words of eter¬ nal life, which God has revealed in a permanent form for the sal¬ vation of man. In her bosom are all the instrumentalities, by which this inspired truth is ordinarily made effectual in the human soul. In the hearts of her children accompanying her ordinances in their faithful use, and attending the divine word committed to her keeping in its circuit through the earth, is that divine Comforter whose outpouring was the great promise of the Father, and whose perpetual presence was one of the last and greatest promises of the Son. Over her and around about her, is that ceaseless and irresistible providence of God, by means of 400 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. which he brings all events to pass according to the eternal pur¬ pose of his will, and whose whole course is so ordained that all things work together for good to them that love God. And higher than the highest heavens, her glorified Redeemer sits at the right hand of the majesty on high, a Prince and a Saviour — • to give repentance to Israel and the forgiveness of sins — head over all things to the Church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all. Surely we need not doubt that God will make known through his Church, unto principalities and powers, his own manifold wisdom nor that in the dispensation of the fulness of times, all things will be gathered in one, in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth, even in him.2 11. There are two topics which may be supposed to require a few words of explanation under the view I have presented of the Church of God. One of them concerns the position of such pro¬ fessed members of the visible Church, as are not the children of God : the other concerns the infant seed of true believers. Con¬ cerning the former, whatever difficulty may exist lies in the do¬ main of Church Discipline, which I will treat in another place, and not in that of the organization of tbe Church, which is the subject of immediate consideration. In the nature of the case, the more perfectly the apparent Church corresponds with the real Church, the more perfect the former must be ; and the more com¬ pletely our definitions in a Treatise like this, express what actu¬ ally is according to the ordination of God, and not what is merely apparent and delusive, through the wickedness of man, the more nearly does our teaching approach the truth of God. As a ques¬ tion of Ethics and Philosophy, nothing would be more absurd, than to make our definitions false, in order to give a certain validity to appearances which are known to be deceptive. Whatever dif¬ ficulties may be supposed to exist in the just application of the discipline of the Church, so as to exclude from its communion those whom God has forbidden to approach it ; nothing in the Sciiptures is more obvious, nothing in the constant faith of the Church is more settled, nothing is more clear to human reason, than that all children of the Devil are mere intruders into the visible Church, and ought to be cast out of it. They who are not the true followers of Christ, cannot be members of Christ ; they 1 Eph., iu. 10. 3 Eph., i. 10. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 401 CHAP. XX.] who are not members of Christ cannot he members one of an¬ other, in any Christian sense ; but the possibility of making the body of Christ visible by means of any external organization, rests upon these two truths, namely, that we are members of Christ, and of each other. Whatever organization is composed on opposite principles, is necessarily corrupt : whatever individ¬ ual, destitute of fellowship with Christ and with Christ's people, intrudes into a true Church, is merely an intruder. We delude ourselves by a word, forgetting that it is not the same thing to be visibly a member of some organization or denomination of Christians, and to be a member of Christ visibly by being a true member of his visible body. It is another question, altogether, what evidence shall be deemed sufficient, against an individual or against a sect. Concerning which, in both cases, it is very ob¬ vious that if either the evidence itself, or the matters established by it, be insufficient, it is at once to usurp the prerogative of Christ, and to outrage our brethren in him, if we reject as false a profession of discipleship, which, for aught that appears, is true. 12. The covenanted duty of Christian parents to dedicate their infant children to God, and the covenanted right of the seed of believers to membership in the Church of God, will be discussed hereafter. At present, it is sufficient to observe that if such a duty rests on Christian parents, and such a right is given by God to their infant seed : then all I have said, so far from excluding such infant members from the visible Church of Christ, necessarily embraces them. Their position is determined absolutely by the decision we arrive at, concerning the effect which the faith of the parent has, on the relation of his infant seed to the covenant through which he is himself saved. When the pa¬ rent is not in covenant with Christ, it cannot be pretended that he has any covenant duty to his infant seed, or that it has any covenanted right based on the faith of a parent, who has no faith. I suppose that nothing concerning God's dealings with man, whether in creation, in providence, or in grace, is more remarka¬ ble, than the use he has made of the parental relation, and the pains he has taken to explain to us that use, and the ground of it. VOL. II. 26 CHAPTER XXI. DEDUCTION AND EXPOSITION OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD, CONSIDERED AS THE VISIBLE CHURCH OF CHRIST. 1. 1. The Effect of God’s gracious Interposition after the Fall, upon Man’s Relation to God. — 2. The practical Result of that Interposition, generally stated. — 3. Theo¬ retical Issue of the Probation of the Human Race, upon the Conditions stated. — 4. Revealed Result: Coming of the Son of Man. — II. 1. Divisions of the Human Race, Spiritually Considered : God’s manifold Dealings responsive to those Divi¬ sions. — 2. Manifold Aspect of the Kingdom of God: Visible Church of Christ. — 3. Separate from the World, and organized for the Special Ends, and by the Spe¬ cial Means of its Visibility : Concatenation of God’s Providence and Grace.— III. 1. Nature of Man and of Society — Fundamental Principles of the Church’s Organization — Revealed Ordination of God : Relation between them all. — 2. Ex¬ haustive Statement of the Functions of Society, in itself considered : — (a) The aggregate Expression of what is Right: Public Will: Law: — (&) Enforcement of the Rule of Right — by the aggregate Force: Administrative Authority: — (c) Exposition and Application of Law, to Duties and Rights: Judicial Authority. — 3. Dependence of these Functions of Society, on the Moral, Rational, and Spi¬ ritual Nature of Man: Their Relevancy to God, the universal Lawgiver, Judge, and Ruler. — 4. Application of these Principles to the Visible Church : Funda¬ mental Distinction between the Gospel Church and the Civil State. — 5. The Law of God the sole Law of the Church of Christ : Nature and Ground of this Pecu¬ liarity. — 6. Her judicial and executive Functions : Their Nature and Extent. — 7. Definition of the Visible Church of Christ, now Militant under the Gospel State thereof. I- — 1. The Fall of Man placed the human race in such an estate, that its universal perdition could he prevented no other¬ wise, than by the sovereign and gracious interposition of God, changing the relation of that race to himself. That interposition occurred : and a clear account of it, in its whole nature and de¬ sign, has been given to us by God in the sacred Scriptures. Those inspired writings contain — and they alone contain — the true re¬ ligion of man considered as a sinner : and that religion embraces the sum of God’s sovereign and gracious interposition to prevent the universal perdition of the human race, and, therefore, the sum of what man can need in order to be saved. Yet that interposi¬ tion of God did not change the relation of our fallen race to him, THE VISIBLE CHURCH. 403 CHAP. XXI.] by abolishing the true religion natural to man, considered merely as a creature ; but by graciously adding to it, in a way of divine revelation, the true religion needful for man, considered as a fallen and depraved creature. By what is added God becomes the Re¬ deemer, without ceasing to be the Creator ; and the saved sinner remains the dependent creature of God. 2. In point of fact, the whole human family has never been brought under the influence of this new form, in which life and immortality are brought to light by the Gospel. On the contrary, besides the original apostacy in Adam, God when he has made inquest on signal and widely separated occasions, has found our sinful race alike ignorant of him, and hostile to him. In the days of Noah he drowned the whole race in the flood of waters, saving- alive only Noah and his family. In the days of Abraham God chose him out of a rebellious world, and made his covenant with him as the father of the faithful. In the days of the early Gos¬ pel Church, God set aside even his ancient people for their sins, and has scattered them and hidden his face from them ever since. And Christ himself hath demanded concerning what is yet be¬ fore us, When the Son of Man cometh shall he find faith on the earth P1 The knowledge of the written word of God has never been communicated to any one entire generation of men ; and, even at the present hour, it is probable that the larger part of the human family are in ignorance of God's designs of mercy to fallen men. And of those who have obtained knowledge, more or less complete, on that momentous subject, it is probable that the greater part do not profess to have received the truth in the love of it ; and of those who make that profession, neither the Scrip¬ tures, nor our own most charitable judgments permit us to doubt, that multitudes are alike ignorant and destitute of the power of divine love.2 3. Such is the practical result of the sovereign and gracious interposition of God for the salvation of sinners, as exhibited by its progress from the beginning of time. And the whole is announced when two most pregnant statements are added. First, that it is not given to mortals to foresee how long, how sad, or how variable the struggle between light and darkness may be, before the final victory is won- — nor yet how soon that last triumph may come.3 1 Luke, xviii. 8. 2 Matt., xxv. passim. 3 Matt., xxiv. 36-42; Acts, i. 7 ; 1 Tkess., v. 1-11. 404 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. And secondly, that God's Kingdom has always been, and will continue immovably established, in this rebellious world ; and that the heirs of that Kingdom are the salt of the earth — the light of the world.1 Theoretically, it is not easy to see how this great problem could have worked itself out in a different man¬ ner, upon the terms stated ; nor how any result, substantially different., could ever be reached, or the subject extricate itself from endless conflict, unless some of the conditions of the prob¬ lem are radicallv changed, on one side or the other. For it has been shown that the actual condition of the universe is this, namely, that it lies under the curse of God — with a promise of deliverance ; but the curse is broader than the promise in this, that in some sense the curse embraces all, while the promise takes one and leaves another ; the one fastening and working with in¬ stant and universal force, while the other, pointing chiefly to the future and the unseen, works in the midst of our darkness and pollution. When we speak of the grace of God, the sense is most true and real, but it is also strict : when we speak of the pollu¬ tion of sin, the sense is not only true, but absolute and universal. And the grace itself, rich as it is, is not merely for our deliver¬ ance, but for deliverance in such a way that a true probation is made, alike of those who reject it, and of those who are led in willing captivity to it. 4. The Scriptures, however, leave us in no doubt as to -what the real event will be, and how it will be brought to pass. The nature and certainty of the change that will occur in the terms of this problem, so endless and insoluble to human reason, on the conditions stated, are amongst the clearest and grandest parts of the revealed scheme of our deliverance. The advent of Christ was the great promise of the Scriptures of the Old Testament : his second coming is at once the great promise and the great threat of the Scriptures of the New Testament.2 However we may dispute about that coming, as to its exact manner, its set time, and all its sublime incidents and results ; no one who calls himself an heir of the Kingdom of God, ought to doubt the great fact itself, or its decisive and eternal efficacy. He whose right it is, shall take the Kingdom. The Son of Man shall come in his glory* and all the holy angels with him, and then shall he sit 1 Matt., v. 13, 14 ; xxviii. 19, 20. s Matt., xxiv. 29-31 ; xvi. 26 ; Mark, xiii. 24-21 ; Rev., i. 4-8. CHAP. XXI.] THE VISIBLE CHURCH. 405 upon tlie throne of his glory : and before him shall be gathered all nations.1 IT. — 1. The consequence of such a state of things must be the division of the human family, when spiritually considered, into great classes : and then the subdivision of those classes into subordinate, but still immense masses of human beings. The first division would separate those who have been made acquaint¬ ed with the salvation of God, from the remainder of the human race ; on the one side nominally believing, and on the other un¬ believing peoples, races, and nations. Passing by all the latter, the second division would separate, amongst the former, all who profess to love and obey the Lord, from all merely speculative believers, who make no profession of being the people of God. And again passing by all who fall into this latter class, the third division would separate amongst the professed followers of Christ, such as are the true children of God, from all those whose pro¬ fession is merely a form or a delusion. It is only after these re¬ peated divisions of our race, that the true heirs of eternal life — the true members of the Kingdom of God — can be even theo¬ retically extricated from the mass of our perishing fellow-crea¬ tures, and contemplated as divinely set apart for the special glory of God, as his Church. And it is manifest that these various distinctions amongst men, must be responsive to a manifold me¬ thod of treatment of them by God. His dealings and his mani¬ festations of himself, are not the same towards those who are wholly destitute of all knowledge of his revealed will — Towards those who know his will and despise it — towards those whose professions of love and obedience have no solid foundation — and towards those penitent and believing followers of the Lamb who shall inherit all things. These things are not merely casual — any more than those explained immediately before : nor are these mere speculations. I am pointing out results logically unavoid¬ able — attested by the word of God, and by all experience — which belong to the very system of the universe, under the conditions now stamped upon it.2 2. In a somewhat analogous manner to these spiritual dis¬ tinctions which exist amongst the human family, and are re¬ sponsive to a manifold treatment on the part of God ; there are 1 Matt., xxv. 31, 32 ; 1 Thess., iv. 14-18; 2 Tliess., i. 1-10; Jude, 14, 15. 2 Luke, xxiv. 25-21; Matt., xxiii. 34-39; xviii. 1. • 406 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. various aspects in which the Kingdom of Christ, and God's deal¬ ings with it, and its relations to man, are presented to us. We may consider it with reference to its absolute unity and univer¬ sality; embracing everyone of the elect of God, whether they be now in glory, or in the flesh, or unborn. Or we may consider it as divided by the stream of death into the Church triumphant, embracing only such as have entered into their rest, and the Church militant, embracing such true followers of Christ as are passing through their pilgrimage. Or we may consider the Church universal under the ordinary division of invisible, and visible ; embracing under the former, the universal body of the Elect of God, considered not as they are sinners, but as they are his children ; and under the latter, according as we speak loosely or strictly, all living men who profess the name of Christ, or more truly, all living men who are his true followers. In reality, the visible Church can have no existence, except just so far as it is com¬ posed of true members of the Church universal ; for where there are none of these, there can he no Church of God. Properly speaking, the visible Church can be nothing else but that portion of the true and eternal Kingdom of God, which is apparent on earth : and we might as truly speak of another head of the King¬ dom than Christ ; or another Creator of it than the divine Spirit, as of other members of it than the elect of God. How far the Church of God is, at any time, visible on earth, can be known infallibly only to him. Whether it is visible to us, is, both the¬ oretically and practically, capable of being precisely determined — as I will show in subsequent chapters ; and the knowledge thus attainable, is the guide of Christian fellowship between the vari¬ ous sections, whether national or denominational, into which the Church is divided. Whether particular individuals are to be ac¬ cepted as worthy members of the visible Church, is also capable of being precisely determined ; and the knowledge thus attain¬ able, is the guide for those entrusted with Government and Dis¬ cipline in the Church of Christ — concerning both of which I will treat hereafter. 3. The Kingdom of God, presented to us throughout the Scriptures in a light distinctly threefold, is called the Messianic Kingdom from its head Messiah— is called the New Creation as being the spiritual creation of the Holy Ghost— and is called the Church of God, and of Christ, from its members, who are indi- CHAP. XXI.] THE VISIBLE CHURCH. 407 vidually the members of Christ, and are collectively his Body. Nor is it possible for us to have a clear apprehension of its na¬ ture, if we omit either of these great ideas concerning it. As soon as this Body of Christ becomes visible on earth — that is, ap¬ parent to the world as an institute of God ; it becomes at the same time, by the same means, and to the same extent, separate from the world which lies in sin. And every additional ordinance of God, by which its visibility is made more distinct, and its organization more complete ; is an additional mark of its separa¬ tion from the world — an additional means also of preventing its confusion with a world which has rejected God, and even with every other institute which God has ordained in the world. More¬ over, as I have before shown, whatever ordinance of God makes the Body of Christ visible and separate, in the same degree or¬ ganizes it for all the ends of that special visibility and separa¬ tion ; and every additional ordinance of God by which its visi¬ bility and separation become more complete, becomes a new force in its own distinct organization, a new means by which the great ends of its existence as visible, separate, and organized may be accomplished. But it has been shown that these great ends are its own perfection and increase ; that is, the gathering and per¬ fecting of the saints, in this life, to the end of the world.1 So that, considering the condition of the universe as it lies under the Covenant of Grace as thus far administered ; we behold the out¬ working of the sentence and the promise of God uttered after the fall of man — the spiritual result upon the human race, exhibited in its great divided masses, and the manifold dealings of God therewith — and the gradual emerging of the organized Kingdom of God into its present form of the Gospel Church. God him¬ self has explained the whole to us in his blessed word ; and has pointed out the amazing concatenation of all the parts. The sublime order which pervades nil his works, and the infinite fruit¬ fulness of all his acts, are nowhere manifested in a manner more august, than in those vast schemes of providence and grace, which unite in the career and present state of the visible Church of Christ. III. — 1. Our double relation to God as dependent creatures, and as sinners saved by grace, runs through every part of his dealings with us, and is felt in every aspect which his Kingdom 1 Eph., iv. 1-16 ; Matt., xvi. 15-20 ; xviii. 15-20. 408 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. presents. We are children of Adam — brethren also of Christ. Our nature is, indeed, depraved by the fall ; and the Covenant of Works is abolished as a Covenant of Life. But the funda¬ mental character of our nature as personal, human, spiritual, and immortal, still exists ; and the eternal principles on which the Covenant of Works reposed, are still true and operative. Both that nature and those principles are made full account of by God, in every part of his dealings with us under the new and better covenant ; and are taken for granted in every part of that organization of God’s Kingdom, which, I have just shown, is the unavoidable accompaniment of its separate, visible, existence as a divine institute in this world. But that visible, separate ex¬ istence in the world, though it is the result both as to the fact of it, and the form of it, of God’s sovereign ordination ; has been shown to have a direct connection with the manner in which God’s sentence and promise work themselves out upon our guilty race, taken as a whole — and upon the spiritual condition of that race, considered in its great divided masses. It remains to trace in the fundamental nature of man, and of society, those unal¬ terable principles upon which the visibility, the separation, and ihe organization of the Church rest ; and which, in the very manner of their necessary operation, accord with the revealed ordination of God concerning the visible Church. 2. However large and obscure what is called the science of Government may be supposed to be, its most elemental princi¬ ples are as clear as those of any science whatever, and are, per¬ haps, fewer in number, and more fruitful in operation, than those of any other science. As soon as men are united permanently in what we call society, there immediately result certain necessities, operations, forces, which spring from the organization itself, which are developed by its formation and action, and without which the existence of society is impossible. This occurs in the very na¬ ture of the case ; it results from the nature of man and of society — and from the relations of both to God. It occurs in every possible society formed of men, without the smallest regard to the form society may take, or the object for which it exists, or the motive of its creation. And so complete is this spontaneous and unavoidable development, that except the necessities, opera¬ tions, forces, to which I allude, nothing else results from the or¬ ganization and existence of society, having any analogy to these ; CHAP. XXI.] THE VISIBLE CHURCH. 409 nothing else can, by any possibility be made to result from its organization — and every exigency of every possible form of soci¬ ety, capable of control by society in its organized form, must seek redress from one or other of these functions. Let me explain this a little. (a) In the first place, there results, in some form or other, the expression of the aggregate will : the manifestation, in some way or other, of the dominant sense of what ought to be done, or left undone, in everything of which society chooses to take cognizance. Law, in some form or other, rules whenever society exists : and in whatever form law exists in society, it exists by whatever will — power — is dominant there. Whether it appears in the shape of immemorial custom, of the decree of an absolute ruler, of a written constitution and ordinary statutes — or of any other conceivable public rule ; its abiding nature is, that it must appear, and must predominate. It is the supreme necessity, op¬ eration, force, springing out of the existence of society — without which that existence is impossible. This is the fundamental principle, which underlies the possibility of organized society : and its efficacy is so boundless, that no limits can be set in thought, nor have any been established in practice, to the extent of its reign, or the variety of its applications. Even the King-* dom of God, and in that blessed form of it, where God is our God and we are his people, will be made effectual by his putting his law in our inward parts, and writing it in our hearts.1 (b) In the second place, what occurs, is the practical enforce¬ ment of this aggregate will, in every expression of it, by the ag¬ gregate force of society ; the execution, that is, of the law ; so¬ ciety executing its purposes, and striving to secure its ends. Here, as in the preceding instance, it is wholly immaterial, in the nature of the case, in which one of innumerable ways, these determinations of the aggregate, or predominating will, are ex¬ ecuted under the aggregate, public force. It may be by an armed force, directed by a despot, or by the force of opinion amongst a few people — or by any of the countless methods be¬ tween these two. The fundamental principle is the same, in every manifestation : and the manifestation itself is the expres¬ sion of the second one of these necessities, operations, forces, 1 Jer., xxxi. 31-34. 410 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. which are developed by the organization of society, and without which the very idea of society disappears. (c) In the third place, the aggregate justice, rectitude, of society appears in the form of interpreting, applying, and ad¬ ministering the public will, in the innumerable applications of it, to all the varied exigencies of individuals and of society. This is what we call the judicial exposition and enforcement, in civil society, of all public and private rights and duties, which are regulated by what we call law ; which it appertains to what we call the executive power, to take care that it is obeyed. Here, as in both the previous instances, the method is nothing, as regards the nature of the case. It is the principle, which is of unalterable certainty and necessity ; and which is the third and final necessity, operation, force, which results out of every possible form of government, and without which none can exist or act. 3. Now it is wholly indifferent, as matter of mere science, whether the permanent functions of all government, are divided and exercised by separate bodies of magistracy — or united and all exercised by a single person. Such questions are fundamen¬ tal in determining the particular character of the government ; but irrelevant to the question of the inherent nature of govern¬ ment itself. And we might content ourselves with remarking o o that these are the ordinary powers, legislative, judicial, and ex¬ ecutive, with which they are familiar who live under free consti¬ tutions, but which our oppressed race has been so slow to com¬ prehend. But what is now insisted on is, that they are all inherent in the very nature of the social state — and that for all the purposes of the existence and operation of society, they pre¬ sent an exhaustive statement of its possible functions. Then follows the decisive conclusion, as to their use in this place : the indestructible foundation of them all lies in the very nature of man. The first function is the result of man’s natural sense of right and wrong — his moral nature developed in union with his fellow-men, in settling rules of rectitude, which he calls law — the public will. The last function is the result of man’s natural sense of truth and falsehood — his rational nature developed in union with his fellow-men, in determining the true and the right, under established rules ; that is, truly applying in practice what had been already declared to be right. The middle function is THE VISIBLE CHURCH. 411 CHAP. XXI.] the result of man’s free and active nature, developed in union with his fellow-men, in enforcing, by the general will, the general sense of the right and the true. Conscience, Reason, Will : these are the grand characteristics of man’s moral, rational, and spirit¬ ual nature — itself a faint image and likeness of the living God. Legislative, judicial, executive : these are the grand functions of society — which, under whatever form, can be considered in its fundamental nature, as nothing else than an organized develop¬ ment of man — ordained by God ; and so, in a certain sense, an image and likeness, in the second degree, of the nature of God, as the great Lawgiver, Judge, and Ruler of the universe. 4. These principles are just as true and effective with regard to the visible Church of Christ, as with regard to any other or- - ganized society of human beings. All ignorance, abuse, or mis¬ use of them, as inevitably works spiritual injury to it, as a similar procedure works temporal injury to civil society : while it may no more certainly destroy the particular portion of the Church so misguided or misorganized, than similar conduct may destroy a State. But in the application of these principles, the Church of Christ is placed in circumstances altogether peculiar, the just observance of which does involve her very existence. Nor do I speak now, particularly, of one form of Church government as compared with another ; but, as I have done all along, of the fundamental principles of all authority in the Church of Christ. In all communities that which is good and true, is obligatory upon them by the law of nature, as the rule whereby they should exercise every function of society ; and it is because all commu¬ nities are constituted of persons who are naturally depraved, that the law of nature is ever transgressed by authority of the State. As soon as the God of nature, restates the law of nature by way of a divine Revelation, and adds thereto a new and better way of life for fallen men ; all communities, which come to the knowl¬ edge of this divine rule of what is good and true, are bound to observe it in the exercise of every function of the State. I say all communities are so bound — each in its place and according to the special ends of its existence ; because I have proved else¬ where, that they exist by the ordination of God — and I have just now explained how, in their very existence and operation, they demonstrate the creative, the providential, and the gracious do¬ minion of God. Throughout all ages, the civil State and the 412 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. Church of God have been developed, side by side — not indeed among all peoples — hut among all where God had a people. From the call of Abraham to the establishment of the Insti¬ tutions of Moses, there seems to have been little distinction be¬ tween the two. From the establishment of those Institutions to the erection of the Gospel Church State, the distinction between the two was made as exact as the union was close. It is under that Gospel Church State, that the union between them has been dissevered — and each assigned to its proper sphere ; one as the ordinance of God for the temporal benefit of man, the other as the ordinance of God for the eternal salvation of sinners ; one fitted to be universal, the other obliged by its very nature to ground itself, in some degree, on whatever is local, peculiar, distinctive, personal. Of necessity, and in every way, there¬ fore, the law of God, and the person of Christ, have a relation to the functions of the visible Church, different from the rela¬ tion of both to the civil State. It is this which remains to be explained. 5. I have proved in a previous chapter, that the word of God contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only infallible rule of all that God requires of man, and all that man ought to believe concerning God. I have also proved that the gathering and perfecting of the saints of God, in this life, to the end of the world, is the great immediate object of the organization and continued existence of the visible Church on earth. It follows that the word of God is not only the supreme, but the exclusive law of his Church ; the whole function of de¬ termining what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is bad — the whole power of making laic in its proper sense, and for the proper ends of her existence — much less for other ends — being swallowed up and exhausted in her joyful and com¬ plete acceptance of God as her Lawgiver, and his laws as hers. There are other lines of argument by which this same conclusion is very variously established ; I content myself with remarking, that the express command of God himself crowns and settles all. The absolute sufficiency of the sacred Scriptures, is the funda¬ mental principle of the Reformed religion — in other words of Christianity itself. Every addition to them, and every subtrac¬ tion from them, which the visible Church, or any portion of it, may dare to attempt ; is a, usurpation of the prerogative of God, an THE VISIBLE CHURCH. CHAP. XXI.] 413 attack upon the Mediatorial office of Christ, and an outrage at once upon the freedom and the conscience of the saints.1 6. Accepting, therefore, the law of God — the functions which remain to the organized Church, considered as a visible, hut divine Institute ; are the true interpretation and application, and the faithful administration and execution of all that blessed truth, of which her Lord has made her, the pillar and the ground. While her whole power is thus limited with relation to the Law of God, her judicial and executive power, like that of every society, limited to the exposition and enforcement of such law as is pecu¬ liar to them, or common to all societies, in her, is limited exclu¬ sively to the law of God. For the law of God appertains to her, to her nature, and to her ends ; to expound it, and to en¬ force it, for the gathering and perfecting of the saints — is her business on earth. Considered simply as God’s Kingdom, there is no other law which appertains to her ; and, therefore, there is no other with which she may meddle, either to expound it, or to enforce it. Acting always in the name and by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ — uttering always the mind of God as made known to her through his word and Spirit — having no end but the glory of God in the salvation of fallen men ; it is God’s Kingdom in this ruined world, made visible as the Church of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ — and now militant in its Gospel State. T. We may therefore define that the Church visible of Christ, is the Kingdom of God in this world, created through the com¬ munion of saints, developed externally through principles inher¬ ent in human nature and common to other societies, possessed of a peculiar and divinely appointed organization, separate from the world, and so a divine institute among men : that all the mem¬ bers of it, are members of Jesus Christ, its Lord and Head, whose Body it is — the infallible rule of whose faith and practice is the revealed will of God — to expound and apply, to adminis¬ ter and enforce which, are its sole functions as a government separate from the world — the scope of all its powers, being the scope of its own end, is exclusively spiritual, and exclusively directed to the gathering and perfecting of the saints, who are lost sinners saved by grace. 1 Gal,, i. 8, 9 ; 2 Tim., in. 14-11 ; Deut. iv. 1, 2 ; Rev., xxii. 18, 19. CHAPTER XXII THE FREEDOM OF THE VISIBLE CHURCH, CONSIDERED IN ITS INDE¬ PENDENCE OF THE STATE, AND ITS CONSECRATION TO CHRIST. L 1. The Family, the State, and the Church : Their Relation to Human Nature, and to God. — 2. The Impossibility of either of them supplying the place of any other. — 3. Relation of Christian Duty to the Commonwealth. — 4. Tendency of Society to engulph the Church in the State : Certainty and Nature of the Retri¬ bution. — 5. Results of the Union of the Church and the State. — 6. Their distinct Nature and separate Mission : Their mutual Relation and Duty. — 7. Fundamental Necessity of the Spiritual Independence of the Church. — 8. Absolute Impossibility of confounding the True Church and the Civil Power : Distinction between the inward and outward Freedom of the Church. — II. 1. Relation of the Glorified Redeemer to the Visible Church, and her Relation to Him. — 2. Infinite Dominion of Christ, and unspeakable Freedom and Blessedness of the Church therein : — (a) The Head of the Church, head over all things : — (b) The Church the Purchase of his Blood: — (c) She Chosen in Him — chooses Him as her only Lord: — (d) His Worthiness to possess, and Competency to execute, boundless and everlasting Authority: — (e) In Him dwelleth all Fulness: — (/) By Him, are all eternal Re¬ tributions. — 3. The Crown of the Redeemer as exclusively his, as his Cross. — 4. The Root of our inward Freedom. — 5. Consecration of the Church to Christ, her true Freedom. — 6. Nature of this Freedom. — 7. Condition of the Visible Church, when possessed of it. — 8. Relation of all States to Christ’s Free Church. I. — 1. When we have considered man as an individual beinpr, and then considered him under the various social aspects in which he is united with his fellow-creatures ; there remains nothing which concerns his nature, his development, or his duty, which may not have been subjected to our scrutiny. For there is no position in which man can be contemplated, which does not be¬ come distinct under one or other of these points of view. I have attempted in the early part of the previous Treatise to analyze what may be called the social possibilities of human nature, as a necessary part of the demonstration of the total and universal depravity of the race. The result reached was, that all the so¬ cial relations which have been ordained and regulated by God, and of which human nature appears to be capable, are embraced 415 CHAP. XXII.] FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. under the institutions of the family, the State, and the Church ; these three institutions, and none besides, appearing to be un¬ avoidable under the scheme of creation, providence, and grace, known to us ; and, at the same time, to exhaust the social capa¬ bilities and satisfy the social necessities of human nature, in its present condition. In order to the analysis and demonstration which it was necessary to attempt, neither of these social insti¬ tutions was required to assume any particular form, out of the innumerable forms in which all of them have existed, or might be supposed to exist. What was to be shown was, the social capabilities and wants of human nature, concurring with the ordination of God, and uniformly producing the organization of families, of civil communities, and of religions — however per¬ fect or imperfect they might be supposed to be ; by means of the whole of which, and by no other means, those social capabilities and wants are completely exhausted and satisfied. This is the result on the side of Philosophy — illustrating the course of divine Providence towards man, and confirming the perpetual teaching of God's word, that these, and only these, are the social institu¬ tions which belong to human nature in its present condition, and which have been ordained by the Creator and Ruler of the uni¬ verse. 2. It follows, that neither of these institutions can discharge the functions which are peculiar to either of the others ; and that neither of them can encroach upon the proper domain of any other, without jeoparding the highest interests of man, and at the same time attempting to disorder the course of divine Provi¬ dence, and to set at naught the revealed ordinations of God. If it were possible to obliterate the sense of religion in the human soul, we should become a race of fiends. If it were possible to annihilate the irresistible tendency in man to a state of society, mankind would be exterminated by mutual violence, unless want, and pestilence, and beasts of prey, anticipated the savage work. If it were possible to extinguish the parental, the filial, the fra¬ ternal, the marital affections and instincts of our race — its con¬ tinued existence would be impossible. It is by means of these profound and enduring elements of our nature, that our race has been found capable not only of existing, but of making progress, under conditions which would seem capable of overwhelming it with ruin and despair. 416 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. 3. Civil society, then, is by divine appointment — and the commonwealth is an ordinance of God. The magistrate is, in his place, the servant of God.1 Obedience to the laws of the land in which we dwell, loyalty to the community of which we are members, zeal for the advancement of the commonwealth to which we belong, are not only obligations of natural religion, and high impulses of nature herself ; they are explicit duties of re¬ vealed religion, enjoined by God. But, like all other relative duties, they are neither exclusive nor absolute ; but are bounded and regulated by other duties of equal dignity ; and are liable, on one hand to be greatly strengthened, and on the other to be even effaced, by coincidence or by conflict with duties more ex¬ alted than themselves. 4. Nothing in the history of society, is more remarkable than the strength of that tendency to confound and identify its civil and religious institutions, which has manifested itself in all ages. And yet from the moment that the tribal form of society was superseded, by what may be properly called the State, and the Church became visible and separate ; nothing would be more illogical, and nothing has been more disastrous. When God or¬ ganized his ancient people under a form of administration imme¬ diately tlieocratical, not only did he keep the functions of the Church and those of the commonwealth distinct ; but he ren¬ dered their union impossible — and secured the freedom of both — by making one tribe royal, and another priestly. Yet man¬ kind, imbued with a deep instinct of the divine origin of society, while they apprehended vaguely its true principles ; overlooked the divine ordination of its separate organization for its special and limited ends, and engulphed under the one ruling idea of the State, every interest of man, personal and public, temporal and eternal. However great may be the error of denying the divine authority of civil society ; the error is equally great that swal¬ lows up the individual — the household — and the Church — and leaves to man nothing positive but the State — and no distinct relation but that of citizen, or subject, or slave, as the case may be. The social instincts of man, not less powerful in their reli¬ gious than in their civil tendencies, might be expected to seek a terrible retribution ; and they were taught the way, both by the spirit and the method to which governments were prone. The 1 Matt., xxii. 15-22 ; Rom., xiii. 1-7. CHAP. XXII.] FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. 417 long and bloody career of the Latin or Roman Apostacy in the bosom of the last of the prophetic universal world-powers ; and that of the successors of Mohammed in the bosom of the three preceding universal monarchies ; have exhibited examples of this tendency to engulph all in the idea of the Church, more tena¬ cious and more frightful, than were ever exhibited by the oppo¬ site tendency to engulph all in the idea of the State. 5. Supposing the visible Church to exist in such a union with the civil power, that the distinctness and freedom of each, with respect to the other, are lost ; then, one or other out of a few clearly appreciable results, seems to be theoretically inevitable — and is historically certain. The civil power enslaves the Church ; or the Church enslaves the State : or there are endless conflicts between the two, with perpetual alternations of mutual domin¬ ion. A fourth result may be imagined — but it has never been attained, and cannot be ; namely, the concurrent action of both under the condition just stated, with a perfect mutual observance and freedom of the functions, duties and rights of each. This cannot be. The two institutions — though both are based in the very nature of man, and both are manifested through principles fundamental in that nature, and both enter into that vast con¬ catenation by which God is manifested in all things ; — yet in their scope, and end, and means, and sanctions, are utterly dif¬ ferent from each other. No State has existed in which the true followers of the Lord, were even numerically coincident with the members of the civil community. Even in the Jewish common¬ wealth, when the union between the visible Church and the civil institutions was in many respects so close, the distinction between the two was, as I have shown, complete ; while it was one great part of the mission of the Apostles of the Lord to transform the visible Church from its close, and ritual, and legal form, into its open, and free, and Gospel form.1 6. The Church of Christ, though in the world, is not of it.3 The Kingdoms of this world are exclusively, both in it, and ot it.3 The children of the Lord may be citizens, or subjects ot the State ; and the rulers and magistrates of all States may be heirs of the Kingdom of Heaven ; and the institutions and laws ot all 1 Matt., xxviii. 18—20; xvi. 13-20; xviii. 18; John, xx. 19-23; 1 Cor., v.,.4,. 2 John, xviii. 36 ; vi. 15 ; Daniel, ii. 44 ; vii. 9-14. 3 Mark, xii. 13-17; Rom., xiii. 1-7. VOL. II. 27 418 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. communities ought to be made and administered in the fear of God. It is, no doubt, the special duty of the Church, to have in constant remembrance before God, all who are in authority and it is their special duty to be nursing fathers and nursing mothers to the Israel of God.2 The State is for things temporal, things local, things visible and transitory ; none of which we brought with us into this world — none of which shall we take with us when we leave it — none of which, while they endure are able to save our souls, or separate them from the love of God. Great as are the blessings it is capable of bestowing, so far is it from being possible that the political millennium for which men look, can be secured by any temporal organization of society ; that the end of all the Kingdoms of this world is, that they shall he broken in pieces and consumed, and become the Kingdom of our Lord and his Christ ; and he shall reign forever and ever.3 In that spiritual Kingdom manifested in the Visible Church, and whose true seat is within us, neither time, nor place, nor condi¬ tion, nor race has any vital significance ; nor can flesh and blood inherit it ; nor does anything avail but the new creature. Its union with the civil power is the highest aggravation of con¬ founding it with the world — for the State is the highest form in which the world appears. So that neither the Visible Church, nor the civil joower, can have any duty either towards God or itself, or each other, more clear and transcendent, than that each should confine itself with respect to the other, to its own obvious sphere — each regarding the other as the ordinance of the com¬ mon father and God of both. Let the Church so act, that the State ordained of God, may protect and nourish her as the Bride of the Lamb : let the State so act, that the Church ordained of God, may reverence and obey her as the minister of God on earth. T. This spiritual independence of the Kingdom of God in this world, is a necessity so fundamental, that no portion of the Visible Church has surrendered it, without surrendering in an equal degree, the spirit of its divine vocation. And all corrupt Churches which have sought the closest union with the civil power, have done so, not in order to submit themselves to the dominion of the State, but rather to subject it to a tyranny as 1 1 Tim., iu 1-4. 2 x]ix. 22, 23. 3 Rev., xi. 14 ; Daniel, ii. 35, 44. CHAP. XXII.] FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. 419 relentless as that, which they made it the instrument of inflict¬ ing. To plead for the freedom of the Church is, therefore, to plead, at the same time, for the independence of States, and for the security of mankind against the cruelties of all false reli¬ gions. If the Church of Cod had conferred on mankind no other boon, than to disseminate throughout the earth, and to settle in the depths of the human soul the sublime truth, that in Christ Jesus there is a law, separate from all other laws, and higher far than they ; that in him there is a power, distinct from and more enduring than all power besides ; she would have bestowed on our suffering race, a source of consolation capable of sustaining it through all its sorrows, an instrument of deliverance competent to the overthrow of all its oppressors, an assured means of vic¬ tory — temporal and spiritual — efficacious at last for the destruc¬ tion of those who have destroyed the earth. In those blessed lands — where this great truth is the common inheritance, the Church of Cod ought to beware how she so walks in the light of it, that all peoples may see — and live. 8. In point of absolute truth, however the State and the Church may deprave each other — yet the confusion of the two as now ordained by Cod — or the complete subjection of either to the other — before one or both are wholly perverted — is really, and in a strict sense, impossible. And the impossibility results so completely from the absolute nature of both those divine in¬ stitutions — that the final glory of the Kingdom of Cod, will be exhibited towards the Kingdoms of this world — as I have al¬ ready shown — not in that they will be subjected to it, but in that their mission being ended, they will pass utterly away. In the meantime, innumerable evils are engendered, and countless in¬ juries are inflicted on humanity, and on the cause of Christ — by the corruption of the professed people of Cod — by the oppression of his true children — and by the general demoralization of man¬ kind ; through perpetual attempts to accomplish that which in its very nature cannot occur, so as to leave both to the State and to the Church its true spirit, and its real nature. The fundamen¬ tal conditions of the visible Kingdom of Cod being, its separation from the world and its spiritual freedom — both of which are im¬ possible as long as it is confounded with the State no mattei whether the State is subject to it, or it is subject to the State , all that remains in that calamitous estate of the Chuich is the 420 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. inward freedom which every member of Christ possesses, and must vindicate in order to he a member of the Kingdom of the First Born whose names are written in heaven. When the outward freedom of the visible Church is gone — this true inward freedom of God's people may still exist in its highest perfection.1 Kay this condition of the Church — when brought about by the perse¬ cution of the State, is so far from being impossible or unusual, that it is that in which it has ordinarily existed : and so far is it from being helpless, that it has proved to be one of mighty power. Nevertheless, it is no more the mission of the Church to court persecution, than to shrink from it. Her normal condition is that, on the one side, of spiritual freedom, and independence of the State — which I have thus far attempted to exhibit ; and, on the other, that of absolute consecration to the Lord Jesus Christ — which remains to be considered. II. — 1. Let all the house of Israel know assuredly, said Peter in the name of all the Apostles, on the day of Pentecost, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.2 We are his witnesses, he and they all added not long afterward to the council of the Jews, — and so is the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him, that the God of our fathers hath raised up J esus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree, and hath exalted him with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins.3 John, in his vision of him whose name is called the Word of God , and who was clothed in a vesture dip¬ ped in blood, saw upon that vesture, and upon his thigh, a name written — King of kings and Lord of lords ; and all the armies which are in heaven followed him.4 And Paul declares that God has not only raised up Christ from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come; but that he hath put all things under his feet, and given him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.6 And the risen Saviour proclaimed to his Apostles, in the most emphatic manner, and Gal., v. 1; Jolm, viil 32; Kom., vi. 18; 1 Peter, ii. 15, 16. 2 Acts, ii. 36. 4 Kev., xix. 13-16. 3 Acts, y. 29-32. 5 Eph., i. 20-23. 421 CHAP. XXII.] FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. as part of his last charge to them concerning his Kingdom, — All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.1 Him, there¬ fore, the Church of the living and true God accepts as the one Lord Jesus Christ,2 her sole Foundation3 — Husband4 — Head6 — and King.6 2. If we would but consider in how many and how decisive j)oints of view the Scriptures place this absolute right and do¬ minion of the Lord Jesus over his Church ; and his infinite fitness to possess them, and his infinite faithfulness in the exe¬ cution of them, and the unspeakable freedom and blessedness of his people therein ; we should perceive clearly how deeply our salvation, and the glory of God in the whole work of his redeem¬ ing love, are staked on the matter we are now examining. Let me suggest a few particulars. (a) As Mediator Christ is invested with all power in heaven and in earth : as Head of his Church he is Head over all things, with unlimited dominion and lordship over them all.7 (b) Christ has purchased the Church with his own blood, that it might be unto him a chosen generation, a royal priest¬ hood, a holy nation, a peculiar people — showing forth the praises of him who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light.8 (c) That Church, chosen in him — has with unanimous and unfaltering voice and consent of every heir of God, chosen and declared the Lord Jesus to be its Lawgiver, Ruler, Judge, and Saviour ; whose glory as such, is above the heavens, and whose infinite exaltation as her Lord, every tongue will at last confess/' (cl) Nor is there anything wanting in him, to make him wor¬ thy to possess and competent to exercise this boundless dominion — since it is he which searcheth the reins and hearts, and giveth to everyone according to his works — he by whom God shall judge the secrets of men, according to the Gospel.10 (e) In him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowl¬ edge ; and the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of 1 Matt, xxviii. 18. 2 1 Cor., viii. 6. * 2 Cor., xt 2. 3 Epli., i. 22. 7 Matt., xxviii. 18; Eph., i. 22; Phil., t 9-11. 8 Acts, xx. 28 ; 1 Pet., ii. 9, 10. 9 Isaiah, xxxiii. 22 ; Psalm viii. 1, 10; Phil., it 9—11. 10 Rev., it 23 ; Rom., ii. 16. 3 1 Cor., iii. H. 6 Psalm ii. 6. i 422 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV knowledge and of the fear of the Lord, rest immeasurably upon him.1 (/) It is before his judgment bar that we must all appear, that every one may receive the things done in his body, accord¬ ing to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad ; whereof God hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.2 3. What less can we say to these things, than that the crown and Kingdom of Jesus Christ appertain to him as exclusively as his cross ? He alone is King in Zion — as really as he alone is the Redeemer of Israel. By the eternal purpose of Jehovah — by the unalterable covenant between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost — -by the purchase of his own most precious blood — by the ratification of his work by the Father in the in¬ finite exaltation of the glorified Redeemer — by the ratification of his work by the Holy Ghost in his unbroken testimony to Christ — by the willing obedience and joyful suffrage of every heir of eternal life — by his own glorious fitness to rule over and in the Kingdom of God — by his infinite power, and wisdom, and justice in the final judgment of the quick and the dead — by the unsearchable fulness out of which he bestows on his brethren a weight of glory which no heart can conceive, and upon his ene¬ mies tribulation and anguish beyond their wildest fears : — by rights and prerogatives so immense, so accumulated, so over¬ whelming — he is the King, the Lawgiver, the Judge, the Lord in Zion ! 4. It is precisely in this absolute and exclusive headship of Christ, and the consecration of his Church to him responsive thereto, that the root of her inward freedom lies ; just as it is on her entire separation from the world, that her outward freedom is grounded, and can be made manifest. Nor is the doctrine of her inward freedom barren — any more than that of her outward freedom. Nay, this is before the other : necessarily before it in the order of her life — immeasurably before it in the power of its operation. For without this inward freedom there is no Church of God, to which that outward freedom can appertain. Where- ever Christ reigns in the human soul, there the Kingdom of God is set up, even though men and states recognize it only to reject and oppress it. The Kingdom corneth not with observation : it 1 Col., ii. 3; Isaiah, xi. 2. 3 2 Cor., v. 10; Acts, xvii. 31. FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. CHAP. XXII.] 423 is within us — and is righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.1 5. The manner in which we are personally made free by Christ, has been fully and carefully explained, and the whole process of our deliverance traced. Considering all those who are delivered by Christ as united in the fellowship of saints, and conducted into the glorious liberty wherewith Christ makes his whole people free ; we have before us that great company of the redeemed, which is the City of God.2 Their individual freedom is the result of their personal union with Christ ; the aggregate freedom of the whole is the result of Christ's headship over his Church. Their individual consecration to Christ as their Sa¬ viour, is the clearest manifestation of their personal deliverance by him : their public and organic consecration to him as their only King and Head, is the clearest proof of the organic freedom of the Church. 6. These divine realities are developed in a way, at once dis¬ tinct and irresistible. The mode of our being and the character of our nature, alike render it impossible for us to exist, in any independent and irresponsible condition — which we might choose, in our folly, to dignify with the name of freedom, and which we might imagine was attainable and to be desired. We have no freedom — -and can have none — which can deliver us from God, and from nature, and make us independent of those ever-living forces of reason, morality, and providence, which operate within and around us, and amidst which, as a part of them, and not as irrespective of them, we are borne onward to our destiny. We may perish — or we may be saved by Christ : besides which, there is no alternative. We are already under the law and the bondage of sin and death : and from this condition nothing but the law of the Spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, can make us free.3 In this condition the blood of Christ is efficaciously applied to our souls. The infinite dominion of the Son of God, which pervades the universe with absolute completeness and perfection, becomes un¬ speakably merciful and loving towards us, and supersedes in us every other dominion. The divine agency by which it acts — even that of the Holy Ghost — is infinitely pure, gentle, ennobling, 1 Luke, xvii. 20, 2L; Rom., xiv. 17, 18. 2 Psalm xlviii . passim ; Rev., iii. 12 ; xxi. passim; Gal., iv. 22-31. 8 Rom., viil 2. 424 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. and efficacious ; and the divine truth through which it works, quick and powerful as a two-edged sword, is also sweet, and purifying, and healing, as the halm that is in Gilead. And the company of the Lord's redeemed, who walk in white bearing the symbols of victory, are round about us, every one a monument like ourself of divine grace and glory. Now, is this bondage — • — or is it deliverance P 7. Freedom of the human conscience from all control but that of God — freedom of the human reason from all authority but that of truth — freedom of the human will from all dominion but that of the Ruler of the universe — freedom of the human soul from all subjection but that to its Creator and Redeemer : add to all this majestic freedom — the freedom to use it all — freely for all good ! This is the feeble expression of that spiritual condition proposed to the Church of the living God — and for which the Spirit of God is able to prepare her. This is the true condition, inadequately expressed, of the visible Church of Christ, which in its free action separates itself more and more from the world, and solicits from all States a complete separation from them, in all her spiritual life and movement. This is the result of the supreme and exclusive headship of the glorified Redeemer, to which the perfect consecration of his Church to him — -is her responsive act. It is a freedom of which none are worthy — to which none are competent — unto which none can attain — but the Bride of the Lamb ! As to her, the more perfectly her will is swallowed up in the will of God, the more complete her free¬ dom is. The more entirely God’s truth obtains possession of her mind and heart, the more thoroughly does that truth make her free. The more constant and pervading the power of God's Spirit within her is, the more assured and enlarged is the liberty of her service and her love. And as to every dependent creature — fallen and renewed by grace — This is the only form of spiritual freedom offered to them by God, or of which their fallen nature is capable. It is the form in which our Saviour Jesus Christ hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel.1 8. The present enquiry does not lead us to the particular con¬ sideration of the duty of the State, as a divine institute, and that of the civil magistrate, as in his office a servant of God. It may 1 2 Tim., i. T-10. 425 CHAP. XXII.] FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH. be observed, however, that the separate ordination of States, is very far from releasing them from the duty of piety towards God — from the open recognition of their position, as powers estab¬ lished by him and responsible to him — or from the obligation to respect and protect every other institute ordained by him.1 The obligation resting on the State to take note of the Church of God, is in its nature very similar to that resting on the Church to take note of the State ; the duty of acting righteously in the sphere assigned by God, is as clear with respect to one as to the other ; and the certainty of God*s favour, or his displeasure, is equally absolute and efficacious, with respect to both. The God of the Christian is the only God. His dominion extends to all things — his providence directs all things — his will is the rule by which all things are determined. All peoples, all States, all rulers — all that exists, in every relation in which it .exists, is his : and so the whole universe is his. F or his own glory he created all things : for that, he sustains and governs all. The humblest creature is not beneath his regard — and the most exalted is as nothing before his wrath. Whoever imagines that kindnesses or injuries done to the least of his children — are forgotten by him, knows nothing of him. And the kings of the earth who set themselves, and the rulers who take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his Anointed ; ought to know that he that sit- teth in the heavens shall laugh — that the Lord shall have them in derision.2 1 Prov., viii. 15, 16; Psalm lxxxii. 3, 4; 2 Sam., xxiii. 3 ; Rom., xiii. 1-8. 2 Psalm ii. 2, 4; Matt., xxv. 31-46. CHAPTER XXIII. THE HISTORICAL, LOGICAL, AND SUPERNATURAL ELEMENTS OF THE CHURCH : CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO THE MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. I. 1. Posture of the General Exposition: Marks of the True Church. — 2. Elements of the Question of the True Church. — II. 1. The Historical Element : The Sacred Scriptures excluded from this Element. — 2. Uninspired History of the Church: Nature and Influence thereof. — 3. General Career of the early Gospel Church: Its Fate in the East : The Latin and the Greek Churches and Empires. — 4. Career of the Gospel Church, and of the Latin Church, in the West — till our Times. — III. 1. The Logical Element: Stated and explained. — 2. Its Force when directed by Divine Grace. — 3. Sympathy between the inward and outward Life of the Church: Unity through all Generations. — IV. I. Supernatural Element: Its Vital Supremacy. — 2. The total Abnegation of Identity between the Gospel Church, and every Institution, real or possible. — 3. Positive Exposition of it, Supernatur- ally Considered. — V. 1. Infallible Certainty concerning the True Church. — 2. All possible Forms of the elemental Idea of Religion, reducible to three : These stated. — 3. The First Class reject the Revelation of God : They cannot be the Church of Christ. — 4. The Second abuse and pervert that Revelation : Precision of the Rule of Judging them. — 5. The Third are the result, and expression, of that Revelation: Their Glory and Blessedness. — VI. 1. Recognition of the Church Visible, universal. — 2. Particular Marks distinctive of her: General Statement concerning them. — 3. The two ultimate and opposite Foundations: Authority — Reason. I. — 1. I have now traced, in the four preceding chapters, the Church of Christ as it may be considered in its fundamental idea and elemental principles — as it may he considered in its nature and end — as it may be considered as the universal Church visible — and as it may be considered with regard to that spiritual freedom which results Irom its complete consecration to Christ. It seems to me that this course of exposition brings the whole subject to a position in which we may say we have precise knowledge, and therefore have clear and just views, touching a matter at once un¬ speakably vast and important. What would follow, if we lived in the first age of the Church, would be to sum up and apply the knowledge thus obtained, to the designation of those universal marks of the divine Kingdom thus displayed, whereby it might 427 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. be infallibly distinguished. We live, however, not in the first, but in the nineteenth age of the Church. And all the intervening ages have claims greater or less upon our consideration ; and all the permanent effects which their terrible convulsions and vicis¬ situdes, may be supposed to have produced upon these great ques¬ tions, require some line to be clearly drawn through them, whereby we may walk in confidence. Before attempting, therefore, to point out those infallible marks of the true Church to which I have alluded, it seems necessary to explain carefully, but generally, those great principles and truths, to the test of which all the past, with all its influences, must submit ; and in the presence of which, the true position of every age, as it exists, becomes equally distinct. 2. There are united in the very fabric of the Church, three elements, distinct but closely allied as they come to us, all of which we must appreciate, in order to comprehend fully the as¬ pect she ought now to present, and to render truly our decision upon the marks that determine her very existence. These are the historical, the logical, and the supernatural elements which enter into the question of the Church. Of these the last, is the transcendent element : the second is next to it in importance, but far below it : and the first, instead of being the chief, as is so often asserted, really derives all its importance, since the close of the canon of inspired books and the death of the last inspired man, from the light it imparts to the other two, by showing us how they have affected man, and how he has abused them. I will consider each in its order as briefly as possible ; observing that the necessity of any such consideration, and even of any precise determination of the marks of the true Church, rests, on one side, on the certainty that there is such a Church on earth, and on the other side, on the certainty that fidelity to Christ and to our own soul, renders it impossible to allow, without examination, any claim, by any organization, that it is that Church. II. — 1. I exclude from the historical element of the Church, all its inspired history, all the narrative portion of the sacred Scriptures ; for all this is an essential part of its supernatural element — what God said he did, being as really divine as any¬ thing else he said — and the inspired narrative of what he did being obligatory upon us as expounding his revealed will, an(l 428 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IY. not to be considered as simply explaining the course of events. The Church is delivered to us hy Revelation in its Gospel state — tbe state in which it should exist by divine appointment, and the Revelation of which is addressed to man and cognizable by man. Whatever history it had before, is written by God : what¬ ever development, was by divine authority, was under the Cove¬ nant of Grace, and terminated with the Apostles of the Lord. That the steps of its previous development had been numerous and distinct — all progressive, each emerging from the bosom of its immediately preceding state, and conducting directly to its immediately succeeding state : all this proves clearly that we must accept the common result of all, as the Church of Christ ; but proves, also, that further progress and development of the same description, so far from being normal to the Church — -are impossible in the absence of that immediate authority of God, attested by miracles and revelation, which had attended all its previous changes. Add to this the express and repeated declara¬ tion of God, that the Gospel Church is the last dispensation of his grace directed to the salvation of sinners, and that the second coming of the Son of Man is the next manifestation of his King¬ dom ; and the demonstration is complete that the Apostolic Church, and not a Church developed beyond it, is still the true Church of Christ. 2. Whatever, therefore, the uninspired history of the Gospel Church, during her progress, her convulsions, and her vicissitudes for nineteen centuries, may deliver to this generation ; must, as regards its value as an elemental part of the question of the Church, sink very low in comparison with the supernatural ele¬ ment of it : and must submit whatever value it may really pos¬ sess to the severe scrutiny of the logical element of the great question. What God has ordained his Church to be, and what the human soul enlightened by divine truth, perceives from her nature and end that she should be ; may derive a certain con¬ firmation to us from the fact, that historically that is what she is, and has been. And our judgment may, to a certain extent, be influenced by her free and common judgment, maintained through all ages, as to what the ordination of God is, and as to what her own nature and end oblige her to be. But it is only of the true Church of Christ, that such statements can be made : for the history which has been enacted, and the judgments which 429 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. have been uttered, by dead heretics and schismatics, dead per¬ secutors and oppressors, dead seducers and corrupters, are of no more authority to us, than they were to those saints whose blood they shed. When we attempt to appreciate the value of the historical element of the question of the Church, we must be careful not to deceive ourselves, by allowing the corrupters of the truth and the oppressors of the earth, to speak in the name of the Bride of the Lamb, whom these very despisers of the cross of Christ have driven into the wilderness during two-thirds of her pilgrimage, and would have destroyed utterly, if God had permitted them. Nor must we allow ourselves to forget, even when the Bride of the Lamb herself makes her voice audible through centuries of corruption and persecution, that she must speak by the same rule by which we must judge. We could not allow her, even if she desired it, to settle determinately, and for us, the significance of the elements of her own great question ; without surrendering every claim which the Knowledge of God has, to be considered a science of positive truth. In effect, there has always been, and there is now, a true Church universal of the Lord Jesus Christ ; and its history is the most important part of the history of mankind, since the days of the Apostles ; and it gives us a determinate element in the great question of the true Church, chiefly as it sets before us to be scrutinized, the very thing we seek. 3. Christ's conception of his own Kingdom as exhibited in its members, and therefore called his Church, his Body, his Bride ; was of a universal Kingdom of righteousness, peace, and joy, into which men are divinely persuaded by teaching them eternal truth. From the earliest dawn of tradition, and the existence of the first powerful State among men, the human idea was the establishment of universal dominion by force ; which has been realized four times in the history of mankind, in those four uni¬ versal world-powers, of which various portions of the prophetic Scriptures, especially the book Daniel and the Revelation of St. John, give so remarkable an account. In the bosom of the last of these, the Gospel Church took its rise, when the set time had come. During all subsequent ages, it had its predicted course, first under the shadow, and then under the more baleful sun¬ shine, of this vast power ; till it was itself subverted, and the very idea of universal dominion, as a pure civil conception, was 430 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. lost amongst men. Then the Gospel Church continued its course towards its own predestinated triumph, in the midst of the pro¬ phetic Kingdoms into which that last subverted empire was rent. The Roman empire, and the visible Church already deeply cor¬ rupted, had both been torn asunder ; and the Latin Church and empire, and the Greek Church and empire, at length divided the civilized world between them. In the latter arose the apostacy of Mohammed ; in the former the apostacy of the Papacy. Both under the pretext of religion, and with the most formidable union of spiritual and civil power the world has seen, sought to prolong the existence in new and appalling forms, of universal world-power by force, directed ngainst both the conscience and persons of men. To this day the Churches of the whole East re¬ main under the yoke of Mohammedan superstition, or are sunken in spiritual deadness and defection. God has given to them no great awakening, no great reformation, during twelve hundred years ; and in all those vast regions, it would be far easier to point out intolerable corruptions of Christianity, than to designate a true mark of the Church of Christ. 4. In the West the Latin Church and empire had a different career: and so had the true Church of Christ. From the days of Christ to those of Constantine the Great, the whole Church through three centuries of persecution, possessed, nevertheless, inward freedom, and filled the earth with the knowledge of the Lord. From Constantine to Pope Hildebrand, commonly known as Gregory VII., during about seven and a half centuries more, the Church of God passed through a period of constant declen¬ sion and oppression, and at length of merciless persecution ; and the Papacy from small beginnings in the city of Rome, gradually extended its dominion and its corruption, until it became the mistress of Europe, and sought to subject the whole world to its sway. From Hildebrand to Luther, during more than four addi¬ tional centuries, the true Church of Christ is to be traced chiefly in the blood o( its martyrs, and in the edicts of its oppressors ; and the Papacy reigned with unlimited despotism throughout the Latin Church, and over the nations inhabiting the countries that composed the Latin empire. Twice before Luther, once in the eleventh century in the south of Europe, and once in the east of Europe in the fifteenth century, a Christian people had at¬ tempted, as did the Germans in the sixteenth century, to main- CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. 431 tain against Rome, the right to love and serve the Lord : and in both cases, they were visited with protracted and exterminating war, and cut off with indiscriminate slaughter. From Luther’s day to our own, during more than three additional centuries, the Church of Christ, restored to life by a miracle of divine grace, has passed through a ceaseless struggle, with the Papacy on the one hand, and with every form of unbelief and misbelief on the other. And now she stands before the same lost world, from which she has been so long separate, consecrated to the same Saviour who has always been her portion, appealing to his blessed word, and to her own nature and end, to confirm that historical claim to be the Bride of the Lamb, which has been the crown of her rejoicing through centuries of trial. III. — 1. The Church visible of God, in whatever light we con¬ sider it, has, like everything else that is subjected to our scrutiny, a logical element which it is impossible to omit, in every judg¬ ment we form concerning it. Everything that relates to that Church, considered as the Church visible and universal of the Lord Jesus Christ, distinguishes the question concerning it, as containing this logical element in a very high degree. The un¬ inspired history of Christianity both in its purity and its cor¬ ruption, demands, from its very nature, a more thorough scrutiny before any controlling influence can be allowed to it, than any history besides ; whilst yet no permanent interest of mankind, remains more inadequately prepared for the scrutiny of any, but the learned, than this vast and diversified history. Moreover, the entire supernatural element, which is the controlling element in every question that relates to Christianity, cannot be accepted by man, much less so accepted as to satisfy it, without something to justify that profound conviction it demands. It is in the light of all we know, and all we are — the light of reason, of conscience, of philosophy, of the whole power we possess whether by nature or through grace, directed by all the knowledge we have obtained; that our meditations are to be directed to every serious question, and above all to questions relating to God and to duty. The ground of every decision is, in one respect, obliged to lie in the subject matter itself; and, therefore, as in all I have said, so em¬ phatically here, nothing can be determined irrespective of its own nature and end — irrespective of its own logical element. Nor is it possible to determine anything against its own nature and end, 432 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. against its own logical element, without determining falsely. It would be wholly impossible to believe that a God of purity and truth, purposed to save sinners in their pollution, or by means of falsehood and cruelty : impossible to believe, that the saints of God have Satan for their Lord, instead of Christ : impossible to believe that to be a true Church, which by virtue of its faith, its life, and its worship, promotes sin instead of holiness. Ration¬ ally, it is not competent to man to say, that truth and falsehood are the same : ethically it is beyond his nature, to confound the distinction between good and evil : logically the concrete of all this is a controlling reality of his being — he cannot disregard the nature and end of things. 2. If we add to these great principles and truths, which are common to man, that which is peculiar to the children of God, we shall perceive how sure a foundation is laid in this logical ele¬ ment of the question of the Church, for a true decision concern¬ ing it. He who is born of the Spirit is able to discern the King¬ dom of God,'* and is fit to enter it.1 That which is born of the Spirit is spirit, as really as that which is born of the flesh is flesh.2 To know God, the living and true God, and to know Jesus Christ whom he has sent — this is eternal life.3 The Son of God has given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true : and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ : this is the true God, and eternal life.4 But this Saviour whom we know, is the way, the truth, and the life : and we know the truth, and the truth has made us free : and the Spirit of truth guides us into all truth.6 And is it so, that they who are thus enlight¬ ened cannot discern the common mother of them all ?“ Is that spiritual insight which suffices to discern God, and Christ, and all truth, blind when it is turned toward the Spouse of Christ ?7 Are the very elect of God, whom it is impossible for false pro¬ phets, and even false Christs to deceive, incapable of distinguish¬ ing a ferocious harlot, from the faithful and beloved Bride — the Lamb's wife.8 Then what we are expected to believe is, that he who ascended up on high, leading captivity captive, and who gave * A vvarat tdeiv. * John, iii. 3-G. 2 John, i. 13 ; iii. 6 ; Titus, iii. 6. * John, xvii. 3. * 1 John, v. 20. 5 John, viii. 32; xiv. 6; xvi. 13. 3 Gal., iv. 26, 27. * Song of Solomon, passim. 8 Matt, xxiv. 24; Rev., xvii. passim ; xxi. 9-27. 433 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, for the per¬ fecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edify¬ ing of the body of Christ ; gave them sufficient grace to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, and to discern the one Spirit, the one hope of our calling, the one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all ; hut did not give them grace to discern the one body to which they were given : although he says he did, and names it first of all, in the very front of the wondrous array.1 3. Nor is this element of the question of the Church fully appreciated, until we reflect, that besides the force which its very existence implies, in distinguishing the true Church, the force of its own working makes every mark of the Church more and more distinct, while the absence of that working may be so ab¬ solute, as to destroy all evidence of the existence of the Church. Considered of herself, the sympathy between the inner and the outer life of the Church, is constant and profound ; her spirit, her faith, her life, her form, all mutually and continually influ¬ encing each other. When she rose under the labours of the Apostles, she rose altogether ; when she declined under the tyranny of Rome, she declined altogether ; when she was re¬ stored to life under the labours of the Reformers, it was a resto¬ ration altogether ; and every apostacy from her, has been an apostacy altogether. In proportion as each member is like Christ, ail are like each other : in proportion as the Church is pure, she is identical in all generations. Her early Greek creeds and her still more numerous creeds of the Reformation — the for¬ mer preceding the Apostacy of Rome, and the latter following by a thousand years, and renouncing that apostacy, are all expressive of the same unalterable faith. Nor is a less illustrious example of that invincible force and concatenation of sympathy between her inner and outer life, exhibited in all her endeavours to ex¬ ecute her true mission on earth. Her force in the world, and on it, has always been great in proportion to her separation from it, and feeble in proportion to the closeness of her connection with it : and her desire and fitness to execute her mission, have al¬ ways risen and fallen with her ability to do so, as measured by her own complete organization, and vital activity, as Christ's Kingdom. 1 Eph., iv. 3-13. 28 VOL. II. 434 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. IV. — 1. The supernatural element of the question of the Church, is the grand and controlling element in every aspect in which it is possible to present it. If we would obtain the funda¬ mental idea of the Church, and the most elemental form of the principles which enter into that idea ; if we would rightly appre¬ ciate the nature and end of a Kingdom, organized upon that idea as an eternal witness for God ; if we would have a clear concep¬ tion of the aspect, and form, and working of this Kingdom, with Christ at its head, the Spirit as its life, and regenerate men as its members ; if we would understand the necessity and the form of its real freedom, resulting from its being separate from the world and consecrated to the complete dominion of Christ : if this is what we desire to understand, we have, we can have, no alterna¬ tive, but to sit down at the feet of Jesus and be taught by him. It is this which, in the four preceding chapters, I have endeavoured to prove and illustrate ; and in the widest sense of the truth im¬ plied in that method, it is this which pervades all I have written. Whether we consider God, or man, or the Mediator between them ; or salvation, or the truth which is available unto salvation, and that whether in its objective or subjective form ; or the individual sinner, or the race of sinners ; or the individual believer, or the whole elect of God, or the Kingdom of God composed of them, and that whether considered in its head the Lord Christ, or in its author the Holy Spirit, or in its members the children of God ; or whether we consider the Church visible, and that whether in the very elements of the question, or in the marks of the true Church — and that whether with reference to her faith, her life, her worship, or her form : the moment we shut our eyes to the supernatural element which not only pervades all, but determines all — there we extinguish light and hope together. The just live by faith ; the relation between life and righteousness, and the re¬ lation between both of them and faith — is divine, absolute, un¬ alterable.1 It is to the supernatural element in Christianity itself, as well as in the question of the visible Church by means of which Christianity presents a particular aspect, that both the other ele¬ ments thereof are merely applied ; nay merely so applied, that we may the better comprehend its intimate nature, its practical operation, and its eternal design. 1 Hab., ii. 1-4 ; Rom., i. 14-21 ; Gal., iii. 10-14 ; Heb., x. 35-39 ; John, iii. 16-21. 435 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. 2. The Church of God is no longer manifested in a particular race, as under one aspect of the Abrahamic covenant : it is no longer identified with a particular State, or a particular nation¬ ality, as with the Jewish commonwealth and people. The truth, of which it is the pillar and ground, is for all the world ; the Gospel which it proclaims, is for every creature ; the repentance and remission of sins, which are preached in the name of Christ, are for all nations.1 Nor is it a high, but spontaneous and neces¬ sary, development of the fallen religious nature of man, under fixed conditions ; so many degraded forms of which heathenism presents to us. Nor is it a system created by human skill and thought, out of such elements as existing systems furnished, aided by such suggestions as reason, and passion, and natural religion might afford ; of which we have examples in the system of Mohammedanism, and in that of the disciples of Confucius. Nor is it a fortuitous, or capricious, or traditional, or eclectic col¬ lection and arrangement of opinions, and speculations, and ideas, and theories ; like the schools of the Oriental and the Greek phi¬ losophies. Nor is it a myth — springing from the efforts of the human mind to objectify, upon the traditions of the race, its own vague but powerful subjective life ; and assuming the particular form in which we find it, by the development of the common life of the race. Nor is it a voluntary association of individuals, combined for particular purposes, governed by rules prescribed by themselves and perpetuated from generation to generation ; of which so many and such varied examples have been furnished, in the progress of the human race. Nor is it even, like civil society, which it resembles most of all in some remarkable par¬ ticulars which I have pointed out ; a permanent and divine insti¬ tution, of which God has laid down the elemental principles and obligations, and left to human choice, or to the course of events, to determine the particular form it mny assume, and the particu¬ lar direction it may take. The Gospel Church is none of these things. It is widely, divinely, different from them all. And in saying this it will he observed that the negations which have been made, exhaust the ordinary possibilities of human association, in a simple form ; and yet they present few aspects which, in some ace, have not been asserted, bv those destitute of the truth, to be the true aspect of the Church of Christ. 1 Tim., iii. 15, 1G ; Mark, xvi. 15; Luke, xxiv. 47 436 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. 3. Considered merely in its supernatural element, this is what it is. It is a permanent, universal, spiritual Kingdom, set up by God in this world ; of which his Son Jesus Christ is the Lord, and Saviour, and head ; of which the Holy Ghost is the life ; and of which every member is chosen out of the human family, by God himself. All these members in all lands and ages, con¬ stitute one vast brotherhood, and perpetuate themselves through all time, disregardful of all things that would obstruct their vo¬ cation and their progress. They are united under the immediate authority of God, made manifest in his written word, and en¬ forced by his divine Spirit ; their outward organization being that prescribed in that word, and every act of authority being performed in the presence, and in the name, of the Saviour of the world. Every object to which the efforts of this body, thus organized and administered, may be directed ; every doctrine it may accept ; every duty which can devolve on it ; all are laid down, explicitly or implicity, in the sacred Scriptures. The body itself and every member of it, is absolutely precluded from doing anything which God has forbidden, and from leaving undone any¬ thing which God has commanded ; no matter at what risk, or loss, to themselves or others — no matter what ties are broken — • or what authority subverted — by obedience to God. While all men, left to themselves, avoid and reject this absolute dominion of God ; and while all who submit to it, do so only as they are made willing and able by the Spirit of God ; it is, nevertheless, the immediate duty and right of every human being, to deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Jesus Christ in the regen¬ eration ; and it is the immediate object of this universal Church visible, to make known to every creature, his duty and his right in this particular — to urge every one with all importunity to flee from the wrath to come — and to teach every one with all dili¬ gence and love, the way of life eternal. This Church of God, is the great glory of God, in time and through eternity. In a world of sinners, it is vain to speak of a Church of God which contains no such element as this : vain to speak to sinners saved by grace, of any element paramount to this— or fit to be compared with it : vain to think of supplying its place — and yet saving lost souls. V. — 1. These elements of the question of the visible Church, appear to be exhaustive ; and any just consideration of them to 437 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. place that question in a posture, where the marks of the true Church cannot fail to be always present with her, always so ob¬ vious that all may know her, and that her own children cannot mistake her. What those marks are in particular, or considered generally, every one who is enlightened in divine things, readily determines practically, and truly to his own satisfaction : nor can it, in any instance, affect the validity of the conclusion reached, that boundless variety of mental experience and exercises, occurs in the process by which the human soul reaches its conclusion upon this, any more than upon other questions of our spiritual life. Nevertheless, those marks of the true Church are capable of distinct classification and statement, under a few general heads — as I will attempt to show in the following chapters. And pre¬ liminary thereto, I will apply the foregoing analysis and exposi¬ tion to the great question of all religions and Churches, for the purpose of clearing away all needless questions, and reducing the one we have to settle to its exact state. 2. I have already shown that the innumerable acts which are performed by public authority under every possible form of so¬ ciety, fall under a very few, namely three, great functions, which exhaust all the force which results from its organization — and supplies all that is possible, or even conceivable. It would be perfectly easy to show, in addition, that all the possible forms which organized society can assume, although they appear to be innumerable — are reducible to a very few ; besides which, in their simple exhibition and in the multiplied combinations of them, there is no possible, or imaginable, form of organized society. There is a form which is strictly popular and democratic ; there is a second which is strictly aristocratical ; there is a third which is strictly regal ; there is a fourth which is strictly republican and representative ; and there are innumerable combinations of the elements of these four forms. But nothing else is possible — until some unknown element heterogeneous to society, and, as regards human nature — -either divine or diabolical — is introduced as a further modification ; and even then, it is the spirit more than the form that is affected. In like manner, the permanent forms which are possible, or conceivable, with relation to the idea of religion, even in its widest sense — are very limited in number, are capable of being precisely stated, and, following the nature of the subject, are less capable of serious admixture without 438 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. mutual destruction. However numerous and diversified the re¬ ligions which have appeared among men, may be supposed to be — the following classes embrace them all. (a) Those which, destitute of all true external revelation from God, are the product of the natural impulses of fallen man — and of his necessities manifested through his depraved religious sus¬ ceptibilities. ( b ) Those which are the product of the abuse and perversion of a true external revelation received from God. (c) Those which are the product, the sum, and the expres¬ sion, of all true external revelation received from God. 3. No one can doubt that all religions which fall under the first of these three classes, are to be indiscriminately and com¬ pletely rejected, as no part of the Church visible universal of the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever effect may be produced ou man in this life, or in that which is to come, by any conceivable form of religion of that kind ; it is perfectly manifest that no single effect, in either life, identical with any effect which the religion of Jesus was designed to produce, can be produced — or even desired, or con¬ templated by any of them. It is impossible, in the nature of the case, for the Christian religion to identify itself with any form of natural religion, or general morality' — or speculative belief origi¬ nating in that way — without forfeiting at once, every divine claim. Of systems of idolatry and superstition — of fraud and violence — of pollution, folly, and brutality — which have been accepted as religions amongst men ; there is no occasion to speak here. So far is it from being possible to recognize, from the stand-point of the Christian Church, any system of religion originating in human nature, or wrought out by man in his own strength, as being com¬ petent for our guidance in this life, and for our eternal salvation ; the necessary effect of the triumph of Christianity, is the total destruction of all such religions — the necessary effect of the re¬ generation of each soul, is its deliverance from every such delu¬ sion. At the very first step, therefore, of all enlightened attempts to identify the Church of Christ, and even before the exact set¬ tlement ot the precise marks which infallibly distinguish it ; the field of enquiry is swept of an overwhelming mass of refuges of lies. 4. Those religions which fall under the second class, require more consideration. The decision which ought to be formed in 489 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. each particular case, depends somewhat on the circumstances pe¬ culiar to each. The general principle is clear enough. For as the rejection of the true external revelation made by God to man, necessarily deprives men of all knowledge of a Saviour, and, there¬ fore, excludes them from all communion with him ; so the abuse and perversion of that revelation, to the extent of depriving men of saving knowledge of Christ, also puts them out of the possi¬ bility of all communion with him. Nor is it at all material whether this terrible result is reached, by abusing and perverting God’s revelation to man through human additions made to it — through rejection of additional revelations made by God — through voluntary ignorance of the way of life taught in the accepted revelation — through perverse misstatement of the truth divinely taught — through carnal deadness and indifference to it — through holding it in unrighteousness — or by whatever other means dishon¬ ouring God the Saviour, and concealing from lost men the light of life. In every such case, the just consideration of either ele¬ ment of the question of the Church, much more of all three — shows that none such can have the freedom of the city of God. The difficulty lies, not in the principles on which our decision ought to rest ; but in the uncertainty which may attach to the facts in each case, or in the conclusive significance of the facts when established. That is, it lies, not in the supernatural, but in the historical, or logical element of the question. For it is not true that every abuse and every perversion of the word of God — even though it should he such as to be permanent, and characteristic — justifies us in calling a Church corrupt, much less apostate ; any more than that individual Christians whose faith is very weak, or even erroneous on many points — or whose lives may come greatly short of the Gospel standard, are to be cast out as the children of the wicked one.1 The most remarkable examples, perhaps, which the history of the Church affords, of the abuse and perversion of the revelation of God, are those fur¬ nished by the Jewish and Papal Churches. And while it is per¬ fectly clear that neither of them can be considered any part of the visible Church of Christ ; it is very remarkable to observe the difference in God’s providential dealings towards them, and in the whole tenor of his word respecting them. Let it he noted that whatever practical difficulty may exist arises only on the 3 Isaiah, xl. 9-11 ; Eph., iv. 1-3 ; Col., iii. 11-15. 440 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. lowest margin of the subject. It may not be easy to discover, that those who shall be saved, yet so as by fire, are nevertheless upon the only foundation that is laid, which is Jesus Christ;1 nor to discern Satan when he is transformed into an angel of light, and his ministers when they are transformed into ministers of righteousness.2 But assuredly there is no mistaking the Bride of Christ — to whom he saith himself, Thou art beautiful, 0 my love, as Tirzah, comely as Jerusalem, looking forth like the morn¬ ing, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners.3 5. It is those religions which are embraced in the third class, those, namely, which are the product, the sum, and the expres¬ sion of all true external revelation received from God, which are truly divine. That is the religion now professed by the true Church, visible and universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ. Nor has the human race any interest so great, as that this religion, on the one hand, should have free scope upon earth — and that, on the other, it should not be allowed to depart from its own sublime mission, and thereby not only deprive mankind of in¬ finite blessings, but become perverted into an engine of unspeak¬ able misery. No folly of mankind is more fatal, than the success¬ ful accommodation of the Gospel Church, to human philosophies, passions, and ends — the subjugation, that is, of God and eternal truth, to man and to all changeful vanities and lies. The con¬ stant effort, rather, should be, to reduce the visible Church more and more perfectly to the absolute standard of divine revelation, on which it wholly reposes ; and to make every human interest which comes within its scope, conform itself more and more, to the same perfect and eternal standard. As for the Church, all she has is the gift of God. When this does not suffice, her mis¬ sion is at an end. For the Spouse of him who was dead, and is alive, and liveth forevermore, may not accept bridal ornaments from any hand but his, any more than she may lay aside those with which he has adorned her, as proofs at once of his infinite triumph, and his unquenchable love ! What has she to do— I will not say with the pollution and guilt, but with the empty and tawdry splendour of this miserable world ! Her faith— her life — her all, are from above — and there is her hope and her rest : and 1 1 Cor., iii. 11-15. 3 2 Cor., xi. 13-15. s Solomon’s Song, vi. 4-10. 441 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. her glory and her blessedness can mean nothing, hut the presence and approval of her Lord, and her fitness to serve and to enjoy him ! • VI. — 1. Our recognition of the Kingdom of God, therefore, under the form of the visible Church universal of the Lord Jesus Christ, is more than the personal recognition of individual be¬ lievers ; however impossible it may be to recognize her in their absence, or except through them. On the other hand, it is less than the recognition of the universal body of the elect — the greater part of whom -were never in the flesh together ; less also than the recognition of such a universal organic unity of all the elect on earth, as we behold in a particular Church. The Gos¬ pel Church has no visible head — the Lord Jesus Christ being its only head ; the conditions which attach to our present state, and the necessities and obligations which arise from those conditions, are incompatible with the organic union of the universal Church ; the whole course of divine providence renders it impossible, under the present dispensation ; and the revealed will of God discloses it as appertaining to a more exalted condition of the Church.1 Schismatical, and even needless divisions of the Church, are sin¬ ful. But national, denominational, or other necessary divisions of it, are no more to be condemned than the organization of sep¬ arate congregations, or particular Churches ; but, on the other hand, to a certain extent, and in certain ways, they promote the peace, the efficiency, and even the spirituality and unity of the Church. The Church visible universal, therefore, which we are to recognize, and which, as I have shown, it is not conceivable that a child of God should mistake, is the Kingdom of God mani¬ fested in this world, and struggling to subdue it unto him : God's people indeed — but God's people divinely organized under the banner of the Lord Jesus Christ.2 2. Descending from this wide and manifest ground of recog- nition, whatever particular marks of the true Church may be de¬ manded, must be such as the children of God, with his love in their hearts, and his word in their hands, may clearly and readily distinguish ; not such as even the wise and learned might find it difficult to ascertain and determine, though honestly seeking for them, by the light of eternal life. For the Kingdom of God 1 John, x. 14-16; Rev., xx. 4; Rom., viii. 17-25; Rev., v. 10; 2 Tim., ii. 11-13. 3 Rev., xix. 13, 14. 442 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV must be entered in the spirit of a little child ; it is to the hum¬ ble and the poor, pre-eminently, that the Gospel is sent ; and the common people are they who have always heard Christ gladly. They are marks, moreover, not determinable by the Church, but by God. Nor are they exclusively for any Church to judge her¬ self by, but for all men, and especially for believers, to judge every Church by. The testimony of any Church, that she possesses them may, or may not, be true ; and must be received or rejected, ac¬ cording as it may be found to be. In their very nature, the marks of the true Church are anterior to the claim of any particular Church — they are logically independent of the Church, and com¬ pletely and divinely decisive concerning the Church. It is, there¬ fore, wholly absurd to speak of our ascertaining the Church first, and afterwards ascertaining through her, what her true marks are ; which is the method of the Papacy, and a specimen of the methods of all in all ages, who exalt the historical element of the Church to supremacy over its logical and supernatural elements. It is a method by which it is impossible to arrive at truth ; a device whereby the word of God, and the reason and conscience of man, are sought to be controlled, by whatever body of persons, that can obtain, by whatever means, dominion over whatever they see fit to call the Church of God. Its use has been to cast the responsibility of the most atrocious wickedness, and the most % abominable perfidy — upon the Church of the living God. What¬ ever may be the risk of error in determining for ourselves, what these marks are, and where they exist, and by consequence, which is the Church ; it is less by far — and there is no possibility of es¬ caping it — than necessarily falls upon every human soul, in de¬ ciding the previous, and still more important questions, which relate to Christ, and to our own souls. Moreover, in both cases, the risk is not diminished — but is immeasurably increased — by trusting to human instead of divine guidance — by following the commandments of a worm like ourselves rather than the doctrine of the living God.1 3. There are but two ultimate foundations, upon one or the other of which everything must rest, and all human conduct proceed. One of these is authority, the other is reason : reason, pure and simple, in all natural things — reason, enlightened by divine grace, in all supernatural things. Either of these may be 1 Matt., XV. 9 ; Isaiah, xxix. 13, 14 ; Col., ii. 18-22. 443 CHAP. XXIII.] MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. adopted, and will conduct us completely ; but nothing, except one of these, will do so. We may commit our souls to the au¬ thority of the priest, to the authority of antiquity, to the autho¬ rity of the Church — to any authority, lower than that of God — and blindly follow it ; and such are the peculiarities of the fallen human soul, that it maybe degraded into an unquestioning obe¬ dience to its idol — even to its own perdition.1 Or we may commit ourselves to the guidance of that reason, by which God has dis¬ tinguished us above the beasts that perish ; and addressing it to the great realities which environ us, follow the truth made known supernaturally by divine revelation, and effectually applied to our souls by the Holy Ghost. This is the method ordained of God, commanded in his word, and appropriate to our nature, both as created and regenerated by him. The true and the good become clearer to the soul, and are more precious, as its devotion to them is more constant. The power and the proportion of that divine faith by which we walk, open before our steadfast gaze. And as with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, we are all changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.2 1 2 Cor., iv. 4; John, xii. 31-41 ; 1 Tim., iv. 1-3. 2 2 Cor., in. 18; iv. 6; Col., iii. 10. CHAPTER XXIV. PURITY OF FAITH: THE FIRST INFALLIBLE MARK OF THE TRUE CHURCH. I. 1. Alleged Difficulty of Knowing the True Church of Christ: Cause of whatever may exist: Impostures. — 2. Naturo of her Infallible Marks. — 3. The State of the renewed Soul, responsive to the Revealed Salvation. — 4. Purity of Faith, the First Infallible Mark of the True Church. — IT. 1. Divine Revelation the Infallible Arbi¬ ter of the Purity of Faith — and the Infallible Rule by which to Judge the Church. — 2. The Questions of Salvation — Church — Rule of Faith — and Judge of Contro¬ versions : Their indissoluble Connection. — 3. The exact Relation of the True Church to the Question of the Purity of Faith. — 4. God himself the Infallible Judge: In this World by his Word and Spirit: At the Last Day, by Jesus Christ. — 5. The Imposture of an Earthly, Infallible, Judge of Faith, and of Controversies. — 6. The Relation of all Christian Graces to Purity of Faith. — 7. The Saving Work of the Holy Ghost — the Vital Test of the Purity of Faith, and of the Church itself. — 8. The Regulative Power of Faith. — III. 1. Nature and ground of our Judgments con¬ cerning true Faith, and the true Church. — 2. Symbolical Statements of the Chris¬ tian Church. — 3. Hatred and Vengeance of God against Corrupt and Apostate Churches. I. — 1. As soon as God's people on earth assume, by his direc¬ tion and under his guidance, an organized, separate, visible, com¬ mon existence ; new obligations to each other, and to all mankind, as well as new obligations of individual men and of civil communi¬ ties towards this divine society, arise out of its creation and action. One alleged difficulty in the performance of these duties, is the pretence of great uncertainty in ascertaining, amidst an immense variety of religions, which is that true Church of God whose ex¬ istence amongst men gives rise to the duties themselves. Under this pretext, the wicked evade the obligation to follow Christ at all, and willingly confound his Church with every synagogue of Satan ; while every anti-christ seeks, through it, to promote his own wicked ends, and to defeat the grace of God, which bringeth salvation. If the world, and more especially the children of Christ, would follow simply and earnestly the light of that reason, with which God has endowed us, and the teachings of that divine word, which he has given to be a lamp unto our feet and a light unto CHAP. XXIV.] PURITY OF FAITH. 445 our path, it is not easy to imagine how the least obscurity could hang over such a question. If the Church were, what she should be — even then the wicked might hate and shun her; but it would be for her glory and beauty — and not upon the shameful pretext that the house of Judah is like all the heathen. As long as the people of God manifest clearly, the new life which animates them, men cannot well avoid taking knowledge of them, that they have been with Jesus ; nor can joint inheritors of the Kingdom of Heaven fail to recognize each other, and so recognize the body, which they unitedly compose. A city cannot be hid, if it be set on a hill ; and salt is cast upon the dunghill, only when it has lost its savour. And it has happened during the most deplorable corruptions of the Church in the high places of the earth, that the obscure and despised but faithful disciples of the Lord, have found refuge, though it were in dens and caves of the earth ; and when prevented by persecution from publicly manifesting God’s Kingdom, or when unable amidst surrounding darkness and cor¬ ruption to discern that it existed, they saw plainly that those who claimed to be the Church of Christ, were indeed the Synagogue of Satan. It is in order to favour the pretensions of corrupt, per¬ secuting, and apostate Churches, that all those false and delusive means of distinguishing the true Church, which occupy so large a space in controversies, and which are discussed in systems of theology — were at first invented, and have been so vehemently defended. I leave to those controversies and those systems, the settlement of the true value of such impostures. The whole subject, which to the true Christian is practically extremely sim¬ ple, has its chief importance in the clear statement of that, which if it had never been intentionally corrupted and obscured, could never have come to be doubted. To that statement, therefore, I will address myself. 2. The Kingdom of God on earth, as I have sufficiently proved, is constituted out of his elect, redeemed, and regenerated people. The nature and end of that Kingdom, have a precise relation to that definite principle and method of its composition. It is, ns so composed, of such a nature and for such an end, that it be¬ comes visible more and more, by becoming more and more per¬ fectly organized. Its absolute freedom, thus organized and visi¬ ble, is complete in its perfect separation from the world, and its perfect consecration to Christ, its only Head. Its supernatural 446 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IY. element is, therefore, its distinguishing element — as exponents of which its logical and historical elements find their chief value. o Inevitably, therefore, whatever mark infallibly distinguishes this divine Kingdom, must he in complete accordance with these ele¬ mental truths, and must make full account of them all. What¬ ever pretended mark does not obviously meet this necessity, must obviously be a fallacy and an imposture. Whatsoever mark does obviously meet it, is beyond all peradventure, a permanent and infallible mark of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Where any such mark is found, there is found a portion of that Church — it may be an imperfect one — but still a true portion, of that Church : just as there are real but feeble Christians. Where the whole of these marks are found — and they are both few and sim¬ ple — there beyond all doubt, that Church is found in her beauty, her strength, and her completeness. 3. Now the fundamental characteristic of every elect, redeemed, and regenerated person — that is of every member of the Church we seek — is, that he is a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, as the only and all-sufficient Saviour of sinners. To perpetuate and to propagate this belief on earth, for the glory of God and the salvation of men, is the fundamental object of the existence of the Church, and of all its efforts to perfect and extend itself. Every step by which the Church has become organized, visible, and complete, has been a step perfecting, enlarging, and confirm¬ ing this belief, and making every method of perpetuating and extending it, more and more complete and efficacious. The sub¬ ject matter of the belief itself, the mode of its communication to men ; the power by which it is made effectual unto salvation ; all the steps by which those who cherish it, are united, organized, and separated from the world into one body unto Christ ; and the total action of that one body, unto the great ends of its own ex¬ istence : all are supernatural — all are by divine revelation. It is a revealed Saviour, revealed truth, revealed holiness, a revealed Church, a revealed immortality. All are brought nigh to us, and manifested in the union of all who are united to Christ — in the organized communion of all who have communion with Christ. This is that which we profess to seek. That in man which is re¬ sponsive to all this, God and all God’s people in all ages express by a single word — Faith : faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ.1 1 Rom., i. 16, 17 ; 1 John, v. 10 ; Eph., L 13-23 ; ii. 3-21. PURITY OF FAITH. 447 CHAP. XXIV.] 4. The first infallible mark of the true Church is, therefore, the Purity of her Faith. That faith, of which Christ crucified is the specific object ;* of which the word of God revealed to us in the sacred Scriptures, is the only infallible rule :2 of the pro¬ duction of which, as existing in us, the Holy Ghost is the divine agent :3 which is unto us the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen :4 which is in us a divine power, working by love, and purifying the heart, so that in everyone that is born of God faith is the victory that overcometh the world.5 This is so great a reality, and is so directly related to Jesus Christ, that he is himself both the author and the finisher of it ;6 and without if-, it is impossible to please God.7 In this wide and yet most specific sense, purity of Faith is the simplest, most obvious, most universal, and most comprehensive mark, by which to ascer¬ tain and determine the union and communion of any soul with Christ — and by which to judge and settle the claim of every Church to be considered a part of his visible Church. What can be more certain than that a Church thus spiritually and com¬ pletely united to the Lord Jesus Christ — is his Church P What cnn be more monstrous than for a Church, defiled and drunken with the blood of saints and martyrs, shed for their maintenance of the truth as it is in Jesus — to call herself his Body, his Bride ?8 The Church with respect to Christ, is his Body ; with respect to the human race, it is the company of God’s elect saved by grace. Omitting either of these ideas — much more omitting both — the conception of the Church vanishes : and every society that pro¬ pounds ideas of the Church opposite to these, or fails to pro¬ pound these, as its foundation — is by force of its own statement, no Church of Christ. For the elemental idea of that purity of Faith, which is itself the elemental mark of the true Church is, that it has for its object the divine Redeemer, crucified for us, who is unto us the wisdom of God, and the power of God.0 II. — 1. I have devoted a previous chapter to the establish¬ ment and illustration of the great truth, that the sacred Scrip¬ tures are the only infallible rule of faith and practice. Little need be added now to show, that being the only rule whereby we can infallibly know what we ought to believe concerning God ; 1 1 Cor., i. 23, 24. 2 Isaiah, viii. 20. 3 Eph., ii. 8-10. < Heb., xi. 1. 5 1 John, v. 4, 5. 6 Heb., xii. 2. 7 Heb., x. 6. 8 ltev., xvii. 6. 9 1 Cor., i. 21-31. 448 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. they are necessarily the only rule whereby we can determine whether any particular belief concerning God, is right or wrong — any particular thing believed true or false. It is one of the ulti¬ mate laws of our being — without which indeed, our nature could not be called rational — that we must believe whatever appears to us to be established on sufficient evidence. Our belief cannot, indeed, change the nature of things ; but it is itself regulated by constant laws, one of which I have just stated. It is of the essence of that law, and of our nature, that we must judge for ourself, of the sufficiency of that evidence ; and this judgment, also, is regulated by constant laws. Truth is, in all things, that which we ought to believe — that which was natural to the soul in its original purity — which it still desires, and seeks in propor¬ tion as it is pure — -and whose existence, as a divine reality, we cannot deny without denying our rational and moral nature, and involving ourselves in endless contradictions. But as truth pre¬ sents itself to us in connection with all things, and therefore in a boundless variety of aspects ; evidence of its existence, its pres¬ ence, and its particular form, must also be various in its kind, so as to be pertinent and responsive to the various aspects in which truth appears. Thus, facts cannot be established, except by proof : a logical conclusion cannot be reached except by a process of rea¬ soning : the external world cannot be known to us except through our senses : nor the internal except through our consciousness. Now truth that can be known to us only from God, must depend on the testimony of God. And this is precisely the case with every¬ thing that is the object of saving faith. There can be no ade¬ quate evidence of such things, independently of that given by God himself: for if there could be, both the nature of saving faith, and the nature of that truth, which is the rule of it, would he wholly changed. For us, his revealed word, and his divine Spirit, and faith itself created by the Spirit and regulated by the word, are witnesses of the infinite truth he teaches us — witnesses of the infinite veracity of God. The word of God, therefore, made plain to the soul, in its own divine light, and divine power, by the Holy Ghost, is not only the appropriate, but is the only existing manifestation to us, in a way of infallible guidance, of the will of God concerning our salvation. To deny this is to render sal¬ vation by means of a divine Revelation, impossible : for it is to deny the competency of God to reveal saving truth to man — CHAP. XXIV. PURITY OF FAITH. 449 and to deny also Lis competency to make that truth effectual in man, even if it were revealed. Moreover, if we are not compe¬ tent to determine the Church of God, by the revealed truth of God ; much less are we competent to determine our own relation to that Church, by means of that truth. For the second ques¬ tion requires us to determine three things, instead of the single one involved in the first question : and one of these three is that insoluble first question : for we never can determine our relation to the Church, until we know both our relation to God, and the relation of the Church to God. The end of which is, to make the soul, the Church, and the truth, mutually incompetent and irrelevant, each to both the others : as before to make God in¬ competent alike to reveal truth, or make it, if revealed, effectual in man. 2. The question of the judge of controversies, is a corollary of the question of the rule of faith ; and its decision must follow the decision of the main question ; just as the question of the rule of faith, is itself a corollary of the question of the Church, and must be decided according to the idea we have of the Church itself; and just as the question of the Church, is a corollary of the question concerning the nature of personal salvation. They are indissolubly united in the word of God ; and at the bar of reason the decision of one necessarily controls the decision of the rest, through the series in its order. If the personal salvation of man is secured sacramentally, ex opere operate) , then the Church may be the visible society of all those, who by such a baptism, are bound to the adoption of a particular external creed, to the use of those sacraments so operating by their own force, and to obedience to a common visible head : and their faith is accord¬ ing to that creed — as interpreted by that Church, or its head ; which latter is the judge of controversies. This is a State — not a Church : salvation is impossible this way : in short this is Popery. On the other hand if, by personal salvation, we mean union and communion with the Lord Jesus Christ, by means of the renewal of the soul through the work of the divine Spirit ; then the Church is the congregation cf the saints, the gathered body of all believers in Christ ; and the rule of its faith is the word of God ; and the question of the judge of controversies — as I will immediately show — receives a corresponding solu¬ tion. This is in reality a Church : salvation in this way,, is 29 VOL. II. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 450 [book IV. revealed from Heaven, and is certain : this, in short, is Chris¬ tianity. 3. It is, no doubt, true that the Church, being the pillar and ground of the truth, and being charged with the work of evan¬ gelizing all nations by means of that truth, must receive that truth in the love of it — must proclaim it to all men — must ear¬ nestly contend for it, and must faithfully apply it both in the way of doctrine, and in the way of discipline. And, doubtless, decrees and decisions concerning the truth, and concerning con¬ troversies, are proper to all councils, assemblies, synods, and other lawful authorities in the Church ; composed of the overseers and other rulers of particular Churches, met by virtue of their office in the name, and by the authority of the Lord Jesus.1 And these decrees and decisions, if consonant to the word of God, are to be received with reverence and submission, not only for their agreement with the word of God, but also for the power whereby they are made, as being an ordinance of God appointed thereunto in his word.2 And in general, the presumption — before any particu¬ lar enquiry — is that all such decrees and decisions of the true Church, are consonant to the truth of God : but since the visible Church is not infallible — that presumption may be false : nor is it possible for any decrees or decisions of a fallible Church, to bind the conscience, by their own power. In this way, and to this extent only, the Church visible is the judge of controversies concerning that pure faith which is her own fundamental mark. She must keep the unity of the Spirit — she must keep herself pure — and in the love of God.3 4. Beyond this, every man must judge for himself, and on the peril of his soul, what true Faith is, and where it is to be found, and what is the value, and what the result of such con¬ troversies about it, as it may be his duty to meddle with.4 Every company of believers must act in like manner — for themselves, and for the furtherance of truth, peace, charity and holiness.5 The universal Church visible, must in its life, its testimony, its worship, and its eftorts, show itself alive to the discharge of those great functions, which I have shown appertain to it, with refer¬ ence to the maintenance of truth and peace, and the suppression 1 Acts, xv. passim. 2 Acts, xv. 27-31; xvi. 4; Matt., xviii. 17. 8 Eph., iv. 3; 1 Tim., v. 22; Jude, 21. 4 Rom., xiv. 5. 6 Rev., ii. 2, 6, 14, 20; iii. 20. PURITY OF FAITH. 451 CHAP. XXIV.] of error and disorder. Bat God himself, the fountain of all truth, is also the true judge of all controversies concerning it. The author and finisher of our faith, and the giver of the only infallible rule alike of that true faith and of all duty connected with it ; is alone able to destroy every refuge of lies, and to cast the father of them all into the lake of fire.1 For this present life, the divine and infallible word, given by inspiration of God, profitable for all things, and able to furnish the man of God for every good work, and make him wise unto salvation — is the great arbiter. It is God, who speaks to us through it. And his divine Spirit, working in us, and also applying it with divine power and wisdom to our soul, mind, and heart — leads us into all truth : and by the manifold testimony of our own renewed conscience, heart, and soul — of the infallible word of God — and of the wit¬ nessing Spirit — God begets in us an infallible assurance of faith.2 And finally, in the great day of Jesus Christ, he the eternal judge of the secrets of all hearts — will judge and settle for all eternity — every question which enters into the endless fate of every soul. To that bar, at last, all questions of good and evil must go : this with all the rest. 5. The whole doctrine of an infallible living judge of contro¬ versies, competent and divinely authorized to bind the conscience by his decisions, and to put an end to controversies concerning faith, not only by ecclesiastical censures but by direct temporal punishments of every sort ; is one of those impostures, whose terrible influence upon mankind has been great in proportion to its utter want of any foundation in reason, in the word of God, or in necessity whether temporal or spiritual. I have shown that its logical foundation lies in a definition of the Church, itself so utterly false, that what results from the definition is a State — and not a Church — and that under it the possibility of salvation disappears. If it could be supposed, that such a doctrine could have any plea of necessity, it must be, that controversies about faith are intolerable, and can, and should be put an end to, by punishment. But every part of this plea is a fallacy, of which it is not easy to say, whether the folly or the wickedness exceeds. Heresy and schism can no more he put an end to, than any other 1 Rev., xx. 10-14. 3 Ileb., vi. 11-19; Eph., i. 13, 14; 1 John, v. 13; Rom., viii. 15, 16; 2 Cor., i. 21, 22. 452 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. form of sin or folly. Neither of them is an offence which ought to subject men to temporal punishment. Nor if they could be suppressed, and it they ought to be suppressed by punishment, when considered of themselves ; is the peril arising from their free toleration, worthy to be thought of, when compared with the evils resulting from every attempt to enforce such doctrines. It is not, therefore, to be wondered at, that they who usurped the prerogatives both of God and of the State — should have been given over to commit offences both against God and the State, a thousand times more heinous than those they caused to be vis¬ ited with fire and sword. The Church of God can survive all heresies and schisms which God will endure. But she cannot exist, without proclaiming her abhorrence of the combined fero¬ city and ignorance, which under the pretext of an infallible de¬ cision of controversies, would exterminate the last believer in Christ. 6. Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.1 Gold, silver, and precious stones may be builded thereon, and they shall abide forever ; or wood, hay, and stubble may be builded thereon, and they shall be destroyed in the day when every man’s work shall be revealed by fire. That house which is founded upon a rock, foils not ; but sure and great is the fall of that house, which is built upon the sand ; and this is the difference, pointed out by Christ, between those — whether they be men or Churches — who hear his sayings and do them, and those who hear, and do them not.2 It is they who are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone — who are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow- citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.3 Nor does it change the nature of the case, that men and churches err concerning the truth, and overthrow the faith of some ; for the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal— the Lord lmoweth them that are his.4 But having found the true foundation— it is the duty of all— whether men or Churches, to build upon it — to leave the principles of the doctrine of Christ, and go on unto perfection.5 Every Christian grace is the product of the revealed word and the divine Spirit, as really as faith is ; every one, as truly as it depends upon the 1 1 Cor., iii. 11. 3 Matt., vii. 24-29. 3 p]ph., ii. 19, 20. * 2 Tim., ii. 18, 19. 5 Heb., vi. 1-6. PURITY OF FAITH. 453 CHAP. XXIV.] union and communion of the renewed soul with the glorified Re¬ deemer, and like it is a manifestation of the new life of that soul. Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meek¬ ness, temperance and such like, are declared to be the fruit of the Spirit in them that are led by the Spirit. Whereas adul¬ tery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, en- vyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like, are the works of the flesh : concerning which these two things are plainly declared, namely, that they who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of Gfod — and that they that are Christ’s have cru¬ cified the flesh with the affections and lusts.1 7. To be horn of the Spirit, is at once the condition and the method of our entrance into the Kingdom of God.2 The rejec¬ tion of the doctrine of the Holy Ghost and of his saving work in the human soul, therefore, renders it impossible for any sinner to he saved ; how much more for a company of such impenitent and unbelieving sinners, to constitute that very Kingdom, which nei¬ ther of them — Christ himself being judge — can either see, or enter ? The Church of Christ is by Christ, and our entrance into it is through him. But if the direct opposite — as- Rome as¬ serts — were true, and our connection with Christ were produced by our connection with the Church ; even then, when we reject the doctrine of the saving work of the divine Spirit — what re¬ sults is, that the Church is composed exclusively of such as have by that rejection, rendered salvation impossible. That is, the vis¬ ible portion of the saved — consists of those whose salvation is, upon the data, impossible. It is precisely, upon the doctrine of the saving work of the divine Spirit, that all corrupt and apostate Churches are prone to make shipwreck. Christ himself has said, that much sin against him may be forgiven, and that great blind¬ ness and perversity can be overlooked, in those who really love him. But it is otherwise with regard to the Holy Ghost, whose office it is, not only to teach us truth, and make us holy, but also to give us life. In rejecting, resisting, and denying him, we sin not only against truth and holiness, but against life itself; and blaspheming him — which we do when we disallow his work, or when we ascribe his work to Satan, to the incantations of priests, to the inherent force of sacraments, or to anything else — 1 Gal., v. 16-26. a John, iiL 1-21. 454 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. is, in its very nature, a sealing over to perdition.1 It is here that the humble follower of Christ is least likely to err, in finding the true heirs of salvation — the true Bride of the Lamb. For it is in the unity of the Spirit that the bond of peace is kept — it is the witness of the Spirit that is the crowning proof to the chil¬ dren of God, of their one ingrafting into Christ — and error con¬ cerning the doctrine of the divine Spirit, enters into every form of fatal heresy. 8. The power of faith itself as a force regulating the life of man, by means of its transforming power in his soul ; would be a proper topic of enquiry in determining that purity of faith, by which the Church itself is to be judged. That faith only can be pure, which makes us pure ; and it is the constraining love of Christ, by which it works ; — and this inward purifying and this powerful working by love, are of the essence of that victory over the world, which faith itself is declared to be.2 I have, however, in former chapters, very fully and variously discussed the general subject ; and it will be necessary, in a succeeding chapter, to ex¬ amine this special aspect of it, in considering that infallible mark of the true Church which is exhibited in a holy life. A Church which inculcates sin, can be considered nothing else than a Syn¬ agogue of Satan — and its unhappy members heirs of perdition. III. — 1. It is the duty of every one to strive after perfection in truth and holiness — the duty of the Church of the living God to strive, above all, after exact conformity to his will in all things. Whether in Churches or in individuals, voluntary ignorance of divine things, is declared to be the peculiar sin of scoffers, walk¬ ing after their own lusts ; who are the peculiar pest of the last days, and whose contented ignorance envelops nothing more deeply, than the swift destruction which awaits them against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.3 But in forming those judgments which we are obliged to form, both of individuals and Churches, there is a wide difference to be made, according to the opportunities they have enjoyed, and the light they have ; a wide difference also between the position they oc¬ cupy, as teachers and leaders of God’s people, or as humble dis¬ ciples — much more as lambs of Christ’s flock. Nevertheless, there are attainments in the divine life, which are absolutely distinctive 1 Matt., xii. 31, 32 ; Acts, vii. 51-53. 2 1 John, v. 4. 3 2 Peter, iii. 1-1. CHAP. XXIV.] PURITY OF FAITH. 455 of Christianity ; for the impenitent and unbelieving cannot be Christians. And there are revealed truths so absolutely funda¬ mental, that their removal from the plan of salvation completely destroys it as the way of life eternal. I have stated, in every variety of form, what I suppose to be the immediate and universal foun¬ dations of that Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth and God himself has de¬ clared, that if an Apostle, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel than that of Christ, he is accursed.2 It is absolutely impossible, therefore, to esteem any faith pure, or any Church true, unless the Lord Jesus Christ is accepted in sincerity as the divine Saviour crucified for lost sinners — unless the word of God is accepted purely as the infallible rule of faith and duty — unless the Holy Ghost is accepted as divinely and effectually working in the soul — and unless the new life, imparted to us by these means, with its perpetual fruits, is accepted as the result of all. With less than this, neither truth nor charity can admit, that the re¬ vealed remedy for sin has been received b}r man ; or that men know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent — which is eternal life.3 In effect, therefore, the true and satis¬ factory judgment which every child of God forms concerning purity of faith, and concerning the true Church ; is the neces¬ sary result of his own inward experience of divine things, grounded upon his own saving knowledge of Christ. Nor is any truth more clear in itself, or more clearly revealed, than that if any man will do the will of God, he shall know the doctrine whether it be of God.4 2. The lawfulness and the value of the symbolical books of the Christian Churches — those creeds and confessions against which all heretics have protested — seem to be beyond reasonable doubt. Indeed, it is not possible in the nature of the case to avoid the formation and use of systematic statements, which are V J essentially creeds. Every one who accepts the Gospel as the ground of his hope, the rule of his faith, or the standard of his life ; necessarily accepts it according to some sense of its vari¬ ous parts — and of the whole composed of those parts ; and neces¬ sarily utters this accepted sense of the parts, and of the whole, as often as he has occasion to explain his religious life. But this 1 Rom., i. 16. 2 Gal., i. 8. a 1 John, passim 4 John, vii. 17, 456 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. is simply the formation and utterance of his creed. If the Gos¬ pel of God is so intractable, that its various parts cannot be put together in some systematic order, then it is simply incapable of being known by man, otherwise than as a series of incoherent statements : if it is capable of being systematically stated — then the primitive laws of our being unavoidably oblige us to state it so, as soon as we take interest enough in it to desire to under¬ stand it. And every organized Church must necessarily do something tantamount to this, every time it acts organically ; and it is its indispensable duty to do so, both in order to preserve its own purity and peace, and to bear its testimony for the truth of God. Nor is it without great value to the Church herself, that the most distinct expressions of her faith should be as permanent as they are articulate. For by them the highest and surest proof is created and preserved, through all ages, not only of her exist¬ ence but of her condition, age after age, beside the mighty stream of time, as it rolls across all the centuries. It is thus she erects, from generation to generation, great landmarks, by which pos¬ terity may know assuredly, how far the inundation of error had spread, and how deeply the waters of eternal life had fertilized the earth. Of course, human creeds can possess no more than human authority ; and it is the highest profanation to put them on a level with the word of God. But they may justly claim great authority ; chiefly because they may — and so far as they do — accord with the divine word. In addition, they are cove¬ nants, mutually binding, as such, upon the conscience of all who voluntarily enter into them. And the clearness, fulness, rational power, and spiritual unction, with which the great truths of sal¬ vation and the great duties of men, may be systematically stated by such as God raises up, from time to time, for this very end ; become means of great comfort to his poople, and of great con¬ fusion to his enemies. The Spirit, which has always been the life of the Church, sometimes more powerfully, sometimes less so, produces by his powerful presence, nothing more certainly, than a renewed hatred of error, and a fervent love of truth, leading to those great conflicts, out of which all the great testimonies of the Church have been accustomed to spring ; testimonies which there is reason to accept, as in a peculiar manner expressive of the life of God’s Church, in its most powerful manifestations. 3. It is impossible for the heart of man to conceive too deeply, CHAP. XXIV.] PURITY OF FAITH. 457 of the sin of corrupt Churches, and of God's hatred of them. Throughout the Scriptures, the image of the true Church is a chaste, loving, and faithful wife ; and besides innumerable sep¬ arate passages, the entire Book of the Song of Solomon — and that not one of the shortest — is devoted to the complete illustra¬ tion of this similitude. On the other hand, a faithless, corrupt, and shameless wife, is everywhere the image of an apostate Church; and besides multitudes of separate passages, a large part of the last Book of the inspired oracles, is employed in exposing and de¬ nouncing the greatest, bloodiest, and most polluted of all apos- tacies, under the frightful appellation of a harlot. Nor is there any command delivered to such of God's children, as may chance to be found in such Synagogues of Satan, more distinct than that they should come out of them ; nor any threat more precise, than that they will, otherwise, be partakers of their sins, and receive of their plagues.1 It is not, therefore, only against error, delusion, and sin, abstractly considered, that God calls his children to tes¬ tify ; but, also, against the corruptors and oppressors of the earth — and that all the more earnestly when their sins are perpetrated in his holy name. Heaven itself is called on to rejoice, with holy apostles and prophets, when God avenges his slaughtered saints upon great Babylon, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth : and the voice of much people in heaven is heard glo¬ rifying the Lord God, and saying, Alleluia — when the smoke of her torment rises up, forever and ever !2 1 Rev., xviii. 4; Isaiah, xlviii. 20; lii. 11; 2 Cor., vi. 11, 18. 2 Rev., xviii. 5, 20 ; xix. 1-3. CHAPTER XXV. THE WORSHIP OF GOD IN SPIRIT AND IN TRUTH: THE SECOND INFALLIBLE MARK OF THE TRUE CHURCH. I. 1. Divine Statement of the Three Infallible Marks of the True Christian, and the True Church ; The Second One now to be explained. — 2. The Unity and Spirit¬ uality of God the sole Object of all Religious Worship: The Truth and Spirit¬ uality of all Worship, acceptable to Him. — 3. True Conception of this Worship — and of its Nature and Grounds. — 4. Relation of the Word of God, and of the Life of God in our Souls, to each other, and to God’s Worship. — 5. God — Religion — Worship — Salvation — Human Nature. — II. 1. The Kingdom of Royal Priests: Their Life, a Life of Worship. — 2. The Obligation, the Rule, the Blessedness, and the Perpetuity of this Ordination. — 3. The Plan of Salvation — the Work of Christ — the Divine Idea and Organism of the Church, relative to Worship. — 4. That Or¬ ganism in its Fundamental Nature as hitherto disclosed — and as yet to be traced in Connection with the Gifts of God to his Church. — 5. Relation of the Sacrifice and Priesthood of Christ, and of his Ascension Gifts, to the Idea of True Spiritual Worship by the Church. — 6. The Relation of Worship to Religion, and to God — through every conception thereof — from the widest to the narrowest. — 7. Wor¬ ship, as divinely disclosed in each Christian Congregation. — 8. Abstract Demon¬ stration, of the unavoidable Conclusion. I. — 1. We are the circumcision, says the Apostle Paul, which worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.1 These are the marks in the elect in¬ dividually, of reigning grace ; the marks also, in their collective body when organized into Christ's visible Church, by which that body is to be infallibly distinguished as his body. According to the point of view from which the subject is contemplated, the particulars of this divine and all pervading definition, fall into one or another order ; but in whatever order of these particulars, unitedly they absolutely distinguish the child of God — and the Church of God. In the order of absolute reality, they stand as the Apostle has placed them ; for all is from God, all is through Christ, and all is unto our complete deliverance from all subjec¬ tion to the flesh, and from all trust in it. In the order of actual 1 Phil., iii. 3. CHAP. XXV.] SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 459 development to our weak understandings, and to a certain ex¬ tent, also, in the mode of their in working with our souls ; their manifestation to us is, perhaps, more clear from the lowest to the highest, to wit, man, Christ, God. And considered as accom¬ plished in us, and viewed as marks of our estate before God, the first thing is our relation to Christ, and then our relation to God through him, and then our real condition produced in that man¬ ner. I have, therefore, treated first and with reference to Christ and our glorying in him, purity of Faith as the first infallible mark of the true Church. And I am now to treat of the true spiritual worship of God, which is indissolubly connected with our union and communion with Christ, as the second mark. And in the next chapter I will endeavour to disclose, as the third mark, that holiness of life — that total abnegation of the flesh — which is the product, through Christ, of all divine operation in the human soul. 2. There can be but one God. I have proved that with any true notion of the living God, we are incapable of conceiving of a second God : and the Scriptures, as we might expect, assert continually, and imply throughout, that God is one.1 The reality and the unity of his existence — are the primitive truths upon which the possibility of all spiritual religion rests. Hear, 0 Israel: The Lord our God is one God : and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might :2 this is the revealed foundation of whatever acceptable worship — in whatever sense of that term — man has ever rendered to God.3 He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him : for with¬ out faith it is impossible to please him.4 Ye worship ye know not what ; said Jesus to the woman of Samaria — we know what we worship ; for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Fa (her in Spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him. For God is a Spirit : and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in truth. And then he told her plainly, that he was Messias — the Christ : — I that speak unto thee am he.5 In like manner, the other part of true religion — all duty as well as 1 Gal, iii. 20 ; Rom., iii. 30 ; 1 Tim., ii. 5 ; 1 Cor., viii. 4. 2 Deut., vi. 4, 5. 3 Deut., vi. 13; x. 20; I Cor., viii. 6. 4 Heb. x. 6. 5 John, iv. 21-26. 460 the knowledge of god. [book IV. all faith, is involved directly in these immense truths ; and all morality — all holiness — that is acceptable to God, as a part of true and spiritual worship — depends upon the recognition of them. Thou shalt have no other gods before me ; is the founda¬ tion of the moral law written with the finger of God in the na- . ture of man — revealed anew at Sinai — and wrought by the Holy Ghost in the inward parts of every saved sinner.1 And the true and spiritual worship of God, responsive to the whole duty re¬ quired of man towards God — is declared by Christ himself ; Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.2 But the Triune God — the God revealed to us in the sacred Scriptures — is the only, the living, and the true God; God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost — is the sole object of all true and spiritual worship : and what is to be illus¬ trated now is, that the worship of this glorious God, in spirit and in truth, is the second infallible mark, of the true Church, visible, universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ.3 3. I have proved, abundantly, that as the creatures of God, we are obliged to make his will the rule of our conduct, in all things ; and that as his sinful creatures, we are obliged to make the will of the divine Saviour whom he has provided for us, the rule of our conduct in all things. But God our Creator, and God our Saviour — is the same, and the only God ; so that both as creatures merely, and as sinful creatures also, we are bound to him in our souls, and in our bodies, in all that we have and are. To render back to him, in the way pointed out by himself, the love, the service, the praise, and the adoration which are due to him ; to do this truly, out of penitent and believing hearts — to do it spiritually, as unto the infinite Spirit who fills immensity and eternity — to do it, in all things : this is the posture of God's children towards him, revealed in the Scriptures as their glory and blessedness. In this posture, taught by the word of God, and led by the Spirit of God — their lives are, in the widest and truest sense, a true, spiritual, and perpetual recognition — service -—worship of God. What God is, of himself, entitles him to all this, on our part : and what he has done for us, entitles him to it all, in a manner still more precise. The heartfelt recognition 1 Exod., XX. 3; Jer., xxxi. 33. 2 Matt., 37^ 38. Luke> x ^ , 28. 3 PhiL, iii. 3 ; 1 John. ii. 22, 23 ; Matt., iv. 10. SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 461 CHAP. XXV.] of this — the willing and joyful endeavour to manifest that we do thus recognize it — and, by consequence, the habitual surren¬ der of our will to his will : this is true and spiritual worship of God, and he who strives to render it, is the child of God — and the Church that inculcates and practices it, is the true Church of the Lord Jesus. The ordinary and restricted sense of the worship of God is true, and is a part of this wide and compre¬ hensive sense of it ; hut to make that the whole, is to come far short of what God requires — nay even of what his feeble but lov¬ ing children habitually render to him. 4. The revelation which God has given to us of his will con¬ cerning our salvation, makes known to us the only way in which we can accomplish the chief end of our existence, in glorifying him and enjoying him forever ; and it does this by teaching us infallibly, what we ought to believe concerning God, and what duty he requires of us. It follows, that the infallible rule of our faith and obedience, is, of necessity, the infallible rule of our worship of him in whom we believe, and whom we serve — no matter in what sense we use the term. And the sacred Scrip¬ tures disclose to us, in the clearest manner, the nature of that true and spiritual worship, in its widest sense, as well as the me¬ thod of that which is more special, in its narrowest sense. The habitual state of heart which they everywhere inculcate, is one which finds its truest manifestation in a life of habitual recogni¬ tion — service — worship of God, our Creator and Redeemer : and all mercy, through endless generations, is covenanted to them, who, in such a spirit, love God and keep his commandments.1 Moreover, Jesus Christ, who is the specific object of our faith, and both its author and its finisher; is, also, the head and means of all acceptable worship of God. Through him alone, is there any mercy from God to sinners ; by him alone, is there any access for sinners to God. It is unto him, that the elect of God are pre¬ destinated to be conformed ; and the Church composed of them is his Body.2 The revelation of him, is that which gives unity to the sacred Scriptures; and to justify him, is the peculiar work and office of the Holy Spirit. And that heartfelt worship of God, manifest in all things, is the fruit in us, of the word and Spirit of God, through the merits of the Lord Christ ; and they who 1 Deut., vi. passim; Exod., xx. 6. 9 John, xiv. 6 ; Rom., viii. 29 ; Col., i. 24. 462 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. render it, can be only sucli as enabled by a pure faith — -and, be¬ yond all doubt, it is at once the means and the expression of a holy life.1 So that the connection of this mark of the true Church, is indissoluble alike with the one that precedes it, and the one that follows it. 5. The deepest and most enduring element of our nature, is its religious element. Human nature must have a God, a reli¬ gion, a worship. Each one of us knows that we are finite— each one feels that there is an infinite, from which that finite comes, and to which it returns. In its presence, our sense of depend¬ ence, of accountability, and of blameworthiness, is explicable alike to our reason and our conscience ; and our susceptibility of resto¬ ration, a sense of which was never utterly lost, is no sooner de¬ monstrated by the very fact of being restored — than the infinite object of so many convictions, is demonstrated too. Our utter helplessness, in our natural estate, to all that is spiritually good — our unalterable assurance of a life beyond death — our sense of an eternal judgment, of our unfitness to appear in it, and of the fear of God : in what manner is it possible to evolve such con¬ victions as these common convictions of our race — without dis¬ closing a God — a religion — a worship P But, if the God of the Bible is not God — if the religion of Jesus is not true and divine — if the worship of that God, through that Saviour, in Spirit and in truth, is not an infallible mark of the restoration of the soul : then it is infallibly certain, that all the fundamental con¬ victions of our nature are false, and utterly destitute both of cause and result — and that there is no God — no religion — no worship. So that every way, the same result follows. And from the side of God — of the Saviour — of revelation — of religion in its widest O sense — and of human nature in its profoundest convictions ; the result is that true and spiritual worship, as the Lord has taught us, is the only worship acceptable to the infinite Spirit — the only worship taught or tolerated by Messias — the Christ.2 II. — I- It is the Church, considered not merely in its indi¬ vidual elements, but chiefly in its social life, that we are at pres¬ ent seeking to distinguish. It is the life, the worship, of a divine Kingdom, which is to be determined. And this of necessity gives the broadest significance to the term, which, for lack of one more 1 Dent., xii. 3; Matt., xv. 9; John, xiv. 6; 1 Tim., ii. 5; Epk., ii. 18. 2 John, iv. 19-26. CHAP. XXV.] SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 463 comprehensive, I am forced to use. For the social life of the Church of God, in its whole organism and action, is a life of worship : a life, that is, of religious obedience to the revealed will of God, through the Lord Jesus Christ. It is clean hands and pure hearts, lifted up to God in sincere faith and exact obe¬ dience, whether to labour, to suffer, or to testify : by those who once were not a people, but are now the people of God. For though once they had not obtained mercy, now they have ob¬ tained mercy. The everlasting doors have been lifted up, and the King of glory, who is the Lord of hosts, has come in, and given the blessing from the Lord, and righteousness from the God of our salvation.1 Organized as the visible Church of him who called them out of darkness into his marvellous light, their very vocation is to show forth his praises. And by whatever acts, through whatever forms, in whatever ways their communion with each other and their organic life are made manifest ; it is still through faith in Christ Jesus — still by the guidance of bis word and Spirit — still in reverent and joyful obedience to God ; it is still the recognition — the service — 'the true and spiritual worship of the most high God. Is not that a worship — in which none but God's priests take part ? Is not that regal worship — where every priest of God is also a king ? God promised, from of old, to make that holy nation the most peculiar of all people, even a kingdom of priests ;2 and the crucified and exalted Saviour, who gave himself for us, that be might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works — makes every one be loves and washes from his sins in his own blood, both a king and a priest unto God and his Father.3 Yea, and the sacrifices of these priests of the Lord — these ministers of our God — are the very sacrifices of God — a broken spirit. And be that came to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison -to them that are bound ; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God ; to comfort all that mourn : a broken and a contrite heart, 0 God, thou wilt not despise.4 Yea, verily, remove the idea of true worship from our spiritual 1 Psalm xxiv. passim; 1 Peter, ii. 10. 2 Exod., xix. 5, 6. 3 Titus, ii, 14; Roy., i. 5, 6 ; 1 Peter, ii. 9. 4 Psalm li. 17 ; Isaiah, lxi. 1-5; Luke, iv. 16-32. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 464 [book IV. life, personal and organic — and the Kingdom of Royal Priests is extinct — Christians exist no longer ! 2. I have shown that the worship of the true Church of Christ, has such a relation to its faith and its obedience, that it must necessarily have the same infallible rule which they have — that is the word of God contained in the sacred Scriptures.1 All true and spiritual worship which is acceptable to God, is divine — is revealed by God to man ; it is therefore strictly obligatory upon the creature — while it is, at the same time, a means of blessed¬ ness to him, and, through him, of great and endless glory to God. There can be neither any service of God, nor any enjoy¬ ment of him, by any creature, which does not assume the nature and form of worship.2 But the service and enjoyment of God, is our glory and blessedness throughout eternity ; and to increase our fitness and our desire for that service and enjoyment of God in this life, by gathering and perfecting his saints to the end of the world, is the very mission of the Church on earth.3 It may well be, that the glorified saints and the Church triumphant, will serve and enjoy God in a manner widely different from any, now clearly appreciable by us ; for this has occurred, to a remarkable extent, under the successive dispensations of grace even upon earth. But it has not occurred, nor can it occur, that the idea of the worship of God in Spirit and in truth — and that through Jesus Christ our Lord — has been separated, or is separable from all true service, all conceivable enjoyment of him, by any crea¬ ture. Everything we know concerning heaven, is mingled with exalted worship ; and the whole life of the Son of God — who is the way, the truth, and the life — was a life in which the idea of worship — in every sense — is perpetually manifest and perpetually designated by himself.4 Recalling what I have said in a former chapter, touching the great elements of the question of the Church ; the supremacy which I have asserted for its super¬ natural element, is perfectly palpable in the determination of this second infallible mark of it ; and, at the same time, the utter absurdity and impiety of all human changes in the revealed worship of God — whether in the nature of it, or the form of it. In the lowest possible sense, to act in that manner is to assume 1 Rom.., i. 3. 2 Psalm lxv. 2 ; Mai., i. 11. 3 Isaiah, lix. 21; Phil., ii. 10, 11. * John, iv. 3-34 ; Matt., xxvi. 36-46. SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 465 CHAP. XXV.] divine authority, and exercise it in a way which we cannot know is acceptable to God ; and in a broader sense it is the assumption of divine authority over the faith — obedience — and inner life of the Church, the whole of which are involved in the idea of its worship, and find expression in connection with it.1 3. The social life of the Church — essentially a life of the worship of God — is commensurate with the divine organization of the Church ; for that divine organization, in itself, extends to the entire social life of the Church ; and the mode of its produc¬ tion, and everything implied in its existence, and resulting from it, are all related, in the most intimate manner, to the true and spiritual worship of God. The root of our salvation lies in our union with Christ ; and our communion with him in grace and glory, is the source of every blessing and every benefit of the Covenant of Redemption received by us, whether in this world, or in the world to come. The communion of his children with each other, is the effect of their common union with him ; and his headship over his redeemed — is the effect of his whole work as Mediator between God and man, whether as our Prophet, our Priest, or our King — and is, indeed, the fundamental stipulation of the Covenant of Redemption. But this communion of saints, and this headship of Christ, are the component elements of the Kingdom of God, considered as an organized Church — the Body of Christ. Yet, nothing can be more obvious, than that this Church of the Lord Jesus, whether considered in those elemental principles of it — or in its own nature and end — or in its complete organization and visibility — or in its spiritual freedom and con¬ secration to Christ — through the whole of which I have carefully traced it ; totally changes its whole relation to Christ on one side, and to penitent and believing sinners on the other side, the moment she is stripped of the glorious function of vindicating before the universe, God's exclusive right to the adoration of every creature — and of illustrating to all eternity what his true worship is — and what is the blessedness of all who render it.2 4. The progress of our enquiry into the Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered, renders it necessary to discuss the ques¬ tion of the infallible marks of the true Church, as soon as a certain point has been reached in tracing the effects divinely pro- 1 Matt, xv. 9; Matt., iv. 10. 2 Eph., iil 7-13 ; 1 Cor., ii. 7-10. 30 VOL. II. 4GG THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. duced, by the use which God has made of the doctrines of the Headship of Christ, and the communion of saints, in the organ¬ ization of the Church visible, universal. In the general enquiry, it remains to explain, as fully as my limits permit, the vast sub¬ ject of the gifts of God to this Church — which I propose in the next Book. Having now illustrated the nature of the true and spiritual worship of God, as the second infallible mark of the true Church, by means of the truths already established, concerning its divine organization ; I will point out, in a more general man¬ ner, the bearing, upon the same topic, of those Gifts of God to his Church, hereafter to be carefully considered, which have im¬ mediate relation to that organization — and therefore to her visi¬ bility, and to her social life. 5. The idea of sacrifice, strictly considered, as a perpetual form of outward worship for the Church of God, was perfectly consummated in the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ ; after which there would remain no more offering for sin, since Christ has put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, and by that one offering hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.1 The idea of priesthood is indissolubly connected with the idea of sac¬ rifice. I have shown, in another place, how the institution of the Passover was connected with the rise of the priesthood, through the first born of Israel whom the destroying angel spared ; and how both sacrifice and priesthood stood related to Jesus Christ, and through him to the Gospel Church and to its ministry. The priesthood of Christ was after the order of Melchisedeck — 'and was, like his sacrifice, unchangeable and for eternity ; and this being so, he is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.1 Both sacrifice and priesthood, therefore, occupy a peculiar posi¬ tion in the Gospel Church : — the sacrament of the Lord’s Sup¬ per, and the very nature of the peculiar people — children and heirs of God, every one of whom is both a king and a priest — manifesting continually those great ideas, and the relation of both of them to Christ. In the body of this kingdom of royal priests a ministry is established by Christ — office-bearers are divinely ordained — a government is constituted — tribunals are erected — sacraments are instituted— its special worship is disclosed— the 1 Heb., ix. 19-28; Heb., x. passim. 3 Heb., vi. 20 ; Heb., vii. 24, 25. SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 467 CHAP. XXV.] relation of the word of God and of all divine ordinances to it is clearly pointed out — and Discipline, both in the wide and in the judicial sense of that term, is- appointed of God. For the pres¬ ent enforcement of the truth, that the true and spiritual worship of God is an infallible mark of the true Church ; it is not mate¬ rial that the general statement just made of the ordinances and ascension Gifts of Christ, should be exactly true ; that it is so, however, will be proved hereafter.1 Because the adoring recogni¬ tion — service — worship of God, is already admitted to be an in¬ fallible mark of his Church, as soon as we confess that his Church is bound to ascertain from his word, under the guidance of his Spirit — whether these things are so : and thus seeking, is bound not only, but is prompt, to accept with joyful obedience every¬ thing which God has ordained, and to reject everything else. And what heart that adores God, can conceive that voluntary ignorance of his will — much less open disregard of it when known — is consistent with the true and spiritual worship of him ? But admitting the general statement I have made, concerning the Gifts of God, and his ordinances for the Gospel Church, to be substantially correct ; it is not possible to conceive how any or¬ ganization of that sort could be created at first, or perpetuated afterwards, in the absence of a spirit of believing, trustful, ador¬ ing obedience to God ; nor to conceive how such an organization when once created, could fail to manifest that spirit, so long and so far as the Saviour of the world was its living head, and the Holy Ghost was the bond of its vital union. But this is the same as to say that the life of the true Church is a life of wor¬ ship, rendered to God in spirit and in truth. 6. The more we descend to what is special, the more distinct does the idea become, that the worship of God in spirit and in truth, is the habitual manifestation of the life of God in every soul. The wide idea of worship which we cannot separate from that of God, and that of religion — is necessarily determined, as to the nature of the worship, by the nature we attach to the God, and the religion : so that to accept the living God as our God, and his only begotten Son as the Mediator between him and us, determines that we must worship that God, through that divine Redeemer : and that we must do this in the way made known to us by them. And then, when these true worshippers of God, 1 Eph., iv. 1-25. 468 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. in Christ, become organically united, through the headship of Christ, and their communion with each other ; everything that is special in the conception, the nature and end, or the absolute condition of this Body of Christ, shapes and illustrates more and more distinctly, the idea of worship, step by step with the ideas of religion, and of God. And then, when the Gifts which God has bestowed on his Church, under every aspect of it — his Spirit, his Son, and the knowledge of his will ; and the more special Gifts which he has bestowed on it through them — his written word, a ministry, sacraments, an outward organization, all divine ordinances : it is manifest that the whole of these Gifts of God are of that kind, that in proportion as they are received in the love and in the power of them, the worship of the visible Church becomes more distinctly the manifestation of her life, while it also becomes more spiritual in its own nature, and rises to higher forms of truth. And then, when all that God has done for his Church, is concentrated in the ordinances of a particular congre¬ gation — a special Christian Church, met for stated and habitual worship — and receiving and manifesting grace, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ; the ordinary form of the spiritual life of the Church, exhibited in this primary and most obvious and permanent aspect of the organization of these royal priests of God — is the worship of God in spirit and in truth. And finally, when we consider these followers of Christ, one by one — and reflect on the personal relation of each to these numerous themes — many of which are infinite ; when we call to mind the innumerable statements of the word of God, touching the manner in which each one is to work out his own salvation, and make his own calling and election sure ; when we look into our own soul, and remember what we once were — how we be¬ came what we now are — and by what means we hope to obtain the crown : it seems to me we are ready to set our seal to what our brother Paul has said, and proclaim that they are the cir¬ cumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh ready to respond to our divine Lord, in his own glorious words, God is a Spirit — and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in •truth.2 7. To make this explanation complete, let us consider more 1 Phil., iii. 3. 2 John, iv. 24. SPIRITUAL WORSHIP. 469 CHAP. XXV.] carefully the narrowest organic aspect of tlie subject, in its rela¬ tion to a particular congregation. It is needless to enquire here, how the worshipping assemblies of God's people may have been constituted and conducted, before the days of Abraham, or even of Moses. This is undeniable, that those Synagogues of the Jews, in which the written word of God was publicly read and expounded, and prayer offered to God, statedly every Sabbath- day ; were as much a part of the religious life of God's ancient people, as the temple service was — were probably at least as an¬ cient — and have survived it nearly eighteen centuries. In them, our divine Lord habitually worshipped and taught ; — and after the model they furnished, in many respects, his inspired Apos¬ tles organized our Christian congregations. Each of these Chris¬ tian congregations is an elemental and organized portion of the Church visible universal of the Lord Christ : and every one of them, when complete, has everything which is possessed by that universal Church, in its present state : and it is by means of the union of these, that Church assemblies having rule, and a gov¬ ernment, are created. Now divine worship in its widest sense, is the specific object of the existence of these particular Churches ; and, in the narrowest sense of worship, it is one of their chief objects — as it is their main employment. Such as gladly receive the word of God, are baptized in them. Such as will be saved, the Lord adds to them.1 To believers and to their seed, are the promises of God herein held forth.2 To them, Pastors, Elders, and Deacons are given, by Christ ;3 and in the bosom of each one, a court of Christ is created.4 In this Church, it is the will of God, that his people should statedly assemble on the Sab¬ bath-day, and as often besides as his providence permits, for his solemn public worship, as revealed by himself.5 And, as parts of that worship, it is the ordinance of God, that public prayer should be offered to him :8 that his praises should be sung, with grace in our hearts to the Lord :7 that the word of God should be read, expounded, and preached :8 that the sacraments of the Christian Church should be duly administered :9 and that the i Acts, ii. 41, 41. 2 Acts, ii. 39 ; 1 Cor., vii. 14. 3 Eph., iv. 11, 12 ; 1 Tim., v. 11 ; Acts, vi. passim. 4 1 Tim., v. 11 ; Rom., xii. 6-8; 1 Cor., xii. 28. 5 Acts, ii. 42 ; xx. 1 ; 1 Cor., xvi. 2 ; Heb., x. 25. 6 1 Tim., ii. 7 Col., iii. 16. 8 Acts, xiii. 15, 21 ; Titus, i. 9 ; 2 Tim., iv. 2 ; 1 Cor., i. 18. 0 1 Cor., xi. 23-26; Matt., xxviil 18, 19. 470 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. jieople should be blessed from God.1 Moreover, God has or¬ dained that each particular Church — should, by the Court of his Kingdom erected in its bosom, take care that its members lead blameless and holy lives :2 and that all I have discussed as appertaining to our New Obedience, as rendered unto God, and our Good Works, as performed towards our fellow-creatures — be truly observed, as becometh saints ; and as the chief of all, charity — love to God and compassion for our fellow-men.3 Now, with such a state of case as this disclosed to us by God himself, in connection with the primitive and most elemental part of the organic life of the Church visible, universal ; we are left without any possibility of denying — that the idea of the wor¬ ship of God pervades the total life and organism of the Church of God ; and that the nature of the worship and the nature of the Church, must necessarily harmonize. If God is a Spirit, and is true — then the worship of him in spirit and in truth, is an infallible mark of his true Church. 8. Religion is exhausted, as a matter of contemplation, when we have considered it under the aspect of Faith, the aspect of Duty, and the aspect of Worship. It is in these three aspects that it necessarily affords us, the three infallible marks of the true Church. So when the word of God has taught us infalli¬ bly, what we ought to believe concerning him, and what duty he requires of us, there remains nothing to be taught concerning salvation, except the expression of both, in the form of wor¬ ship. If, therefore, purity of Faith be one infallible mark of the Church of Christ, as I have proved — and if holiness of life be another, as I will prove — neither of which, I suppose, any Christian will deny ; then, it is perfectly unavoidable, that pu¬ rity of worship, must be the remaining mark. And the very terms of the whole science of Christianity, give us the same result. God — man — and the Mediator between them ; this is its mighty elemental formula. But Faith in that Mediator, and worship rendered to that God — and Holiness — nourished by both of them, through the grace of which all three are the products ; this is the infallible manifestation that Christianity is realized in us, in a form responsive to its mighty elemental formula. 1 2 Cor., xiii. 14. 2 Heb., xiii. 17 ; 1 Tkess., v. 12, 13. a 1 Cor., xiii. passim; Matt., v. 43-48; vi. 1-4, 19-23. CHAPTER XXVI. HOLT LIVING: THE THIRD INFALLIBLE MARK OF THE TRUE CHURCH. I. 1. Relation of all Righteousness, in Man, to the Law of God. — 2. Gospel Holiness : its Relation to Christ — to Faith in Him — and to the acceptable Worship of God. — II. 1. The Reality of Moral Distinctions: the Demonstration they afford that God is the Fountain of all Goodness. — 2. Neglect or Perversion of these Moral Distinc¬ tions, fatal to all Religions in which either occurs. — 3. The indissoluble and eternal Connection of Holiness with Blessedness. — 4. The inward Aspect of that Holiness, which infallibly distinguishes the True Church. — 5. Unity of that Holiness, as a Mark of the True Church, with each of the preceding Marks. — 6. The Unity of the Mystery of Godliness; Goodness the perfection of Knowledge, of Duty, and of Grace. — III. 1. The True Life of the Church, is the Power of the Holy Spirit. — 2. Conclusive Effect of the Supremacy of the Supernatural Element, in the Ques¬ tion of the Church. — 3. Majesty and Glory of the True Church. 1. — 1. To keep and to do all the statutes and judgments of God, is the highest proof of spiritual wisdom and understanding. It has always been required by God as the sum of the whole duty of man — always been declared to be the way of peace and mercy for his people — always been prescribed as the surest evidence of their true faith in Jesus Christ, and their acceptable worship of the most high God.1 The sum of the instruction which the Apos¬ tles had in charge to give, in discipling all nations, was that all should observe all things whatsoever J esus had commanded them.' And the constant doctrine of Jesus was, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed ; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.3 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me : and I give unto them eternal life ; and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand.4 2. Without holiness no man shall see God.5 This great truth is involved in every just idea we can form of God and of salva¬ tion ; and so essential is it in all that the Scriptures intend by 1 Deut., iv. 1-6; Eccl., xii. 13; Matt., xv. 9; John, xii. 50; vii. 17 2 Matt., xxviii. 19, 20. 3 John, viii. 31, 32. 4 John, x. 27, 28. 5 Heb., xii. 14 472 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD [BOOK IV. salvation, that nothing therein relating to us is either explicable, or effectual, if we omit or fatally pervert their teaching concern¬ ing this. The everlasting righteousness which has been brought in by Messiah the Prince,1 the righteousness which is of God through the faith of Christ,2 the righteousness unto which they live who are dead to sin ;3 this is the righteousness which, together with all goodness and truth, is the fruit of the Spirit,4 with which the blessed, who hunger and thirst after righteousness, shall be filled — and, in the blessed fruition of which, the pure in heart shall see God.5 Now, this Gospel holiness — which I have so carefully sought to trace and to disclose — is that which I always intend, when I speak of holy living as a mark of the Church of Christ. For the constant doctrine of the Scriptures is that the just shall live by faith ;6 and the relation between life, and righteousness, and faith is so close, that in every Christian sense, either of the three necessarily involves the other two. So while true faith is the life of the Church, and true worship is the means of nourish¬ ing that life — true holiness is the manifestation of its healthful existence. Faith that rejoices in Christ Jesus, is the living tes¬ timony to the work of the Mediator between God and men ; wor¬ ship rendered unto God in Spirit and in truth, is the testimony to the whole doctrine of God, of grace, and of salvation : and total abnegation of the flesh — that is, true Gospel holiness, is the testimony that the whole doctrine of God and of Christ, is real¬ ized in the power of it and the love of it, in the soul of man. God, man, and, between the two, the God-man : this is the divine formula.7 To worship God in the Spirit, to rejoice in Christ Jesus, and to have no confidence in the flesh : this is the practical result, in the human soul, as explained by God.9 Purity of faith, spirit¬ uality of worship, holiness of life ; this is the manifestation on the part of the Church, which makes it certain, past doubt, that she is the Kingdom of God — the body of Christ — the holy nation. It is to the exposition of this third infallible mark of the true Church, visible, universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ, that this chapter is devoted. II. — 1. In connection with the general subject of the fall and i Daniel, ix. 24. 3 1 Peter, ii. 24. 6 Matt., v. 6, 8. 7 1 Tim., ii. 5. 2 Phil., iii. 9. * Eph., v. 10. 6 Hab., ii. 4; Kom., i. II. e ^hil., iii. 3. HOLT LIVING. 473 CHAP. XXVI.] recovery of man, while discussing various parts of the way of life and our relations thereto ; I have found it necessary to enter somewhat fully, into enquiries touching the moral constitution of man, considered in all the estates disclosed in the word of God. It does not seem to me necessary to repeat, in this place, what I have advanced on that subject ; just as I have already declined repeating here, what I have taught in previous chapters, on the subject of evangelical holiness. Bat as the immediate relation of the latter topic to the present subject, demanded the brief ex¬ position I have just given of it : so the close connection of the former topic, with the most direct method of illustrating the sub¬ ject before us, renders a few words of explanation concerning it, important. I observe, therefore, that the reality of moral dis¬ tinctions is incontestably established, by the moral constitution of man, upon principles as clear as those upon which the reality of physical distinctions is established, by the physical constitu¬ tion of man. Whether such distinctions do, in fact, exist or not, we are obliged by an ultimate law of our being, to recognize them as real ; nor have we any faculty more intense, more pervading, or more distinctive of our nature, than that which we call con¬ science, by means of which we take cognizance of these moral distinctions. To say we have no conscience, is to contradict the universal consciousness of the human race — as really as to say we are not endowed with reason — or with sight. To admit we have a conscience, but deny that the moral distinctions of which it takes cognizance, have any reality — or existence ; is the same as to admit we have reason, and then deny that there is anything true, or anything false ; or to admit that we have the sense of sight, and then deny that there is anything to see, or any light to see by. To say nothing of the supremacy of the moral sense — and of the overwhelming ruin in which such a race as ours would be immediately engulphed, but for that supremacy : the statement I have made seems to put beyond question, the abso¬ lute and ineffaceable existence of morality itself, independently of us, and paramount to our nature. If that be so, the existence of a creator and moral ruler of the universe is certain : and it is in the bosom of the First Cause — the living God — that the source of all good is found. 2. The disregard of these moral distinctions, thus thoroughly fundamental in the spiritual system of the universe ; must be 474 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. utterly fatal to the claims of every religious system, in which it exists, to be considered either revealed by God, or suitable for man. No religion can be true which misunderstands the absolute nature of these moral distinctions — which overlooks or misstates the relation of man’s moral nature, in its fallen state most espe¬ cially, to them — which confounds the distinction between good and evil in the very matter of salvation — which shocks man’s natural sense of morality — which inculcates that which is wrong in itself — which denies our felt moral depravity, or proposes as a remedy for it, that which is incompetent, that which is false, or that which is evil. In accepting any such religion as true, we outrage the conscience itself — to sanctify which is the chief end of true religion. The ruin which all false religions spread around them, is produced chiefly by their blinding and depraving influ¬ ence upon the conscience ; a ruin analogous to that which would occur, if the supremacy of conscience could be overthrown. And the readiness with which our depraved nature accepts all false religions, is the clearest proof of the disorder of the moral sense of man, of the overpowering force of his religious instincts, of his absolute need of a moral regeneration, and of the total fal¬ sity of all religions which cannot accomplish this. In estimating that purity of life which religion, if it be from God, must pro¬ duce, we are obliged, therefore, even upon grounds of mere reason and natural morality, to reject, indiscriminately, all religions whose faith is inconsistent with virtue and good morals, or whose worship is a snare to the souls of men, or whose life violates the sense or loosens the bonds of duty. This great rule is laid down by the Saviour. By their fruits ye shall know them : and it is expressly laid down to enforce this great duty, Beware of false prophets.1 In this manner, every false religion is rejected by Christ — upon the ground of the fruit it bears ; even before we pass the threshold of the subject. That which promotes sin — that which is drunk with blood — which is polluted by unclean¬ ness — which is rank with imposture — that whose very life is sus¬ tained by the death of souls : what madness is greater than to recognize such organized unrighteousness as true religion, be¬ cause mankind is sufficiently brutal to be led captive by the Devil at his will ;2 given over by God to strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned 1 Matt., viL 15-20. 2 2 Tim., ii. 2G. HOLY LIVING. 475 CHAP. XXVI.] who believed not the truth, hut had pleasure in unrighteous¬ ness.1 3. The connection between virtue and happiness is so imme¬ diate, that any attack upon the foundations of morality, is also an attack upon every hope and possibility of blessedness. But whatever is an absolute condition of blessedness for human na¬ ture, in any estate, or at any period : is an absolute condition of its blessedness, to all eternity ; because human nature preserves its essential identity, through all possible estates. Amongst all the results of experience, not one is more certain — amongst all the meditations of philosophy, none are more clear — amongst all the teachings of the Holy Spirit, nothing is more distinct, than that virtue, purity, holiness, lie at the foundation of human blessedness. All growth in grace, strengthens this divine union : and its bond will become closer in eternity, when grace is swal¬ lowed up in glory — closer forever, as we approach nearer to the presence and the measure of God. To make us pure in heart, that we may see God — discern him — know him — have fruition of him, is amongst the chief blessings of true religion, pointed out by the Saviour ;2 and no mark can be more palpable, that any system of religion is not from God, than that it obscures our vision — our fruition of him — by obstructing a life of holiness, and hardening the heart. Both faith and righteousness, which are indissolubly connected with spiritual life, have their seat in the heart ;3 in which is begotten, and out of which must flow, that true holiness, in which the new man is created, after the image of God.4 Even in its natural state — much more when it has been renewed by divine grace — how full is the testimony of the heart to its own need of this very holiness ! Its deep and sorrowful convictions, at every survey of its best emotions ; its profound sense of duty, even in the midst of the clearest mani¬ festations of weakness and sinfulness ; its intense longings for that it hath not, even under the burden of pollution that robs it of the power of articulate expression of its very wants ; and when it has found what its need was, and has been sup¬ plied out of God’s unwasting fulness — its clear and joyful vis¬ ion of all that was confused before, and of its God and Father above all, and through all, and in all :5 can all this mean 1 2 Thes3., ii. 11, 12; 1 Cor., vi. 9, 10; Rev., xxii. 14, 15. 2 Matt., v. 8. 3 Rom., x. 10. * Epk., iv. 24 5 Eph., iv. 6. 476 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IY. anything less than the perfect relation of the divine remedy, to onr fatal disease — the perfect accordance between the testimony concerning our previous emptiness and pollution, and that con¬ cerning our satisfying fruition of a new and divine holiness ? Well may we say, we were sometimes darkness, but now are we light in the Lord. And since the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, and righteousness, and truth ; well does it become us to walk as children of light.1 4. It is by Revelation from God — outwardly in his word, in¬ wardly by his Spirit — that the soul is made acquainted with the true nature of all these mysteries of God and man. Revealed in that power of the divine word, which is such a glorious peculiarity of the truth of God — and revealed in the power of the Holy Ghost, working by and with that truth, in the human soul : these great mysteries come to us in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.2 God reveals himself to those to whom it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven,3 in a peculiar light and with a peculiar power, as the God of all grace — the God who saves penitent and believing sinners by the blood of the everlasting covenant. The purity which is needful, in order to this salvation, is also a most peculiar form of righteousness, and is revealed in a most peculiar manner. For the Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth, reveals the righteousness of God from faith to faith : which Paul first asserts, and then confirms by the perpetual, equivalent truth, The just shall live by faith.4 Christ, and his righteousness, re¬ vealed to us and revealed in us ; life, righteousness, and faith — indissolubly united. It is, therefore, a righteousness of such only, as have been renewed in the spirit of their mind : of such only, as have put off the old man, which is corrupt according, to the deceitful lusts — and have put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.5 This special holiness of truth — and that the very truth of God — is the only form of righteousness which is available in, or unto, a lost sinner. And this is attainable only in, and through, the Lord Jesus Christ. But of his fulness every penitent and believing sinner receives ; and that in a manner, at once so complete and so 1 Eph., v. 8, 9. 3 Matt., xiii. 11. 6 Eph., iv. 22-24; ii. 10. 2 1 Cor., ii. 4. 4 Bom., i. 16, 17 ; Hab., ii. 4 HOLY LIVING. 477 CHAP. XXVI.] specific, that all grace in him finds some counterpart respon¬ sive to it, in all renewed souls.1 This is the inward aspect of that holy living, which is an infallible mark of the true Church. 5. This holiness, exhibited as it must be in the wide form of holy living, is the product of the same divine life in man, which has been shown to he manifested in purity of faith, and in true spiritual worship. I have several times pointed out the indisso¬ luble connection of these three marks of the true Church with each other, and the grounds upon which that connection rested, in the very essence of the Gospel. Let me very briefly, disclose the unity between this mark and each of the preceding marks. The divine life. which is manifested in evangelical holiness, is of that nature and operates in that manner — whether in individual persons, or in whole communions : — that it cannot commence by means of the New Creation, without saving faith, being immedi¬ ately manifested ; nor can it be sustained or increased afterwards, except in connection with the perpetual exercise of that faith. For the righteousness of God is by faith in Jesus Christ ; and is unto all, and upon all that believe.5 And it is of God that we are in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.3 But that pure faith makes men pure. For, it not only overcomes the world,4 but it does this by purifying the heart.5 And the instru¬ ment by which it works in our purification, is love.6 So that the purity of life which is an infallible mark of the Church of God, is that purity which is manifested by love to God, and love to our neighbour. But the Lord has told us that this is the sum of all the commandments of God — all the law and the pro¬ phets hanging thereon.7 And I have just shown that it is the sum of Gospel holiness. In like manner, holiness imparts to our worship, in whatever sense we use the term, one essential char¬ acteristic — which makes it acceptable to God — that is, its quality of true obedience : while, at the same time, it is itself sustained and advanced by all true, spiritual worship. For, whether in the form of the Church, or whether in the assemblies of God's people 1 John, i. 16-18 — and grace for grace — xaPLvi civtl xaptroq 2 Rom., iii. 22 ; Phil., iii. 9. 4 1 John, v. 4. 0 Gal., y. 6. 3 1 Cor., i. 30. 8 Acts, sy. 9. 7 Matt., xxii. 37-40. 478 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. statedly met, or in all the parts and particulars of the stated worship of him therein : or whether in the right use of the sac¬ raments he has instituted as signs and seals of the Covenant of Grace ; holiness of heart — and by consequence holiness of life, is the very end at which everything aims, and to which everything tends. We can have no just conception of the worship of God, in spirit and in truth, which it is possible to separate, on the one side, from the idea of duty rendered unto God — any more than it is possible to separate it, on the other side, from the idea of belief in God. And so while honour and majesty are before the Lord ; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary : and the exhortation is, Oh, worship the Lord in the beauty of holi¬ ness.1 For out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined.3 6. There is a wonderful unity apparent in the whole mystery of Godliness — from whatever point of view it is contemplated, or by whatever process it is examined. One of the firmest founda¬ tions of faith is the grand and simple truth, that it is with the heart man believeth unto salvation :3 responsive to which, the Saviour has deduced from all the law and the prophets that most glorious climax, that all duty to God and man, is fulfilled in love.4 The wisest of mankind, therefore, could utter nothing more profound in its doctrinal import — more pungent in its practical use, than the solemn words, Keep thy heart with all diligence ; for out of it are the issues of life.5 Goodness, then, is at last, the perfection of knowledge, the perfection of duty, the perfection of grace ; the nature of man, and the Kingdom of God — find perfection in a common result. When we treat of Justification, it is Faith, and it is Forgiveness, which we are called to contemplate : when we treat of Adoption, it is Hope and the glory of the Kingdom, which burn in our hearts : when we treat of Sanctification, it is Love and God’s image perfected in us, that fill the measure of earthly blessedness. And our en¬ trance into the Kingdom — our being replenished with its bless¬ ings and its benefits — and our being perfected in its spirit al¬ together ’ unitedly do but express, in another form, the great conclusion, Now abideth Faith, Hope, Charity.6 Nor need we hesitate to add — since the Apostle has done so, But the greatest 1 Psalm xcvi. 6, 9. 2 Psalm 1. 2. 3 Rom., x. 10. 4 Matt., xxii. 34-40. 6 Prov., iv 23. c 1 Cor., xiii. 13 HOLY LIVING 4T9 CHAP. XXVI.] of these is Charitv. And when we examine the whole matter %/ with all thoroughness, in order to ascertain with certainty the infallible marks of the Church ; we find ourselves conducted to results precisely corresponding with those reached through so many other processes, and precisely in accordance with the whole analogy of faith. To be pure, is the grand necessity, obligation, and blessedness of the Church. To be holy, according to that peculiar manner of holiness, which is involved in the salvation of sinners by the grace of God ; is her first step upwards. To be holy, in perfect goodness — love to God and to man — charity — the greatest of the great graces — is her last step upwards, in her present form. Between these two stand Faith and Obedience, looked at from the practical side ; Faith and Hope, looked at from the doctrinal side ; for both a boundless Hope and a Hew Obedience, are exponents of our Adoption into Christ — and Worship is an expression of them both. A pure Faith, a pure Worship, and a pure Life — is the general expression alike of the true relation of saved sinners to an infinitely pure God — and of the true Religion of the Son of God, who is the Saviour of the world. If either of the three is removed, the Religion is de¬ stroyed ; because the three stand, or fall, together. If they all abide, the Religion is complete. They are, therefore, the infal¬ lible marks of the true Church, visible, universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ. And there are no others. III. — 1. The life of the Church of God is most inadequately conceived, if we suppose it is complete when the doctrine is pure, and the order is perfect, and the outward conduct is irreproach¬ able. It is possible for the understanding of man to receive the doctrine of salvation revealed in the Scriptures, while the heart remains unaffected by it, except as by a philosophy. It is possi¬ ble that the model of the Church should be outwardly Qxact, in all things, and yet that the torpor of death should cover her fair proportions. It is easy to see that her outward acts might wear a decent conformity to the commandments of God, in the whole round of her great duties ; and at the same time, a heartless formality, or a self-righteous Phariseeism, supplant all true love in her bosom. The true life of the Church, is a divine reality ; perfectly distinguishable — scarcely capable of being mistaken by such as partake of it. It is a power animating her faith, sus¬ taining her obedience, and nourishing her activity. It is the 480 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. fruit of God’s Spirit within her. They do not err, who rate this far above all. But they do err fatally, who suppose that this divine power has no necessary connection with the faith, the wor¬ ship, and the active life of the Church : no necessary connection with her doctrine, her order, and her practice. So far as we know, it has a connection with them all, both absolute and ex¬ clusive : nor have we any reason to expect the supernatural inter¬ position of God, in .saving any soul, except through his revealed truth ; while we know, assuredly, that the divine Spirit does not — will not — quicken men, otherwise than through Jesus Christ, much less in dishonour of his person, his work, or his glory. The faith, the worship, and the life of the Church, which is the fulness of him that filleth all in all, are, therefore, not the power itself ; but, precisely in proportion as they are pure, they are fit to man¬ ifest the power by which men are saved. And, as far as we know, the power of God unto salvation, is revealed only in the Gospel of Christ, to every one that believeth ; and it is only therein that the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith ; and only thereby that the just live by faith. Taking all things as they are made known to us by God, if the Holy Spirit were withdrawn, there could be no more salvation — no matter what else remained ; if divine truth were lost from amongst men, there would be no more operation of the Spirit : if the people of God were all cut off, the Spirit and the word, in order to convert the world, would be obliged according to the divine Gdconomy we have, to reconstruct the Church out of penitent and believing sinners saved by grace : and that Church, when reconstructed, would possess the very marks I have demon¬ strated, and occupy the very position they indicate for her as God’s Kingdom in this world. The whole Giconomy of salva¬ tion is reducible to this solution : nor does it appear to admit of any other. 2. The supremacy with which the supernatural element of the question of the Church, pervades every part of this discus¬ sion, must be obvious to every reader. Nor is it possible to conduct any enquiry, that can be of the least value, upon such subjects, on any other basis. If the religion which we seek to comprehend, is a mere philosophy — nay, if it is any less than a divine revelation ; then, of course, it stands in the wisdom of man, and that wisdom must construct it, aided, no doubt, by CHAP. XXVI.] HOLY LIVING. 481 such intimations as God may have been pleased to give. But if God has revealed to us, in a manner designed by himself to be complete, a way of salvation which he requires us to accept : then the whole matter stands in the power of God, and must be so treated.1 Where the revelation stops, the divine power, in its manifestation to us for salvation, also stops : and every attempt on our part to extend the power, is either an attempt to extort a further revelation from God, which is sacrilege — or an attempt to teach God, which is impiety. The patriarchs did not presume to erect the institutions of Moses ; nor did Moses presume to bring in that simple grace and truth, which came by Jesus Christ. Even Christ did not set up the new form of his own Kingdom, or write one word of his own glorious Gospel ; but he left to the divine Spirit, acting through his inspired Apostles, the comple- tion in both respects of the will of God. How then shall men, without the smallest claim to an extraordinary vocation from God, dare to add one tittle or take away one jot ? Nor can it make the least difference, whether we address ourselves to one part or another, of what God has given to us as the perfect ex¬ pression of his will, concerning our salvation. It is as utterly beyond our competency to institute for God a worship which he ought to accept, as to establish a doctrine concerning him which he ought to approve : a task as much above us to complete the form of his Kingdom, as to improve the method of his grace. We have no knowledge, we have no authority, we have no suffi¬ ciency, for any such thing. God alone has them all in infinite fulness. And upon these two truths rests the argument, a priori, for all divine revelation. So that we not only discredit the suffi¬ ciency of the revelation which God has given us, but call in question the necessity of any revelation at all, as realty when we would amend, as when we impeach the faith, the worship, or the life, prescribed by God to his Church. And every act of this sort is the more to be condemned, because God has made known to us so clearly in his word, what he would have us do ; that the poor pretext of his silence can be made good, only by holding his truth in unrighteousness, or by handling his word deceitfully. He has spoken all his mind in the matter of our salvation ; for¬ bidding us in the beginning, and forbidding us at the end — always under the most terrible penalties — -to add unto the word or unto 1 1 Cor., ii. 1-5. 31 VOL. II. 482 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK IV. the things commanded by him, or to diminish aught from either of them.1 For besides the injuries we inflict on men, and the corruption we bring into the Church, and the dishonour we offer to the majesty of God, by such acts of presumptuous disobedi¬ ence ; we are also guilty of treason against our Lord the King in Zion, as often as we usurp these high prerogatives of his crown. With reference to ourselves — nothing can hind the faith or con¬ science of a Christian, in the matter of his salvatian, that is not revealed from God. But nothing is revealed unto salvation, ex¬ cept in Jesus Christ our Saviour. So that where faith, conscience, revelation, and salvation, have no place ; there is no Saviour — and can he no Church. 3. This whole doctrine is transcendently glorious to the Church of God. It invests her with the majesty, which springs from her total deliverance from the control of carnal command¬ ments, and from her being clothed with the power of an endless life. Her mission is commensurate with the human race. Its very essence is, to do all good to all. Her own goodness is the measure of her ability to do good. A mission of faith, obedience, and love, accomplished in the power of the divine life by which she lives. Salvation is wrought out through her, in proportion as it is first wrought in her. As she trusts, obeys, and imitates Christ, she manifests in the same degree the purity of her faith, of her worship, and of her life ; exhibits the mighty power of God, which works in her trustful and loving heart ; demon¬ strates her entire conformity to the divine will ; and thus work¬ ing out the glory of God on earth, she works out for herself an eternal weight of glory. Does any child of God desire to take from Christ, any part of his dominion over himself? Then why should it be considered possible, that the spouse of Christ would desire any such thing ? Does any sanctified soul feel the yoke of Christ to he a heavy yoke ? Then why should it be im¬ agined that all sanctified, souls should fail to rejoice as the pre-eminence is given to him, in all things ? Nor will God endure to be robbed of that which is his. I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God — is the reason given by himself, why the glory, dominion, and worship, should be given only to him ; and is rendered as a portion of that unalterable morality, whose foundations are laid in his own being, and which pervades every 1 Deut., iv. 1-24; Rev., xxii. 18-20. HOLY LIVING. 483 CHAP. XXVI.] manifestation of himself.1 And the last recorded utterance of the redeemed in glory is, As it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia : for the Lord God om¬ nipotent reigneth.2 1 ExocL, xx. 5. 3 Rev., xix. 6. . THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. ARGUMENT OF THE FIFTH BOOK. This Fifth Book bears to the Fourth, a relation somewhat analogous to that which the Third Book bears to the Second. For the Second Book attempts to demonstrate a Christian, and the Third to demonstrate those personal Offices without which there can be no individual Christianity : while the Fourth Book attempts to demonstrate the visible Church of Christ organized out of those same Christians, and this Fifth Book to demonstrate the Gifts of God to this Christian Church, without which it can have no visible existence. And as in the former case, those individual Offices of themselves prove that he who discharges them does so by the grace of God, and is a true disciple of Christ ; so in this latter case, these divine Gifts prove of themselves that the organized body of Disciples of Christ possessing them, does so by the grace of God, and is a true Church visible of the Lord Lesus Christ. And the negative conclusions in the two cases are analogous ; namely, that lacking these individual Offices no one can be a true disciple of Christ — lacking these Gifts of God no organized body can be com¬ posed of true disciples of Christ, or be his visible Church. So that the demon¬ stration is double in each case, and then general of the whole. The Twenty- Seventh Chapter, which is the First of this Book, is devoted to the three supreme Gifts of God to his Church more especially considered as visible, namely, his Son, his Spirit, and his Word; one large division of the Chapter being occupied with the separate and detailed exposition of each. Concerning the Son it is shown in what sense he is given by God to the Church, over and above the* sense in which he is given to each individual Christian, and in what different form he is given to the Gospel Church, as compared with preceding dispensations ; what are the mutual results of this as to Christ, and as to the Church — what is the relation between them thus created — what is the position of the Church thus considered — and her consequent glory and blessedness in her witness-bearing and her work. Concerning the Spirit it is shown that all efficiency of the Church is of him as really as all authority is of Christ ; the difference in the manner of bestowment, the manner of operation, and the manner of relation to all things, between the Spirit and the Son, is explained ; the order of the mysteries of grace, the relation of the Spirit to the work of Christ and to the Gospel Church, and the attestation of everything relating to both, and to all truth and godliness > 486 ARGUMENT OF THE FIFTH BOOK. by the Spirit, are disclosed ; the promise of the Spirit — his outpouring, his mani¬ festation and work, extraordinary and ordinary, the Relation of both to Christ, to the Church, to each other, and to salvation are explicated : and the doctrine of the Spirit and of his relation to the Church is shown to be absolutely vital. Concerning the Word of God, its relation to the Son, the Spirit, and the Church, and its special relation considered as written to the Church considered as visible, are pointed out; the Word and the Church before the former was written, and the latter organized, and again after the former was written and the latter organized, and again after the former was complete and as such bestowed on the Gospel Church, are specially considered: the power of the Word as mere truth, and its further power as the instrument of the Spirit, is disclosed ; and the Chapter closes with an appreciation of the written Word considered as a divine Gift to the Visible Church, and of the Gospel Church considered as possessing the supreme Gifts of God just discussed. The Twenty-Eighth Chap¬ ter, which is the Second of this Book, discusses the Sabbath-day, the Sacraments, Instituted Worship, Discipline, and Evangelization, as Ordinances given by God to his Church ; one large division being devoted to each. The Sabbath is shown to be a perpetual element in the moral system of the Universe, and to be indis¬ solubly connected with the creative, providential, and gracious work of God therein : and its unspeakable importance to man is pointed out. The Sacraments are treated generally, the idea of them, their nature, and use, the ends they an¬ swer and promote, being explained ; their efficacy is shown to depend on the work of the Divine Spirit, and to be wrought instrumentally by them, in us, by him through our faith in Christ: the number of them and its constancy, their relation to the Church under successive dispensations, Christ’s relation to them, and their record of him, are explicated. The Instituted Worship of God is discussed, and the relation of Atheism on one side, and that of spiritual worship of the true God on the other, to our natural convictions is disclosed ; the revealed will of God concerning the worship he requires of man is demonstrated ; the particulars of that revealed worship, now divinely established in the Gospel Church, are proved, classified, and explained. Discipline, as an ordinance of God, is demonstrated, and its nature and efficacy are explained, — together with the manner and objects of its administration ; the nature of Church censures, their relation to the Threatenings of God, — and their execution upon God’s erring children, and upon his open enemies are set forth. And finally the Evangeliza¬ tion of the world is shown to be an Ordinance of God obligatory upon the Church : and a brief appreciation of that great endeavour is attempted. The Twenty-Ninth Chapter, which is the Third of this Book, is devoted to a particu¬ lar discussion of the Sacrament of Baptism, considered in its Nature and Design, the Subjects of it, the Mode of its Administration, and the Apostolic Practice of it. The origin and nature of the sacrament of circumcision, and its relation to Christian Baptism, are explained: the relation of the Baptism of John, and of that administered by the Apostles during the life of Christ, to Christian Bap¬ tism is also explained : Christian Baptism is shown to have been instituted by Christ, after his resurrection, as a sacrament of the Gospel Church : the relation of the outpouring of the Spirit to Christian Baptism is disclosed : and the cer¬ tainty of these divine mysteries, together with their sum, and their relation to ARGUMENT OF THE FIFTH BOOK. 487 the doctrine of God and of salvation, is proved. In the next place, tne relation between Baptism and the blessings of which it is the seal, is exhibited ; the title of every one to the seal, who has title to the blessings, is proved ; and the right of the infant seed of believers both to the covenanted blessings and to this seal of them, is demonstrated, in each of eleven successive propositions; and the effects, both of the neglect, and of the exercise of this right are shown. Then it is shown that Baptism may be valid, even when its administration is not per¬ fectly regular ; Immersion in water, as a commemoration of the burial of Christ, is proved to be a total perversion of this sacrament : the true scriptural relation between baptism and the death and burial of Christ is disclosed : the various senses in which the Scriptures use the word baptism, are set forth, and the right of Christ to fix the sense in which he uses it asserted : and that he did use it — to mean the sacramental application of water to the person, as a sign and seal of our purification by the Holy Ghost, and our ingrafting into Christ is demon¬ strated in each of five successive propositions. The examination of the Apos¬ tolic practice follows, and the great example of Pentecost is shown in each of three successive propositions, and then the great example of Gentile baptism at Caesarea is shown in each of three successive propositions, and then more briefly other Apostolic examples of every known class are shown, to accord exactly with what was before shown concerning Christ’s sense of this sacrament ; and the Apostolic doctrine of baptism is deduced. The Thirtieth Chapter, which is the Fourth of this Book, treats in a particular manner, of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, considered in its Institution, Nature, Use, and End ; wherein the relation of this Sacrament to the ancient Sacrament of the Passover is explained ; the divine account of its institution by Christ is stated ; its general nature and ordinary use are disclosed in detail from the Scriptures : the matter of it and elements of it, are pointed out ; and how it is a sign and what it signifies, and how it is a seal and what it seals are set forth. Entering more deeply, what the Saviour meant us to understand by saying the cup was the New Testament in his blood, and by saying the bread was his Body broken for us, is care¬ fully examined ; the efficacy of the Body and Blood in our spiritual nourish¬ ment is disclosed; the relation of this Sacrament to the Worship, the Word, and the Spirit of God, is explicated ; and the relation of the constant and sacramen¬ tal showing of the Lord’s death to his Second Coming is pointed out. And finally it is shown how strict is the relation of Christ’s sacramental word and action to the Nature and definition of this sacrament; and that of the sacra¬ ment itself to the whole question of the Church. The Thirty-First Chapter, which is the Fifth and last of this Book, treats of the Office Bearers of the Gospel Church, and of Church government in their hands. It is shown that all the Office Bearers of the Church both appertain to it, and in a still higher sense to Christ ; that the divine origin of the Church, of its government, and of its office bearers is perfectly indisputable, both according to the universal testi¬ mony of Scripture, and to the absolute nature of the case ; in proof and illus¬ tration of all which, the example of the Apostolic Synod constituted at Jerusa¬ lem on the question of Gentile circumcision, is carefully examined, and the fact, the nature, and the perpetuity of the government divinely established in the Gospel Church, are demonstrated; the office bearers who constituted that 488 ARGUMENT OF THE FIFTH BOOK. synod, are shown to have been in part Apostles, but chiefly Elders — Presbyters; and then the nature of the office held by these Elders — Presbyters, and the na¬ ture of their right to constitute that synod, and every other tribunal in the Gospel Church, is demonstrated. Then the question of the Church, purely as a question of fact, is taken up at the death of Christ and its condition shown : the effects of the outpouring of the Spirit on Pentecost, and the events which followed, are traced, and the immediate formation of particular congregations with a tribunal in each, and the nature and composition of that tribunal as a congregational Presbytery composed of Presbyters — Elders, are proved : the union of a number of these congregations with their tribunals — is shown to have constituted a larger body with its tribunal over them all, still com¬ posed of Presbyters, and called in the Scriptures a Presbytery ; and then the union of all these Presbyteries with all their tribunals and all their congregations with their tribunals — gives us the universal Church and brings us back to its synod already demonstrated ; for that is the scriptural name of this high tribunal ; and thus the nature, organization, and divine authority of tribunals, Parochial, Presbyterial, and Synodical, all composed of Elders — Presbyters — is proved by tracing the divine progress and development of the Church, as before by a specific divine example. After this the nature of all church power delegated by the Mediator, is analyzed, and its relations to his Prophetic, Priestly, and Kingly offices shown ; the result being that the whole power of Regimen is from his Kingly office, and is vested in all Presbyters alike ; while the ministry of the word is a delegation from his Prophetic office, and the Stewardship of Divine Mysteries is a delegation from his Priestly office — which two functions — as a power of Order — are added, as to certain Elders, to their power of Rule, and thus two classes in the order of Elders are produced ; and it is shown that this power of Order is a several power, — while the power of Regimen is a joint power ; the result being that all rule is not only by tribunals, but all tribunals are constituted of both classes of the order of Elders. The mode of creating office bearers is shown to be by an inward and personal vocation of the particular person, by God to the particular office; which is ascertained by the vocation of the individual by a particular congregation to be its office bearer, and afterwards by the approbation and ordination of the person by a church court : the vital power and importance of this Parochial and Presbyterial vocation — being specially insisted on. Then the offices of Prophet, Evangelist, and Deacon, who are the only remaining office bearers of the Church, whether ordinary or extraordinary — are explained : and the Chapter and Book close with a summary statement, in four successive propositions, ot the absolute nature of the government which God has bestowed upon the visible Church ; and a slight appreciation of its marvellous origin, progress, and actual position. The difficulty of treating the whole organic life of the Kingdom of God, under the action of so many and such amazing gifts of God, in a few Chapters, and of determining truly and disposing in a lucid order, in so small a compass, so many and such vast topics— is one of the greatest to which the human mind can address itself. To reduce these Chapters to a short connected argument, which will present the whole matter fairly, clearly, and sufficiently — is also very difficult. And now to deduce from that argument its fundamental ARGUMENT OF THE FIFTH BOOK. 489 results, in a few short propositions is no easy task. Possibly the chief results may be summarily stated somewhat as follows : namely, That the Son, the Spirit, and the Word of God, appertain in a peculiar manner to the visible Church of Christ, under the Gospel dispensation, as the supreme Gifts of God to it : — That the Sabbath day, the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Sup¬ per, the Instituted Worship of God, the administration of the threaten ings of God by Discipline, and the Evangelization of the world, are divine Ordinances obligatory upon the Gospel Church, being gifts of God to it : — That Baptism instituted by Christ must be administered with water by a steward of the mys¬ teries of God, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, to the disciples of Christ, and to their infant seed, once only to each person ; wherein our purification by the Holy Ghost, our ingrafting into Christ, and the pardon of our sins, are sacramentally signified, and sealed to those who worthily receive it : — That the Lord’s Supper, instituted by Christ, must be often celebrated and partaken of by all believers ; wherein the bread broken and the wine poured out are the elements, and the broken body and shed blood of Christ are the matter, and all together are the sacrament : the eating and drinking of the bread and wine, and the spiritual receiving of the body and blood of Christ by faith, through the Spirit, the word, and prayer, is a sacra¬ mental showing forth of his death, and a communion therein with him, and with each other ; all the benefits of Christ, more particularly our redemption by, and our communion in his death, and our spiritual nourishment and growth in grace by feeding sacramentally upon his body and blood, being herein signified and sealed to all who worthily communicate : — That God has bestowed upon the Gospel Church Office Bearers, both extraordinary and ordinary, of whom the former have ceased, the ordinary and perpetual being Elders and Deacons — to whom must be added in a special sense — and as peculiar, Evangelists ; that the whole power of Regimen in the Church is a joint power, and is wholly in the hands of Elders — amongst whom certain, in addition to their power of rule, labour in word and doctrine, and are stewards of the divine mysteries, both of which are several powers, so that there are two classes of the one order of Elders ; the power of Regimen being joint , all rule is, not by persons, but by Tribunals composed of some of both classes of Elders, all of each class being equal one with another, and the whole equal as Elders ; which Tribunals, one above another, Parochial, Classical, Synodical, and Universal, are neither clerical nor laic, but are Presbyterial Courts of the free, spiritual Commonwealth, which is the Church of the Living God. . \ CHAPTER XXVII SUPREME GIFTS OF GOD TO HIS CHURCH: HIS SON: HIS SPIRIT: HIS WORD. I. 1. The special Gifts of God to his Church : Supreme amongst these, his Son — his Spirit — his Word. — 2. Our Responsibility, personal and aggregate : corresponding bestowal of these divine Gifts. — 3. Special Gift of the Son of God to the Church : immediate mutual Results — 4. Nature and Effect of the relation between Christ and the Church thus created. — 5. The Condition of the Church, considered as possessing Christ. — 6. The Holy Church Catholic — the Communion of Saints — the Forgiveness of Sins. — 7. The true God and Eternal Life. — 8. The Glory and Blessedness of the Church, in her Witness-bearing, and her Work. — II. 1. Gift of the Holy Ghost: all Authority in Christ — all Efficacy from the Spirit. — 2. Dif¬ ference, in the manner of bestowment ; and the manner of operation ; and the re¬ lation of the Son and the Spirit to : — (a) Human Nature : — ( b ) The Plan of Salva¬ tion: — (c) The Church: — ( d ) The World. — 3. The order of the Mysteries of Grace, with respect to the Gift of the Holy Ghost. — 4. Relation of the Spirit to the Work of Christ, and to the Gospel Church. — 5. The Saviour, the Church, the Truth, and the Mystery of Godliness, all attested by the Spirit. — 6. The Promise of the Fa¬ ther: the day of Pentecost. — 7. Difference in the manifestation of the Spirit: extraordinary manifestations: Their relation to the Church. — 8. Saving mani¬ festation of the Spirit : Its relation to his extraordinary manifestations. — 9. The Doctrine of the Spirit, and his relation to the Church, vital. — III. 1. Gift of God’s Word: Its relation to the Church, and the preceding Gifts: Relation of the writ¬ ten Word to the Visible Church — 2. The Word, before and after it was written: the Church, before and after it was organized : General Exposition. — 3. The Gos¬ pel Church — and the Sacred Scriptures. — 4. The Efficacy of God’s Word, consid¬ ered merely as Divine Truth : its further Efficacy when savingly used by the Holy Ghost. — 5. Appreciation of the written Word, considered as a Divine Gift to the Church. — 6. Appreciation of the Church, considered as possessing these .Supreme Gifts of God. I. — 1. I have endeavoured to trace the principles upon which the divine idea of the Church, and its permanent and visible existence are disclosed in the Word of God — and to make, not only its nature and end plain, hut the immense truths also which give it vitality, and the infallible Marks which distinguish it. The course of the orderly treatment of the subject, conducts us next to the consideration of those Divine Gifts which God has bestowed upon his Church, thus created, organized, and made 492 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. permanent in this apostate world. Gifts, every one of which is a proof of his love, every one a manifestation of his wisdom, and the whole united an infinite dowry ; in the enjoyment of which the Lamb's wife is shown to be the delight of God and the glory of his universe, and the use of which is the means of the de¬ liverance of his universe from the curse and pollution of sin. Amongst these Gifts there are three, which so immeasurably transcend the rest, and, indeed, so exceed all that the heart of man could have conceived, that the very Salvation which they alone could have conferred, seems to human reason an object unworthy of them. It is only as we comprehend that unsearch¬ able love and grace and mercy are the foundation of such gifts, and that the highest glory of God, as well as the endless blessed¬ ness of the universe, is involved in the results they will produce ; that we can see it to be capable of belief that God has given his Son to die for his Church, his Spirit to dwell continually amidst its sorrows and its sins, and his Word, made known through so much anguish of his most beloved children, to be a light and power and joy to those so utterly unworthy of it. Yet these very gifts are so entirely the very essence of salvation, that it is impossible to explain, or ever to conceive, any part of it, with¬ out the perpetual presence of them all. Of necessity, therefore, they have been continually held up to view, in all I have said. Nevertheless, the special aspect in which we now encounter them, demands a particular statement concerning them. 2. The personal responsibility of every human being, whether to God, to individuals like himself, or to those public authorities, ot whatever kind, to which he may be subject ; is the most fun¬ damental result of our personal existence, as rational and moral creatures. It is far, however, from being the only result in the nature ot responsibility, to which the circumstances of our ex¬ istence may give rise. As a member of a household, of a body politic, ot the Church, nay, as a member of the great human family, or one of the particular races which compose that great unity ; every human being is liable to suffer and to be blessed, and that out of all proportion to his personal share of respon¬ sibility, for that which brought him happiness or misery. This aggregate responsibility is as real, as our personal responsibility ; and can, no more than it, be overlooked or evaded. — In like manner, the Gift of the only begotten Son of God, the Gift of CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SON. 493 the Holy Ghost, and the Gift of the Divine Word, has, each, a general as well as a personal relevancy, in the dispensations of God. The gift of each of them to the individual children of God, and the gift of each of them in organizing these children of God, under Messiah, through the Holy Ghost, into the divine kingdom now held forth as the Gospel Church : has been already sufficiently considered. But there is, also, the gift by God of each of them to the Church contemplated as the Body of Christ, in a sense different from any, that it has been hitherto necessary to state very explicitly. Nay, there is a gift of each of them by God, to the whole family of man considered merely as such : which we are apt to overlook, because it does not result in salva¬ tion, but which is, nevertheless, by far the greatest bestowment which God makes to our race. For it is possible, that of whole nations and races, not an individual might sufficiently regard the message of salvation, the admonitions of the Spirit, and the love of Christ, to believe, repent and be saved : while yet these divine agencies might so enlighten their darkness, and so rebuke their sins, and so diffuse a real power for what is good, that all other blessings given to them might be insignificant, compared with these. To a certain extent all speculative believers in Christianity, and all nominally Christian nations, are examples of this very mercy of God : this efficacy of these divine gifts to the world. But it is in the more strict sense of their bestowment, namely, — upon the Church of Christ, that I am now considering them. 3. He whom God has raised from the dead, and set at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come : he under whose feet God has put all things, and who is head over all things : he it is whom God has given to the Church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.1 He filleth all in all : and the Church is his fulness — because it is his body. It is the Son who made all things and who rules and governs all things. — As Mediator of the covenant of grace, as Head of the Church, all things are still under his feet : things in heaven and things on earth, and things under the earth — things present and things to come. He, the glorified God-man, that liveth, and 1 Eph., i. 20-23. 494 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. was dead, and is alive forevermore, in whose hands are the keys of death and hell : has been given by God to this Church, of which, having redeemed it with his most precious blood, he is the Lord and Head.1 Nor is it difficult to understand the na¬ ture of the claim, which the Son of God has on the believer whom he has redeemed from hell, and made a member of his mystical body forever ; nor, on the other hand, to understand the nature of the claim which the believer has in that divine Saviour, given to him by God, and to whom his soul is united in the bond of an everlasting covenant. In like manner, the title of the Lord Jesus is clear and perfect, to that Church which he so loved that he gave himself for it, which he makes worthy to partake of his own glory and blessedness, and upon which he has staked his renown : and on the other hand, the Church which has given itself to Christ to be his Bride, and which can produce proofs the most tender and the most august, that he has redeemed her, purified her, and owned her for his Spouse ; has such a claim upon Christ her Lord, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other crea¬ ture, shall be able to separate her from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus her Lord.3 4. Our want of faith and our sense of personal unworthiness, cause us to shrink from the full acceptance of God's plain dec¬ larations, and from the unavoidable result of our own firmest beliefs and convictions. How is it possible for the Saviour to have a people, unless his people have a Saviour ? How can God give a kingdom to his Son, without giving his Son to that king¬ dom ? He does both. He gives to his Son an eternal kingdom : to his people an almighty Saviour. And though, as yet, we see not all things put under him, we have seen that he who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death, has been crowned with glory and honour :3 we know that the heav¬ ens must receive him until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began :4 and we need no more doubt that the kingdoms of this world will become the Kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, than if we beheld the heavenly multitudes 1 1 John, Mi. 1 ; iv. 10 ; Rom., v. 8-10 ; viii. 32. 8 Heb., ii. 9. 3 Rom., viii. 39. 4 Acts. Mi. 21. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SON. m rejoicing over this assurance, and saw the four-and-twenty El¬ ders fall upon their faces before God, as they cry, We give thee thanks, oh ! Lord God Almighty, which art, and which wast, and which art to come, because thou hast taken to thee thy great power, and hast reigned.1 5. It is manifest, that as the very existence of the Church hangs on her relation to Christ, and his relation to her : the gift of Christ to her involves, implicitly, every other gift which that may draw after it. Wherefore, the manner in which she receives, cherishes, and uses this supreme gift, must be decisive of the in¬ fluence which every other gift of God will exert upon her, and upon the universe through her. Christ is her life : and her only hope of appearing in glory, is that when Christ shall appear, she also shall appear with him.2 He not only shows her the way : he is the Way. He not only teaches her the truth : he is the Truth. He not only conducts her to life : he is the Life.3 Having said this, making himself all in all : he adds — precluding everything else, Ho man cometh to the Father, but by me. Whatever of wisdom, or righteousness, or sanctification, or redemption, the Church can enjoy or communicate, she possesses not only by but in Christ : for he is made of God unto her, not only the method by which these wonderful gifts are bestowed, but in the highest possible sense, the very things themselves.4 God manifest in the flesh, is the most comprehensive statement of the sum of Chris¬ tianity : and Christ in his person, his work, and his glory, is its concrete form, and its infinite essence, and its almighty power. Christianity may exist in permanent supernatural records : it may live, as an activity, in the hearts of believers : it may be proclaimed as a rule of life to all nations : it may be taught as a science in the schools : it may pervade the earth as a per¬ fect system of spiritual truth : but it is in Christ himself' that his undefiled Bride possesses it absolutely. She possesses him as her only Mediator with God — -her Immanuel, Prophet, Priest, and King : the author and finisher of her faith— her very present help in every time of need — her glory unto her, and her light to enlighten all nations : her final judge, deliverer, and rewarder for all she has done and suffered for his name — her eternal and satis¬ fying portion in the blessedness of the life to come. All the 1 Rev., xi. 16, 17. 3 Col., iii. 4. 3 John, xiv. 6. 4 1 Cor., i. 30. 496 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. while that she thus possesses him as her own, he, her Head and Lord, is the Creator of the universe, by the word of whose power all things were made : the infinite source of all life, and light, and truth, and goodness : the infinite Ruler who controls and directs all things by the word of his wisdom : the infinite Bene- factor, from whom all blessings flow, and through the word of whose grace Salvation is bestowed on lost sinners ! Glorious Church ! Transcendently glorious Saviour ! 6. It was with good reason that the ancient, comprehensive and universal symbol of the Christian Church, expressed con¬ spicuously amongst its fundamental propositions such articles as these : I believe in the holy catholic Church — I believe in the communion of saints — I believe in the forgiveness of sins The earliest and probably most rational form of the first of these three statements was — not that I believe in — but I believe the Church. Either way, the conviction may well be cherished and asserted, that she, in the midst of whom God dwells, shall never he moved : and that notwithstanding the malice of devils and wicked men, the gates of hell shall not prevail against her.1 Nor can it be doubted, that while she holds fast to Christ, she will also hold fast by the truth, which he himself is : and that as the common mother of all be¬ lievers, she will know and testify the doctrine of God, in propor¬ tion as she walks according to his divine will.3 Pure in Faith, true and spiritual in the Worship of God, and holy in Life, she needs must be, so long as she possesses Christ. Nor can there be any uncertainty touching the universal duty of the Communion of Saints. For the very organization of the visible Church, and every ordinance of God which separates it from the world, pre¬ sents these two conspicuous aspects ; that therein is a proof of God’s rejection of the world, and therein his saints constantly ' V profess, that as the brethren of Christ, they are brethren. For it is not possible for them to be united to their common Head by faith, without being united to each other in love.8 But one of the highest obligations of Christian love, as well as one of its clearest manifestations, is the perpetual endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bonds of peace : since we know that we are one body, and have one hope of our calling, through one 1 Psalm xlvi. passim ; Matt., xvi. 15-18. a Gal., iv. 26, 27 ; John, vii. 17. 3 Col., i. 18; Matt., xxiii. 8-10. GIFT OF THE SON. 497 CHAP. XXVII.] Lord, one Spirit, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all.1 Nor is this communion of Saints less important in itself, than it is clear in its grounds and obligations. For whether we consider the nature of the case, or the plain intimations of the Scriptures, there is no ordinary possibility of Salvation, out of the Church of Christ.2 For the forgiveness of Sin, which is the third point, and which the Church has in charge to proclaim, in the name of J esus, to every creature, as the very essence of the Gospel unto them : and in the reality of which, we profess our trust, through the means revealed in the Gospel : has no exist¬ ence whatever, except in connection with the person and work of Christ. It is by her ministry, that proclamation of this for¬ giveness of sin, is made to fallen men : it is by her ordinances, that this forgiveness is sealed to penitent sinners : it is through her worship that they are built up in the sense and the fruits of it : it is the Saviour, the Spirit, and the Word, which are God's supreme gifts to her, whereby any possibility exists that God can be just, and justify the ungodly. When we say, therefore, that we believe in the holy catholic Church : and immediately add, that we believe in the communion of saints, and in the forgive¬ ness of sins ; we give utterance to the most vital truths touching the nature and office of the Church, considered as in possession of the divine Redeemer, as God's unspeakable Gift.3 7. I think I have shown conclusively, in another place, that the salvation of sinners is inconceivable upon any supposition of the mode of the divine existence, materially different from that revealed to us : and on the other hand, that the plan of salva¬ tion actually revealed to us, is incomprehensible, except on the supposition that the mode of the divine existence revealed in connection with it, is that of three Persons in one Essence. What is commonly called the doctrine of the Trinity, is there¬ fore, at the foundation of all practical godliness, as well as of all exact knowledge concerning God, and all intelligible exposition of the life and immortality brought to light in the Gospel. This makes it very wonderful, that this great doctrine should have been considered a mystery of that kind, that can have no imme¬ diate relation to the life of God in the human soul. But when it is so considered, it makes it very plain why systems of The- 1 Eph., iv. 1-6. 2 Acts, ii. 47 ; iv.. 14 ; xi.,,21-24. 3 2 Cor., ix. 15 ; James, i. 17. VOL. II. 32 498 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. ology should be as completely emptied of all spiritual unction, as systems of mere Philosophy : and why so much, of what is meant for evangelical preaching, should be little more than pious rhapsodies, or little better than ethical disputations. The Son of God given to the Church, is the true God and eternal life.1 And the incontrovertible foundation of the whole mystery of godliness — is God manifest in the flesh.2 Nor can it be called in question, without taking down the whole fabric, and rendering nugatory every remaining support on which it rests. For why should the Spirit justify, or the unseen world obey, or the Church proclaim, or the human race accept, or heaven receive in triumph: a Saviour who neither did, nor could, deliver a single soul from death : and concerning whom, everv one of these sublime reali- o J ties becomes an utter nullity, the instant it ceases to be true — that he is God manifest in the flesh. 8. The very existence of the Church, then, considered as the possessor of this transcendent gift of God, is to the end that she may vindicate to the universe the true doctrine of Christ : and therein the true doctrine of the divine being and perfec¬ tions. In the very preaching of the unsearchable riches of Christ, and in all attempts to make men see the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world, had been hid in God ; it is the intent of God, that now unto principalities and powers in heavenly places, might be known, by the Church, the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose, which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.3 No wonder then that Christ loved the Church, and gave himself tor it : no wonder that he sanctifies and cleanses it, and that he will present it to himself, a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but holy and without blemish.4 By means of it, the universe will be taught all those infinite realities concerning God, his perfections, his works and his purposes, now revealed in his word, which otherwise had remained forever hidden ; now seen in part, and darkly as through a glass, and known in part — but when that which is perfect is come, then to be seen face to lace, to be known by us even as we ourselves are known.5 And in the process of this unspeakably glorious development, the in¬ finite Goodness and Justice of God, his unsearchable Grace, and 1 1 John, y. 20. 2 1 Tim., iii. 16. 3 Eph., [[[, 8-10. * Eph., v. 25, 27. 5 1 Cor., xiii. 9, 12. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SPIRIT. 499 his immaculate Holiness, will shine forth to all eternity in the salvation of his elect, the perdition of Devils and ungodly men, the purgation of the universe from the pollution of sin, the re¬ capitulation of all things in the Son of God as the Saviour of the world, and the everlasting reign of blessedness ! Is it possi¬ ble to exaggerate the position of such a Church, with such a Sa¬ viour, and such a mission ? Is it possible to exalt, unduly, that Gift of God to this Church, whereby her place in such a scheme, of such a God, is at once assured, and made effectual to such re¬ sults ? II — 1. It behooves to treat next of the Gift of the Holy Ghost. And the most obvious fact concerning his indwelling is, that the efficacy of every act and every function of the Church, depends as absolutely upon him, as the authority of every one does upon Christ. Whatever the Church does, derives what¬ ever validity it has from the approval of Christ : whatever force it has from the work of the Holy Ghost. Without the former everything she does is a mere usurpation : without the latter, it is a mere nullity. All that has been advanced con¬ cerning the knowledge of the mystery of God’s existence and purposes, as developed through the Church, by means of the gift to her of the Son of God to be the Saviour of the world : is equally true, according to its own manner, of the gift of the di¬ vine Spirit to the Church to be the Sanctifier, alike of her, of her children, and of her acts. The fitness of her children to partake of the blessings she is capable of bestowing on them, as well as their fitness to be the instrument of bestowing these same blessings upon the world : depends upon the efficacy of the work of the Spirit, in each one of them. And the ability of the Church to bless, either her children or the world, depends upon the efficacious working of the same divine Spirit, in her own bosom. And again, the efficacy which abides in her acts, her ordinances, her sacraments, her communion of Saints, her exer¬ cise of discipline, her proclamation of truth, her continued sup¬ plications, and her abounding charities : results, absolutely, from the presence and power of the Holy Ghost. 2. There is, however, a great difference in the manner of be- stowment, between the gift of the Son, and that of the Spirit. The Son is given simply, freely, and sovereignly, in the covenant of God’s eternal love. The Spirit is given not only as the prom- 500 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. ised, but as the purchased Spirit. Christ did not give himself for his Church, because the Spirit would sanctify the Church : but the Spirit sanctifies the Church, because Christ has pur¬ chased it with his blood. It is the work of the Son, which draws after it the work of the Spirit : the Gift of the Son, upon which the gift of the Spirit depends. He is sent from the Father and the Son : and his coming is the crowning proof of the glori¬ fication of the Son, and of the certainty of the eternal triumph of divine grace.1 There is a great difference, also, in the man¬ ner of operation. For, on the one hand, the operation of Christ is external to us : while on the other, the operation of the Spirit is internal with us. Or to express this difference in other words ; the operation of Christ is specially with God, in reference to us ; wdiile that of the Spirit is specially in us, with reference to Christ. The work of Christ changes our estate and relations to¬ wards God : that of the Spirit changes our nature in a way of conformity to God. — Still further, there is a great difference be¬ tween the relation of the Son and that of the Spirit, to human nature, to the plan of Salvation, to the Church, and to the world. Thus : (a) As to human nature, the immense difference is, that the Son has taken our nature into personal and eternal union with ,the divine nature : and in that manner human nature, in its to¬ tality, becomes partaker with the divine nature. But the Spirit, remaining separate from and free of any personal union with hu¬ man nature, so renews that nature in the divine image in every individual who is elect of God and redeemed bv Christ : that all V of them are made partakers of the divine nature, and are filled with all the fulness of God.3 (b) As to the plan of Salvation, the difference is, that Christ as the Mediator of the Covenant of Grace, has actually wrought it out as God-man, in his estate of Humiliation, and administers it as God-man, in his estate of infinite Exaltation. While the Spirit, continuing simply God, applies the whole work of Christ and makes it all effectual, through the merits and in the name of Christ, quickening, enlightening, sanctifying, and comforting the Church, and all her children, by means of what Christ has done and now administers.3 i Acts, it ‘passim. 2 2 Pet., i. 4; Eph., iil 19. 3 Rom., viii. 1-1 7. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SPIRIT. 501 (c) As to the Church, the difference is, that the relation of the Son is that of elder brother to every child of the God and Father of all ; that of husband, head and Lord to the body of Christ, which they unitedly compose ; that of Mediator of the eternal Covenant, and as such the Prophet, Priest, and King in Zion : who having accomplished all that appertained to him in humiliation, now administers from the throne of God all that appertains to his estate of exaltation. While the relation of the Holy Ghost to the Church is, that he is the Vicar of Christ here actually and divinely present with her, and with all her children : working in them to will and to do according to the good pleasure of God, as manifested in Jesus Christ. Which he does with authority so plenary, that to resist and grieve him is to shut ourselves out from Christ ; and to blaspheme against him, is the same thing as to make our bed in hell ; while to honour, love, and obey Christ is the infallible means of increasing the gifts and graces of the Spirit, to the greater glory, through the Church, of her divine Lord.1 (i d ) As to the world, the difference is, that the Son, who made it and all that is therein by the word of his power, and who is able to save it by the word of his grace, rules it with infi¬ nite dominion as head over all things, and head of the Church ; by his revealed will in the Scriptures commanding all men to believe and repent that they may be saved, and making known to the Universe, through his Church, his manifold wisdom ; by his secret will, upon which his adorable providence proceeds, con¬ ducting all things to the infinite issue which God purposed in himself, from all eternity. While the Spirit has to the same fallen world, the relation of its divine Reprover, convincing it of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. Of sin, because they believe not in Christ ; of righteousness, because Christ is gone to his Father, and is seen no more ; of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. All the while being the Spirit of truth — glorifying Christ — and comforting his Church and his brethren, and guiding them into all truth.2 3. All the promises, mercies and gifts of God, are in Jesus Christ. Out of him God is a consuming fire to fallen creatures. The name of Jesus is the only name given under heaven amongst men, whereby we must be saved. Still, there was a reason, 1 John, xiv. 15,-17 ; 1 John, iii. 23, 24 a John, xvi. 7-15. 502 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. which God has clearly stated, which led him to bestow on fallen man the unspeakable gift of his only begotten Son ; and we must beware lest we fall into the error of supposing, that it was this gift itself which produced God's purposes of mercy to us. It is not because he has given his Son to the world, that God so loves the world ; for then, while the reason for the love, after the gift, might be clear, no motive for the gift itself would be exhibited. The method of the unsearchable riches of God’s grace, as ex¬ plained by himself is, that Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it but that God, who is rich in mercy, not only so loved us, that on account of that great love he quickened us to¬ gether with Christ, even when we were dead in sins ;2 but this amazing love of God towards us, was manifested in the very fact that he sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.3 And Jesus himself, when expressly recount¬ ing the grounds and objects of his coming in the flesh, says that it was God’s love for the world, that caused him to give his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life.4 This, then, is the order of these mysteries of divine grace ; the infinite beneficence of God, is the source of our salvation ; this manifested itself in the unsearch¬ able love he bore to fallen sinners of the human race ; this love exhibited itself in the eternal covenant of grace between the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost ; the outbirth of this eternal Covenant is the whole Mediatoral work of Immanuel, with all the results thereof ; the sending of the Holy Spirit, upon the glorification of the Mediator, after his work of humiliation was over, was the immediate result both of that glorification, and of the eternal covenant ; of which sending of the Spirit, the actual result was the Gospel Church, together with all it has received with the Spirit, and by means of it ; and the general and certain result, complete salvation by Jesus Christ, and the total exclu¬ sion of sinners from God’s mercy, except through him, by the Holy Ghost. 4. This divine exposition clears the whole relation of the Spirit to the work of Christ on one side, and to the Gospel Church on the other, of all obscurity. The Spirit considered as the author ot the Hew Creation, under all possible aspects of that creation, has relation to the Godhead as the third Person 1 Eph., v. 25. 2 Eph., ii. 4, 5. 3 1 John, iv. 9. 4 John, iii. 15. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SPIRIT. 503 thereof, to the covenant of grace as a party thereto, and very especially to the Son considered as the Mediator of that cove¬ nant ; but considered in a special manner as the gift of God to the Gospel Church, the Spirit has direct and inseparable rele¬ vancy to the work of Christ as the Saviour of sinners. The operation of the Spirit, therefore, through the Church, and the doctrine of the Spirit in the Church, must depend, always, upon the position of the Church with reference to the person and work of Christ ; that is, upon the amount of its actual knowledge of the Redeemer, and the state of its actual faith concerning him. For while it is universally true, that all who are saved, are so by means of the Covenant of Grace, and, therefore, through the merits of Christ, applied to them by the Holy Ghost ; still, the clearness, the fulness, and the power of any particular dispensation, or age, or saint, with reference to the Holy Ghost, could not, in the nature of the case, exceed the actual knowledge of Christ, and the actual faith thereby possible in him. And we are thus fur¬ nished with an explanation of all those differences observable in the manifestation of the Spirit, under successive dispensations of the Church, and during different periods, and even in different individuals under the same dispensation. Whatever views we may see fit to hold concerning the sovereignty of divine grace, or the ability of man to that which is acceptable to God ; it is certain that all the manifestations of that grace of God, which bringeth salvation, are by means of the revelation of Jesus Christ to us and in us ; both of which are accomplished only by the divine Spirit.1 5. As soon, then, as it is admitted that the Gospel Dispensa¬ tion is more clear and powerful, than the dispensations which preceded it ; there remains no possibility of doubting that the gift of the Spirit under it exceeds, in the same degree, all that went before. The more of Christ, the more of the Spirit also. So that what took place on the day of Pentecost, and what has been taking place ever since ; is no more than is inevitable, if the resurrection and ascension of the Saviour, be once admitted : no more than the ancient prophets had foretold : and Jesus had taught his Apostles in the most explicit manner, to await it as their unction for their great ministry.2 For the Church of the living God is the pillar and ground of the truth : and however J Tit., ii. 11-15; iii. 3-7. 2 John, xvi. 7-16; Acts, i. 3-9; ii. 14—33. 504 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. great may be that mystery of godliness which is the sum of that blessed truth, the elements which compose it are beyond all con¬ troversy. For the sum both of the truth and of the mystery, is revealed as contained in these six incontrovertible propositions, namely : God manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.1 Of these six propositions, five are, in a manner expletive of the first The second is to the effect, that the whole work of the Holy Spirit is unto the whole person, work and glory of the God-man — one vast, perpetual, perfect justi¬ fication. And so the Saviour, the Church, the truth, and the mystery of godliness, are all divinely attested by the Spirit : and the ends designed in all are made complete and effectual, through him. 6. In a peculiar manner, therefore, the Church of God, after the day of Pentecost and until the second coming of the Son of man, is a Dispensation of the Holy Ghost. It is a Dispensation administered by the glorified Eedeemer, and executed by the Divine Spirit, through grace and truth, — and as a Gospel ; and is declared by the word of God to be far more glorious in all re¬ spects, than any that has preceded it : amongst other things, in the completeness of our knowledge of God and of Christ, and the corresponding power, fulness, and extent of the saving work of the Holy Ghost.2 Nor is anything in the teachings of Christ more explicit than what relates especially to this subject : any¬ thing in the divine record concerning the establishment, and early life of the Christian Church, more distinctly explained. It is expedient for you, said Jesus, that I go away : for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you ; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.3 And then he explained, as I have be¬ fore shown, how this promised Spirit would glorify him, both as he would be the Reprover of the world, and the spirit of truth in all believers : and added the emphatic promise of his own re¬ turn — the great promise of the New, as his advent was of the Old Testament.4 And amongst his last words to his Apostles were these, Behold I send the promise of my Father upon you : but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.5 And on the day of Pentecost, when the 1 1 Tim., iii. 15, 16 2 2 Cor., iii. passim. 3 John, xvi. 7. 4 John, xvi. 16 ; Col., iii. 1; 1 John, iii. 2. 5 Luke, xxiv. 49 ; Acts, L 3, 4 ; Joel, ii. 28 ; Isa., xliv. 3. 505 CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE SPIRIT. great promise was fulfilled, Peter standing undismayed amidst the overwhelming proofs of God's immediate presence, explained to the wondering multitude gathered around him in the temple from every quarter of the earth, the great miracle and the great truth it attested. This, said he, is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel, It shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. This Jesus, whom ye have taken and with wicked hands have crucified and slain, God hath raised up, whereof we are witnesses. Therefore, being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear.1 It is added most significantly, by the sacred historian, that the same day about three thousand souls gladly receiving the word, were baptized and added to them. And from that to this, and from this day onward, as long as these last days shall continue, in the sense divinely limited : the outpouring of God's Spirit upon all flesh, is the promise of the Father upon which the continuance of the Church de¬ pends : and from which Joel, and Peter, and Paul, each contem¬ plating that promise from a different point of view, unite in drawing the same grand conclusion of practical grace, Whoso¬ ever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.2 And with this agrees the wide declaration of John ; that the life which was in Christ, was not only the light of men : but was the true light, that lightetli every man that cometh into the world.3 Alike in duration, in extent, and in efficacy, the Promise of the Father, the Redemption of the Son, and the Work of the Spirit, go hand in hand across all these last days, during whose continuance the Gospel Church has in charge, to preach the gos¬ pel to every creature.4 7. There is a distinction to be made between the manifesta¬ tions of the Spirit. For though every manifestation of him is a gift of God, and every one is in order that they also receive it may profit withal : yet there are diversities of gifts by the same Spirit, differences of administration by the same Lord, diversities of operation by the same God, which worketh all in all. And the body also is one — though its members like its gifts, bo both numerous and diverse. All are baptized in one body, by one 2 Joel, ii. 32 ; Acts, ii. 21 ; Rom., x. 13. 4 Mark, xvi. 15. i Acts, ii. 16, 17, 32, 33. 3 John, L 8. 9. 506 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. Spirit — all are made to drink into one Spirit — everything being wrought by one and the self-same Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will. This distinguishing peculiarity of our di¬ vine religion, and of the power which gives it all its vitality, has been clearly and systematically explained by the Spirit himself.1 I have already pointed out that every operation of the Spirit that has relation to the covenant of grace, has also immediate relevancy to Christ : and that his saving operations bear a direct relation to the clearness and fulness of our knowledge of Christ. But it is to be borne in mind that some of the greatest and most indispensable operations of the Spirit, considered as under the covenant of grace, and as immediately relevant to Christ, and as directly indispensable to the Church, and to the salva¬ tion of men : are not of that kind which disclose him as the in¬ dwelling life of .the Church, or which disclose him as the Quick¬ ening Spirit in the human soul, leading it into all truth, working in it all holiness, and diffusing through it divine love and peace. These manifestations are distinguished by calling them Extraor¬ dinary. Examples of them, having immediate connection with the gift of the Spirit to the Church by God, are the most re¬ markable of all that are revealed to man. It was in one of these that the Apostles of the Lord received the Spirit, as the prom¬ ise of the Father, so signally announced by Christ : and through his unction were anointed and qualified for their great work, as the immediate founders of the Gospel Church. It was in one of these, that they and the other servants of Jesus Christ, who spake and wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, who had so long withheld all manifestations of this kind : made those divine utterances, which are recorded in the New Testament Scriptures, wherein the revelation of God is completed. It was in one of these, that miraculous power was added to miraculous authority and miraculous insight : whereby, through signs and wonders and gifts of the Holy Ghost, the authority of the action, the truth of the utterance, and the fitness of the persons chosen by Christ, were all divinely attested. It has seemed good to the Head of the Church, that these manifestations of the Holy Ghost, should be permanently continued only in their effects. And the whole career of the Church since they ceased to be made, sufficiently attests how thoroughly her very existence de- 1 1 Cor., xii. passim. CHAP. XXVII. 1 GIFT OF THE SPIRIT. 507 J ✓ pended on their "bestowal at first : and how completely all her fitness still depends, in their permanent effects, upon their orig¬ an d efficacy. 8. But it is by the saving operation of the Holy Ghost, that all Extraordinary Manifestations of himself, can be savingly re¬ alized in the soul, and by the Church. The truth revealed by inspired men, remains ; the work of the Apostles in taking down the fabric of the preceding dispensation, and reconstructing the Church, also remains ; the signs and wonders, and diverse mira¬ cles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost are no less real now, than when thevwere first manifested. The whole of these effects of the Ex- V traordinary Manifestations of the Spirit, are made efficacious to us for salvation, precisely in the same manner they were made effi¬ cacious to those who personally witnessed them : in all instances not by the Extraordinary Work of the Spirit which produced them, and which has ceased from the Church ; but by his gra¬ cious, quickening, enlightening, and sanctifying work, still pow¬ erfully wrought. And the mode in which the merits of Christ are applied to men, by the Holy Ghost ; and the efficacy which he gives to the preached Gospel, and to all the ordinances of God ; are exactly the same, as when the Church manifested her early life in her present form, amidst miracles and inspiration under the teaching and rule of the Apostles of the Lord. In addition to these we have long centuries of God's most glorious providence developed to his Church — and of his wonderful work¬ ing in the souls of men. The divine and saving element provided in the gift of the Holy Ghost, is permanent and constant ; sov¬ ereign, always, in the actual operation. The Extraordinary ele¬ ment, provided in the divine gift — not permanent in its manifes¬ tation, but permanent in the effects of that manifestation : which also are made efficacious, through the manifestation which is per¬ manent. And those effects survive through all generations — and upon every generation is accumulated, besides, all the treasures of practical knowledge and grace, which all preceding generations yield : these last accumulating in force, under the continually increasing proofs of the presence and power of God. 9. The relation of the Holy Spirit to the Church is, there¬ fore, in every sense vital : and the doctrine and life of the Church with reference to this great gift of God, are completely decisive of its state. Independently of the Spirit of God, there can be inal reality 508 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. no Christian Church — no Christian man. It was so always. But under the present Dispensation, there is an emphasis in this great truth, derived from all that is peculiar to it, in addition to all that is common to every dispensation. And it is the more im¬ portant that this should be carefully considered by every believer, because the doctrine of the Spirit, in itself and with reference to the Church, is continually assailed, from the most opposite quar¬ ters, and upon the most diverse grounds. Nor is there any point upon which the truth and the Church can be assailed, under more deceptions appearances of eveiy sort ; nor, on the other hand, any point upon which all possible assaults can be more effectu¬ ally resisted, as soon as they are disclosed, both by the everlast¬ ing testimony of God, and by the inward convictions of every one of his children, and by the true life of the Church itself. It is here, therefore, that the Church is most secure when she lives near to God — most exposed when she sinks into indifference, or is carried away by fanaticism. The more she cherishes and uses this great gift, the more she increases while she scatters ; and the more she withholds both its diligent use, and its free bestowment, the more she tends to poverty. The waters of eternal life are free for the whole family of man. The Spirit saith to all that are athirst — come ! Let the Bride, also, say — come ! As she leads her children beside the still waters, and teaches them that they are the waters of eternal life ; let it dwell in her heart that the last exhortation of her Lord is, to be urgent that all men take of them freely.1 III. — 1. The third Supreme Gift of God to his Church, is his Written Word : concerning which it remains to treat briefly, considered in that light. It is in the third aspect of the King¬ dom of God, namely, the aspect of it as held forth in its mem¬ bers, and therefore called his Church ; that the revelation of the will of God concerning Salvation, and especially that revelation considered in its written and permanent form, is always exhibited as the Gift of God to his Kingdom. Considered under the first aspect of that Kingdom, — namely, as the Messianic Kingdom : Christ, the Head of the Kingdom, and the Mediator between God and man, and so the Saviour of the world — is the great Gift of God to it. And considered as the New Creation, which is its second aspect : the Divine Spirit, sent from the Father and the 1 Rev., xxii. 17. GIFT OF THE WORD. 509 CHAP. XXVII.] Son, whose work is the efficient cause of all salvation, is always exhibited as the Gift of God to his Kingdom. These gifts of God have a necessary and a perpetual relation to each other, and to the Kingdom of God. Though we can distinguish, in thought, between the Kingdom itself and the aspects of it thus presented ; and cannot confound, in thought, the Kingdom with the gifts bestowed on it — much less can we confound these gifts with each other : yet, under the whole oeconomy of salvation, the Kingdom is not manifested independently of all three of these supreme gifts of God to it : and throughout that oeconomy they are all manifested unto Salvation, always in precisely the same relation to each other. With regard to the Written Word, it is very certain that none of it is older than the age of Moses ; unless the Book of Job belongs to the period between the giving of cir¬ cumcision and the giving of the Passover. If this exception be insisted on, even then, the written word began after the distinct organization of the visible Church began. And from Moses until the last inspired writer, the divine organization and the revela¬ tion in a permanent form, went on ; till both were delivered up in their perfect and final condition, and the Gospel Church stood before men, invested with all divine gifts. Commensurate, too, with the rise of a permanent revelation to the Church, and a per¬ manent organization of it: God laid, in the miraculous preserva¬ tion of the first-born in Egypt, the foundation of priesthood and ministry for his gathered Church — -and at Sinai restated on tables of stone, and uttered audibly to all Israel, as the foundation of all his written revelation, that moral law which he had written, at the Creation, in the nature of man. So that the divine Teacher and his Word of truth, and the divine Spirit which justifies him and makes it effectual, and the organic visibility of the divine Kindom, and the permanent institution of a ministry between God and man, with God's holy will and holy ordinances committed to them : stand in immediate and indissoluble relation to each other, in the origin as well as in the entire progress of the King¬ dom of God, considered as visibly separated from the world and organized as the Church of Christ. 2. Whatever the Lord Jesus Christ has done, or will do for his Church, and by consequence the foundation of all that the Spirit has done, or will do, in her and by her : has no other infal¬ lible record and repository, accessible to man in his mortal condi- 510 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. tion, than the Holy Scriptures. The whole of them is declared to he given by inspiration of God : to be spoken by holy men of God as they were moved by the Holy Ghost : to be able to make men wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus ; to be profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruc¬ tion in righteousness ; to be the means whereby the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.1 These Scriptures, therefore, holy in themselves, and in all they teach, divine in their origin and in their contents ; are a complete reve¬ lation from God, of the great end of our being, and of the way in which we may accomplish it. They are, as to the form of them, invested with divine certainty ; as to the matter of them, with divine authority. And thus they are the only infallible rule whereby men may know what duty God requires of them, and what they ought to believe concerning him. In their present form, they present to the Gospel Church the means of knowing the will of God, in some important respects, different from what existed under all previous dispensations — widely as their several conditions may have differed from each other. God’s Kingdom existed in this world for many centuries, without possessing any written revelation of his will ; and it might have existed con¬ tinually, in that condition — through the same divine means that actually sustained it so long — or through whatever other resources of the infinite wisdom, power, and grace of God. As soon as God began to separate his Kingdom — visibly and organically from the world which he rejected, he began, also, to bestow on it the permanent knowledge of his will, in a written form — as I have before shown. But under the Mosaic Dispensation, these written revelations of the will of God were given, little by little, through many centuries ; whereas we possess the complete and final record of his whole will concerning our salvation. To esti¬ mate with some degree of certainty, the practical effect of a dif¬ ference which seems to be so great ; there are other elements of the problem, and they decisive, which are to be considered. The word of God, when unwritten, was adequate for the guidance of the ancient people of God in the way of life ; and the successive p 'rtions, as written, were adequate in the same way, to the Jewish Church. But after the Old Testament Scriptures were complete, and the Jewish Church and people had crucified the Lord of life, — 1 2 Pet., iii. 10; 2 Tim., iii. 15-17. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE WORD. 511 the whole became a sealed hook unto them — even to this day. And now God's entire word, in its perfect form, does not avail, of itself, to keep the nominal professors of the religion of Jesus from fatal heresy and iniquity, much less to subdue his avowed enemies. We must add, therefore, on one side, the extraordinary presence of God, in his ancient Church, and the constant mani¬ festation of miracles, prophecy, and immediate divine inspira¬ tion ; and on the other, the mighty increase of the saving work of the Spirit, commensurate with the increase of the saving reve¬ lation of Christ, in the Gospel Church. So far from diminishing the pre-eminence of the Gospel Church state — these added con¬ siderations seem to increase it greatly ; and to point out to us, in the sum of its relations to Christ, to the Spirit, and to the written Word — the ground of that undeniable supremacy over all preceding dispensations, which is so clearly asserted in the Gospel.1 3. With the Written Word complete ; with Christ crucified, and then infinitely exalted ; with the Spirit actually poured out according to the promise of the Father, actually dwelling in the Church, with all his saving influences; with her own organization complete, according to the will of God ; and with the accumu¬ lated fruits and experience of eighteen centuries of labour, of warfare, of witness-bearing, of suffering, and of rejoicing, as the Bride of the Lamb : the Church of God presents herself to the actual generation of perishing sinners — with the one Great Mes¬ sage, repeated through all ages, and in all tongues, — Deny thy¬ self — take up thy Cross — follow Jesus Christ in the regeneration! Her fundamental means of grace, is the Knowledge of this Written Word. Her highest duty, is to hold and teach the whole counsel of God, therein revealed. The great office of the ministry given to her by God, is to preach this blessed Gospel — which is the power of God unto Salvation, to every one that be- lieveth. And the highest necessity, as well as the chief duty, of every one that hears the good tidings of great joy, glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good will towards men ; is to arise from the dust, and hail the blessed day, and hasten to the light of Zion and to the brightness of her rising. For here is that truth, of which this Church of God is the pillar and ground. Here is that household of faith, of which Jesus Christ is the ! Gal., iii. and iv. passim ; lleb., vii. passim. 512 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. chief Corner Stone ; of which all the Prophets and Apostles have been successive foundations; in which all true believers are fellow- citizens with the saints : which the Holy Spirit builds together as a habitation for God ; and whose life is first given, and then perpetually nourished, through that incorruptible and imperish¬ able truth.1 4. From the beginning of the world God's will was made known to man, in a supernatural manner, concerning all that relates to his spiritual advancement. It was so before the fall of man : still more emphatically so after the fall. Through all the centuries the revelation of divine truth continually increased ; and it is capable of being shown — as I think I have shown in a former Treatise — what was the aggregate state of divine Knowledge among men, at every great era of the past — and what was added by God from period to period. At length, all that had been revealed was reduced, by men chosen and inspired of God, into a written form, and delivered to his ancient Church as soon as it was completely organized : and thenceforward, during many centuries, as further revelations were made to it by men chosen and inspired by God, they were reduced to writing and delivered to the Church. And coincidently with the complete organization and establishment of the Church in the gospel form of it, and her complete possession of the whole revealed truth of God unto Salvation, inspiration from God ceased altogether ; and with it, the power of miracles, and the spirit of prophecy, by which God was accustomed to attest the extraordinary voca¬ tion of bis divine messengers. And now for nearly eighteen centuries, this Gospel Church, visible, universal, of the Lord Jesus Christ, has possessed this inestimable gift of God in this complete form. Thus considered, the subject presents itself to us under two distinct aspects. In the first place, this complete revelation must be contemplated as a perfect system of divine truth — -independently of any divine efficacy external to the written Word, as, for example, of the Holy Spirit ; and inde¬ pendently of the effects of that superadded efficacy, in us. In this aspect, it has whatever efficacy truth, of itself, has : and it has this in the highest degree — because this truth is complete —and has no error mixed with it ; and the failure of that inhe¬ rent efficacy of truth, when this truth is brought to bear on 1 1 Tim., iii. 15 ; Eph.. ii. 19-22. CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE WORD. 513 man, is necessarily attributable to some quality in man himself — as, for example, the sinful blindness of his mind or hardness of his heart — and not to the untruth of truth itself. Uttered by God with infinite authority and certainty ; addressed to the understanding of man with perfect simplicity, directness, and clearness, making known to him more distinctly all moral, spiritual, and eternal things which he knew before, and re¬ vealing to him the most glorious truths, before wholly unknown to him ; appealing to bis heart and conscience in a manner the most effective, by methods the most powerful, and with motives the most transcendent : whatever it is possible for truth, of itself, to effect, responsive to itself in the mind, and soul, and nature, and life of man ; this heaven-descended truth — issuing from the bosom of Jehovah, embodied in the person of God manifest in the flesh, inspired by God the Holy Ghost ; must be competent to effect, far out of comparison with the combined effects of all other truths of which man can have any knowledge. Indepen¬ dently of any superadded efficacy, this is the natural efficacy, so to speak, of this gift of God to his Church ; and upon the ground thereof, the obligation to make its contents known to every being capable of being influenced by truth, is complete : and the rejection of it by any such being, is a demonstration of his own depravity. But in the second place, this efficacy of divine truth, transcendent as it is when compared with all analo¬ gous means of influencing man ; is as nothing compared to the efficacy of that same divine truth, when it is used by the divine Spirit as the divine instrument of our salvation. Just as the Spirit executes his work of grace, with reference to the Lord Jesus Christ as the Mediator of the Covenant of Grace : so, also, he executes that work with reference to divine truth in its prac¬ tical application to our souls, — of which truth Christ, in all his offices, is the central object. And just so far as the sacred Scriptures contain the revelation of the will of God unto salva¬ tion ; in the same degree the divine truth they contain, is that truth which the Spirit uses as his instrument, and with reference to which he performs his work, in man's salvation. But as these Scriptures are by inspiration of the Spirit himself, and contain his own record of the way of saving sinners : it is merely im¬ possible that sinners saved through him, can be saved by, or into, any other form of truth ; impossible if he works by truth vol. ii. 33 514 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. at all, that he should fail to work by this very truth ; impossible that this truth, thus used by him, should fail to effect the very object for which he — very God — both revealed it, made it per¬ manent, and now uses it. This is the aspect of this gift of God to his Church, considered with reference to the work of the Holy Ghost, in our salvation ; and so considered, it is absolutely cer¬ tain that the Gospel of Christ, is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth ; and is the great means bestowed on the Church by God for the promotion of his glory, and her own blessedness. 5. Considered in itself, and considered as the heritage of the Church by the gift of God, this Written Word is capable of an appreciation perfectly distinct, and as immense as we are compe¬ tent to make, (a) It is unto the Church her divine warrant, for all that it is her duty to attempt on earth ; and is, in addition, a divine guaranty of support, of comfort, and of final triumph, in all her faithful endeavours to accomplish the will of God. ( h ) It is an infallible guide to her faith, also, wherein her own blessedness is assured, in proportion to her holiness ; and wherein salvation is secured to every one, upon the single condition of ac¬ cepting her Lord, as their Lord, (c) Widening from these ele¬ mental points, it is the divine record of the entire life of the Church, from the beginning to the end of time ; the record, also, of the career of the human race, from its creation to the con¬ summation of all things ; the record, also, of the bearing of all earthly things upon the Church and upon the human race, and of each of these upon the other. So that, standing in the midst of the centuries as they roll over her, she has the means of comprehending clearly, both herself and all things that touch, or in any wise affect her. However dark the place may be, she has a divine light which shines into it. (c?) Still widen¬ ing, it carries her back into immensity and eternity, setting be¬ fore her the system of the Universe, of which all earthly things are so small a part, — making known to her the position which the race of man occupies in that boundless system — revealing the influence of his fall and recovery upon it— -the relation of the method of his recovery to it — and the relation of all these stu¬ pendous realities to the being, the counsel, the providence, the grace and the glory of God, as manifested throughout his im¬ measurable works and dominion. So that, face to face with the 515 CHAP. XXVII.] GIFT OF THE WORD. unseen world, she may comprehend her own mission, and posture with relation to the whole Universe, (e) Still widening, it opens before her the eternity to come — the life beyond death with its wondrous laws — her own consummation in boundless glory — the ruin of all the enemies of God with an endless ruin — the con¬ summation of all power, and wisdom, and justice, and good¬ ness and truth, and love over all worlds, to all eternity. And amidst all these fearfully immense issues of so much force so long applied, her own sublime and endless exaltation — her own transcendent relations to God and to the Universe, when God will be all and in all, and the Universe retrieved from sin, will be full of the blessedness, which her own Lord and Saviour, Head over all, will have bestowed on it, through her his elect Bride ! So that all along her pilgrimage there is no moment of darkness so profound, but that if she could endure it, she might have the vision of God ; no moment of weakness so abject, but that if she could lift up her head, she might behold upon the heights of heaven, the banner that was dipped in blood ! 6. We seem prone to form the most erroneous opinions, con¬ cerning the true nature of the Church of God. On one side, men attribute to her an authority essentially divine ; and claim for her ordinances and office-bearers, powers which reside only in God. On the other side, they strip her of all authority, reduce her to the condition of a merely human association, and look to her own articles and acts as the only source of her power. Widely different from both, God represents his Church to be a real spir¬ itual Kingdom, strictly subordinated to himself, yet charged with a sublime mission, and invested with authority to execute a work unspeakably glorious. Giving to her his only begotten Son, his Divine Spirit, and his Inspired Word, it is not possible to con¬ ceive that he could hold men guiltless, who resist his purposes of infinite grace and mercy through her. How then, should those who profess to be his people, pervert her nature, contemn her au¬ thority, or corrupt her life ; without forfeiting many of the most costly blessings provided for them, and putting at hazard the whole work to which they suppose they are called P Where the divine Redeemer, and the Holy Spirit, and the Sacred Scriptures abide — even if it be with the humblest children of God ; there God abides also. But when these unspeakable gifts are bestowed by God as marks of his divine favour, to his Kingdom made 516 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. visible on earth — and as the efficacious means, besides, wherein that Kingdom grounds its very existence, and whereby it is able to execute the eternal purpose of God's will ; we insult the ma¬ jesty of God, and we obstruct, according to our ability, the progress of his grace, by whatever departure, on the one side or the other, from the simple and complete reception, as they come from heaven, of ordinances which have the most convincing proof that they are of God. CHAPTER XXVIII. DIVINE ORDINANCES: THE SABBATH— THE SACRAMENTS— INSTI¬ TUTED WORSHIP— DISCIPLINE— EVANGELIZATION. I. Statement of the General Demonstration. — II. 1. The Sabbath a perpetual element in the Moral System of the Universe. — 2. Its indissoluble connection with the whole Creative, Providential, and Gracious Work of God. — 3. Its unspeakable importance to Man. — III. 1. The true idea of the Sacraments. — 2. Nature and Use of these Divine Mysteries. — 3. Descriptive explanation of them. — 4. The Ends they serve and promote. — 5. Their Efficacy depends on the Work of the Spirit in him who receives them, and is Wrought through our Eaith in Christ. — 6. The Number of them, and its constancy: their Relation to the Church under Successive Dispensations : Christ’s relation to them, and their Record of him. — IV. 1. The Instituted Worship of God: Atheism repugnant to our natural con¬ victions: The Spiritual Worship of the true God repugnant to our depraved na¬ ture. — 2. The Revealed Will of God concerning the Worship he requires: its Object, Nature, Means, Rule, Obligation and End. — 3. Particulars of Revealed Worship. First class: Sanctification of the Sabbath — Stated Assembling of Con¬ gregations — Almsgiving. — 4. Second class: Particulars of stated Public Worship ordained by God for each congregation. — 5. Third class : Administration of the Sacraments, Infliction of Church Censures, Public Fasting and Thanksgiving. — V. 1. The Ordinance of Discipline: Its Nature, and Efficacy. — 2. Manner and Objects of its Administration. — 3. The Censures of the Church are wholly spirit¬ ual : those inflicted upon offending members. — 4. Administration of the Censures of the Church against all the Enemies of God. — VI. 1. The Evangelization of the world, an Ordinance of God : its Obligation on the Church. — 2. Brief Apprecia¬ tion of that great Endeavour. I. Thf, execution of God's eternal Covenant of Grace, pro¬ duces the Kingdom of God in its threefold aspect of the Mes¬ sianic Kingdom under Christ its head, the New Creation by the Holy Ghost, and the Church of the Living God held forth in the covenant people of God. In this last aspect the Kingdom of God becomes visible and organized by the divine use of the two ideas of the Headship of Christ and the communion of saints : and the whole of that organization, and the whole action of the Church by means of every part thereof, are products of divine ordinances revealed by God, and every one of them a Gift of God to his Church. These divine ordinances therefore, em- 518 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. brace everything which gives visibility, organization, and efficacy to the Kingdom of God as now manifested in this world, consid¬ ered as the Church of Christ. Of the three supreme Gifts of God to this Church, which I have considered in the preceding chapter, only the third one — his written word — can be considered as strictly an ordinance ; and that, perhaps, only in its form as written and therefore permanent. Nevertheless, there is a pro¬ found sense in which not only the written word, but, also, both the Saviour and the Spirit are, as I have endeavoured to explain, peculiar Gifts of God to his Church visible and organized, pecu¬ liarly related to all these ordinances bestowed on her in those re¬ spects. The chief of those ordinances by means of which those three supreme Gifts of God are made effectual, I am now to con¬ sider as briefly as I can. First generally ; afterwards those called sacraments, more particularly ; then the office-bearers who ad¬ minister them, and the Government which these office-bearers compose and administer by the ordination of God. In this man¬ ner the analogy will be complete between the second and third books of this Treatise, on one side, wherein the Subjective Knowledge of God, first in the actual work in the individual soul and then in the effects of that work, is disclosed ; and the fourth and fifth books on the other side, wherein first the actual constitution of the visible Church, and then the outward divine movement of it, are attempted to be demonstrated. And thus the whole Treatise to the end of this book, ought to present to us one large and connected demonstration of the mode in which God saves his elect, the personal work in their souls, their indi¬ vidual lives resulting therefrom, their organization into a visible Church, the true nature, end, and work of that Church, the supreme Gifts of God to it, its divine ordinances, its divinely- ordained office-bearers, and divinely-appointed Government and the movement thereof. II. — 1. The consecration of man to the service and enjoyment of God, and therewith his investiture by God with dominion over, and property in, the earth and all things therein, and the divine command to possess and to replenish it with his seed ; was coin¬ cident with the creation of the first parents of our race.1 The other great act of God's providence preceding the Covenant of Works, was that he blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.* 1 Gen., i. 27-30. s Gen., n i_3. DIVINE ORDINANCES. 519 CHAP. XXVIII.] Throughout the Scriptures no two ideas are more perpetually held forth, than these two of the primeval consecration of man and of the Sabbath ; and amidst the great variety of aspects in which the latter is presented to us, we are never left in doubt that it is a fundamental element in the moral system of the uni¬ verse to which man appertains. Its primary conception is that of a hallowed rest, whose use shall be the special worship of God, the cultivation of the divine life in our own souls, and the doing of good to our fellow-men. It is, therefore, a divine ordinance containing in itself, in some sort, a summary of all human obli¬ gation ; our duty, namely, to God, to ourselves, and to each other. In this manner we see it connected with the whole work of God, as manifested in creation, in providence, and in grace. In this manner it is connected with the origin, course, and destiny of our race under both Covenants, under every dispensation of the Covenant of Grace, with reference to our entire being in this life, and to all the issues of it in the life to come. 2. I have already pointed out the fact of its institution in immediate connection with the work of creation, and as one of the two great acts of God's providence towards man in his estate of original perfection. And the reason of that connection, and of the connection of those two acts of God towards man with each other, is clearly and repeatedly given by him. The act commemorated, alike, God's work of creation, and God's ceasing from further creative work, in ineffable repose, when that work was done, and he saw that everything he had made was very good : and it ordained that man, the created and the blessed head of this whole work, should thus commemorate, forever, his own origin and blessedness, and the being, and glory, and work, and rest of God, in whose image he was created.1 And this was its special use, under both covenants — with such additions as in¬ creasing revelations of the grace of God made thereto — until the work of humiliation by Christ was complete, and he had risen from the dead. Its connection with the moral nature of man, and the moral Law written in that nature by God at the creation of man, is no less immediate. When God, at Sinai, restored upon two tables of stone, the sum of that unalterable rule of all duty required of man, and laid it at the foundation of his written 1 Gen., ii. 1-3 ; Exod., xx. 8-11. 520 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. word ; one of the four commandments of the first table, the sum of which as interpreted by Christ, is the duty of supreme love to God, was the distinct reiteration of this ordinance of the Sabbath day, as possessing the very highest moral obligation.1 Nor was its connection less close with the civil polity, ordained by God for his ancient people. The feast of the Passover which commemorated both the bondage and the deliverance of the Jewish people, the feast of Pentecost which commemorated the mvins: of the Law at Sinai, and the feast of Tabernacles which commemorated their pilgrimage from Egypt to Canaan — the greatest events in their history, were all as really sabbatical as they were national ; and both their years of Jubilee, the seventh and fiftieth — the most remarkable features of their political insti¬ tutions, were purely sabbatical years. Indeed the idea of hal¬ lowed time — time consecrated to God and a Sabbath for man, pervaded, thoroughly, every civil institution of that remarkable commonwealth. The ceremonial system added to the moral and political systems, completed the outward organization of the Jewish Dispensation ; and the idea of the divine and perpetual obligation of the Sabbath day was as completely fixed in the whole Levitical and sacrificial system, and in the Dispensation considered as a whole, as I have just shown it to have been in its moral and civil elements. In the wilderness no manna fell on the Sabbath day. Nothing might be brought in through the gates of Jerusalem on that day. And so completely was the right observance of the day a conspicuous token between God and his ancient people,2 that this has been continually made a pretext for rejecting the Sabbath, as a purely Jewish institution. In like manner, the New Testament Scriptures and the Christian Dispensation, have not only accepted and perpetuated, in a man¬ ner the most complete, this vital conception and ordinance ; but they have articulately enlarged its significance by investing the Sabbath with the idea of Redemption as well as the idea of Crea¬ tion — the idea of the divine Saviour as well as the idea of the omnipotent God. Christ proclaimed himself to be the Lord of the Sabbath day ;s his inspired Apostles called the day on which he rose from the dead — and repeatedly appeared to them — the Lord's day ;4 and, divinely authorized, they distinguished that 1 Exod., XX 8-11; Mat., xxii. 37,38. 2 isa>> iviii. 13, 14; Ezekiel, xx. 12-20. 3 Mat., xii. 8. 4 Rev., i. 10; John, xx. 19. 26. CHAP. XXVIII.] DIVINE ORDINANCES. 521 day as the perpetual Sabbath of the Christian Church : which that Church has observed through all ages, with a fidelity exactly proportioned to the measure of its grace. — And finally, this en¬ during and august summary of the sublime spiritual system of which God, and man, and creation, and providence, and redemp¬ tion are the everlasting elements — is projected into eternity ; and the assurance of a rest — a sabbatism — on the other side of the Jordan of death — even that heaven into whicl\ Jesus the Son of God, our great high priest has passed, is revealed to our faith as one of its very firmest supports.1 3. To us, then, this Sabbath day is a sign between God and our own souls, alike of our original perfection as his creatures, and of our crowning and endless blessedness as his redeemed children. It is besides a joy and a support to us, all along our weary pilgrimage, fighting as we go the good fight of faith Truly has our Lord said, The Sabbath was made for man ;2 and, therefore, how could it be, that the Son of man should not be Lord of the Sabbath ? Take from the Christian Church this very first gift of God to man, and who can conceive by what other means she can either gather or perfect God’s saints ? Take from a world full of sin, and toil, and ignorance, and mis¬ ery, this hallowed rest, and then imagine by what possibility the human race can be extricated from perpetual degradation in this life, and endless ruin in that which is to come P Silence, in the hearts of all God’s saints, those words of solemn admonition and of sweetest consolation, Kemember the Sabbath day ; and who could endure a life of temptation, and trial, and warfare, and sorrow — robbed of all hallowed rest on earth — robbed of all type, and sign, and seal of eternal rest to come ? And who should restore to God the glory and the praise of all penitent and believing souls — the glory and the praise of all created and redeemed souls — when the day of the Lord should return no more, and the voice of the bride be heard no more ? Many things are done and many are left undone, both by the Church and the world, which, while we see the omission or the act to be wrong, we see also some way to explain the motive for that which we condemn. But that the Church or the world could ever appre¬ hend the ordination of the Sabbath day — as anything else than a transcendent blessing to our ruined world — a transcendent. 2 Mark, ii. 21, 28. 1 Heb., iv. passim . 522 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. proof of the goodness and wisdom of God — seems to be incapa¬ ble of any explanation, that is not grounded in the total obdu¬ racy of our depraved nature. III. — 1. The covenant in eternity between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is the complete and is the most remote expres¬ sion of all God’s grace toward fallen man ; and each penitent sinner, a party in interest from the beginning through Christ his covenant head, becomes a party in fact from the moment of his union with Christ, in his effectual calling. Following the anal¬ ogy of this infinitely vast conception and example, God has been pleased from time to time, when he revealed to man some signal mercy which he had in store, to reduce the statement of it into the form of a covenant, and to add a sign and seal of the covenant in the form of a sacrament. — The Covenant of Works was the first example : and the special divine covenants under all dispen¬ sations of the covenant of grace, are additional examples more or less complete — all of which and their sacraments, whether extraordinary or permanent, are manifestations of that eternal covenant. Until the time of Abraham, these merciful dealings of God with man, were of a kind that did not create any visible and permanent separation of his people from the world, nor lead to the outward organization of his Church. But to the covenant which God made with him, which contained so many stipula¬ tions and such numerous and glorious promises, he added the sacrament of circumcision — a token of the covenant — and by it signified every stipulation and sealed every promise of it.1 The ideas involved in this remarkable transaction are very clear in themselves, and are reiterated, explained and enforced through¬ out the Scriptures. As it will be necessary for me to treat the two sacraments of the Christian Church separately, I shall in this place speak only of that which is common to all, as the sec¬ ond great ordinance of God. 2. God’s Covenant, whereby grace is given to men, is ex¬ hibited in permanent rites, appointed by himself.2 These rites are tokens, signs, and seals between God and his people, con¬ sidered both individually and collectively, of his covenant together with every promise made and every truth held forth in it, and also of every duty enjoined and every right conferred by it. 1 Gen., xvii. 9-16; Rom., i v. passim. 2 Gen., xvii. 9-14; Ex., xii. 1-20; 1 Cor., xi. 23-34; Matt., xxviii. 19; John, lii. 22. DIVINE ORDINANCES. 523 CHAP. XXVIII.] Above all, these rites bold forth Christ, the Mediator of that eternal covenant of Grace to which every sacrament of the Church of God appertains ; and they hold forth those blessings which he confers on all believers — most especially those benefits which are connected with the righteousness of faith ; the whole of which are thus signified and sealed, according to the measure of the true knowledge of God under each dispensation — and most conspicuously of all under the sacraments of the Gospel Church.1 We call these sacraments , after the Latin Fathers, who trans¬ lated the Greek word pvorrjpLov which is of such frequent occur¬ rence in the New Testament, not by the more obvious Latin word arcanum which the Romans had consecrated to their idola¬ trous mysteries, but by the word sacramentum whose previous use was chiefly juridical and military. The true sense of the original term is a divine secret ; and the proper signification of our term sacrament is the entire thing to which God gave the original name ; not merely the outward elements and rites, not simply the sign and the seal, but also the sublime spiritual reali¬ ties which all these hold forth to our faith. 3. Sacramental signs and ceremonies, of whatever kind, are to be clearly distinguished from moral obligations, which are binding upon all men : for the former are obligatory upon believers only, and are accessible only to them. They are insti¬ tuted and revealed by God ; are wholly destitute of natural existence, and of human authority ; and so both their obligation and their efficacy are divine. In order to any efficacy, there must be some external, visible, substantial sign, distinguishing them from mere oral instruction — and which in its application to us, becomes sensible and real. There must be a correspondence, indeed a union, between the sign and the thing signified ; not indeed natural, much less physical — but moral and spiritual, and at the same time constant and authoritative. There must be the things signified — the benefits held forth, taught, confirmed unto those to whom the outward signs are applied ; and those also properly qualified to receive those signs, and to partake of the blessings they signify — to seal which unto worthy recipients is the chief end of every Sacrament. And that great end must be clearly set forth and understood, in the proper use of every sacra¬ ment, as being accomplished in us, not by the inherent efficacy 1 Gal., iiL 27 ; 1 Cor., x. 16; John, vi. 27-65. 524 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. of the sacrament — nor by the power or intention of him who administers it — nor by the will of him who receives it — hut by the power of God who instituted it, and who exhibits and applies his grace by means of it. 4. There are, therefore, obvious and various ends and uses, all of them of the highest importance, to which sacraments are relevant, and to which God has caused them to be applied. Pri¬ marily, both of the sacraments of the Church after Abraham, and both of those of the Gospel Dispensation, served as visible marks of separation between those in covenant with God, and the world out of which he had called them to be his people. As sacred rites, God’s people by their first use make open profession of giving themselves away to him ; and by their after use renew their public profession of being his — with personal and solemn engagements to his service, through Christ, by the Gospel. As divine ordinances, God’s people by their use make profession of that true faith by which alone sinners can be saved ; holding forth in this manner the sum of the great truths and promises of God, and their acceptance of them all, and of Christ the sum of all — as a testimony to the world that lieth in sin. They serve, by their use, to realize the communion of all saints with each other, and with their common Lord, through the Holy Ghost, by the word of God ; and thus to promote amongst all saints, a more perfect fellowship, in the Church which is the Body of Christ, a more complete spiritual unity, a deeper sense of the supreme headship of Christ, and a fuller participation of the Holy Ghost. _ They serve as sensible, perpetual, and sacred manifestations, on the part of God, to the faith of his people, of the reality of his promises and the exactness of his fidelity in their performance ; according to his eternal covenant, in Jesus Christ, by his Spirit and his Word. They serve as perpetual means whereby the obedience and love of God’s penitent and believing children, are both manifested and strengthened ; wherein, by the use of God’s appointed signs and seals of his Covenant — all his promises, and Jesus Christ the sum of them all, are so made over to them, that the merits of Christ and the work of the Spirit, and the consolations of the Gospel, are more and more effectual in their souls — to their great growth in grace, and increase in all spiritual gifts. And finally, they serve, by their true and lawful use, as a perpetual exhibition of the ex- DIVINE ORDINANCES. 525 CHAP. XXVIII.] istence, the life, and all the infallible marks of the Church of the Living God, to which they appertain by his gift ; manifesting the power of God’s word and ordinances, and the efficacy of that ministry bestowed on it by Christ, and in whose hands is the administration of the sacraments of the Christian Church. 5. The nature of all sacraments is such that their mere use cannot insure salvation — nor their mere absence defeat it. Being only of positive obligation, and not in their nature moral, they are in their nature variable, and in their use efficacious only in the way and to the extent revealed by God, and only by reason of his blessing on their use. So far from involving salvation, there¬ fore, their efficacy is indissolubly connected with faith in Christ, and they cannot of themselves confer any grace. On the other hand, being ordained of God, and their lawful use enforced by divine commands and promises ; their neglect, perversion, and coiTuption are not only heinous sins, hut, according to the gross¬ ness of the abuse of them, are infallible proofs of unbelief, of backsliding, of depravity, of apostacy. Considered as outward and visible signs, of inward and invisible grace ; they would be pertinent to any grace, and might be held forth in any sign, that God would appoint. In effect these principles and truths have had a wide application, as every student of the Scriptures is aware; and perhaps the tendency of those who have expounded those sacred oracles, has been rather to enlarge than to limit the application of the great principle on which the idea of all sacra¬ ments rests, namely, the confirmation of God’s promises to man, by outward signs and seals. It is certain — as I have already said, that true sacraments can have no efficacy except through the work of the divine Spirit in us ; and that it is through our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, that the efficacy imparted to them by the Spirit produces its effects in us. And since the word of God is the infallible rule of our faith, and Christ crucified is the spe¬ cific object of it ; whatever can he accepted as a true sacrament of the gospel Church, must have the precise warrant, in that word, of that Saviour ; and must hold forth that Saviour in his person, his work, his promises, and all his benefits. 6. The number of ordinary and perpetual sacraments of the Covenant of Grace, is but two. The truths and principles upon which they rest are permanent — and the essential characteristics of those divine rites which signify and seal to us the blessings 526 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. and benefits which the Redeemer confers on penitent sinners, must also be constant. We need, and he secures for us, on the one hand pardon and acceptance with God, and on the other re¬ storation to his lost image. This is the sum of whatever form of revealed salvation for fallen man through the Mediator ; the sum of what is held forth in the sacraments of the Covenant of Grace — however their form may have been divinely varied. That change of form has occurred but once — and will occur no more : for the state of the revealed Knowledge of God, so increased from Ahraham to Christ as to require the change of their form under the Gospel Church, is constant under it till the second coming of the Son of Man. I have shown in another place, how the insti¬ tution and use of these sacraments necessarily involved the visi¬ bility and organization of the Church of God, and the visible and sacramental rejection of the world by him ; how, therefore, their institution was so long delayed ; and how, coincidently with their institution, and again with the change in their form, all things relating to the Kingdom of God considered as held forth in his children organized into a visible and separate Church, received successively their shape and direction. The Church is before the Sacraments, before every ordinance of God bestowed on it ; even the Sabbath day, was ordained and hallowed after God had created man, and consecrated him to his service. But the Sacra¬ ments are before the Church considered as visible, organized, and separate from the world ; and are, together with all the other ordinances bestowed on her by God, the outward means of pro¬ ducing her organization, of perpetuating her existence, and of achieving her triumph. The Sacrament of Circumcision was im¬ mediately connected with the Abrahamic Covenant, which is, in a manner, the great charter of the Church of God, and of the human race. The Sacrament of the Passover, formed the point of separation between the Abrahamic and Mosaic dispensations — appertaining to both ; and the Jewish institutions, possessing no sacrament peculiar to themselves, accepted these two, and by means of them perpetuated the sacramental unity of the visible Church, during the long interval between the dispensation of Abraham and that of Christ. Christ came, not to destroy but to fulfil. A priest forever after the order of Melchizedek — an order above and before Abraham himself — the end of all the priest¬ hood, all the sacrifices, all the righteousness of the law of Moses; CHAP. XXYIII.] DIVINE ORDINANCES. 527 he accepted these primeval sacraments, used them, ratified them, changed their form, fulfilled them into a perfect accordance with the perfect form of the Knowledge of God. He came by water and blood — the Spirit being his witness. In heaven the Father and the Word bear record ; in earth, the water and the blood bear record ; the Spirit in this great spiritual dispensation, bears record both in heaven and in earth ; in heaven, as one with the Father and the Word; in earth as agreeing in one with the water and the blood ; and this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.1 In the Sacrament of Baptism by water, and in the sacramental use of the symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ, therefore, there is a threefold re¬ cord in earth — agreeing with a threefold record in heaven. — to the Son of God as the Saviour of the world. IV. — 1. The Church of God to which he has given the Sab¬ bath and the Sacraments, has by his ordination an instituted Worship. In a previous chapter I have discussed the question of worship acceptable to God, considered as one of the infallible marks of the true Church ; and have treated the whole idea of it, in connection with a pure faith on one side, and a holy life on the other, as obedience rendered with a willing, subject, and trustful heart, to the Triune God, by his people, according to his law. That worship may be considered as personal, domestic and social, or public : it is public worship, as connected with tbe true Church, and as a divine ordinance, which I am now to con¬ sider very briefly. I understand the Scriptures to assert that the existence of God is manifested by God himself, in the con¬ viction of every soul created by him ; and that, on this account, invisible things concerning him — amongst the rest his eternal power and Godhead — are clearly manifested to men, by the things he has created ; and thus every man is left without excuse. Thus knowing God, men neither glorify him nor rejoice in him ; but reject him and corrupt themselves, until at length they transfer the glory due to the incorruptible God, to images of corruptible man, and birds and beasts, and creeping things. Then God gives them over to all degrading sins, to change his truth into a lie, to a mind utterly reprobate, and to the fellow¬ ship of all whom he judges worthy of death.2 On the other hand, the Gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation 1 1 John, v. 6-9. 2 Rom., i. 18-32. 528 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. to every one that believetli ; for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith ; as it is written, The just shall live by faith.1 In effect, atheism is incompatible with the nature and convictions of any created being, who has reason and con¬ science ; and on the other hand, the recognition and worship of the true God, are incompatible with the nature and desires of any created being having reason and conscience — who is depraved and left without the grace of God. Religion and worship, man must have. Left to himself in his fallen state, they will cer¬ tainly be false — probably brutal. If pure and true, they must be revealed by God, and perpetuated through his grace. 2. All religious worship should be rendered to the true God the triune God is the only true God ;3 no religious worship should be rendered to any other being.4 I have proved at large in previous chapters, that the word of God is the only infallible rule of faith, obedience, life — and in the most special sense, of all religious worship ; with reference to which, the law of God is the rule prescribed by him to us, of all that we ought to do and to avoid, under the penalty of death to the disobedient, and the promise of life to the obedient.5 The special manner in which God requires man to approach him, is in the way of spiritual worship ; and in the first table of the Law he has revealed, in the form of a covenant binding and unalterable forever, the sum of all duty due directly to himself ; and this sum our Lord has explained to be supreme love to God.6 All worship rendered to God by fallen man, must be rendered through the Mediator of the Covenant of Grace ; who is Jesus Christ the Son of God and the Saviour of the world.7 It must be rendered also by the help of the Holy Ghost ;8 and according to the will of God.9 And seeing that God is a spirit, they who worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth :10 and all who do thus worship him, are his covenant people — and being kept by the power of God, through faith unto salvation, will inherit eternal life.11 This summary, brief as it is, of the revealed will of God con¬ cerning the worship due to him ; discloses with perfect clearness, I Rom., i. 16, IT. 2 Deut., vi. 13 ; x. 20. s 1 Jno.f v. 7 ; 2 Cor., xiii. 14 ; Mat., xxviii. 19. 4 Matt., iv. 10 ; Ex., xx. 3. 5 Matt., xix. 17 ; Rom., i. 18-32. 6 Ex., xx. 1-11 ; Mat., xxii. 37, 38. 7 1 Tim., ii. 5 ; John, xiv. 6. 8 Rom., yiii. 26; Eph., ii. 18. 8 1 John, y. 14. 10 John, iv. 24. II Phil., iii. 3; 1 Pet., i. 5. 529 CHAP. XXVIII.] BIVINE ORDINANCES. its object, its nature, its means, its rule, its obligation, and its end ; and at the same time discloses the most fundamental truths concerning God, concerning ourselves, and concerning those great relations between him and ourselves which we express by the word religion. When we come to apply the revealed truths which I have stated, to the practical life of God's visible Church, so as to determine with certainty the particulars of that divine worship which he has instituted for her ; we find the whole mat¬ ter revealed with the clearness and the completeness which dis¬ tinguish God's word. I shall not in this place for lack of room, attempt to disclose the particulars of God's instituted public worship, which were peculiar to any preceding dispensations ; but confine myself to those which appertain to the Gospel Church. And in summing up the chief of these from the sacred Scriptures, I will endeavour to classify them in such a way as to avoid all confusion ; the object being, not to comment on them, but to show what they are, and that they are of divine authority. 3. There is a class of these particulars of which it may be said, they are stated in their recurrence, general in their appli¬ cation, and universal in their obligation. The chief of these are the sanctification of the Sabbath day ; public worship by the congregations of God's people, especially on that day ; and the giving of alms for the poor, and for other pious purposes, as an act of religious worship. The sanctification of the Sabbath, as a duty we owe to God, is expressly revealed as a part of the moral law ; its indissoluble connection with all recognition of the true God by man, and all recognition by God of any people as his, is manifested throughout the Scriptures ; and its relation to the Lord Jesus is so close, that on it he rose from the dead, on it continually appeared to his disciples, on it finally ascended up into heaven, and in commemoration of him his inspired Apostles changed the day of the Jewish Sabbath, and called the Chris¬ tian Sabbath, the Lord's day.1 The stated assembling of the gathered congregations of God's people on the Christian Sabbath, for his solemn worship, was obligatory and habitual from the foundation of the Gospel Church ; and the weekly contribution of the saints to pious purposes, was as distinctly commanded, as any other divine ordinance of its class.2 Nor was either of the 1 Ex., XX. 8-11; Matt., v. II, 18; Rev., i. 10; Heb., iv. 3-11. 2 Heb., x. 25; Acts, ii. 42; xx. 7 ; 1 Cor., xvi. 1-4; Gal., ii. 9, 10. vol. ii. 34 530 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. particulars just stated, new to the Gospel Church. For under every preceding dispensation the sanctity of the Sabbath had been a fundamental part of revealed religion ; the synagogue worship goes back, possibly, to the captivity in Egypt — certainly to the captivity in Babylon ; and the service of God by means of our worldly substance, religiously appropriated according to his will, is as ancient as religion itself, and thoroughly pervaded the institutions of Moses. The Church of God ought never to forget, that special blessings and duties rightly performed, go to¬ gether. 4. There is another class of these particulars of which it may be said, as of the preceding, that they are stated in their recur¬ rence, and universal in their obligation, but, unlike the others, they are special — not general — in their application. They ap¬ pertain to each congregation, severally, with all the force of a divine appointment, and embrace its stated duties and privil¬ eges, as an assembly habitually meeting for the worship of God. I had occasion in a previous chapter, when treating of purity of worship as an infallible mark of the true Church ; to state all the divine ordinances for public worship in each Christian congre¬ gation, and to adduce Scripture proof of what I taught. — I, therefore, limit myself here to a brief recapitulation. It is the ordinance of God, plainly declared in his word, that in the stated public worship of each Christian congregation, the sacred Scrip¬ tures shall be read in the hearing of the people, prayer shall be offered to God through Jesus Christ, God's praises shall be sung by the congregation, the gospel of the grace of God shall be preached to the people, and the blessing of God shall be in¬ voked upon them. It is thus that God has provided, in the stated worship of every congregation, for the manifestation of his own glory, for the comfort and edification of his saints, for the conversion of sinners unto himself, for restraining and rebuking the iniquity of the impenitent, and for the perpetuation and in¬ crease of the Church itself. 5. The last class of these particulars, though all of them are ordained of God, and all as ordinances of God have relation, more or less intimate and direct, to his Church ; that relation varies too much amongst the several particulars, to admit of any general definition of it, that would embrace all and be at once brief and exact. The administration of the sacraments, 531 CHAP. XXVIII.] DIVINE ORDI N A N C E S. in each particular congregation, to all such as are entitled to re¬ ceive them, is of stated, but at the same time of occasional and special obligation.1 The infliction of Church censures consid¬ ered as the public execution of sentence ; and in like manner the public restoration of such as have been separated from the Church by due process of Discipline ; are both parts of the in¬ stituted worship of God, of only special obligation.2 Public and solemn fasting and humiliation — as well as public and solemn thanksgiving, are divine ordinances of a peculiar kind ; for while it is competent to the civil power, as appointed of God, to ap¬ point both with reference to the commonwealth ; it is the duty of the whole Church upon occasions relevant to the whole, and of each particular congregation upon occasions relevant to it, to observe these ordinances of worship, whose obligation is only special — and may arise very often, or very seldom.3 It cannot be said that the rite of marriage appertains in any way to the instituted worship of God — •nor that the burial of the dead is a spiritual ordinance obligatory upon the Church : nevertheless, marriage is treated in the Scriptures as being far more than a merely civil contract ; and the relation of temporal death to sin, together with the certainty of the resurrection of the body, impart to the burial of our dead the deepest solemnity. It is in accordance with the revealed will of God, that both particulars should be attended with special religious solemnities. — The office bearers and government of the Church, both of which are ordi¬ nances of God, have the most intimate connection with the mat¬ ters I have been discussing. But as it will be necessary to treat those topics more fully, they are passed over here. The especial fitness of the former for their respective places in every congre¬ gation, and their diligent discharge of the duties appertaining to their several stations ; are, next to the blessing of God, the decisive element in the practical effect of every particular in the instituted worship of the Church of God. Y. — 1. Though the public infliction and the public removal of Church censures, are particulars of the worship appointed of God ; it appertains to the government ordained of God for his Church, to determine the particular cases in which censures shall 1 Matt., xxvi. 26-29 ; xxviii. 19 ; Acts, ii. 41, 42 ; 1 Cor., xi. 23-29. 9 Matt., xviii. 15-18; 1 Cor., v. 1-5; 2 Cor., ii. 6-8. 3 Luke, v. 35 ; Psalm 1. 14 ; Phil., iv. 6. 532 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. be inflicted or removed, according to the divine law and the merits of each case ; and the practical administration of that law of G-od, both as a function of government, and as a part of wor¬ ship, is what is specialty meant by the Discipline of the Church, which is one of the great ordinances bestowed upon her by God. The commonwealth is, both in thought and in fact, before and above any particular form which is given to what we call govern¬ ment ; and that again is before and above any particular institu¬ tions which are created for the community, in connection with the co-existing form of government. But in whatever state of advancement any commonwealth may be, and whatever may be the form of its government, and whatever may be its peculiar in¬ stitutions, whether civil, political, or social ; it is certain that the just, wise, and faithful administration of its government and institutions, is indispensable in the accomplishment of whatever they are designed or competent to effect. In the Christian Church considered as a free commonwealth, which it is, there is this great peculiarity, that the community itself exists after a spiritual manner, and for spiritual ends — and that the visible form which it acquires is prescribed by God in the sacred Scriptures, together with all government and all institutions relevant thereto. The just, wise, and faithful administration of the government, institutions, and whole interests of such a community, is, upon the conditions stated, perfectly vital : and when, in addition, God gives to this universal administration the dignity of a divine ordinance, and bestows it upon the Church as at once a special command and a special blessing ; the Discipline of the Church becomes a matter not merely necessary to her peace, her edifica¬ tion, and her purity — but indispensable to her continued existence as the visible Kingdom of God. According as the laws and or¬ dinances of God are administered, more or less truly and exactly, in the Kingdom of God, by the government he has established in that Kingdom ; the Kingdom itself is more or less prosperous, more or less glorious. But when they cease to be administered •rjfi£v ovv avrcj 6ia tov fSaTruGfxaTog, &c.; the Greek, as well as the sense, m both passages, making the Baptism — not a burial nor a similitude of one — but a means unto our mystical joint burial with Christ. 2 Col., il 9-12. 568 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. with his resurrection ; since we must be ingrafted into him, if we would live with him ; and it is shown how that ingrafting and that fellowship are signified and sealed in our baptism. For by it our death to sin and our resurrection to righteousness, are sealed in Christ ; and the burial which attends one, and the newness of life which attends the other, are both not only in but with Christ : and therefore both are through baptism. Which is precisely equivalent to saying, that baptism seals our ingraft¬ ing into Christ, and our purification by the Spirit. The Apostle does not say that our baptism is our burial, or that it is the similitude of a burial, or a resurrection. But he says it is a means whereby our burial and that of Christ become a joint burial, and whereby our resurrection and that of Christ also became joint. It is such a means, he says, through faith, — which is the work of God who raised Christ from the dead ; and our complete¬ ness in him, thus signified in baptism — was equally signified in cir¬ cumcision. Now our baptism being, indubitably, neither Christ's burial nor our own, it can be truly said that by means of it we have a joint burial with Christ, only in a mystical sense : which is exactly what is said. In a real, but in a spiritual sense — that is mystically — sacramentally — the people of God have a joint death, burial, and resurrection with the Saviour : and baptism signifies, and seals all three. But it seals neither of them by immersing a person in water, as a representation of the fact and manner of Christ’s burial and resurrection : but it seals them all by the ap¬ plication of water to the person, as a sign of the purification wrought in us by the Holy Ghost, who was purchased by the death of the Saviour who redeemed us with his blood, and sent from heaven as the Comforter of his people — the crowning proof of his glorification. 4. I have, said the blessed Lord, a baptism to be baptized with ; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished l1 Had that baptism a solitary point, identical with any one in ordinary Christian baptism P And yet how many have incurred, and do still incur, that baptism of anguish, with Christ, and for Christ ?3 Again, we have the word used in a comparatively low spiritual sense, to signify so much of the things of the Lord as was taught by John the Baptist : and that even after Christian baptism had 1 Luke, xii. 50 ; Matt., xx. 22, 23 ; Mark, x. 38, 39. a Rom., viii. IV, 18, 37 ; 2 Cor,i. 3-7. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 569 spread over the Roman empire.1 Again, we have the word applied in an exclusive and strict sense by the Apostle Peter, who of all men ought to have known what Christian baptism was ; to sig¬ nify the outward ordinance, calling it a figure, an antitype of the Ark in which Noah was saved.2 And again, it goes so high as to become a baptism with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.3 Four senses of the word baptism, each of them scriptural, and most distinct; and yet neither of them the sense intended by Christ when he instituted the sacrament of baptism, and commanded his Apostles to teach all nations, and to baptize his followers in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.4 And if there were a thousand scriptural senses, and a thousand more heathen senses, in which the word had been used, should that prevent the Lord Jesus from using it in a specific sense, for a special purpose ? What if some hundreds of its other senses did better accord, in the judgment of many thousands of men, learned and unlearned, with the original meaning which they suppose the word had, or should have had, than the sense the Lord gave to it did ; should that oblige the Lord to mean what he did not mean ? Nay if countless men, who judge themselves to be learned, are sure that one special sense is the true, original sense of a term afterwards used in many senses ; should that oblige us to torture language, human and divine, until we extort, no matter at what cost of reason and faith, the meaning which satisfies this multitude ? For my own part, I admit the right of the divine Redeemer to establish what ordinances he pleased ; to give them what names he thought proper ; and to attach to the terms he used, the sense he considered most appropriate. Thus accepted, the Scriptures do unquestionably teach, as I think I have proved, and as the true followers of Christ have commonly and always believed, that what the Lord meant by baptism was a divine mystery, administered by his Apostles, ^and to be administered’ to all his disciples to the end of the world, by duly authorized stewards of his mysteries ; that the element used in this divine ordinance, was water ; that the administration of it was directed by the Saviour to be in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; and that it was designed to be, and has continued according to the promise of Christ to i Acts, xviii. 24-26; xix. 1-7. 2 1 Peter, iii. 20, 21. 3 Matt., iii. 11 ; Luke, iii. 16 4 Matt., xxviii. 18, 19. 570 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. the present time, one of the two sacraments of the Gospel Church. So far, there is probably no dispute amongst evangelical Christians. I add, that this sacrament was designed and understood by his Apostles, to be administered to the infant seed of believers, as I have endeavoured to prove : that it was designed by Christ and understood by his Apostles, to be administered by the application of water to the subject, that is by affusion, or the pouring or sprinkling of the water upon the subject, and not by immersing him in the water ; as I will attempt to prove. 5. In considering the intention of the Lord, as to the mode in which water should be used in the administration of this sacra¬ ment, which intention if it can be ascertained is conclusive on all who believe in him ; some of the grounds upon which we are now able to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion, may be very briefly stated, somewhat after the following manner. (a) Nature of the Grace , of the Seal , of their Relation to each other , and all to Christ . It is, as I have proved, the doc¬ trine of the word of God and of the Church of Christ, that the fundamental idea of a sacrament is, that it is an outward and visible sign of inward and invisable grace ; and that the great inward grace signified in baptism, by the sacramental use of water, in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is the purification of the soul by the blood of Christ, through the work of the Spirit. Now the whole of this is from God to us : done to us from above, not done by us. It is the grace of God, the blood of Christ, the work of the Spirit, applied to us. The water which signifies it all, and signifies by its puri¬ fying virtue the effect of all, and that by the institution of Christ, should also be applied to us. Which is confirmed by the decla¬ ration that we are elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and% sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ and the further declaration that the pouring out of the Spirit of God, is the characteristic work of the only dispensation in which water is a sacramental element.2 It is the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus, it is the outpouring of the Spirit of God on us, it is the efficacy of these which produces the inward grace, which the water sig¬ nifies. Unless we are expressly told the contrary, how are we to i 1 Peter, i. 2 ; Ileb., xii. 24. 3 Joel, ii. 28, 29 ; Acts, ii 17, 18. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 571 avoid the conclusion that the water, also, must he poured or sprinkled on us ? (b) Relation of Sprinkling Blood and Water , always , to pu¬ rification and to Christ. The use of both water and of blood in the sacred mysteries of the Church of God, was habitual and constant under the institutions of Moses from their origin. But that ancient form of the Church, was simply a dispensation of the Messianic Kingdom, of which the Saviour of the world was the head and Lord : and everything in it was his, and pointed continually to him. Moreover he was a Jew, and his ministry was passed as a minister of the circumcision ; and his Apostles were all Jews ; and his whole life was passed in scrupulous and perfect observance of the entire righteousness that was by the law. Now when the covenant between God and his people was ratified after the giving of the law at Sinai; Moses by the command of God, sprinkled half the blood of the sacrifices offered to God upon the altar, and the rest of the blood he sprinkled upon the people, saying, Behold the blood of the covenant which the Lord hath made with you.1 The Apostle Paul in allusion to this, and in the transcendent exaltation of the Christian above the Jewish dispensation, says, We are come to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh bet¬ ter things than that of Abel.2 It was a perpetual statute, that all who were ceremonially unclean by any contact with the dead, should have the water of separation applied to them, as a puri¬ fication from sin : which was done by sprinkling the water upon the person :3 and upon the great day of Atonement, once every year, the high priest sprinkled the blood of the sacrifice even upon the mercy seat, which covered the ark :4 both of which with other ordinances, the Apostle Paul recounts in illustrating what the Lord Jesus had done, and adds, How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot unto God, purge your consciences from dead works to serve the living God?5 Let me add the remarkable declaration of Paul, that all Israel that went up out of Egypt were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea :6 and that of Isaiah, in one of his most illustrious prophecies of Christ, So shall he sprinkle many nations :7 and that of Ezekiel, when expressly 1 Ex., xxiv. 6-8. 2 Heb., xii. 24 3 Numb., xix. passim. 4 Lev., xvi. 14 5 Heb., ix. passim. 6 1 Cor., x. 2. ? Isa., lii. 15. 572 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. . foretelling that blessed time, when God would give his people a new heart, and put a new spirit within them, Then I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean.1 Let these exam¬ ples suffice, to illustrate the mode in which blood and water were used by the authority of Christ himself, in the sacred mysteries of the ancient Church ; the form in which these ideas lay in the mind of every child of God on earth, when Christ instituted the sacrament of baptism with water, as the sign of the sprinkling of his purifying blood — the form in which they could not but lay in the mind of the Jewish people on the day of Pentecost when the first Christian baptism was administered to three thousand Jews. In the absence of any explicit statement that he meant something else, how can we doubt that he intended the water in baptism to signify a purification, and to be sprinkled or poured on the subject ? (c) Sense , original and actual, of the Words personally used by Christ . The language of the New Testament is a somewhat peculiar dialect of the Greek : though that is not the language which Christ spoke, and in which he taught. We have those sacred writings in that tongue, by inspiration of the Holy Ghost: and accept them as they are, as infallible truth concerning what our Saviour said, and did, and meant. It is extremely easy for those whose minde are already made up that a particular mode of baptism is exclusively valid ; to make positive assertions concerning the original meaning and only proper use and signifi- cancy of words in this peculiar language and in classic Greek ; neither of which the bulk of mankind know anything of, and which very few persons understand thoroughly. I cannot, of course, enter at large into discussions bearing on that aspect of the subject, in such a Treatise as this. What is proper here, on such a point, with reference to such a subject, is to state my own convictions, and support them as briefly as possible. The wonder is that it should ever have been supposed, that wre are competent to determine either the laws of thought or of speech in such a manner ; as by them to fix an absolute and invariable sense beforehand, to which the utterance of the Cre¬ ator, both of thought and speech, shall be limited. The utmost to which we are competent, is some just knowledge of the sub¬ ject and the language, and then the careful consideration of 1 Ezekiel, xxxvi. 25. 573 CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. what God has actually said and done. The sacred use of water in connection with their religious rites, which I have alluded to in the case of the Hebrews, is known to have been common to all ancient nations — the Egyptians, the inhabitants of Judea, the Persians, the early Romans, as well as the Greeks. If it were positively certain that the mode of this sacred use, espe¬ cially among the Greeks, was exclusively by immersing the person in water ; it would prove nothing with regard to the in¬ tention of Christ as to the sacred use of water by him in the Christian Church : not even if he should adopt the very words they had previously used in their mysteries. This obvious truth is illustrated in the frequency with which words in common use by Greek authors, are employed in the New Testament in a sense materially, sometimes wholly different from the classical sense, in order to express ideas peculiar to the Church, and to salvation. And surely, in the whole system of Jesus, nothing is more peculiar than the idea of the union of the soul with him, through the virtue of his shed blood, applied to us in the work of a divine agent. I deny, however, that there was anything in the original signification, or the previous use whether common or sacred, of the word employed to express the intention of Jesus in the institution of this sacrament,* to authorize the inference that he meant the subject of it to be immersed in water. On the contrary the original sense of the term (i danro)) from which all the rest are derived, was, when applied to things common, that their state was changed by changing the surface — and when ap¬ plied to things sacred, that their state was changed by purifying them ; which, in effect, accords with the idea of baptism, by which the state of man, both external and internal, is signified as being changed ; changed outwardly by his becoming a cove¬ nanted follower of Christ, and inwardly by his being born of the Spirit. In the common use of the terms, they signify any change of colour by dyeing garments, or anything else, even the hair ; the glazing of pottery ; the painting, varnishing and gild¬ ing of pillars, statues, or anything else ; the cleansing of house¬ hold vessels and furniture by the use of water, and the like ; some of which uses can be easily proved by citations from the New Testament, and all of them, and many more to the same purport, are common in the Greek classics. The use of the * Ben rTi&vTeg — flan — panru. 574 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. words attributed to Christ by the sacred writers, is remarkable. He told Nicodemus, early in his ministry, that in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, a man must be born of water and of the Spirit j1 but it was not until after his resurrection that he explained this use of water to be baptism in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ;2 nor till then that he explained the great difference between John's baptism, and his own.3 In one of his parables he put the word f3axp7] into the mouth of a man in hell ; Send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water ;4 and as he celebrated the last Supper, he used it again in the same sense.* He that dippeth his hand with me in the dish : one of the twelve that dippeth with me in the dish : he it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it ; it is thus our translators have rendered the places.5 He used the word again, when he spake of his own cup and bap¬ tism alluding doubtless to his agony in the garden of Geth- semane and on the Cross ; to the whole, it may be, that befell him, from the last Supper till his resurrection.6 Once he applied the word (iauTiopia to the baptism of John, demanding of those who questioned his own authority, whence that baptism was.7 These are the chief instances, if not the whole, in which it is known that Jesus personally used these words, either before or after his resurrection. He applied them once to the baptism of John, once to the wetting of the tip of the finger, once to a piece of food put in a dish, and to the putting of a man's hand in a dish for food, twice to his own approaching agony ; and after his resurrection, he used them once in instituting the sacrament, once in exhibiting its relation to salvation, and once in pointing out the difference between John's baptism with water, and the immediately approaching baptism of the Holy Ghost, which John had so distinctly taught was peculiar to Christ, and out of all comparison superior to his own. Upon this state of case, presented in this paragraph, and remembering what was shown before, what pretext is there for asserting that the teaching of Jesus establishes immersion as a way, much less the exclusive way of Christian baptism P 1 John, iii. 5. 2 Mat., xxviii. 19 ; Mark, xvk 16. 3 Acts, i. 5 ; xi. 16. 4 Luke, xvi. 24. * EfifSaxfiar — e/upairTOfj.£vog — Jarpac. 6 Mat., xxvl 23 ; Mark, xiv. 20; John, xiiu 26. \ BrnTTiG/ua — ftairTioOrivai — panT^o/iai — ficnrTKjfhjGeoOe. 6 Mat., xx. 21, 22 ; Mark, x. 38, 39 ; Luke, xii. 49, 50 ; xxi. 25 7 Mark, xi. 30 ; Luke, xx. 4. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 575 (d) Sense of Christ’s special Explanation. In connection with his command to await the outpouring of the Spirit, Christ said to his Apostles, For John truly baptized with water ; hut ye shall he baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.1 Peter says that when the Holy Grhost fell on the Gen¬ tiles in the house of Cornelius, he remembered the words of the Lord, which he repeats ; and they led him to baptize those first Gentile Christians.2 Thus remarkably did Christ fulfil the prom¬ ise he had made, that the Comforter should teach them all things, and bring all things to their remembrance.3 Thus remarkably did he make Peter the honoured instrument of opening the Church of God, once more, to the nations so long rejected ; according to his promise to him, when Peter made that great confession of him.4 And thus completely did this explanation by Christ, of the baptism he had instituted, control its administration, as we shall afterwards see,, both to the Jews and Gentiles. What I insist on here is, that those decisive words of Christ, oblige us to understand that his baptism was to be administered with water, and not in — much less into water ; that the water was to be ap¬ plied to the person — not that the person was to be immersed in the water. The Greek words are the same, in both the passages already cited from the Acts of the Apostles.'"' The language in the English is also very nearly the same in both passages, and exactly expresses the sense ; baptized with water — baptized with the Holy Ghost : a form of expression, and of contrast, common in the Hew Testament. But the Greek form of expression in the words used by Christ, is not the same in both branches of the statement. When he says John baptized with water, he puts the noun ( vdan ) in the dative case, after the verb, and omits the preposition (ev) : and when he says they should be baptized with the Holy Ghost, he uses the preposition before the dative case ( [ev nveyfiaTi ayu ,)). In the former case it is John, and the person baptized, and the means, the element, with which as the case used shows : in the latter case it is Christ, and the person baptized and the divine Agent with whose concurrence, as the case used shows. It is noteworthy that the writer of the Acts of the Apostles, when repeating the words of John the Baptist, i Acts, i. 5 . 2 Acts, xi. 1 6. 8 John, xiv. 26. 4 Matt., xvi. 16-19. * "On I uavvrjg uev cfiannev vtian, v/ucig tie (ianTLadrioeaOe kv KvevfiaTt uyUf). 576 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. expresses the same sense as to the water, by changing the p»hrase a little ; putting the noun ( vdan ) before the verb, in the dative, and without the preposition ; at the same time preserving the exact form in what related to Christ. Matthew and Mark re¬ peating the words of John the Baptist, use the preposition before both nouns, in the dative case, after the verb :l while John once conforms to that usage, and once uses the noun before the verb, prefixing both the preposition and the arti¬ cle.2 These are the various forms in which the statements concerning the relation of J olm's baptism and that of Christ to each other, are given in the words of both of them, by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The unquestionable sense of all the statements seems to me to be, first, that we must be baptized ivith water, and not into water ; and, secondly, even if with water were proved to mean in water in the sense of completely wetting the person, it would be as remote as ever from immersion, that is, into the water. Such modes of expression as I have pointed out, oblige us to understand that the water, and the blood, and the Spirit are applied to us : and I suppose it to be impossible to find, or to construct, a Greek sentence analogous to these re¬ markable passages, which could, without violence, be understood otherwise. If this be so, the very words used by Christ, after his resurrection, to his Apostles, in exposition both of John's bap¬ tism and of that which he had instituted, oblige us to see that Christian baptism is to be administered, not by immersion, but by sprinkling or pouring water on the subject. (e) Sense attributed to these Words by the Apostles of ths Lord. The sense intended by Christ to be affixed to the terms he used in instituting the Sacrament of baptism ; is precisely determined by the use made of them by his Apostles, who re¬ ceived the command from him, and executed it with plenary au¬ thority and inspiration. Their account of the matter is to the following purport : Christ loved the Church, and gave himself for it : that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glori¬ ous Church, not having spot, nor wrinkle, nor any such thing ; but that it should be holy and without blemish.8 Here is the love and the sacrifice of Christ — the power of the divine word — the power and effects of the divine Spirit — the product of all, the glo- 1 Matt., iii. 11 ; Mark, i. 8. 3 John, i. 26-33. 3 Eph., v. 25-27. SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 577 CHAP. XXIX.] rious Church ; but in the midst of these, is the cleansing of the Church with the washing of water.* Baptism, therefore, rep¬ resents the powerful washing of the blood and Spirit of Christ, by which we have access, by a new and living way to the holiest of all ; to which, says the Apostle, Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.1 How then is it possible for the heart to be purified, by having it sprinkled ? Paul tells us it is by sprinkling it with the blood of Christ, that the conscience is purged from dead works.2 And as to sprinkling the blood of Christ on the heart, Peter tells us that this sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, is through sanctification of the Spirit :3 and to clear the matter still fur¬ ther, he adds that by the washing of our bodies with pure water in baptism, he does not understand the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God.4 For it is not by works of righteousness that we have done, but according to the mercy of God our Saviour, that he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost : which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Sa¬ viour.5 But what Paul had called the washing of water in the Epistle to the Ephesians, he calls here the washing of regenera- tion.f Baptism, therefore, is the seal of our ingrafting into Christ, and into his body which is the Church ; a seal, also, of our puri¬ fication by the work of the Holy Ghost ; and the washing with water in it, is not to cleanse the filthiness of the flesh, but signi¬ fies the work of the Spirit in the conscience, — and is after the manner of the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, upon our hearts. Christ said to Nicodemus, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God ;6 and the declaration of Paul is precise, that God saves us, according to his mercy, by the washing of regeneration, and the renewing of the Holy Ghost.7 According to the word of God, the blood of Jesus Christ the Son of God cleanseth us from all sin ;8 even that Jesus who came not by water only, but by water and blood, as the spirit of truth beareth witness.9 And so it is * KaOapicac rep "kovTpti tov vdaroc. 1 Heb., x. 22. 2 Heb., ix. 13, 14. 3 1 Peter, i. 2. 41 Peter, iii. 21. 5 Titus, iii. 4-6. \ Aca Tiovrpov na^ryyevecnag. 6 John, iii. 5. 7 Titus, iii. 4, 5^ 8 1 John, i. 7. 9 1 John, v. 6. VOL. II. 37 578 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. declared, Ye are washed, ye are sanctified, ye are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.1 Now, that this sacred mystery, this baptism, this washing, this sprink¬ ling,0 was the sacramental application of water to the person of him who received the ordinance ; thereby signifying and sealing his ingrafting into Christ, and his purification by the Holy Ghost ; is as undeniably certain, as it is that the Greek tongue is capable of expressing these ideas. As to any teaching of the divine Scrip¬ tures, that this sacrament is a burial, or an immersion ; that it is an exorcism, or a charm, or that it has any inherent efficacy, or that it is to be accompanied with any ceremonies beyond those necessary in the solemn application of the water to the person : nothing of that sort is to be found in the word of God ; but a great deal irreconcilable with it all. As to any pretended incon¬ sistency between the obvious sense conveyed by the language of the sacred writers, and the alleged original, and only proper sense of the terms they used ; it appears to me that those men, speak¬ ing Greek by immediate inspiration of God, instructed in what they taught immediately by Christ, and full of the Holy Ghost ; very probably knew what they professed to teach. And that they were both honest and in earnest, is rather clearly proved by their having sealed their testimony with their blood. IY. — 1. It remains to examine, as carefully as my limits will allow, the Apostolic practice with regard to the administration of this sacrament. The first instance of it that occurred, was alto¬ gether the most wonderful and pregnant ; and the divine state¬ ment of the actual event corresponds, in simplicity and brevity, with those concerning the institution and the exposition of the sacrament by Christ. Then they that gladly received the word were baptized ; and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.2 This record was made many years after the event, and by a man who may not have been present on t he occasion : but the Acts of the Apostles as an inspired book is invested with such proofs of its divine origin, as to justify the title by which it was once known, namely, the Gospel of the Holy Ghost. Those long intervening years had been full of the most wonderful events. Luke, the writer of the book, in which the history of the planting of the Gospel Church, and of the first 1 1 Cor., vii. 7, 11. * M vcTrjpiov — fSanTity/ua — ?.ovrpov — ^avnc/iog. 2 Acts, 11. 579 CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. period of the dispensation of the Spirit with power, has been preserved ; had already written his Gospel, in which the life and acts of Christ, from his birth to his taking up into heaven, are narrated ; and the doctrine and practice of that baptism, the first and grandest example of which is stated in the words I have quoted, had penetrated all civilized nations. Considering the solemn occasion on Pentecost from this point of view, and in this light; it would have been strange if the Evangelist had paused in his great narrative, to give a particular explanation of the mode of administering baptism. He recounts the miraculous outpouring of the Spirit, that promise of the Father so much in¬ sisted on by Christ ; the miraculous effects of this on the Apos¬ tles, and their immediate exercise of the gift of tongues ; the amazement of the vast, heterogeneous multitude gathered out of all nations at Jerusalem, and their hurrying together in confused wonder and trouble ; the mighty discourse of Peter, and its mighty effects ; three thousand souls accepting the words of eter¬ nal life — added to the company of the redeemed — baptized. If there is anything connected with such a scene as this, which throws incidental but ‘clear light upon things less important than the main events ; we can hardly doubt that this light be¬ longs to the nature of the case, and is to be confidently ac¬ cepted by us. I think there is much, and will endeavour to disclose it. 2. (a) The nature of the Events and the shortness of the time. It was the third hour of the day ; about nine o'clock in the forenoon. The three thousand persons were baptized and were added to the Church of Christ, that same day.1 The ninth hour of the day, about three o'clock in the afternoon, was the habitual hour of public prayer, at which the Apostles attended ; and this was a season of great solemnity.3 The entire period occupied by these great occurrences, could not, therefore, have occupied more than six hours. Within that space must be crowded, all that was uttered by Peter — those other words, (as well as what is recorded) in which he testified and exhorted the multitude to save themselves from that untoward generation ; and all that was said by all the Apostles, before Peter commenced his discourse, to crowds of people from every nation under heaven, of whom fifteen nations are mentioned by name, to every man in 1 Acts, ii. 15, 41. 2 Act?, iii. 1 ; ii. 48. 580 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. his own tongue wherein he was horn, concerning the things whereof the Spirit gave them utterance.1 Moreover it was to be ascer¬ tained who they were who gladly received the word, and they were to be separated from the great impenitent multitude, and were to give such proofs of their faith as satisfied the Apostles, before they received them into their fellowship. And further still, whether we suppose these stupendous scenes to have oc¬ curred in the very temple itself, or in the general enclosure more largely called the temple, * or perhaps in one of the courts or porches of it ; in either case, whatever delay may have arisen from the special difficulties appertaining to the particular place, must be considered. To say nothing further, let the six hours allowed by the inspired narrative, suffer the deduction required by the foregoing circumstances ; and how are we to conceive it to be possible, that the portion of time remaining was sufficient to allow of the immersion of three thousand persons, even if, on the instant, and at the place, everything had been in readiness P There are but three allowable solutions. They were immersed by the Apostles — which seems to be impossible. Or they were sprinkled in mass, according to the custom of the Jews, who on certain occasions appear to have purified in this manner, by the sprinkling of blood or water with a hyssop ;3 which would not have been the baptism instituted by Christ, and is wholly unsup¬ ported hy evidence. Or they were baptized by pouring or sprink¬ ling water upon each one of them, sacramentally ; just as they would be now, according to the method still practised in the Church of Christ ; which was possible, under the circumstances. The conclusion then, supposing the mode of baptism to be dis¬ puted and doubtful, is apparently very strong against the immer¬ sion of these three thousand persons — and in favour of their baptism by the application of water to them. ( b ) The Nature of the Place , and the Circumstances. Let it be borne in mind that the circumstances of this enquiry are inexorable. It is expressly stated that these people were con¬ verted on the day of Pentecost, and that they were baptized the same day : they were baptized with water : and there are but three modes by which this is possible, namely, putting them into water, or applying the water to them, or combining both in one 1 Acts, ii. 5-13, 40. * Nnof — the temple itself; lepov — everything in the walled area. 2 Ex., xii. 22 ; Lev., xiv. 51 ; Num., xix. 18 ; Heb., ix. 19. 581 OHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. ordinance. As to tlie third of these possible methods — it is not imaginary. It probably prevailed to a considerable extent in the early Church ; and in it, and in some of the oriental Churches, so far as trine immersion has ever prevailed, the water poured on the subject after the threefold immersion, was, in effect, the real baptism ; the immersions being purifications in the name of the Trinity, added without divine warrant, gradually accepted as part, and by some finally as the whole of the sacrament. In the Churches of the Latin Empire, in the Papal Church, and the Protestant Churches, this superstition, which only increases all the difficulties of the immersionists, never prevailed ; and need not be discussed here. Upon the circumstances stated, therefore, it follows, that whatever tends to establish either of the re¬ maining two modes, tends in an equal degree to confute the other : and whatever subverts one establishes the other. This inexorable antagonism is the basis of all the practical difficulty created by the immersionists, and is the logical foundation of ' their argument, their conclusion, and their practice. It is better to accept the issue, and put an end to the question, if that be possible, than to content ourselves, as was formerly the case, with affirming the lawfulness of affusion as a mode of scriptural bap¬ tism. Admitting then that a mode is the mode, I urge that in addition to the physical impossibility arising out of the nature of the transaction, which I have explained in the preceding paragraph ; there is an additional and more obvious impossi¬ bility, arising out of the nature of the place where, and the cir¬ cumstances under which, the transaction occurred. It is not possible that these three thousand persons could have been bap¬ tized by the Apostles, and the record is positive that they alone had anything to do with the matter ;x because there was no place about the temple where it could be done at all, in the sudden and hurried manner required ; and because if there had been such a place, they would not have been allowed to put it to any such use. If the events occurred in the temple itself, or within its general area, in one of its courts or porches ; then it is certain there was no possible way of immersing three thousand persons off hand, about the temple ; certain, also, that those having the control of the temple and its sacred pools, would not have allowed them to be used for any such purpose, even if they had existed, and 1 Acts, ii. passim. 532 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD [BOOK V. been sufficient, and in complete readiness ; certain, also, that the temper of the Jewish priests towards Christ whom they had caused to be crucified a little before, and towards Peter whom they caused to be arrested a little after, was the furthest possi¬ ble from allowing to the Apostles, of all men in the world, indul¬ gences forbidden by their law and their traditions, and which those priests could consider as nothing but a profane and osten¬ tatious desecration of the temple. The narrative contains no in¬ timation that any change of plan occurred, preparatory to the baptism ; but it proceeds exactly as if the three thousand per¬ sons were baptized forthwith, and where they were; and it is manifest that all the proprieties of the case, indicate the temple of Jerusalem as the very spot, where the Holy Ghost should de¬ scend upon the infant Church of Christ, and where his Apostles should inaugurate that Church amidst just such proofs of the mighty power of God, as attended that first Christian baptism. But the exigencies of the place and circumstances, as well as the narrowness of the time before pointed out, rendering one of two disputed modes of baptism impossible, the presumption is irre¬ sistible that the other mode, which was perfectly practicable at the place and under the circumstances, was the one adopted. I suppose it cannot be controverted that these events took place in the temple : for in immediate connection with the statement of them, it is said they continued daily with one accord in the temple,1 and it is afterwards added that the Apostles ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ daily in the temple.2 And moreover, it is expressly stated that the second great discourse of Peter, which he was arrested and imprisoned for preaching, and under which many believed, and the number of the men was increased to about five thousand ;3 was delivered in the temple, in the porch that is called Solomon's.4 It is significant that while it was said many of them that heard the word believed, there is no indication that any were then baptized ; it being eventide, and Peter and John who had gone there together, being put in hold unto the next day.6 But even if it were conceded that the great scene on Pentecost did not take place in the temple ; or if it were conceded that although it did take place there, up to the actual administration of the Sacrament, and then the three 1 Acts, ii. 46. 2 Acts, v. 42. 3 Acts, iv. 4. 4 Acts, iii. 1-11. 5 Acts, iv. 1-4. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 583 thousand persons were led away and immediately immersed some¬ where else ; neither admission can beget a doubt as to the mode of their baptism. We have the means of knowing more about the city of Jerusalem, in all that hears upon the present enquiry, than about any decayed city that ever existed. And it may be pronounced to be certain, that nowhere in that city, on the even¬ ing of that day, was it possible for those three thousand persons to have been immersed off hand by the Apostles, without any previous expectation or preparation for the unparalleled occasion, in the space of time left to them. It could not have been done at the pool of Bethesda, which was near the temple ; for besides being in the possession of the priests, and being the common re¬ ceptacle of the filth from the temple and of the blood and offals of the sacrifices, it was habitually without an adequate supply of water for immersion, at the season of Pentecost. It could not have been done at the brook Kidron, a turbid rivulet whose channel passed along the east side of Jerusalem, and was dry except in winter. It could not have been at Siloam, a small fountain depressed in the rock, some distance from the temple, at the foot of Mount Moriah and Mount Zion, and from which at some distance, a small rill emerged with an inconstant flow. No, it was not possible. It was by no such spectacle — by no such wild and confused attempt to display a burial in water as the sacramental commemoration of the mighty power of God, that day experienced by thousands and witnessed by all Jerusa¬ lem ; that the Kingdom of Messiah assumed its last and perfect form, as a dispensation of the grace of God unto salvation. (c) Nature of the Case itself , as divinely explained. There is another aspect of the subject, which seems to me to have a controlling influence. The relation of the Holy Ghost to the sa¬ craments of the New Testament Church, is as fundamental a part of the doctrine of these sacraments, as the relation of Christ himself to them. This relation of the Spirit is more obvious with regard to baptism than to the Lord’s Supper. For the Lord’s Supper being a special sacramental commemoration of Christ’s propitiatory sacrifice, the relation of the Spirit to it is, that he uses it as one of the methods of applying to believers the benefits of that sacrifice. But he does this also with regard to the sacrament of baptism, and the benefits signified and sealed in it ; but does it in such a way as, in addition, to signify and 584 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. seal bis own special work in our salvation ; this sacrament being a special sign and seal of tbe purification wbicb tbe Spirit him¬ self works in us. When tbe matter is considered in this light, it is easy to see why an immersionist represents baptism as a burial, and not a purification. For if we allow water, tbe visible sign in baptism and tbe visible purifier of all things sensible, to rep¬ resent tbe work of the only purifier of all things spiritual, namely the Holy Ghost ; it is but a short step afterwards to tbe conclusion, that tbe manner of applying the water should sym¬ bolize, and not outrage, tbe manner of tbe application of the Spirit. Tbe Lord Jesus took bread, and broke it, and said, take, eat, this is my body wbicb is broken for you.1 In like manner, this is God’s Spirit poured out on us ; and why should we refuse to pour water, in token thereof, on him that is baptized ? Throughout thirty years embraced in tbe Acts of tbe Apostles — throughout all their immense labours — I believe it will be impos¬ sible to find a single expression or act, suggestive of any concep¬ tion of tbe work of the Spirit, which is justly represented by the immersion of the believer in water ; while the application of water to the believer justly represents the conception of the work of the Spirit, which the uniform language of Scripture suggests. No more decisive example of this need be sought, than is found in the narrative of the events of Pentecost ; in which numerous expressions occur illustrating what I insist on. Thus : Suddenly there came a sound from heaven — cloven tongues as of fire ap- pearcd unto them and sat upon them — they wer q filled with the Holy Ghost — they spake with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance — the whole was the result of God’s Spirit poured out upon them — which, by special promise of the Father was poured out that day — the Lord Jesus having received , that pro¬ mise had shed forth that Spirit which was to be poured out on all flesh — they were pricked in their heart — Peter told them they might receive the gift of the Holy Ghost — they gladly received the word — and were baptized.2 All this appertains to the narra¬ tive of the first baptism, after the advent of the Spirit. Is it capable of belief that the sacrament which, on the spot responded to it all, was so administered as to conceal, confuse, and contra¬ dict the conception constantly suggested by the narrative ; when it might be so administered as to conform to it, illustrate it, and 1 1 Cor., xi. 23, 24. 8 Acts, ii. passim. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 585 enforce it ! That a sacrament with water, after all this, did not mean purification, but did mean burial ? That it did neither signify nor seal the outpouring of the Spirit, then operating gra¬ ciously in the hearts of thousands, and miraculously before the eyes of thousands besides, and therefore water must not be ap¬ plied to men ; but did signify and seal the burial of the body of Jesus, and therefore men must be immersed in water ? Upon a careful consideration of this immense and decisive example, I do not see a single circumstance compatible with the notion that these three thousand persons were immersed by the Apostles ; but, on the contrary, it does appear to me to be certain that they were baptized by affusion — that is by sprinkling or pouring water upon them. Still however, I repeat, that I consider the perver¬ sion of the sacrament from its true nature and end, and the schism wrought in the Church of Christ in support of that per¬ version, far graver evils than a simple error as to the mode of using the sacramental element. For an error as to the mode does not necessarily annul the sacrament itself, nor necessarily produce schism. But schism is sinful of itself ; and the perversion of the sacraments in their absolute nature, attacks the essence of faith, and the life of the Church. 3. Next in importance to the great example which I have considered, is the baptism of the company of G-entiles in the city of Ceesarea ; concerning which the Scriptures give so full an ac¬ count. By it, the right of the Gentile world to share in the life and immortality brought to light by the Gospel, was miracu¬ lously established, and openly sealed. By the events of Pente¬ cost the Gospel Church is fully endowed with the Holy Ghost — and commences her sublime course. By the events at Cmsarea, eight years afterwards, she enters upon the greatness of her work, and is forced to understand that God manifest in the flesh is to be preached unto the Gentiles, and believed on throughout the world.1 Ye shall be witnesses unto me, said the Saviour to the Apostles, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth.2 And now they had borne their testimony to Jerusalem, and Judea, and Samaria ;s and the time had come to commence the world work. We have seen the majestic figure of Peter in the very front of the great scene when the kingdom of heaven Avas opened to the 1 1 Tim., iii. 16. 2 A.cts, i. 8. 3 Acte, ix. 31. 586 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. Jews ; and now we see him chosen of Christ, according to his wonderful promise to him,1 to open the Kingdom to the Gentile world. So Peter understood it ; and none could gainsay it. For when he recounted what he had done, they of the circumcision held their peace, and glorified God, saying, Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.2 In the arduous years which had intervened, and during which such wonderful results had followed the labours of the early Christians ; so far was this great Apostle from losing the impression of the events of Pentecost, that the very declaration of the Saviour which filled his mind that day, and which he expounded to the Jews who crowded the temple, filled his mind again as he stood in the palace of the Roman soldier at Caesarea, and expounded to the Gentile multitude the doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth. I remem¬ bered, said he, the word of the Lord how he said, John indeed baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost.3 God had shown both to him and Cornelius, that the whole matter was of his own divine ordination ; and as Peter uttered the words of eternal life, the Holy Ghost fell on the Gen¬ tiles as he had fallen on the Jews, and the same miraculous gifts were bestowed upon them. Well might Peter demand of those brethren of the circumcision, who afterwards contended with him, Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gifts as he did unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, what was I, that I could withstand God ?4 He commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord.5 And now I will gather from this great example, the matter and manner of the baptism. 4. ( a ) Matters common to the Baptism on Pentecost , and that at Caesarea. There is so much that is common to the two ear¬ liest Apostolic administrations of Jewish and Gentile bap¬ tism in the Christian Church, that much of what I have said concerning that, applies with equal force to this. There are two inspired accounts of this baptism in Caesarea : one written by Luke, the other given in the words of Peter himself;0 and a third, but brief statement of the case by that Apostle, when the memorable decision concerning Gentile circumcision was ren¬ dered.7 Not only are the operations of the Holy Ghost, and the 1 Matt., xvi. 19. 8 Acts, xi. 18. 3 Acts, xi. 16 ; ii. 33; i. 5. 4 Acts, xi. 17. 5 Acts, x. 48. 6 Acts, x. passim; xi. 1-18. 7 Acts, xv. 7-11. 587 CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. reality and nature of his gifts continually insisted on ; but the manner also — his being given to us, poured out on us, his de¬ scending on us, filling us — is constantly stated. And throughout this transaction, the connection between the work of the Spirit and the sacrament of baptism, and between the nature of the application of the one inwardly and the other outwardly to us ; is as clearly stated and sustained, as I have shown it is in the ac¬ count of the events of Pentecost. In this case as in the previ¬ ous one, the idea that baptism is a sacramental representation of the burial of Jesus, and must be administered by burying us in water, is wholly destitute of any support. This case, therefore, like the other, presents two conclusive lines of proof; one nega¬ tive, showing the total absence of everything suggestive of, or consistent with, that conception of this sacrament and its nature and end, which immersion exacts ; the other positive, showing the existence of everything suggestive of, and consistent with, that conception of it which requires it to be administered with water and not into water. That is, upon any principle of symbolism immersion is necessarily confuted ; because it is neither a symbol of any known sacrament, nor of any known act of God, or grace in man. But the correspondence between the symbol and the thing sacramentally symbolized, is assumed as indispensable, when our immersion is declared to be symbolical of the burial of Jesus. Therefore, baptism being symbolical, it is impossible that immersion can be the mode. On the other hand, to purify men is the work of God, and to be pure is a grace in man ; and the purifying Spirit is poured out — and the application of puri¬ fying water to us, is a sacramental symbol. And this is the doc¬ trine of the first Gentile, as well as of the first Jewish baptism by the Apostles of the Lord. ( h ) Circumstances peculiar to this Example. As in the pre¬ ceding case there were many circumstances, some of which have been considered, which were decisive of the nature of the sacra¬ ment and of the nature of its administration ; so in this case, besides those circumstances common to it and the previous ex¬ ample, there are others peculiar to it, which throw much light on the principles and acts involved in it. Of all the baptisms administered by the Apostles, this one alone seems to have been attended with great previous deliberation, to have been adminis¬ tered under controlling divine guidance against the previous scru- 588 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. pies and strong personal convictions of the Apostle, to have been seriously called in question after it was celebrated, and to have been ratified after deliberate consideration. Indeed the princi¬ ple on which it rested according to the decision of the Apostles and Elders, by its working finally subverted all that was temporary and special in the religions institutions of Moses.1 Cornelius, a Roman centurion doing military duty at Cassarea, at that time the civil metropolis of Palestine, a devout man and one that feared God with all his house, generous in alms and constant in prayer ; having been instructed in a vision by an Angel of God, sent a devout soldier and two household servants to Joppa, with a message to Simon Peter, that God required him to come and tell him words whereby he and all his house should be saved.3 The day following the vision of Cornelius at Caesarea, Peter had a vision still more remarkable at Joppa, the import of which he did not then understand ; but the great and general sense of which God himself explained to be, that what he has cleansed is no longer common or unclean. While he still meditated on the vision, the messengers of Cornelius had arrived, and found the house of Simon the Tanner, and asked for Peter ; and the Spirit had told Peter that the men were there and that he had sent them, and bade him go with them, nothing doubting. Instructed by the messengers from Cornelius concerning him, and concern¬ ing the vision he had, pondering the vision he himself had, acting under the immediate command of the Spirit ; he went to Joppa expressly to teach the Gentiles the way of salvation through Jesus Christ. Accompanied by six brethren of the circumcision from Joppa, and the three messengers of Cornelius, Peter journeyed to Caesarea during the two following days ; ample time and oppor¬ tunity being thus afforded him, for conference with God, with his own soul, with his brethren of the circumcision, and with the de¬ vout Gentiles of their company, touching the wonders of divine love and mercy, which none of them could doubt, were to be dis¬ closed. Entering Caesarea on the second day, he found at the house of Cornelius, beside his ov'n household, his kinsmen and bis near friends ; a multitude of Gentiles gathered by the Gen¬ tile soldier to meet Peter, and now awaiting him in the latter part of the fourth day after the vision of Cornelius, and of the 1 Acts, xi. 1-18; x. passim; xv. passim. 9 Acts, x. 1-8, 30-33; xi. 13, 14. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 589 third clay after the vision of Peter.1 Whatever, therefore, Peter may have said and done in the matter of this baptism, was in a very peculiar manner, with the divine approbation. Moreover, there was no possibility of his doing anything by sur¬ prise ; for he had ample and repeated warnings both of God and man, of the nature of the service that lay before him. Nor yet of his doing anything, the manner of which would be unusual or amiss ; for it was eight years since Pentecost — years to him full of labour and full of fruit in the whole work of an Apostle. In whatever way, therefore, he baptized all them who heard the word in the palace of Cornelius, that undoubtedly is the way in which he and his brethren had baptized the converted Jews on the day of Pentecost — and had baptized every penitent believer in Jesus, in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and in Samaria ; and that beyond question, is the way in which every Gentile convert in all nations, and through all ages, ought to be baptized. (c) Its actual Administration. Peter said, at once, to the Gen til es who awaited him, Ye know that what I have done is unlawful to me — for I am a Jew and ye are Gentiles. But I have done it because God hath showed me that I should not call any man common or unclean. For what intent, therefore, have ye sent for me ? Cornelius recounted his vision, and what he had done in consequence of it ; and telling Peter he had done well in obeying God, added solemnly, Now therefore are we all here present before God, to hear all things that 'are commanded thee of God. As Peter began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on all them that heard the word. He saw, and confessed, that God is no respecter of persons ; that Jesus Christ is Lord of all. He preached Jesus to them — his word— his sacrifice— his resurrec¬ tion — remission of sins through him — eternal judgment by him. In two respects the work was more remarkable than even that at Pentecost ; lor here the Holy Ghost fell on all who heard the word, and his miraculous gifts were manifest in them before they were baptized. All the glory, all the power of Pentecost, nay the very emotions and the very Scriptures came back to the illustrious man. Then remembered I, says he, the word of the Lord, how he said, John indeed baptized with water ; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. And his humble and be¬ lieving conclusion was, What was I, that I should withstand i Acts, x. 19-27 ; xi. 11-14. 590 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. God ? And bis open demand was, Can any man forbid water, that these should be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we ? No man dared to forbid water. And he commanded them to he baptized in the name of the Lord.1 Such is the narrative. This company of Gentiles, these friends, kin¬ dred, and household of a Roman military officer, gathered in his palace to hear the Gospel, are converted to God and ought to he baptized. Has any one authority to forbid it ? What says the centurion ? What say the high Roman dignitaries, his friends and kinsmen there present ? What say the astonished Jewish brethren from Joppa ? No one — a single word ! Then let them be baptized — is the command of the Apostle. Is there any sug¬ gestion to leave the room they occupied ? Is there any sugges¬ tion about a pool, bath, pond, river, or anything of the sort ? There must be water, for without it there can be no baptism : but is there the slightest hint that there must be water enough to immerse them, else they cannot be baptized ? Is there any hesitation, any delay, any confusion, by reason of a sudden and unforeseen demand on Cornelius for a large and# deep body of water ; — or does not the irresistible impression of the scene in¬ dicate a demand for a small portion of water, for instant use ? Is there any intimation of any spectacle, any procession through the streets of Csesarea, the Roman centurion with his near friends, his kindred, his devout soldiers, and his domestic ser¬ vants, led by Pet'er and six Jews from Joppa to a public immer¬ sion — all speaking strange tongues, and all Cassarea filled with wonder P Nothing of the sort : nothing that can be tortured into correspondence with any such ideas. They are the growth of other ages — the product of a state of mind far different from that of the Apostles of the Lord. However great, perhaps unex¬ pected, may be the issue of this Gentile baptism, it is plainly the will of God that it should be celebrated ; and it is done. Done there — then ; ivith water, not into it ; not as a sacramental burial, but as a sacramental purification, commemorating the blood of Jesus sprinkled upon our hearts by the Holy Ghost. Done as it was in the recorded case of an Apostle, even the great Apostle of the Gentiles, when Ananias went to him at the house of Ju¬ das, in Damascus, and put his hands on him and said, Brothei Saul, the Lord, even J esus, that appeared to thee in the way as 1 Acts, x. 28-48; xi. 12-17; xv. 7-11. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 591 thou earnest, hath sent me, that thou miglitest receive thy sight, and be tilled with the Holy Ghost. And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales ; and he received his sight forthwith and arose and was baptized.*1 Done as it was in the case of the Ethiopian Eunuch, with whom Philip riding through the desert between J erusalem and Gaza, came to some water ( em n vdup) • and when both of them had gone, down from the chariot to the water, Philip baptized him on the wayside ; and the Eunuch, no notice being taken of his condition after his supposed immersion, went on his way rejoicing.3 Done as it was at Phil¬ ippi, when Paul and Silas were beaten and imprisoned for casting out a devil ; and at midnight they prayed and sang praises unto God, and a great earthquake shook the foundations of the prison, and its doors were burst open, and every one's bands were loosed, and the keeper of the prison seeing how things were, would have killed himself ; but Paul saved his life and then sought to save his soul and the souls of all his house, through the blood of Jesus Christ preached unto them. In whom believing, he and all his were baptized straightway ; baptized, that is, in the prison, after midnight and before it was day.3 Surely a wondrous night scene in a Roman prison, attending the first planting of the Gospel Church in the land of Japhet, eighteen centuries ago.4 5. We have, then, examples of various kinds ; and I have considered, more or less carefully, the conspicuous examples under each kind. The period embraced is, probably, more than twenty years ; those eventful years which followed the complete unction of the Apostles, the sublime proof of the glorification of Jesus, and of the commencement of the Dispensation of the Holy Ghost. The great example of Pentecost, and the great ex¬ ample of Csesarea, one inaugurating the Gospel Church, the other making it palpable that God had granted unto the Gentiles rejientance unto life, have been gone over with much particu¬ larity ; for when these two examples are thoroughly considered, all that belongs to baptism must respect what they determine. I have added, very briefly, the remarkable case of household * Avt/3?ieil>eTe ^apaxpr]fj.a Kat avaarag e^aiznode. This Greek is even more deci¬ sive than our English version of it, that Paul was baptized in the place where he rose up, and that he rose up to be baptized. Standing up to be baptized, like Paul, is the common mode of baptism. 1 Acts, ix. 17, 18. s Acts, xvi. 25-35. 2 Acts, viii. 26-38. * Acts, xvi. 9-12. 592 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. baptism by Paul and Silas at Philippi ; and, also briefly, two conspicuous ’cases of strictly private baptism, that, namely, of Paul by Ananias, and that of the Ethiopian Eunuch by Philip. Peter most conspicuously, after him Paul, but in the wide sweep of the period and events, all the Apostles and the whole Church of Christ in its origin and during its first -age, stand before us. After so many centuries and amidst so great conflict of human opinion, these all recall us to the simple and indisputable facts of the inspired record. They all demand of us the exercise of our best judgment and our spiritual insight, and afterwards our honest and enlightened verdict, according to the law and the testimony ; for if we speak not according to this word, God has told us, it is because there is no light in us.1 For my part, I never gave a verdict of this kind, after more careful examination, or with deeper conviction of its truth. It seems beyond doubt that the Scriptures do teach that Baptism with water, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is a permanent sacrament of the Christian Church, wherein the ingrafting of the believer into Christ, his purification by the Holy Ghost, and the pardon of his sins, are signified and sealed to all who worthily receive it ; that it is the undeniable right of the infant seed of believers to have this sacrament administered to them, and the sacred duty of believing parents to have it done ; that while any endurable mistake in the mode of admin¬ istering this sacrament does not nullify the ordinance, the only true mode of administration is that intended by Christ, practised by his Apostles, and recorded in the sacred Scriptures, which is by a minister of the word, applying the water to the subject, by pouring or sprinkling it on him : and, finally, that true baptism being once administered, must not be repeated under any cir¬ cumstances whatever. On the other hand, I find nothing in the Scriptures to warrant the assertion that there is any sacramental commemoration by the mode of baptism of the burial of the body of Jesus, nothing to warrant the practice of immersion in the administration of baptism, nothing to warrant the refusal of baptism to the infant seed of believers, nothing to warrant the addition of any ceremonies, any adjuncts, any powers, any prin¬ ciples, by any authority under heaven, to this sacrament. As held forth in the Scriptures, and as practised by the Apostles, 1 Isaiah, viii. 20. CHAP. XXIX.] SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. 593 the sacrament of Baptism is a most simple, complete, spiritual, and glorious ordinance of God ; and whenever the followers of Christ content themselves with it as he instituted it, and his Apostles understood and practised it, they find that it is still, both a divine sign of God’s eternal Covenant of Grace, and a divine seal of its great and precious promises. vol. n. 38 CHAPTER XXX. THE SACRAMENT OF THE LORD’S SUPPER: CONSIDERED IN ITS INSTITUTION, NATURE, USE, AND END. I. 1. Relation of the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ to the more ancient Sacrament of the Passover. — 2. Divine account of its Institution by Christ. — 3. Its General Nature and ordinary Use, as taught in the Scriptures. — 4. Matter and Elements of this Sacrament ; what it signifies, and of what it is a Seal. — II. 1. The blood of the New Testament. — 2. The Broken Body of Christ. — 3. The Body and Blood of Christ given for us on the Cross, and sacramentally given to us. — 4. The Cup the Communion of the Blood, and the Bread the Communion of the Body of Christ. — 5. The sense in which the Bread is the Body of Christ, and the Cup is the blood of Christ. — 6. Efficacy of the Body and Blood of Christ in our Sacramental Nourishment. — I. Relation of this Sacrament to the Worship, the Word, and the Spirit of God. — 8. Relation of this continual showing of the Li rd’s Death, to his Second Coming. — III. 1. Strict Relation of Christ’s sacra¬ mental action and Word, to the Nature and Definition of this Ordinance. — 2. Re¬ lation of this Sacrament to the whole Question of the Church. I. — 1. How great was the honour put on the Jewish dispensa¬ tion, that the Son of God scrupulously observed every ordinance of it ! Not only did he obey the whole law of commandments contained in ordinances peculiar to it ; hut he respected the man¬ ner of use required by it, of those institutions more ancient and permanent than itself, upon which it had been ingrafted, and which it had in some degree modified. He did not come to destroy but to fulfil, the law and the prophets. And his sermon on the mount is, to a great extent, a development of this great and per¬ vading truth in its application not only to the Mosaic Institutions, but to the whole compass of prophecy, to the true nature of the moral law. to all the duties of life, and to the way of salvation and the pursuit thereof by men. Thus it was in connection with his last celebration of the great annual sacrament of the Passover, that he instituted the Gospel Sacrament of his own broken body and shed blood. By means of that seal of God’s special covenant with them — • the heirs of promise, during the Mosaic dispensation of the Cov¬ enant of Grace, and back into the closing years of the Patriarchal CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD’S SUPPER. 595 dispensation of it, had kept alive the remembrance of their bond¬ age in Egypt and their miraculous deliverance from it ; and had kept alive also the sense of their bondage under sin, of which their bondage in Egypt was so sharp a type, and of their everlasting deliverance through the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world, to whom every paschal lamb slain during so many centuries had continually directed their faith.1 It is Christ our passover sacrificed for us, — the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, by whose blood not only all the first born who were saved alive in Egypt, but every one of the first born whose names are written in heaven, have been redeemed.2 And so from year to year through all generations, they kept their feast of unleavened breed, and ate by households with bitter herbs, the lamb slain by the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel. And so Christ with his Apostles, his immediate attendants, ate the pass- over the night before his crucifixion. And when the supper was ended, and Judas had been exposed and had departed to betray him, he instituted that sacrament in bread and wine which super¬ seded the ancient sacrament ; commencing where it closed, by the same authority which had created and sustained it for so many centuries. Thus it has continued to the present hour — according to his command. The Gospel Church by its congre¬ gations, by that organic manifestation which is elemental to its form of the Church visible on earth — does and has always done, essentially what the ancient Church bv its families had done year by year from the night before its departure out of Egypt. And so it will do — attesting on one side the. sacrifice, the faithfulness, and the second coming of the Lord — and on the other the ruin and the redemption of fallen man, till the Son of man shall come.* The difference lies in this, that the ancient sacrament preceded the incarnation of the Son of God, while the present sacrament is immediately connected with his crucifixion. The substance, namely Christ and redemption through his sacrifice, is the same ; the form is changed to make its correspondence com¬ plete with the stale of grace and truth under the Gospel Dispen¬ sation. 2. There are three detailed accounts preserved of what oc- 1 John, i. 29; Rev., v. 6-9; Exod.. xii. passim. 2 1 Cor., v. 7 ; Heb., xii. 23; Exod., xii. 12, 13; Rev., xiii. 8. * John, xiv. 3 ; xxi. 22; Acts, i 11; iii. 19-21; 1 Cor., iv. 5; xv. 25, 26. 596 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. curred at the institution of this sacrament, and of the circum¬ stances immediately connected with it : one by the Apostle Matthew, the other two by the Evangelists Mark and Luke.1 To these the Apostle Paul has added a distinct but condensed state¬ ment of what Christ said and did concerning the sacrament when he instituted it, with which he has connected the commands of the Lord to him concerning the proper celebration of it.2 The Apostle John, whose Gospel was written long afterwards, devotes Ids narrative of what occurred at the Last Supper, chiefly to circumstances which had been omitted or only partially stated in the previous accounts. He occupies five chapters of the twenty- one which compose his Gospel, with the acts and the teachings of Jesus, during the few hours which elapsed from the ending of the paschal supper, to his going forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron to the garden of Gethsemane3 — where he endured his agony — was arrested during the night — crucified the day fol¬ lowing, and already dead by the middle of the afternoon. In a very peculiar manner John has preserved the mind of the Lord concerning this wonderful ordinance ; for besides what has just been intimated, the full and clear account of the relation be¬ tween our inward spiritual life, and our participation of the body and blood of Christ, is preserved by him in the words of Christ in an earlier chapter of his Gospel.4 Besides these numerous and explicit statements, the Old Testament Scriptures teach nothing more clearly than the whole nature, and use of the Pass- over ; and the allusions of the Hew Testament Scriptures to the nature and use of the Lord’s Supper are constant. It may be justly asserted, therefore, that nothing but voluntary ignorance, the seductions of false teachers, and the delusions of the Devil, can prevent any one who has the word of God in his hands, from knowing all that is needful for us to know concerning this solemn, affecting, and powerful ordinance of God. Of this let all judge from the following divine statement of the institution of this sa¬ crament, which is one of the four to which I have alluded : For I have received of the Lord that which I have delivered unto you. That the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was be¬ trayed, took bread : and when he had given thanks he brake it, and said, Take, eat : this is my body, which is broken for you : 1 Matt., xxvi. 1-35 ; Mark, xiv. 1-25 ; Luke, xxii. 1-38. 2 1 Cor., xi. 20-34. 3 John, xiii. — xviii. 4 John, vi. 2C-71. THE LORD'S SUPPER. 597 CHAP. XXX.] this do in remembrance of me. After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood : this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in re¬ membrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death, till he come.1 3. From the great and precious mass of divine instruction distributed throughout the word of God, and most especially throughout the New Testament Scriptures, I will endeavour to collect into a connected statement, as brief as possible, the mat¬ ters which are taught us by the Lord and which appertain to his people, concerning the nature and use of this sacrament. As I have already shown, it was instituted by Christ himself, in imme¬ diate connection with the last passover he celebrated, and in place of it, as one of the two sacraments of his Church ; the other, as I have shown, being instituted by him after his resurrection, in the place of circumcision. This, instituted the night before his crucifixion, had immediate relation to it, and to the benefits which would result from it to his disciples : just as the other, instituted immediately before his ascent finally into heaven, had immediate relation to the benefits which his glorification would secure to his disciples — chiefly the Holy Ghost purchased by his blood, and to be sent with power, as his great witness, and the sole efficient agent in our salvation. This sacrament, therefore, like the other is perpetual : for as long as sinners are saved by grace, the work of Christ and the work of the Spirit, will be the form in which that grace is manifested — and these sacraments will be signs and seals of the covenant through which it flows to us. This do, said Christ concerning this sacrament, in remem¬ brance of me. Baptize all nations — was his command concerning the other. All power is given to me in heaven and in earth : Lo I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world : was his declaration, and his promise concerning the whole work commit¬ ted to his Apostles. Unlike the other sacrament which cannot be lawfully repeated, as I have shown — this must be often re¬ peated : must be, not only from its nature and the nature of the blessings it confers, as will be shown, but from the intention expressed by Christ at its institution. How often, he did not state — but often in comparison with the annual celebration of the passover which it superseded ; and in accordance with the 1 1 Cor., xi. 23-2G. 598 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. practice of the Apostles, whose habitual celebration of it is recorded ; though I do not think the Scriptures warrant any statement, on this point, more definite than this. It is in its nature a social, not a private ordinance ; it is a communion ap- pertaining to the family of Christ and therefore not general ; but as to them it is public — and belongs to them as a Church, and not as individuals. And while the intimations of Scripture are that it was celebrated by the Church at the stated places of its worship,1 I believe there is neither Scripture example nor precept affording the least countenance to any private, much less any individual celebration of it. The contrary practice, to a remarka¬ ble degree, obtained with regard to the other sacrament ; which seems to have been administered privately, by households, and by thousands ; in the temple, in the palace of Cornelius, in the houses of private persons, in prisons and by the wayside as cir¬ cumstances required. The celebration of both is in the hands of the ministers of Christ, as stewards of the mysteries of God3 — the nature of the duties to be performed therein, not only being proper to them and to none else — but the command of Christ concerning the celebration of both this and the other sa¬ crament being, personally given to the Apostles, as teachers and rulers in his Church. It follows necessarily from what I have said, and moreover is distinctly taught, that every true follower of the Saviour is entitled, is in the highest degree interested, and is bound and obliged to partake of this sacrament ; and that no one else has any right to partake of it, or can do so without im¬ piety/ Every one should partake of both elements ; the denial of the cup to private Christians, being a mere act of tyranny and impiety on the part of the Church of Rome.4 But the infant seed of believers may not partake of it until they come to years of discretion, and have knowledge to discern the Lord's body ; of which they must give satisfaction to those whose duty God has made it to decide in all cases, concerning that inward work of which baptism is the sign. For all who approach the table of the Lord are commanded to examine themselves, in order to the eating of that bread and the drinking of that cup, concerning many things that exceed the state of infancy.5 And in like man- 1 1 Cor., xi. 18-22 ; Acts, xx. 7 ; James, ii. 6. a 1 Cor., iv. 1 ; Titus, i. 7 ; Luke, xii. 42. 3 1 Cor., xi. 27-34; 2 Cor., vi. 14-17. 4 1 Cor., x. 15. 16, 21 ; xi. 26-28. 5 i Cor., xi. 28. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD’S SUPPER. 599 ner no outward profession justifies any who are ignorant and un¬ godly, in partaking of these solemnities ; any more than conni¬ vance at such impiety can be justified on the part of the Church.’ It is both from its author, its nature, the occasion on which it was instituted, and the authority of Scripture use, that this sacrament has derived its name. The passover was celebrated at night by divine command, and the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ ingrafted on it by him, was in its nature a com¬ munion both of the disciples with each other, and in a still higher sense, of them all with Christ. The Scripture calls it The Lord's Supper .3 I do not mean to say that this sacrament should there¬ fore be celebrated at night : for none of what may be called the fortuitous circumstances connected with the institution of the Supper, which have no connection with the design or nature of the ordinance, can be considered of any importance : though we should be extremely careful not to class amongst such circum¬ stances, anything whose change or disuse may destroy or even weaken anything that does appertain to its nature or design. 4. It is no more possible to doubt that bread and wine are the elements with which this sacrament is to be celebrated, than that water is the element with which baptism is to be celebrated. The Lord Jesus took bread and blessed it, and brake it and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat ; this is my body which is broken for you. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it ; for this is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins.3 This is my covenant, said God unto Abraham, which ye shall keep between me and you and thy seed after thee : Every man- child among you shall be circumcised.4 And so the passover, and the blood of it, and the observance of it, are continually called a token, a memorial, an ordinance, a sign, between God and his people. And thus Christ says, This is my blood of the New Tes¬ tament which is shed for many for the remission of sins : — a state¬ ment repeated in every account of the institution of this sacra¬ ment. Bread and wine, therefore, and they alone, are the outward and visible signs — elements — in this sacrament. What the bread 1 1 Cor., xi. 27-29 ; v. 6-13 ; 2 Cor., ii. 14-16; 2 Thess., iii. 6, 14, 15. 3 1 Cor., xi. 20. 3 Matt., xxvi. 26-28; Mark, xiv. 22-24; Luke. xxii. 1J-20; 1 Cor., xi. 23-26. •* Gen., xvii. 9-14. 600 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. is, — or is put in the place of, is declared by Christ to be his body broken for us ; and what the wine is — or is put in the place of, is declared by him to be his blood shed for us * Christ and him crucified, is, therefore, the matter of this sacrament. And the inward and invisible grace signified and sealed to us, by this sa¬ crament, are the blessings and benefits secured to us, by the sac¬ rifice of Christ, considered in themselves, and considered in the fruits and effects thereof, wrought in us. It is the relation which God establishes between the thing done and the thing it repre¬ sents, that makes one the sign of the other, and makes the sa¬ crament, which embraces both, a sign of the covenant of grace. Moreover and in like manner, as the correspondence between the elements and the matter of the sacrament, makes one the sign of the other, and makes the sacrament the sign of the Covenant of Grace : so the relation established by God between the sacra¬ ment, and the inward and invisible grace which it signifies — makes the sacrament a seal, as well as a sign, of the Covenant of Grace. The matter of this sacrament, as has been shown, is Christ and him crucified : the sign is bread and wine, represent¬ ing his broken body and shed blood : the things signified by the sacrament, are all the blessings and benefits of his vicarious sac¬ rifice. But merely to signify these things to us, merely to repre¬ sent them and recall them — never could save our souls. There must be, beyond that, a fitness in the sacrament to produce or to nourish in us the graces which must exist in order to our salva¬ tion : a divine correspondence, that is, between the sacrament and the inward and invisible grace of which it is the sign. But this correspondence is exact, complete, perfect. For Christ cru¬ cified, and he alone, can save us. The blessings and benefits he has secured for us, in his redemption of us, are the very, and the only things fitted to save us, or whereby we can be saved. And these wrought in us by the Holy Ghost produce in us all the fitness we have or could have, to be saved. This sacrament is, there¬ fore, not only a sign, but also a seal of the Covenant of Grace. II. — 1. Christ not only said the wine was his blood but that it was his blood of the New Testament ; an expression of great import, and repeated by all the sacred writers who give account of the institution of this sacrament. I have constantly explained, that our salvation is the product of the eternal covenant between the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost ; which I have CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD’S SUPPER. 601 called indiscriminately the Covenant of Grace because all grace is manifested through it, and the Covenant of Kedemption be¬ cause it is the Mediator of that covenant who has redeemed us with his most precious blood. I have also constantly explained that every one of God’s elect is a party in interest to that eternal covenant, by reason of his covenanted Saviour the Son of God having represented him in it ; and that every one becomes a party in fact, as soon as he is personally united to that Saviour in liis effectual calling. Under this eternal covenant, and by way of giving special designation and emphasis to each successive dispensation of it, those dispensations as they arose were called covenants by God ; and the special mercies they conveyed were made stipulations, and were solemnly ratified. Thus the visible Church had its origin in God’s covenant with Abraham, called the covenant of circumcision from the seal of it, and the cove¬ nant of promise from its glorious stipulations.1 Thus the Mosaic dispensation was formally initiated, by a solemn covenant be¬ tween God and the children of Israel, who had already received in Egypt the propitiatory sacrament of the passover : a covenant under which everything was purified by blood — and everything first ministered to condemnation and then pointed to Christ.” That there was a better dispensation, a better covenant to come, Abraham and Moses and every true believer under both the dis¬ pensations which they respectively introduced, knew perfectly ; nay the very covenants themselves had no efficacy, no import touching grace and salvation, except as they were founded on and stipulated the Mediator of the new and better covenant.3 The Apostle Paul puts the matter past doubt ; for he quotes at large the declarations of Jeremiah concerning the new covenant which God would make with his people, and declares that they mean Christ, and were uttered by the Holy Ghost.4 When the Saviour said, This cup is the New Testament in my bloood*we are to understand that they who receive it have God’s covenant in its supremest form — ratified as his own testament by Jesus, and.sealed, by his death upon the cross for us. His death gives, at. the same moment, an endless validity to his testament, and an infinite ratification to the Covenant of Grace, as the Gospel covenant ; 1 Gen., xvii. 1-16; Acts, vii. 8; Epb., ii. 12, a Exod., xxiv. passim; Heb., ix. 18-23. 3 Jer., xxxi. 21-40. 4 Heb.,. viii .jpassimj^ 10-22, 602 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. and this blood of our great High Priest seals it all.1 The Gospel dispensation is the covenant in the incarnate Redeemer, just as the dispensation of promise was the first covenant in Abraham, and the dispensation of the law was the old covenant in Moses." And it is by the oath of God that Jesus was constituted the surety of this better covenant, being consecrated by that oath a priest forevermore, and by one offering of himself perfecting for¬ ever them that are sanctified.8 The blood of Jesus is the blood of this covenant. Thus sealed by his death, this covenant be¬ comes his testament. Sacramentally bestowed on us, it is the blood which the cup in the Eucharist signifies and seals. In it God stipulates remission of sins, and eternal life ; and Christ stipulates for us Faith and Repentance ; and through his blood, and word, and Spirit he works both of them in us. Penitent and believing sinners are, therefore, entitled to all the benefits of this covenant and testament — and sacramentally participate of the blood of Christ, which signifies and seals these benefits unto them. 2. In like manner, Christ not only said the bread was his body, but he broke it and said, This is my body which is broken for you : and these, also, are pregnant words. I have taught continually that union and communion with the Lord Jesus Christ, was the only way given under heaven among men, where¬ by we must be saved ; and that this union and communion are possible only by means of his participation of our nature through his incarnation, and our participation of his nature through our regeneration. But the possibility of our regeneration, depends in every way upon the efficacy of his atoning sacrifice ; and that sacrifice was impossible but for his incarnation, and was without nil efficacy but for his supreme Godhead, and had rela¬ tion to us only through that eternal covenant of which he — God- man — was the Mediator. This broken bread is the symbol of the crucified God-man ; and he has established between the sym¬ bol and the inward and invisible grace, such a relation as makes the one a sign of the other ; and then such a relation between the matter and the sign united into a sacrament, and the effects of Christ crucified, as to make the sacrament itself a seal of the covenant under which the crucifixion occurred ; that is of the eternal Covenant of Grace, and also of the special covenant of 1 Heb., ix. passim. 2 Gal, iv. 24-31. 3 Heb., vii. 20-25; x. 10-15. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD'S SUPPER. 603 the Gospel dispensation under it. But Christ crucified is to every one that is called, both the power of God and the wisdom of God.1 We are planted together in the likeness of the death of Christ; our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin ; and being dead with him, we believe we shall also live with him.2 In knowing him and the power of his resurrection, we must have fellowship with his sufferings, and be made conformable unto his death.3 Suffering with Christ, is the prelude of being glorified together with him.4 Whether, therefore, we consider the cru¬ cifixion of Christ in itself and in the divine motives for it, or in the relation of it to the whole oeconomy of the grace of God and of the salvation of man, or in the inward participation of it by every one of his followers through union and communion with him : we equally perceive the glorious pregnancy of these words of Christ, and the unspeakable fitness of the symbol to represent that for which it was put, and of the sacrament thus consti¬ tuted to be a seal of the covenant under which he made satisfac¬ tion to God for us, and so a seal to us of all that he purchased for us by his death. 3. This sacrament is very far from being a mere exhibition of the death of Christ — a mere representation of the passion and sacrifice of the Son of God. If the whole of our relation to what Christ did and suffered, is satisfied by merely represent¬ ing and exhibiting his agony and death ; we have much to learn about the burden, the curse, and the pollution of sin ; much about the love, the peace, the joy of a soul that has communion with him that died and rose again. If the whole of God's love for us which led him not even to spare his own Son, but on the contrary to deliver him up for us all, is expressed when his Son has done that which lost sinners need only represent and recall ; then his poor children in this world have pungent conceptions alike of their Father's love, and of their need of* it, which he never excited in their souls, and will never fulfil. This is my body which is given for you : This is my blood which is shed for you. It is thus that Jesus speaks. His death is no representa¬ tion : it is a vicarious sacrifice. The sacrament of his broken body and shed blood is not a mere exhibition: it is a sacrament in ! 1 Cor., i. 23, 24. 3 Phil., hi. 10. 3 Rom., vi. 5-8. * Rom., viil 17 ; 2 Tim. il 11, 12. 604 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. which the purchase of that body broken for us is sealed to us, and the purchase of that blood shed for us is sealed to us. He gives to us tokens of inestimable blessings, already secured for us at an inestimable price : he gives to us seals of that covenant ordered in all things and sure, in which these blessings are promised to us. We accept, with loving, confiding hearts the token and the seal. But this is not all. Is no inheritance secured ? Is no earnest of it bestowed? No sure participation, here and now, not merely of signs and seals, but of Jesus, of his death and of his resurrection ? I am — said Jesus — the bread of life : he that cometh to me shall never hunger ; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, dwelletli in me, and I in him.1 Beyond all doubt they who are redeemed by the sacrifice of Christ, have along with their redemption, unspeak¬ able blessing and benefits, which are explained throughout the Scriptures with great fulness and great minuteness, the whole of which are gifts of God, through Jesus Christ.2 All these and every covenanted mercy and every grace of the Spirit, are pur¬ chased for us by the body and blood which was broken for us and shed for us on the cross ; and all of them with that body and blood, are sacramentally sealed to us, — and are ours. To sup¬ pose the sacrament has any efficacy of itself, is to destroy its na¬ ture as a sign and seal of the Covenent of Grace — that is — to destroy it as a sacrament ; and is, moreover, to set aside the work of the Holy Ghost, upon whom the efficacy of all things spirit¬ ual depends, as really as their authority depends on Christ ; thus subverting, on the one hand, the way of life, and on the other life itself. To deny to the sacrament any reality beyond a mere exhibition and representation of the sacrifice of Christ, is either to annul it altogether, by destroying its divine fitness through the work of the Spirit to accomplish its proper end in us ; or it is to go deeper still, and annul the efficacy of the sacrifice of Christ who is the matter of the sacrament, by converting it from a satisfaction into a representation, thus rendering it incompe¬ tent for anything but another representation. 4. In addition to what has been particularly noticed, the Lord Jesus said, Take, eat, this is my body : and in like manner, giving them the cup, Drink ye all of it, for this is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of 2 Col., i. passim • Eoli. i. passim. 1 John, vi. 35, 56. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD'S SUPPER. 605 sins. The Apostle Paul, illustrating the fellowship of Christians with each other, and of all with Christ, demands, The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ P1 And the Apostle John, appealing to his own knowledge of the word of life, which was manifested and was capable of being shown to others as eternal life, declares, That which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you, that ye may have fellowship with us ; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.2 Salvation consists, summarily, in our union and communion with Christ through faith ; and the visible Church of Christ rests upon his headship over all thus united to him by faith, — and their communion with each other by love ; the efficacious bond in both instances, being that of the Spirit. It is the Body of Christ, considered as his Church, nourished by his body and blood sacramentally given to them by him and received by them. It is a communion of saints with each other by means of a joint communion in the body and blood of Christ ; and a communion of the whole with Christ, at the same time, and by the same means. And so completely is this realized in this sacrament, that it is called the communion of the Lord's Supper, or simply The Communion. Nor is there any other way known, nor as far as we can comprehend, possible, by which these sublime spiritual realities can be made at once perfectly simple and efficacious, comparable to the way thus pro¬ vided by the Lord. Our love for each other is both manifested and nourished, and our common increase in all that is sealed to us is itself a precious communion ; while the communion of all with our common Lord, opens in him the fountain of inexhausti¬ ble grace, which all receive from him. But who does not see that if all this be true, it establishes with divine certainty the nature of the sacrament through which it all occurs ? How could the cup we bless be a cup of blessings such as these, it it were not the communion of the blood of Christ ? How cou1 1 the bread we break, produce such spiritual nourishment as this, if it were not the communion of the body of Christ ? 5. It seems to me that any serious consideration of the words of Christ when he intituted this sacrament, and which conveyed to his disciples ideas, which under so many forms of expression 1 1 Cor., x. 16. 2 1 John, i. passim. 606 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. throughout the New Testament, present the very same truths ; ought to satisfy every one who has the least spiritual insight, at least of the general sense in which he wished to be understood. I need not deny that there is much involved in this great mys¬ tery of communion with Christ, no matter in what aspect the sublime topic is presented, which far exceeds our finite compre¬ hension ; since he who was not inferior to the chiefest of the Apostles, habitually speaks nearly to the same effect. Speaking of Christ as the head of the Church and the Saviour of it as his body, of his love for it, of his giving himself for it, of his sanctify¬ ing and cleansing it with the washing of water by the word, and then presenting it to himself a glorious Church ; he goes so far as to say, For we are members of his body, and of his flesh, and of his bones. And then adds — This is a great mystery : I speak con¬ cerning Christ and his Church.1 And this language is not more decisive, than that which Christ used not only when he instituted the Sacrament of the Supper, but a year before his crucifixion in a discourse which has been preserved by John ; afi er which, many of his disciples, understanding him to teach hard sayings which they could not receive, went back and walked no more with him.2 His own explanation to his Apostles was, It is the Spirit that quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing ; the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.3 It is impossible, therefore, to suppose, that Christ meant that the bread was phy¬ sically his body or the wine physically his blood, or that his dis¬ ciples physically eat his flesh and drink his blood ; impossible, because, as we see, he said that would be of no profit to them, and that it was his Spirit and word which made his flesh and blood a means of life to his followers. Indeed it is obvious, as I intimated before, what the general sense of his words is. He uses both sets of terms throughout, and therefore we must accept both through¬ out. We cannot, without violence, allow with the Papists, that the bread and wine are by consecrating them transubstantiated into the soul, body, blood, and divinity of Christ ; for then, to say no¬ thing else, one set of terms used throughout has disappeared, — and the ordinance has become a gross impiety. For the same rea¬ son, we cannot allow with the Socinians, that the whole is a mere representation ; for then the opposite set of terms has disappeared, and the ordinance has become an empty show. We cannot allow 1 Eph., y. 23-32. 2 John, vi. 26— G6. 3 John, vi. 63. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD'S SUPPER. 607 with Luther that consubstantiation has taken place, and that the body and blood of Christ are present in, with, and under the bread and wine ; for then both sets of terms are outraged by confounding what Christ has carefully kept seperate ; and pre¬ tending to eat both bread and Christ's body, and to drink both wine and Christ's blood, we combine into one error the opposite misconceptions of the Papists and the Socinians. All that is left is to accept and respect both sets of terms. And in effect, while no other conception of this sacrament can be justly gotten from the terms of its institution, none can be gotten from any other scriptural representation of it, which does not require the use of both sets of terms to express it. The bread is bread and is eaten, and the wine is wine and is drunk ; and so are Christ's words. But the body and the blood of Christ are as really the matter of the sacrament, as the bread and wine are the symbols used in it : and the relation between the matter and the symbol is instituted by God, and is so immediate that the name of the matter is given to the symbol : and the matter and the symbol — thus related and united by God — unitedly make the sacrament. Physically, the symbols bread and wine are present to our senses. Spiritually, the matter, Christ crucified, his body and his blood, are present to our faith. To express more strongly the reality of this spir¬ itual presence, we may call it mystical ; by which we mean that it is spiritual, but real. Just as our union with Christ is real, but spiritual, that is, it is mystical ; and just as the Church itself, the Body of Christ, is a spiritual but real body — that is, it is a mystical body. We cannot, of course, eat the broken body of Christ and drink his shed blood, in any other sense or manner than that in which they are present with us ; but I have shown that they are present after a manner that is real but spir¬ itual, that is, mystical ; in that manner and in that sense, therefore, and in no other, we participate of Christ crucified, in the communion of the Supper. It is a sacrament. 6. The doctrine of transubstantiation leads directly to the sacrifice of the mass, and to the idea that the Christian ministry is a priesthood who offer sacrifices ; namely the sacrifice of Cal¬ vary repeated continually in an unbloody form, as it is expressed. The whole of this is the grossest heresy and impiety. Christ is the Great High Priest of our profession, a Priest forever after the order — not of Aaron — but of Melchisedek ; and after him 608 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. there is no priesthood at all, except in the sense of the royal priesthood of every brother of Christ, adopted as a son of God. The offering up of himself by Christ once, one sacrifice for sins forever, by which he hath perfected forever them that are sancti¬ fied, — put an end to all offerings and sacrifices for sins : whereof we have the explicit and repeated assurance of God, who even declares that the Holy Ghost is a witness to us of these truths.1 It was not to repeat the sacrifice of Calvary, but to give efficacy to it in the souls of men, that all the means of grace under the Gospel dispensation received their present form. By that sacri¬ fice of himself Christ has redeemed the elect of God : redeemed them in every sense and to every intent. It is not to add any¬ thing to what Christ has done, nor to repeat anything he has done, that the sacrament in his body and blood was instituted ; but its use is to show forth his death, and by participation of him, to nourish and strengthen his disciples in all grace, to exhibit and to seal their union and communion with him and their commu¬ nion with each other, and to testify and renew their covenant with him. In what manner the body and blood of Christ, — that is, in what manner the crucified Saviour can effect the whole of these spiritual objects — or anyone of them : is an enquiry, which if directed to the possibility of such an efficacy, goes to the root of the question of salvation by grace through the Mediator ; or if directed only to the particular manner of that efficacy, goes to the root of the nature of this sacrament. Considered in the former light, the answer is immediate, that unless salvation by grace through the Mediator is a divine reality, neither is the ef¬ ficacy enquired after — nor the sacrament by which it operates, a divine reality : all are nullities together — if the foundation of all is a nullity. Considered in the latter light, the answer is also im¬ mediate, and lies upon the face, and is wrought into the nature of the sacrament. Bread and wine nourish the human body — if we partake of them according to their nature and ours ; they do this by a mysterious vital process of assimilation ; the effect of which is our support and continued existence. In like man¬ ner the body and blood of Christ crucified for us, nourish our souls, if we partake of them according to their nature and ours, that is their sacramental nature and our renewed nature ; they do this through a mysterious spiritual process, expressed by the 1 Heb., x. 10-18. THE LORD’S SUPPER. 609 CHAP. XXX.] terms faith, the new creature, and the work of the Holy Ghost; the effect of which is a closer communion with Christ and with each other, and the comfort and growth of the spiritual life. There is a manifest difference between bread;and the act of him who eats it, and the nourishment which is produced by it, — and the process of assimilation by which the end is reached. There is also a manifest difference between the body and blood of Christ, and the faith of the Christian which rests upon Christ crucified, and the fruit of that faith manifested in us, and the work of the Holy Ghost which produced that faith and now nourishes it in this manner. The declarations of the word of God, and the tes¬ timony of our own experience, and the witness of the Holy Ghost, are the grounds on which we assert the latter series of facts. There are no more conclusive grounds on which to assert the former series of facts. The efficacy on which everything in both series depends, is wholly inscrutable : it is in God. That Christ crucified is the matter of which bread and wine are the symbols, in the Sacrament of the Supper, and that as such he is sacra¬ mentally received, and does nourish our souls ; is not only the plain doctrine of this sacrament, hut is in exact harmony with everything else taught in the Scriptures, concerning the whole doctrine of our union and communion with Christ. In one sacra¬ ment we are baptized into his death : in the other we have com¬ munion with his crucifixion : all the time the glorified God-man is at the right hand of the majesty on high. In the former sa¬ crament our ingrafting into Christ and our purification by the Holy Ghost — in the other our redemption and nourishment by Christ, are signified and sealed. In this life it is mainly fellow¬ ship with his sufferings, and death — in the life to come fellow¬ ship with his resurrection. In both worlds union and communion with him — is salvation. 7. The connection of divine worship, the divine word, and the divine Spirit with the proper administration and worthy par¬ taking of this sacrament, i§ indissoluble The inspired accounts of its institution agree that its celebration was accompanied by thanksgiving, and benediction by the Saviour. Jesus took the bread, and blessed, and brake, and gave it to the disciples ; and he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them. Such are the statements. His directions, also, were clear ; take, eat, drink, this do in remembrance of me. The universal obligation vol. n. 39 610 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. resting on us to sanctify everything by the word of God and prayer/ is made very special in this case, both by what the Lord did and by what he said. And if anything were wanting to add force to this obligation, it would be found in the fact that it is only by means of the blessing of God, and through the presence and inward work of the Holy Ghost, that any blessing is found in the use of this ordinance ; while the state of our own souls may exclude us from the blessings which, so to speak, appertain in a particular manner to the worthy reception of it. Moreover, the peril of trifling with the sacred and mysterious ordinance, much more the impiety of intentionally profaning it, ought to be well considered by such as do not discern the Lord’s body ; since it may well happen that eating and drinking unworthily, men may eat and drink damnation to themselves.8 Without the knowledge which the divine word alone can give us, whereby we might discern the Lord’s body, the spirit of true worship in which it becomes us to approach God in this sacrament of that body, cannot be in us ; and in this condition, we have much more rea¬ son to dread that the Spirit may be grieved, than to hope for any fellowship with him. And yet it is of the very nature of this sacrament, to be fitted to produce — when used by the divine Spirit to that end — as a seal of the covenant of grace, those in¬ ward graces of which it is the sign : and I may add, nothing else has that sacramental fitness with reference to those special graces. Divine truth is specially fitted to produce faith and repentance, and invariably does produce them, when used to that end by the Spirit ; while no other truth is fitted to produce either faith or repentance ; nor is any other ever used in the production of either by the Spirit. So also, all divine ordinances are specially fitted to produce, and when used to that end by the Spirit, do produce the effects appointed of God ; and nothing besides them is fitted to produce their effects, or is used by the Spirit to pro¬ duce them. The great offices of the Spirit in salvation, have immediate relevancy to the Lord Jesus Christ : and both the sacraments of the Christian Church have a similar immediate relevancy to him. We as easily see, therefore, how the efficacy of the sacrament depends on the Spirit, as we see how its au¬ thority depends on Christ. And we might as soon, perhaps, to speak after the manner of men, we might sooner expect the Spirit 1 1 Tim., iv. 5. 2 1 Cor., xl 28-32. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD’S SUPPER. 611 to own and bless uttered falsehoods dishonouring to Christ, than sacramental falsehoods dishonouring to him. If this sacrament is that divine spiritual reality which I have endeavoured to rep¬ resent, it is impossible to doubt its divine relation to the worship, the word, and the Spirit of God ; impossible not to perceive in that divine relation, which it is easy to establish independently, convincing evidence of its own nature and use. 8. All that has been considered is founded on the words of Christ uttered when he instituted this sacrament, but uttered separately of his body and the symbol of it, and of his blood and the symbol of it. Paul speaking of all together, adds imme¬ diately, as part of what he received of the Lord, For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cap, ye do show the Lord's death till he come.1 As often, therefore, as we celebrate this commu¬ nion of the body and blood of Christ, it is bread that we eat, and it is wine that we drink ; but this bread and wine are put for the body and blood of Christ, and it is by breaking and eating the bread, and by pouring out and drinking the wine' — -that we show his death. The efficacy of that death for our redemption — and the certainty of our present participation of that crucified Saviour and of eternal life through him ; are all assured by the resurrec¬ tion and glorification of the Lord. Being planted in the likeness of his death, we are also planted in the likeness of his resurrection. We are dead, and our life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall we also appear with him in glory.2 And so we are to show forth the Lord's death, till he come. This sacrament touches on one side, the crucifixion, on the other the second coming of the Lord, covering the whole space between them, having special relation to the former, and pointing continually to the latter. For Christ is risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection from the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order : Christ the first fruits, afterwards they that are Christ’s at his coming.3 It is that com¬ ing of the glorified Lord, in which they that are his will be made alive by their resurrection from the dead, and will appear in glory with him who is their life ; to which his saints must continually have reference, both as real and as not having yet taken place, as 1 1 Cor., xi. 26. 2 Col., iii. 3, 4. 3 1 Cor., xv. 20-23. G 12 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. often as, and as long as, they sacramentally show his death. While the Saviour sat with his Apostles, and apparently before instituting this sacrament, he said unto them, With desire have I desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer : for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God. And he took the cup and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves : for I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.1 And again, apparently after he had instituted this sacrament and his Apostles had partaken of its elements, he said, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s Kingdom.2 A little after he said, I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me : that ye may eat and drink at m}r table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.3 This sitting on thrones and judging, accordiag to his previous promise to them, will occur when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, and all his followers shall inherit eternal life.4 I suppose, therefore, that the Lord did not mean to refer in what he said, to those few oc¬ casions on which, after the resurrection, he partook of food and drink with his disciples, apparently to satisfy them of his own identity ;5 hut to that coming and estate of the kingdom of God, and that consummation of the work appointed by him unto his Apostles, and that further consummation of the New Testament in his blood, which he had before explained by the parable of the marriage supper of the King’s son ;6 and concerning which the Apostle John, repeating the Alleluias of the redeemed, and re¬ lating the glory of the Lamb’s wife, and the joy in heaven that his marriage had come — writes, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb.7 Whatever of glory and blessedness is in store for us, is purchased for us by the blood of Christ ; and the more perfect our communion is with him in his death, the more complete is our appreciation of all divine things, and the more entire is our fitness for all divine blessings. III. — 1. The manner in which this sacrament was adminis¬ tered by Christ, and ought to be always administered by his fol- 1 Luke, xxii. 15-18. 2 Matt., xxvi. 29. 1 Matt., xix. 28, 29 ; xxv. 31, 34, 46. 6 Matt., xxii. 1-1 4. 3 Luke, xxii. 29, 30. 5 Acts, x. 41. 7 Rer, xix. 1-9. CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD'S SUPPER. 613 lowers, is set forth with great particularity in the Scriptures. His example ought to be sufficient ; but when we consider that everything he did was significant, and that all departures from his example have led to superstition and heresy, we see the more plainly that it is a wise and trustful obedience, which conforms exactly to that example of the Lord. Therefore the bread and the cup are to be taken by him who is to administer the Sacra¬ ment, and so separated unto their peculiar end : they are to be set apart from a common to a sacramental use, by the word of God, and by special prayer, thanksgiving and blessing : the bread is to be broken and distributed amongst those who com¬ municate : the wine being poured out, the cup is to be taken and distributed amongst those who communicate : the bread is to be taken in the hand of the communicant, and is to be eaten by him : the cup is to be taken into the hand of the communicant and the wine is to be drunk by him. At the proper times, and suited to the proper parts of the sa¬ cramental action, the Lord's minister should repeat the Lord's words, according as they were uttered : and they who com¬ municate, reverently, waiting on the Lord, and decently ex¬ hibiting their mutual fellowship in a common and simultaneous participation, should solemnly and believingly eat and drink the symbols of the broken body and shed blood of Christ Jesus their Redeemer. Though there be two elements, there is but one sacrament : and the power of administration is not joint, but sev¬ eral : wherefore all the parts of the sacramental action that ap¬ pertain to him who ministers in the place of the Lord, appertain to a single and the same minister ; just as in the sacrament of baptism. They who worthily and with preparation of heart, wait upon him who said, This do in remembrance of me ; will find his promises fulfilled unto them, to the great peace and ed¬ ification of their souls. And it may be confidently asserted that the natural effects of bread and wine upon those who receive them physically, are neither better assured nor more explicable after their kind ; than the gracious effects of the body and blood of Christ crucified are, upon those who receive them spiritually, after their kind. For this communion is a sacrament of the Covenant of Grace, under the Gospel dispensation, instituted by Christ, wherein by the breaking and eating of bread his brok¬ en body and by pouring out and drinking wine his shed blood, THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 614 [book y. are signified and sealed, together with all the benefits of his cru¬ cifixion, unto all who worthily commune. 2. With respect to each individual Christian, this sacrament is the means of a most solemn, gracious, reiterated, and irrevoca¬ ble dedication of himself to God as his God, and to the Lord Jesus Christ as his Saviour. In return he receives from God pardon, holiness, light, strength, comfort, peace, and joy through the divine ordinance, word, and Spirit. For the crucified Saviour in all his past work, in all his present power, and in all his fu¬ ture glory, is sacramentally assured herein, to the penitent and believing sinner, on whose behalf is God’s eternal Covenant of Grace, and under it the New Covenant which is a testament in the blood of Christ. With respect to the whole company of be¬ lievers, who are the Church of the living God, the Bride of the Lamb, and the Body of Christ, we see how this and every other gift of her husband and Lord, who gave himself for her ; con¬ secrates her to himself, and separates her from a world lying in sin and under the curse of God. She had the promise of her Saviour, the constant revelation of the will of God, and the pres¬ ence of his Spirit, before she had any permanent sacrament. With the covenant of promise in Abraham, came circumcision and her own visible and separate existence ; with the covenant of sacrifice in Moses, a covenant in the blood of beasts, came the passover, and the written word, and her more complete, and ordered, and separate Church state : with the New Testament in the blood of Christ, came baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the complete and permanent revelation of the will of God-— Christ incarnate, crucified, risen, and glorified, the Spirit poured out, and all the ordinances of God, and all the ascension gifts of Christ, peculiar to the Gospel Church. All the time it is the elect of God, the Bride of the Lamb, the Body of Christ, the Church of the first-born whose names are written in heaven : and all are proofs of eternal, unalterable, unsearchable, divine love for her. These are sublime and infinitely fruitful truths. Upon the foundation they establish, the whole doctrine of the Church must rest. What¬ ever will not endure to be built on them, can be no portion of the house of God. Whatever they subvert, is divinely subvert¬ ed. They guide us, from all that concerns the humblest be¬ liever considered as a member of Christ, onward through the whole question of the Church, to the highest generalization that CHAP. XXX.] THE LORD'S SUPPER. 615 concerns the kingdom delivered up to the Father on the Lamb's Book of Life : illuminating the entire career of the Church, from the beginning to the end. As soon as we let them go, we are lost in darkness, amidst the innumerable revolutions of opin¬ ion, and the interminable disputes of men, concerning things with regard to which no opinion is of any value, and about which no man can know aught of any worth, except as divine light is shed upon them. Amongst all the benefits which Christ’s faithful ministers could confer on his Church, none could com¬ pare with a successful effort to recall her completely to these grand and simple truths, the perversion of which has cost her so much. CHAPTER XXXI. OFFICE BEARERS IN' THE GOSPEL CHURCH: AND THE GOVERNMENT IN THEIR HANDS. I. Office Bearers, and Government in their Hands. — 1. Considered in their relation to all Society : and to the particular society called the visible Church of Christ. — 2. As appertaining to the Church, they appertain in a still higher sense to Christ. — 3. Fundamental principle of the Divine Origin and authority of both, commensu¬ rate with the existence of the visible Church : proved and illustrated by the ex¬ ample of the Apostolic synod of Jerusalem. — 4. The Divine Example of that synod particularly considered ; and the Fact, the Nature, and the Perpetuity of Church Government demonstrated. — 5. The Office Bearers who constituted it : and first of the Apostles considered as uniting in the Administration of the government they had formed. — 6. Of the Elders — in whose Hands the Divine Government of the Christiau Church is permanently and exclusively lodged — II. 1. The actual origin of the Christian Church, its Government, its Office Bearers, and its Tribu¬ nals: Its particular congregations, and the Tribunal in each. — 2. Progress and development of the Government: Nature, Organization, Divine Authority of Tri¬ bunals Presbyterial, Synodical and Universal. — 3. The Nature of Church Power as delegated by the Mediator : its relation to his Offices of Prophet, Priest, and King : the fundamental distinction in its Nature and Use. as the Power of Regi¬ men and the Power of Order. — 4. The Perpetuation of Office Bearers and Gov¬ ernment in their hands, by Vocation of God, immediate and mediate. — III. 1. Other Office Bearers ; Prophets, inspired and temporary. — 2. Deacons : Divine Authority, Nature, and permanence of their Office. — 3. Evangelists : Divine Authority, and peculiar Nature of their office. — IV. 1. Summary of the Fundamental Principles of Church Government. — 2. The Phenomenon exhibited in the Origin, Develop¬ ment and Progress of such a Government. I. In the preceding chapters of this Fifth Book, I have en¬ deavoured to explain the chief gifts of God to the Church of Christ, which I had attempted to demonstrate in the Fourth Book. In the first place came God’s supreme gifts to the Church — namely, his Son, his Spirit, and his Word. Then the great Or¬ dinances which he has bestowed on her, namely, the Sabbath, the Sacraments, Instituted Worship, Discipline, and Evangelization of the world. And then, on account of their immense impor¬ tance, the two Sacraments ot the Gospel Church have been sepa¬ rately discussed. What remains, is to demonstrate the Office Bearers ordained by God in the Christian Church, and the Gov- CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 617 ernment in their hands which he has appointed therein. Partly for the sake of brevity, and partly on account of the indissoluble connection of the subjects, they will be discussed together. 1. As soon as we conceive of society as organized, no matter for what purpose, and no matter how, there arises a necessity for the designation, in some manner, of persons to perform for it those offices which, whatever, they may be, society cannot per¬ form in mass, and without the performance of which, society can¬ not exist. These persons are officers. There is a multitude of ways in which they may come into office ; a multitude of condi¬ tions on which they may hold office ; a multitude of official duties, functions, powTers — very various, and capable of being distributed in numberless ways. In all these respects the simple, limited, and powerful elemental principles of government, which I have pointed out in another place, are susceptible of endless variety in their practical exhibition ; and, therefore, government itself is presented under so many diverse aspects. But in every case, under every modification, the office bearer under every form of organized society, is the office bearer of the society, and performs its offices, for its benefit, and on its behalf. Otherwise, he is a mere intruder, usurper, and tyrant, holding simply, by force ; whose acts do not subvert society, but ordinarily defeat the proper ends, and always defeat the proper mode of its existence, until he is taken out of the way. The apothegm of the despot who said, I am the State, was as true as it was insolent. Neverthe¬ less, there could be no despot, if there was no State ; and the powers he usurps are not created by him, but flowing from the existence of society, are grasped and abused by him. The Church visible of Christ is subject, in these respects, to the laws and conditions belonging to the nature of all societies, organized out of human beings. Every office bearer in her bosom, is her officer; and his existence is necessary, because the continuance and per¬ fection of her own organized existence, depends on the perform¬ ance of offices, which she cannot discharge in mass. In the nature of the case, therefore, duty and power, obligation and authority, responsibility and control, go together. But, as I have before explained, the visible Church is a society of a peculiar kind, created in a peculiar manner, and for peculiar purposes. Of necessity, therefore, those great principles and truths which lie in the nature of man and of society, must incur, in this pecu- 618 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. liar use and direction of them, such a combination and applica¬ tion of them, as the nature and end of this peculiar society de¬ mand ; precisely as in all other cases of their practical applica¬ tion. This is a society having primary reference, not to this but to a future life, not to temporal but to spiritual things : a society perfectly free, separate from the world, consecrated to Christ, and so divinely prohibited from making laws for itself, but required to obey, to expound, to proclaim, and to execute laws given to it by God. A society nevertheless ; and hy consequence possessed of officers and a government. Indeed it is by far the oldest society in the world ; having existed through successive dispensations in a visible form, and in unbroken succession, since the covenant of circumcision was made by God with Abraham ; and in its pre¬ sent form as the Gospel Church, since the day of Pentecost. The fact of its organized and perpetual existence, is the most palpa¬ ble fact in the public history of the human race ; and the divine authority for its existence, from the beginning to the end, is far more frequently and variously declared throughout the Scriptures, than the divine authority for anything else that exists. 2. This most ancient and permanent society, concerning whose officers and government we are enquiring, is not only an ordinance of God, like the family, and the State ; but, as I have abundantly proved, it is an ordinance resting absolutely in divine revelation and divine acts, having relations both to God and man, the whole of which are revealed. It is a society created by the special grace of God, out of those who are united to the Lord Jesus Christ, by means of a divine regeneration of the Holy Ghost ; and it is in¬ tended to be the chief witness for time and throughout eternity, to his whole intelligent Universe. It is the Kingdom of God, which his Son, Messiah the Christ, has redeemed with his most precious blood ; which his divine Spirit creates and sanctifies ; which the brethren of Christ, sons and heirs of God, compose and hold forth as the Church of the living God. The relation of the Son of God to this society is inexpressibly close and power¬ ful. He is the Mediator between God and men of the Eternal Covenant under which it exists ; and the Gospel form in which it now exists, as compared with its preceding forms, is in a spe¬ cial sense the New Testament in his blood. To be Mediator, he took their nature into eternal union with his own divine nature ; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself so as CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 619 to become obedient unto death, even the death of the cross for them. As Mediator, he is the Prophet, the Priest, and the King of his Kingdom ; by his word and Spirit the Teacher of it, by the sacrifice of himself, the Redeemer of it, and now glorified, he is the only head, ruler, and Lord of it. Nothing exists in it, except according to the will of God, except through the authority and in the name of the Lord Jesus, except by the effectual work¬ ing of the Holy Ghost. It follows, that whatever office bearers may appertain to this wonderful society, however they may be its officers, as I have already explained, must be in a still more strict sense the servants, the ministers of Christ : and whatever gov¬ ernment of this Kingdom may be in the hands of the servants and ministers of Christ, is his government, administered in his name and for his glory. Undoubtedly it is conceivable that offices of various kinds might exist, and that governments of various kinds might also exist, as God might see fit to order his Kingdom. But it is not conceivable, under the data, that offices should law¬ fully exist in such a Kingdom, or that it should lawfully assume any form of government, except in the name, by the authority, and through the ordination of the King eternal, immortal, invisi¬ ble. The more precisely it can be shown what office bearers he has ordained, and what government in their hands, the more un¬ questionable is the divine warrant for it and for them. But the point now insisted on is that most peculiar to this divine society, namely, that its officers are also officers of Christ, and its govern¬ ment in their hands is also the government of Christ. And how¬ ever clear and important may be the relation of all office bearers and government to the Church as hers ; the relation of both to Christ as his, is still clearer and more important. But all this con¬ cludes both ways to the divine authority of Church office bearers, and Church government in their hands. For, first, if the Church be related to Christ as his in the sense shown, then necessarily her organization as has been shown at large, and by consequence her officers and government in their hands, are his — and so are divine. And, secondly, if in additiou, these office bearers are his Apostles, his Prophets, his Pastors, his Elders, his Deacons, not only as they are exercising offices ordained by him, but as they are also called and sent by him, in their respective places and with their respective functions ; then if anything is of divine authority, such office bearers and government are. 620 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. 3. My space does not permit me to discuss of the nature of the office hearers of the Church, anterior to the founding of the Gospel dispensation ; nor, desirable as it would be, do I sup¬ pose it to be of absolute necessity here. Nothing, however, can be more certain than that God called Abraham, and made the cov¬ enant of promise with him ; that he called Moses, and by him led the Israelites out of Egypt, and made with them the covenant in the hlood of beasts in the wilderness ; and that under these covenants, everything that existed in the Church of God from Abraham to the day of Pentecost, was exactly ordered and estab¬ lished, and did appertain both to God and the Church, iti the manner I have already explained. The principles established, namely the divine origin of all government in the Church and the divine vocation of all who bear office in it, had been commensurate with the whole existence of the visible Church, from its own origin to the day when the Apostles received their complete unction from the Holy Ghost, to execute in the name and by the authority of the glorified Saviour, the whole power he had committed to them concerning his Kingdom in this world. So far were those Apostles from supposing that these fundamental principles were changed ; they furnished in their own persons and office, an example not less illustrious certainly than any that had gone before, of the un¬ alterable perpetuity of both of them, and of the foundation of the Gospel Church State upon them. In which respects, those great principles agree with all others that are fundamental in the nature of God’s Kingdom ; as I have shown with reference to the Sabbath, the Sacraments, the associated ideas of sacrifice and priesthood, and every other great ordinance of God which I have had occasion to discuss. It took many years and unquestionable miracles to make the Apostles understand, that the Gentile world were to partake with the seed of Abraham of the blessings of the Gospel ; and many more years and miracles to make them see, that the Gentiles were entitled to partake of these blessings, free from the yoke which more ancient covenants had imposed ; and many more years, and the most wonderful interpositions of God, to make the Jewish converts understand that Jesus had released them also from the same bondage.1 Within these years the Gos¬ pel had been planted, and Christian Churches organized, and numberless office bearers ordained, and Church courts constituted 1 Acts, xxi. 17-25; Gal., in. passim. GOVERNMENT. 621 CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and in Samaria, and according to the order prescribed by Christ ; and the work for all the world which was to follow, had already spread widely. The very question of Gentile circumcision, to which I have already alluded, was decided, by a synod of Apostles and Elders, before which Paul and Bar¬ nabas and certain other men appeared to represent the Churches of Antioch. Already the government of the Church was fully in operation, already its office bearers were determined and estab¬ lished everywhere, before a Gentile idea had found entrance into its bosom, or those grand and long descended ideas of God's in¬ timate power and personal presence, had changed even their col¬ ouring in the Jewish mind. Nay, when we enter this Christian tribunal which determined this question, in which was involved the fate of the Church and of the Gentile world ; the very name of the office bearers carries us back to Moses, back to the Patri¬ archs. Elders, who were rulers always, since God had a Church visible on earth, whose title was always familiar where God had a people : Elders sit, counsel, decide, with the Apostles.1 And it may be added that this great tribunal of Apostles and Elders, citing the example of Moses, reduced their decrees to writing that they might be read everywhere, and sent them to Antioch by Judas surnamed Barsabas, and Silas, chief men among the brethren, and chosen men of their own company, along with Paul and Barnabas. These written decrees, received with great joy by the multitude of breth¬ ren in Antioch, were delivered by Paul himself, accompanied by Timothy, to all the Churches in the cities scattered throughout Syria and Cilicia, Phrygia and Galatia, as decrees for to keep, that were ordained of the Apostles and Elders which were at Je¬ rusalem ;a which service immediately preceded his first entrance with the blessed Gospel, upon the continent of Europe, about the twentieth year after the crucifixion. 4. Here then are the two objects of our enquiry, set palpably before us by the divine record ; office bearers, and a government in their hands. Concerning the government itself, the most important and fundamental truths lie on the face of the narra¬ tive. It is a government whose authority extends over the whole 1 Gen., L 7 ; Ex., iii. 16-18 ; iv. 29-31 ; Lev., iv. 13-21 ; Numb.,, xi. 24-31; Psalm evii. 32; Joel, i. 14, 15; ii. 15-11; Matt., xvi. 21; xxvii. 12; xxviii. 12.;, Acts, xi. 29, 30 *. xiv. 23 ; xv. passim, ; xvi. 4. 2 Acts, xv. 19-22, 30-41 ; xvi. 1-9. 622 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. Christian world. It is a tribunal whose decision has been sought by the remote Churches of a great Gentile city ; which being con¬ vened, accepts the reference to it without hesitation, and delib¬ erates on the question as one proper for it to determine ; which renders its authoritative decision in writing, and sends that de¬ cision in the form of a decree to the Churches immediately concerned. The same written decree is immediately circulated throughout all the surrounding nations, the great Apostle of the Gentiles who had brought the question to the supreme tribunal, being conspicuously active in delivering it to the scattered Churches in many States of the East ; and it was everywhere delivered, everywhere received, as a decree ordained, and as such to be kept ; ordained by the Apostles and Elders who convened at Jerusalem, to be kept throughout the Christian Church. It had been determined long before, in the great case at Csesarea, that Gentiles may be baptized : but the manner of that decision is not formally recorded.1 Now it must be decided, and the con¬ duct of Peter himself at Antioch, and the supposed scruples of James, and the teaching of certain men who came from Judea to Antioch, obliged the Church to settle, whether or not a Gentile, even though baptized, can be saved except he be circumcised after the manner of Moses.2 And the Church by its highest tri¬ bunal does settle it, and the Church through all her borders re¬ ceives it as settled, and all succeeding ages accept the settlement, that day made at Jerusalem ; that there never was such a Chris¬ tian doctrine, as that a Gentile could not be saved unless he kept the law of Moses. We do not know precisely, how many Apos¬ tles sat in this Church court ; all, doubtless, who were at Jerusa¬ lem. Certainly Peter, who after much disputing by others, de¬ livered his brief and massive decision, ending with the words, We believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they. James also sat in the body ; and after hearing all, stated his judgment briefly, closing it with these words, My sentence is that we trouble not them which from among the Gentiles are turned unto God. Paul and Barnabas were probably members of the synod ; at any rate they urged it to the conclu¬ sion it reached, by declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them. As for the Elders pres¬ ent, we know only that Barnabas and Silas were two ; and that 1 Acts, xi. 1-18. 2 Gal., ii. 11-14; Acts, xv. 1, 2. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS - GOVERNMENT. 623 the number of them was so great, as to be called a multitude. The argument of Peter was, that this question had already been decided by God, and that it was merely to tempt him, to treat it otherwise. The argument of James was, that the prophets had foretold the call of the Gentiles ; and that Peter’s statement was in accordance with their predictions. The argument of Paul and Barnabas was, the actual miraculous demonstration of the will of God. The result reached was unanimous, joyful, also, not only to the Apostles and Elders, but to the brethren also, nay, to the whole Church. Let it be added, that everything that was said and done, avowed or assumed that they w^ere acting by, and under, the authority of God, seeking to know his will, and when known to en¬ force it ; all has express reference to Jesus ; and the formal conclu sion is, It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us1. I forbear to urge farther, that the court decreed as well what the Gentile Church must do, as what they need not do ; the very form of their words, — To lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things, — showing the sense they had of the power of the synod, and of the force of its decrees. But let us note in addition to what has been said, that this tribunal had obviously no connection with any authority civil or sacred, either of the Jewish people or of the Roman Empire ; that it was manifestly constituted of a sin¬ gle body made up of Apostles and Elders, not of two chambers or houses, of which Apostles composed one and Elders the other ; that according to all the intimations of the narrative, as well as all the probabilities of the case, the number of Elders present far exceeded the number of Apostles present ; that as members of this synod, the right to sit, to deliberate, and to decide, was equally complete in both classes of its members ; and, finally, that a clear and decisive example of this sort, in which James, and Peter, and Paul were the chief actors, and such fellow labour¬ ers as Barnabas, and Barsabas, and Silas took part, and the body of Elders, at Jerusalem sat as members, and the whole Church of Christ approved, and the Holy Ghost endorsed : must be con¬ sidered conclusive. Conclusive that there was a government in the Christian Church in the days of the Apostles ; that it was in the hands of the Apostles and Elders ; that it was indepen¬ dent of all human authority, coextensive with the whole Church, and had jurisdiction of the doctrine, the practice, the life, and 1 Acts. xv. 1-29. 624 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. the interest of the whole body considered as a spiritual society ; and that the whole was in the name, and by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. Leaving out the parts of the case which were miraculous, extraordinary, local and transitory, the grand and permanent truths which were settled by means of those ele¬ ments, remain perpetually. The government by tribunals, the Elders, the jurisdiction, the multitudinous congregations, the unity of the whole Church, the supremacy over all of the tribu¬ nal which embraces all, the exclusive spirituality, complete sepa¬ ration from the world, and absolute authority of Christ : all this abides, and has been constantly manifest in the Gospel Church, exactly in proportion to its own fidelity to its divine Lord. 5. So far concerning the Government : next, briefly, concern¬ ing the office bearers in whose hands it is : and of the two classes, the Apostles first. The Saviour near the commencement of his public ministry, chose twelve of his disciples, who received the name of Apostles, to be his constant companions. One of them betrayed him, and then hanged himself. The hundred and twenty Disciples who met in Jerusalem, chose another in his place, sometime between the final ascension of the risen Saviour and the outpouring of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost. It is admitted on all hands, that the glorified Redeemer miracu¬ lously added Paul to the company ; and many suppose that Bar¬ nabas was also of the number. Some allege that others, perhaps many others, were also Apostles ; about which I shall not enquire here, as it is not material to the matter before us. Whoever were true Apostles of the Lord, had, of course, Apostolic power, rights, and fitness, divinely bestowed on them. For they were persons expressly and individually chosen by Christ, to be wit¬ nesses for him, concerning his life, his miracles, his doctrine, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and his glory ; expressly chosen to preach his gospel of salvation and cause it to be preached, to the whole family of man ; and to make known and cause to be made known in all nations, always, even unto the end of the world, all things whatsoever he had commanded them. To these men, even during his own ministry, he gave miraculous powers, and bade them freely use them, in confirmation of all he bade them preach.1 He appointed unto them a kingdom, even as his Father had ap¬ pointed unto him :a he gave them unlimited authority to set it 1 Matt., x. passim. 2 Luke, xxii. 24-30. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 625 up and to establish it — to open and to shut it — to form and to administer it :x he promised and he sent the Holy Ghost upon them, to fit them every way for their divine work, both by his ordinary and extraordinary work with and in them, and by his continual work as the Comforter of all those who should believe on him, and as the Reprover of the world itself :2 and to crown all, he promised to be with them himself in the plenitude of his infinite power, always, everywhere, and to return again, personally and in boundless glory, when the dispensation of his kingdom committed to their hands, had reached the point for his second coming, then hidden in the bosom of the Father.8 These are the men, three of whom certainly, and possibly more, were connected with the synod whose nature has just been considered ; to which, by their participation and approbation, they gave, both as to its substance and its form, its nature, organization, and acts, the whole weight of Apostolical, that is of divine authority. It is not, however, disputed by any, that the Apostles were completely authorized and fitted to create a government for the Gospel Church ; nor that whatever government they did create, was in their hands, wholly or in part. That Elders had part with them in the government they actually established, is as indisputable as the divine record. So that even if the Apostolic office is per¬ manent in the Gospel Church, the exclusion of Elders from this participation with the Apostles, now existing, would be a gross impiety. For if no such Elders exist to share the government of the Church with these living Apostles, according to the man¬ ner ordained by God ; this is an immense and impious revolution. But if such Elders do exist, and are excluded by these living Apostles, this is an atrocious usurpation and tyranny united. If added to one or both of these outrages, these living Apostles are mere intruders into an office that has no longer any existence, then whatever government may be in their hands, is doubly im¬ pious; for it exists by first dispossessing those to whom it rightly appertains, and then giving it to those who are guilty of imposture even in what they pretend to be. After that, it was natural to ravage and pollute the Church which had been betrayed — to deny and insult the Saviour who had been 1 Mark, xvi. 13-21 ; xviii. 15-20; John, xx. 19-25. 2 Acts, L 8 ; ii. passim ; x. passim ; Luke, xxiv. 44-53 ; John, xiv. ; xv. ; xvi. * Acts, L 1-11 ; Matt., xxviii. 18-20 ; xxv. 31-46 ; xxiv. 36-41 * Mark, xiii. 32-3T... 40 VOL. II. 626 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. defied. That the Apostolical office was extraordinary, and never designed by Christ to be permanent in the Church, is every way clear : and even if it were not, it is every way clear that those now claiming to be Apostles, are impostors. Because, if they are Apostles they must be so either by a lawful vocation of the people of God, like other permanent office bearers, which vocation none of them have, or even pretend to have : or they must be so by official succession from the original Apostles, which none of them can produce the slightest evidence that they possess, and which it can be clearly shown it is historically im¬ possible that they should possess : or they must be so by mirac¬ ulous vocation of God, to assert which, besides the imposture of it, is, considering whom they are, equally an insult to the com¬ mon sense of men, and to the majesty of God. But, in effect, the Apostolic office had no such succession as is alleged : because whatever succession appertains to the Church is not by office bearers but by the Church itself, which is the Body of him who is the ruler of the universe. By the vocation of God, ascertained in the manner I will disclose, the permanent offices ordained of God, are filled from age to age. No perpetual succession apper¬ tains to the Church itself, in any other sense than that God has always had, and always will have, a Church in this world ; but where, amongst what people, and how connected with preceding generations under the Gospel dispensation, is matter of sover¬ eign grace, and not of succession. Moreover the very nature of the Apostolic office, namely, with plenary power and fitness to set up and establish a new dispensation of the Church of God ; makes it as obvious that Peter had no successor, as that Abra¬ ham had none, and that Moses had none. And every Apostolic duty is of that nature, that it requires for its discharge such ex¬ traordinary operations of the Holy Ghost, as have ceased from the Church for nearly eighteen centuries : and the Scriptures are not only profoundly silent touching any continuance of this office permanently in the Church, but they assert that impostors calling themselves Apostles will arise, and command us to reject them, and praise those who had already before the death of the "last Apostle, tried some of them and found them liars.1 If however, there could be any doubt to any sincere enquirer after truth — the word of God has laid down three marks of a true 1 Rev., ii. 2; 1 John, iv. 1 ; Matt., xxiv. 3-5, 25, 2G. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 627 Apostle, by the union of all of which he who claims to he one, must make that claim good. First, an Apostle must be a true lover of the Lord Jesus, and his faithful disciple in good report and ill report.1 Secondly, he must be able to verify his claim by working miracles.2 Thirdly, he must have personally seen the Lord Jesus, so as to be personally, and of his own knowledge, a witness of his resurrection.3 If now it be alleged, that inas¬ much as the government was in the hands of Apostles and El¬ ders, the ceasing of the Apostolic office would abolish the gov¬ ernment, by putting an end to the chief element of it ; the answer is very easy. The government, whatever it might be, was created by the Apostles ; that they took part in its admin¬ istration during their lives, has been proved ; that they intended to perpetuate the Apostolic office, has been disproved : the two remaining solutions are, first that they designed the govern¬ ment to be temporary and to cease with their office' — which is absurd in itself, and wholly unsupported by the word of God ; and secondly, that they designed the permanent government of the Church to be by courts composed exclusively of Elders. This is precisely what they did intend, and what they actually did : which I will prove in its place. The Greek words for these El¬ ders and those courts composed of them, are as nearly as possible, transferred into English, in the ordinary words used to express them. The permanent government of the Church is by Presby¬ tery , composed of Presbyters .* That the Apostles should take part in the administration of this government formed by them¬ selves, designed to be perpetual and universal, rapidly extend¬ ing itself over every quarter of the earth, and embracing Jews, Samaritans, and Gentiles, a vast heterogeneous multitude of peo¬ ples, differing in all things but their common discipleship to Jesus ; seems to me to offer the only assurance of its successful establishment, unless the first generation of believers had all been inspired. That their office justified what they did, can hardly be questioned. If it should be questioned, however, it could avail nothing, because it would be further necessary to show that the Apostolic office was inconsistent not only with such a use of it, but also inconsistent with the actual holding of 1 John, xxi. 14-17 ; Luke, xxii. 25-29. ‘l Acts, ii. 42 ; Rom., xv. 16-20 ; 2 Cor., xii. 11-13. 3 Acts, i. 8, 21-26; iv. 33; John, xv. 26, 27 ; 1 Cor., xv. 1-10; ix. 1, 2. * Upeapvrcpt' v — irpeodvrepo^. 628 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. the additional office of Elder at the same time. Blit that never can be shown ; for two at least amongst the most eminent of them, have declared that they were Elders themselves ; and all may have been. Peter says, The Elders which are amongst you I exhort, who am also an Elder, and a witness of the suffer¬ ings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be re¬ vealed.1 John commences two of his Epistles by calling himself, The Elder.2 For my own part, however, I consider it past dis¬ pute that the Apostolic office embraced unlimited Church power ; and nothing can be more certain, than that the Apostles exer¬ cised it all, from the highest to the lowest. 6. I will now examine the nature of the office held by the Elders who, along with the Apostles, constituted the synod met at Jerusalem, which has been examined. As in the preceding portions of this enquiry, so here a clear case made and stated through divine inspiration, shall guide us. If any one ever knew what a Christian Elder was, the Apostle Peter certainly did. His First General Epistle, towards the close of his eventful and glo¬ rious life, is thus dedicated, Peter an Apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ ; Grace unto you and peace be multiplied. In the latter part of this Epistle he ad¬ dresses the Elders of these widely scattered saints, and equally all the Elders on earth to the end of time, in the manner follow¬ ing : The Elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an Elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a par¬ taker of the glory that shall be revealed. Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by con¬ straint but willingly ; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind ; neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadetli not away.3 These state¬ ments hardly admit of being misunderstood. The predominant ideas are, the chief Shepherd, his flock, and the office bearers specially exhorted : it is Christ, and his widely scattered Church, and his under Shepherds who are her Elders. This flock of Christ are called the elect of God, they are said to be redeemed by 1 1 Peter, iv. 1. 2 2 John, 1 ; 3 John, 1. 3 1 Peter, i. 1, 2 ; v. 1-3. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 629 Christ, to be sanctified by the Holy Ghost, and to walk in new obedience : they are the flock of God, the heritage of God, Christ being the chief Shepherd, and the officers whom Peter ex¬ horts being, according to the force and sense of the terms he uses, Elders, that is Presbyters of the flock, a title shared with Peter, Shepherds of it, a title shared with Christ, and as such Bishops of it, teachers of it and rulers of it under the great Teacher, the great King Jesus. They feed the flock ; they have the oversight of the flock ; they are its teachers, its rulers, its pastors, its bishops, all under the one name — Elders.* They were not appointed of God to lord it over his heritage, but to be examples to his flock. They must not take the oversight of it through any constraint upon the flock, but by its willing consent : the great doctrine of Vocation. They must not enter upon this work for filthy lucre, but from zeal. And the second coming of the Lord, and their crown of unfading glory to be re¬ ceived at that time, are the motives suggested for their fidelity. If, therefore, we may rely upon this Apostle, a Christian Elder, to whom the permanent administration of the government of the Christian Church belongs, is a Presbyter, who by his connection with the flock is Pastor and Bishop, and whose functions are to teach and rule ; who is forbidden to lord it over the flock, or even to intrude into it, but is commanded to be an example to it. Peter’s words do not admit of any other sense : and what he teaches corresponds with everything taught elsewhere by the Holy Ghost : insomuch that it may be confidently asserted not an intimation can be found throughout the Scriptures, that any one who is not a Presbyter, has any power of rule, since the Apostolic office ceased, in the Gospel Church. His generic title is Presbyter — Elder — which is specifically significative of his power of rule ; and the officer, the idea, and the mode of expressing both, according to the various tongues, have been a part of the inheritance of the Church of God under every dispensation, since it had a visible existence. Being Presbyter he is ruler ; having the cure of souls he is Bishop ; having charge of a particular flock he is Pastor and Teacher. Thus, to take another example from another Apostle, Paul as he went up to Jerusalem, proba¬ bly for the last time, passing from Macedonia, touched at Miletus, in Asia Minor, and sent to Ephesus and called the Elders of the * Upeo(3vrepovr — 7 xoLpavare — txoluvlov — skloko'kovvtc^ — aox^oLpevog. 630 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. Church. His exhortation to them is preserved in the narrative of the affecting transaction ; in the course of which he spoke these words to them : Take heed therefore to yourselves, and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers, to feed the Church of God, which he has purchased with his blood.1 Now, here is a congregation of believers at Ephesus, whom God had purchased with his own blood, to the aggregate body of whom Paul applies two Greek words, translated by the two English words church and flock.* The persons he sent for, are described by two Greek phrases, one of which is rendered by the words, the Elders of Church, the word for Elder being the only Greek word for Presbyter ; and the other is rendered by the words, the flock over which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers, the word for overseer being the only Greek word for Bishop.f The charge he gives them is, to take heed to themselves and to all the flock, and to feed the Church of God. We learn, therefore, the same things from Paul, as before from Peter. God had a Church in Ephesus, which, like all his other Churches, had office bearers in it, called Elders or Presbyters, who were Overseers or Bishops, who were placed by the Holy Ghost over this flock or Church to take care of it, and feed it ; that is, to be its Pastors, Bishops, Teachers, Eulers. Without multiplying proofs of what seems to be made clear and certain — namely, the nature of the office held by these Elders ; I will add one great and permanent peculiarity of the office, not disclosed particularly in the passages I have cited, but involved in them, and necessary to be clearly understood. The Jewish Sanhedrim, called in Greek Sunedrion (Zvvedpiov) and in English Synod, was established by Moses by the express command of God, in the hands of seventy of the Elders of Israel ;3 and existed throughout the Jewish dispensation as the supreme tribunal, both civil and ecclesiastical ; being in full exercise during the ministry of Christ and his Apostles, till the total destruction of the Jewish commonwealth. In the times of our Saviour and his Apostles, the chief priests and scribes sat in this bodv with the Elders, who were still its chief element :s the whole matter, though frequently alluded to, being unnecessarily obscured in our version by using the word council , instead of 1 Acts, xx. It, 28. * EK^Tjma — koi/uviov. f T ovc npEofivTspovc; enK/iTjOLag ; — ev (p vfiag to tt vev/j.a to aytov sOsto etthtkotcovi. a Lev., xi. 16-30 3 Matt., xxvi. 29 ; Luke, xxii. 66. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARER S — G OVERNMENT. 631 synod. In the body of the Christian Elders, from their first ex¬ istence, all without exception were rulers, as I have proved. But a new function manifested itself amongst these Elders, unknown to those of the Jews ; the great function of preaching the cross of Christ, as the power of God, and of a divine stewardship of those mysteries of God which stand immediately related to the great work of proclaiming the Gospel to every creature. To meet this glorious exigency, many expedients presented them¬ selves. The one adopted by the Apostles was the simplest and the most effectual. The whole body of Elders was divided upon this new function into two classes, one of which should perform it in addition to all other functions, and the other should unite with them as before in the performance of all other functions of the Elder's office. The designation of individual Elders to one or other class, as well as the call of them all, might at first have been miraculous, or might have been personal by the Apostles as theirs had been by Christ. Permanently, it must all be through vocation of God’s people, and by ordination ; the fact of such a distinction as I have pointed out, being the main thing here. The dispensation of Sacrifices had ended, and with it the cere¬ monial law on one side, and on the other the order of the priest¬ hood, the essence of whose office it was to offer sacrifice. But the Church stood not only, but passed into a far higher state ; and every permanent gift which God had bestowed on her, from the foundation of the world, stood forth only the more distinctly as all that was temporary disappeared. The Elders of the people were one of these gifts, older than the call of Moses, which he found and by the command of God organized ; which the Apos¬ tles found, and in like manner organized, as I have shown ; in all instances the form of organization being responsive to the form of each successive dispensation. In the Gospel dispensation, Church power is subject to the profound distinction which both the examples I have just expounded involve and suggest, namely the distinction between ruling and teaching : which distinction in the power, must exist also in those who hold the power ; or else all of them must hold both forms of Church power, and the inherent distinction in the nature of the power be liable to con¬ stant disregard. In effect, what happens by the ordination ot God is, that the distinction in the nature of the power is pre¬ served, and the whole body of Elders is divided into two classes, 632 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. of whom one hath rulers and teachers, while the others rule only ; all being by order Elders — Presbyters. Therefore, says the Apostle, Let the Elders that rule well he counted worthy of double honour, especially they that labour in word and doctrine.1 That is, all Elders are Church rulers, and all as such should he honoured ; and those who do this duty well should receive spe¬ cial honour on that account : hut besides ruling well, there are Elders who preach the Gospel, and these are particularly worthy of being honoured. In the same chapter the Apostle charges Timothy, to whom he was writing, that he should not rebuke an Elder, but exhort him as a father ; and that, on the other hand, in ordaining Elders in every city, to whom should be committed, that they also might commit to others, the things in which Paul had instructed him ; hands must not be laid in ordination sud¬ denly on any man.2 In another epistle this Apostle, more in detail, commands generally that every one having any part in the service of the body of Christ, should diligently use his special office, received as a gift of the grace of God ; and then entering into particulars, commands among other things that those who are thus called of God to teach shall be occupied therein, and those who are called to rule shall do it diligently.3 And to this purport is the whole doctrine of the subject, whether the Chris¬ tian Church be considered in its relation to past dispensations, or in its own special nature ; whether we examine the revealed form of the government given to it, or the absolute nature of the of¬ fice bearers themselves, or the multitudinous statements relating expressly or indirectly to every part of the subject, scattered throughout the word of God. Touching the point I have now discussed, the result is certain ; namely, that the permanent government of the Gospel Church is exclusively in the hands of Elders, and that there are two classes of Elders, of whom one are both teachers and rulers, and the other rulers only. II. — 1. There is then, by divine ordination, a spiritual gov¬ ernment in the Gospel Church, wholly distinct from all civil government : the office bearers in whose hands this government is lodged by God, are revealed : and the nature of the power of the Church, to be exercised through this government, and these office bearers, is taught us by God. I will now endeavour to ex- 1 1 Tim., v. 1 1. 2 1 Tim., v. 1-22 ; 2 Tim., ii. 2 ; Titus, i. 5. 8 Rom., xii. 4-8. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 633 plain, from tlie word of God, as briefly as possible, the manner in which this government originates and tabes its divine form, in which it acts, and in which its existence is every way involved with that of the visible Church itself. And first of the particu¬ lar congregations and their tribunal. We have no means of knowing to what extent men wTere regenerated under the per¬ sonal ministry of Christ ; no means of ascertaining what propor¬ tion of the seed of Abraham, were already true children of God when Christ came, and joyfully received him as soon as he ap¬ peared. When we recollect that the Jewish people were the visi¬ ble Church of God, and that the profession of being a Jew which was only outward and not inward, is distinctly repudiated by Christ and by the Apostles ; and call to mind the signal examples mentioned in the New Testament, of righteous Jews who were waiting, when Christ appeared, for the hope of Israel ; we shall, perhaps justly, conclude that we are prone to make too low an estimate of the number of God's children who were ready to ac¬ cept their Messiah. On the other point, if we call to mind the wonderful ministry of John the Baptist, and its wonderful effects; and reflect on the overwhelming power of the teaching, the mira¬ cles, and the very presence of Christ, and consider wThat vast mul¬ titudes throughout Judea heard his doctrine from himself, as well as from the twelve, and the seventy whom he sent out ; it is not easy to believe that the number of true believers was small, when the Lord was crucified. We know that the number of the disciples met together in one place before Pentecost, who at the suggestion of Peter substituted an Apostle for Judas, was about a hundred and twenty j1 they being, probably, a select body of the principal Christians then about Jerusalem. And Paul states that Christ was seen after his resurrection, by about five hundred brethren at once ; although Peter says it was only by witnesses chosen before of God, that he was seen after his resurrection.2 To this precious, dispersed, and perhaps great flock delivered by Christ to the Apostles, three thousand were added on the day of Pentecost. The number was increased to five thousand a short time after, and the Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved ; and in a single generation the Gospel seems to have penetrated the remotest nations. At first, the Apostles ap¬ pear to have discharged every official duty ; very soon they caused Acts, L 15. 2 1 Cor., xv. 6 ; Acts, x. 41. 634 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. the multitude of the disciples in Jerusalem to elect Deacons ; as soon as we hear of particular Churches, we hear of their Elders : and then of Presbytery, and ordinations ; and then of Synod, and great questions discussed and settled. The office bearers of the Church, are ascension gifts of Christ ; for, it is certain that when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men ; which gifts were Apostles, Prophets, Evange¬ lists, Pastors and Teachers. And these were given, for the per¬ fecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edify¬ ing of the body of Christ.1 And so far were the Apostles from being at any loss, that the narrative of their reception of the Holy Ghost, of their instantaneous proclamation of salvation by Jesus Christ, of the conversion and immediate baptism of about three thousand souls ; proceeds to add that these persons continued steadfastly in the Apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in break¬ ing of bread, and in prayer.2 But this breaking of bread was the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, which has been shown to be a sacrament involving a community, and not merely individual per¬ sons : and this fellowship* necessarily involves the same thing. From Pentecost itself, therefore, the family of Christ, the Church, the Christian commonwealth, already existed in its visible form ; and was numbered by thousands ; possibly, as I have pointed out, by hundreds of thousands. From the remotest antiquity per¬ haps, undoubtedly from the Babylonish captivity, fixed congre¬ gations of believers met to worship God. The Jews called these fixed congregations synagogues, and held the worship of each at a fixed place ; and that worship consisted in the reading and ex¬ pounding of God’s word, and in offering up prayers to him. Each one of these synagogues had a bench of these Elders, whom the Scriptures mention so often, who jointly bore rule in it. During the ministry of Christ and that of his Apostles, these synagogues existed throughout Palestine, and were found in every city in the world, wherever a small community of Jews resided. If the Rabbis are to be credited, Jerusalem contained nearly five hundred syn¬ agogues. Every Christian in the world, probably, for the first eight years of the existence of the Gospel Church, was a Jew : and whether by divine inspiration, by reason of the perfection of the organization, by reason of their Jewish training, or by reason of all combined : the fact is certain that the fixed congregations, i Eph.,, iv. 7-15’ 1 Cor., xii. 5-13. 2 Acts, ii. 42. * YLoivmvlci. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 635 the particular Churches, which the Apostles erected in the bosom of the Church universal, were as near the model of the Jewish synagogue as the respective natures of the two dispensations of the Church of God allowed. The Apostle James, indeed, calls the Christian congregation of his dispersed brethren to whom his Epistle is addressed, your synagogue, which our version obscures by using the w7ord assembly.1 And the promise of our Saviour, Where two or three are gathered together* in my name, there am I in the midst of them :2 appears, from the peculiar word he used, to intimate an organic gathering together, and that after the manner of the synagogue. Now these fixed Christian congrega¬ tions are the elemental particulars of which the whole structure of Church government is constructed. To each one of these Christ gives a plurality of Elders, two or three, ten or twenty, according to its need. To each one of them he gives a Pastor or "Bishop— or two or three or more, if need require. And all these Pastors, Bishops and Elders, are alike Presbyters ; and all jointly rule, and the Pastors or Bishops besides this, labour in word and doctrine. The tribunal, the court in that, congregation, which exercises all the power of rule appertaining to it, is constituted of all these Presbyters.8 To this fixed particular Church, God gave another class of permanent office bearers called Deacons, of whom I have had no occasion to speak particularly as yet, because Church government is not in their hands. They arc mentioned here for the purpose of adding, that every complete Christian Church, has everything that every other one has, everything that the Church universal has : Pastors, Elders, Deacons, members, a tribunal, ordinances, worship, everything. If there was but one on earth it would possess all that the universal Church would possess, if it embraced the whole family of man : numbers only would be increased, the government, the office bearers, the mem¬ bers, the tribunal, the nature of Church power being the same. On the one hand the unity of the whole Church, on the other the efficacy of every particular element of it, is perfectly secured : and all that is lacking is some application of this wonderful organization, by which a tribunal like that in the congregation, shall exist for the whole of the Church considered as one, and tri- i James, ii. 2. * Zwqyfievoi 2 Matt., xviii. 20. 3 1 Cor., v. 4, 5; xii. 28; Matt., xviii. 15-20; Acts, xiv. 23; 1 Thess., v. 11, 12; Acts, xv. 2, 6; xx. 17, 28; Rom., xii. 8 ; 1 Tim., v. 17. 636 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V, bunals like both of these shall exist between the first and the last, the smallest and the greatest, as necessity may demand. This I will now explain. 2. The particular Christian congregations everywhere gathered and organized, everywhere called the Church, the flock of Christ, of which the mention is constant in those divine writings which cover a period of about sixty years, from the crucifixion of Christ to the death of the Apostle John ; varied greatly with respect to members, both one from another, and each one in itself from time to time. The organized congregation and its tribunal, might exist singly in a city and be small : or might exist singly, and the numbers be so great and the city so large, as to require nu¬ merous places for public worship, and numerous office bearers to serve, to rule, and to teach, so great a multitude : or each one of these various meetings might become fixed and organized with its own officers and tribunal. It is an aspect of the subject which presents no difficulty, either in theory or practice. That Presby¬ ters, Elders, Pastors, Bishops, were ordained in every Church, by the Apostles or by their orders, is explicitly and repeatedly as¬ serted in the Scriptures and I have already shown that they constituted the tribunal, the court' — the congregational or pa¬ rochial Presbytery. It is by the union of many of these particu¬ lar congregations, with their tribunals, and by the erection of a tribunal over the united body, similar to the one that exists in each of them ; that the Church preserves its outward unity, and extends its government, as its own area enlarges, and its num¬ bers increase. It is immaterial what the number of these united congregations may be, three, a hundred, or any convenient num¬ ber. The model of this application of the principles of the gov¬ ernment, already existed from the origin of the Church, probably in every large city, certainly in Jerusalem, Antioch and others ; where numerous unfixed congregations, although worshipping statedly apart, belonged for a time to the same organized Church, under the control of its single but numerous tribunal. So that the transition to a similar union of numerous fixed and organized con¬ gregations, and the erection of a tribunal over them all which should be exactly like the tribunal of each, indeed constituted by uniting the whole of the particular tribunals or a select portion of each one ; was a perfectly obvious mode by which the united 1 Acts, xiv. 23 ; xiii. 1-3 ; xxi. 17, 18 ; 1 Tim., v. 17-22 ; Titus, i. 5 ; James, v. 14. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 637 congregations might have mutual counsel and assistance, might more effectually preserve the doctrine and execute the discipline of the Church, might preserve the organic unity of the whole as the body of Christ of which all are parts, and might augment by union of counsel and effort the efficient working of the whole, in perfecting and extending the Kingdom of God. What is as¬ serted is, that this part of the organization of the Church, which seems to be so natural, so obvious, and so wise, is also Apostolical and divine ; that this union of congregations is as thoroughly according to the will of God, as the union of individuals into congregations is ; and the control of the tribunal of the united congregations as real over all the congregations and all their special tribunals, as the rule of each particular tribunal is over the congregation in which it is erected. Thus originating and thus constituted, the members of this tribunal are the same per¬ sons who are members of the tribunals in the congregations ; not only similar, but the same, beyond all doubt to the extent of embracing them ; they are Presbyters of both classes, all of one order, and according to that order all of equal dignity, rank, and authority, as rulers in the house of God. The tribunal itself is called in the Greek Scriptures Presbuterion ( Upeof^vrepLov ) Pres¬ bytery : the very same word being applied by Paul to the Jewish and to the corresponding Christian tribunal ; but obscured by rendering it the Estate of the Eiders when applied to the former.1 So we have in the Jewish Church the Sanhedrim, the Presbytery, and the Synagogue, and in the Christian Church the Synod, the Presbytery, and the congregation : the very names of all the Jewish courts being allowed by the Apostles, as being appro¬ priate to the Christian institutions; and the things represented by these names respectively, being as similar as the difference be¬ tween the two dispensations permits. It would prevent much error, if we would more carefully distinguish between those parts of our great inheritance which are peculiar to our own dispensa¬ tion, and those parts which are common to all dispensations. For the detailed exposition of the three ecclesiastical tribunals so near¬ ly common to the Jewish and Christian Dispensations, a volume, and not a single section of a single chapter, would be required. I therefore content myself, upon this naked point of the divine warrant for the classical Presbytery, that is a Presbytery over a 1 1 Tim., iv. 14 ; Acts, xxii. 5 ; Luke, xxii. G6. 638 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [book V. dass of particular Churches, which is the tribunal next above the congregational Presbytery or Church session ; with merely adding to what has been advanced, the example of the classical Presbytery in the Churches in Jerusalem, in Antioch, in Ephe¬ sus, and in Corinth concerning all of which the numerous statements of the Scriptures, when collected and duly consid¬ ered, make it fully apparent that they were just such courts as have existed always, and as exist still, in the Church of Christ. Supposing, in the next place, the Church visible to extend itself beyond such limits, either in space or numbers, as may be con¬ veniently covered by the classical Presbytery just described ; the formation of additional tribunals of the same kind, either by di¬ vision of such as exist, or the erection of new ones, puts these classical Presbyteries with all the Churches composing them, in a position similar to that occupied by the particular Churches and their congregational Presbytery, before the creation of the classical Presbytery. And the remedy and the result are the same, as in the first case. The union of anv number of classi- cal Presbyteries as such, three, fifty, a hundred, creates a synod covering them all ; composed of the same office bearers, organ¬ ized in the same way, and with the same power and jurisdiction over all, that each had over part. By taking the members of this third court, or synod, immediately from the first one, or Church session, it may be made a very numerous body ; or by taking them from the second court, or Presbytery strictly so called, and applying the principle of representation of the whole Presbytery by a small part of its members, the synod may be a very small body. It is perfectly suitable, therefore, either to be the permanent head of a denomination of Christians, or of a na¬ tional Church ; or to be one of a series of tribunals, the supreme one of which shall be above it. The scriptural warrant for this tribunal has been as fully set forth, and its nature as fully con¬ sidered, in the examination I have already made of the synod constituted at Jerusalem concerning Gentile circumcision, as my limits permit. And now supposing the extent of the Church in any way, or its interests of any sort, to demand a tribunal still higher than the synod, the same divine organization and principles apply perfectly, and with the same result : and a uni- 1 Acts, xi. 27, 30 ; xv. 2, 35 ; xiii. 1-3 ; xx. 17, 28 ; iv. 35, 37 ; vi. 2, 3-6 ; 1 Cor., i. 12 ; iv. 15 ; v. 4-15 ; xiv 29 ; 2 Cor., ii. 6-9. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 639 versal council of any number of Churches, can he constituted for a special purpose ; or a General Assembly of any separate Church, whether denominational or national, can be constituted as a permanent tribunal, without departing in the least particular from the divine model, or from the divine precepts. If the Gen¬ eral Assembly is to be numerous, that is effected by making the Presbyters who compose it, the representatives of Presbyteries : if it is to be comparatively small, that is effected by making the Presbyters who compose it the representatives of Synods. It is the tribunal of the whole Church ; it is the whole Church met in one Assembly by its office bearers, exactly as a Church ses¬ sion is a particular Church met by its office bearers ; and the jurisdiction and power of the supreme tribunal over all, are of the same nature and have the same divine warrant, as the juris¬ diction and the power of the tribunals below it over the parts which they respectively rule. The government of the Church, therefore, is a free representative government : it is not a tyr¬ anny like popery, nor an oligarchy like Prelacy, nor a pure de¬ mocracy like Independency. It is in its conception perfect, no matter how small : perfect, no matter how widely expanded : perfect at every intermediate point between a small company and the whole race of man. It cannot make Christians ; but it en¬ ables Christians to do with the highest efficiency, all that God requires them to do, as his Kingdom. Its whole authority de¬ pends on the only head of the Church, who is Christ the Lord ; in whose name everyone of its tribunals perpetually constitutes ; and all their lawful a.cts are worship of him. Its whole efficacy depends on the Holy Ghost, and its sole rule is the word of God. Its connection with the Church of God, which is the pillar and ground of the truth, is so vital, that its permanent extinction is totally impossible, except by means of the annihilation of the visi¬ ble Church. Nevertheless, while its existence depends on that of the Church, the existence of the Church depends on it only in the sense, that by the command of God she manifests the life he gives her, through the gifts he bestows on her ; two of which are these office bearers, and this government in their hands. Great gifts : but she has others earlier and greater. 3. I have explained in another place, how it is that the inhe¬ rent power of making laws, which in the nature of society mani¬ fests itself in the very process of its organic life ; receives, in 640 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. this divine society, a very peculiar direction, and manifests itself by the willing, nay, joyful acceptance of God as its only law¬ giver, and his laws as the only laws of his Church. Obedience to the laws of God, together with the exposition and administration of them, therefore, embraces the whole power and duty of the government of that society called the visible Church. All its officers, and the whole government in their hands, and the entire tribunals appertaining to that government, are, as I have shown, from God, and of the Church. This Church is the company of God’s elect now on earth, who are disciples of Jesus Christ, his visible Body, a peculiar people purified unto himself, a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.1 To it, God has given inestimable gifts, out of some of which its visible existence originated, and by means of others its complete organization bas been produced ; and its continued existence and extension, as well as its peace, purity and edification are secured by them all. In a special manner the office bearers of the Gospel Church are ascension gifts of Christ to the Churcb in its present form ; and the government in their hands is of Christ, wfith special reference to this dispensation. Nor does it impair, but rather adds to the force of these statements, that the model of the office bearers and of the government of the Church, is found in part under preced¬ ing dispensations ; just as the Sabbath, the Sacraments, the moral law, the Gospel, nay, Christ himself, are found in them. The re¬ lation, therefore, between Christ, the Church, its office bearers, and its government, all to each, and each to every one, is un¬ speakably intimate ; and on that very account we are the more liable to err, in our weak attempts to apply the logical element of the question of the Church, in such a manner as to settle and bound acts and gifts of God, into which the supernatural element of the question of the Church enters so profoundly. Whatever power is in the Church or its office bearers, is in them by investi¬ ture from Christ, and is revealed in the sacred Scriptures. But the whole power of Christ unto salvation is in him, under the covenant of grace, and as Mediator of the Covenant ; and all his power unto salvation as Mediator, is manifested in his offices of Prophet, Priest, and King. Of his Priestly office, and power, he delegates nothing to the Church ; except as it is a Kingdom, every member of which is a royal Priest ; and except as that 1 Titus, ii. 14; 1 Peter, ii. 9. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 641 portion of its Presbyters who labour in word and doctrine, each being a minister of Christ, an Elder, a Bishop, a receiver of gifts, is a steward of the mysteries of God.*1 Of his Kingly office he delegates to his Church, whatever power of rule he invests in the Elders he gives her, and in the government he creates in their hands. And of his Prophetic office he delegates in a wide sense power to every disciple of his, to spread the glad tidings of sal¬ vation through all the earth, and to make the way of life known to every creature ; but in a strict sense, he calls one class of the great order of Elders, and delegates to them the preaching of the everlasting Gospel, they being herein his special official ser¬ vants, ministers, and stewards of the mysteries of God. The whole rule of the Church is, therefore, a delegation to a certain extent, of certain parts of the Kingly power of Christ ; and is in Elders as Elders, to be exercised by them in the tribunals ordained of God. But to a certain class of this order of Elders, the great function of the ministry in word and doctrine, and that of stewardship of the mysteries of God, is divinely committed ; and this is a delegation also, from Christ, and the most glorious of all, but a delegation not of his Kingly but of his Prophetic power as to the former, and of his Priestly power as to the latter. The rule of the Church, I repeat, is a delegation from Christ as Kinsr, and is in the hands of Elders met in tribunals ; the ministra- tion of the Gospel is a delegation from Christ as Prophet, and is in the hands of ministers who are Elders ; and the stewardship of the mysteries of God is a delegation from Christ as Priest, and is in the hands of the ministers of the Gospel. The ministers of the Gospel, therefore, are rulers, not as ministers, nor as stewards, but as Elders, Presbyters ; Presbyters on whom those great addi¬ tional honours are laid by GoJ, and on account of those gifts and callings of God, they become a separate class of Elders, not by any means a different order. There is, therefore, as I said before, a thorough and obvious distinction in the nature of Church power itself ; which is ordinarly and justly expressed by calling one form of it, the power of rule, or government, Potestas Pe- giminis; and the other the power of teaching and of adminis¬ tering the mysteries, or from the nature of it, the power of order, * 'T'jreprjTac Xpcarov, kcu oucovouovg pvoTTjpiov Oeov : — Trpeoflvrepovg etuokottov Oeov oiKpvofiov : — -XdpLOuci — OLK.ovop.oi — -xapLTog Oeov. 1 1 Cor., iv. 1 ; Titus, i. 4-7 ; 1 Peter, iv. 10, 11. 41 VOL. II. 642 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. Potestas Ordinis. The distinction is fundamental ; and the dif¬ ference in the use and exercise of the two powers is also funda¬ mental ; and not only the freedom and efficiency of the Church, hut its very nature as a society, depends on seeing that distinc¬ tion clearly, and observing it faithfully. The power of order is a several power, never joint ; the power of regimen, rule, is a joint power, never several. A Presbyter, who is a minister of Christ, labouring in word and doctrine and a steward of the mysteries of God ; preaches the Gospel, administers sacraments, and the like, as a single person, ex or dine, by virtue of his being what he is ; and nothing can be added to, nothing taken from the lawfulness and efficacy of such acts, by the absence or the concurrence of other office bearers like himself. As to his ruling, it is widely different. No Presbyter has any several power of rule ; the power itself is joint, and can be exercised only by a tribunal, never by a single yierson, nor by any number of single persons taken severally. The exercise of rule in Christ's Church is not by the body of the brotherhood, nor by a diocesian Prelate, nor by a Pope ; but exclusively by Church courts, constituted of both classes of the one great order of Presbyters. The tri¬ bunals they constitute are courts, not legislative assemblies : courts having power, in the name and by the authority of Christ the eternal King and Lawgiver and Judge, to expound and ad¬ minister the laws of his Kingdom on earth ; which laws embrace his whole will revealed unto salvation, as held forth in the Scrip¬ tures. And these courts, as has been shown, rise one above ano¬ ther, each embracing all below it, until that which is supreme embraces all. Everything has reference to the preservation and extension of the Kingdom ; to the gathering and perfecting of the saints in this life, to the end of the world. Everything has a divine authority : or no authority at all. 4 .In the practical continuance of the existence of the visi¬ ble Church, and the practical administration of its government, and of all power whether that of Regimen or that of Order ; everything depends upon the practical exercise of the vocation of office bearers. Theoretically, the subject is no less vital ; for the grounds, no matter what they are, upon which we decide it, will be found to enter deeply into the whole conception we have of the nature of the Church, its office bearers, and its govern¬ ment. If the Pope or the King appoints the diocesan Bishops, CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 643 and they appoint the Priests, and the Elder's office is abolished ; it is easily seen that the idea of the Church, of its government, of its officers, and of their vocation, is consistent throughout. On the other extreme, if the idea of the visible unity of the Church is swallowed up in the idea of the independence of each particu¬ lar congregation, the brotherhood of which is the sole power in the Church of God ; here again, the idea of the Church, of its government, of its office bearers, and of vocation, is consistent throughout. In both cases it is seen how much of what I have established, is destroyed ; and they show, also, that there must be some idea of vocation of officers corresponding with the cohe¬ rent system of the Church, its government, and office bearers, which I have explained. This I will briefly disclose. That Gocl has always established whatever offices have lawfully existed in his Church, whether extraordinary or ordinary, and that, by con¬ sequence, none ever were or can be authorized except they are established by him ; is, I suppose, already abundantly proved. The manner in which individual persons are to obtain a lawful right to these offices, established by God ; is itself, also, ordained by God ; but variously ordained under successive dispensations. Under the Jewish dispensation, none might be Priests but a legitimate male descendant of Aaron, nor he, except on certain conditions and in a certain way, ordained by God ; and none might be High Priest, on the peril of his life, but male after male in a direct line from Aaron ; so that when Aaron had but two sons, God made the perpetuity of the Jewish dispensation depend on this narrow point. Under the Gospel dispensation, the Apos¬ tles were chosen personally by Christ, and were anointed by the Holy Ghost, and their divine vocation attested by miracles. The offices and courts instituted by Christ, so far as the regimen and order are concerned, have been already sufficiently proved and explained. The personal vocation of each individual who occu¬ pies any office in the Gospel Church, is of God, both mediately and immediately. As to the latter, even Christ glorified not him¬ self to be made a High Priest ; but he that said unto him, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee : as he saith, also, in another place, Thou art a Priest forever after the order ot Mel- chizedek.1 Ho man, therefore, may take this honour on himself, but he that is called like Aaron.2 Called, not after the same or- i Heb., y. 5, 6. 2 Heb., v. 4 ; vii. 11 ; Ex., xxviii. ; xxix. 644 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. der as Aaron, but as really called of God. This inward call of God by his Spirit, is the immediate vocation of God ; and every one who becomes an office bearer in the Church of Christ, is at least as much bound to have an inward and satisfying convic¬ tion that he is thus called of God to the work he undertakes, as every one who becomes a disciple of Christ is bound to have an inward and satisfying conviction that he is called thereunto by the Spirit of God. Of the two evils, it is more disastrous every way, to intrude into an office of the Church than merely into its membership ; and nothing can be more clear than that a body whose officers and members are alike destitute of the immediate calling of God's Spirit, is a synagogue of Satan. Whatever remains after this immediate vocation of God, is not mere pru¬ dential rules established by men, but is the mediate call of God ; the ordinances which he has established, whereby his Church may ascertain that he has really and immediately called the particu¬ lar person, to the particular office. I will not deny that the Apostles might have justly exercised, in the vocation of the first permanent office bearers, powers equivalent to everything after the inward and immediate call of God. That they did nothing of this sort, however, may be fairly urged from the manner in which the first Deacons were chosen i1 and I have before shown, that on the day of Pentecost, the doctrine, the ordinances, the ceconomy, and the worship of the Church, are spoken of as already existing. At any rate there was the Church of Christ, whose vocation under two aspects, and at two stages, is that which con¬ stitutes the mediate call of God. No one is subject to be called to any office, who is not already a member of the body of Christ ; and the qualifications which every one must possess, before he can presume to say he has an inward vocation of God, and before the Church can lawfully call him to any office ; are plainly laid down concerning each office, in the sacred Scriptures.2 Nor can any one be lawfully called to a permanent and ordinary office, except by the congregation he is to serve in the Lord ; nor can any office bearer be set in any office in a congregation, except by its own vocation. It is thus that God has guarded his Church against intruders and impostors. It is thus that the Bride of the 3 Acts, vi. 1-7. 2 Titus, i. 5-9 ; 1 Tim., iii. passim ; v. 1 7-25 ; 2 Tim., ii. 21-26 ; Epli., iv. 11-16 ; Acts vi. 31 ; i. 21-25 • xvi. 1-3. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 645 Lamb accepts the ascension gifts of her head and Lord. It is thus that ultimate power is lodged by Christ, in that royal priesthood which constitutes the holy nation, whereby the whole government of the Church takes its start in the bosom of the Christian congregation, and is perpetuated only b}* their perpetual action. And the highest fidelity in the exercise of this great and sacred trust is secured, by obliging each particular congregation to receive as its own office bearer, every one to whom its vocation is given. Nor is the mediate calling of God yet complete. This vocation of the Church attests, on one side, to him who supposes he has been called of God, and on the other side to the tribunal which God has appointed to ordain him to his office ; her con¬ viction that God has called him, and her readiness te accept him. Without this, I repeat, no Church court may lawfully ordain any one, to any ordinary and permanent office. But while the want of this seal of a divine vocation, is a defect which ordination cannot cure ; the possession of it is not conclu¬ sive on the Church court. This tribunal, no matter which it is, is composed exclusively of office bearers who have received the vocation of God, outward and inward, mediate and immediate, to be rulers in the courts of the Lord ; part of whom are always, besides, ministers who labour in word and doctrine. It is for this court of Christ, with the evidence of the vocation of God be¬ fore them, which is furnished by the conviction of the person who seeks the office, and by the call of the Church ratifying it; to judge finally and by whatever other evidence, and under what¬ ever other divine guidance, in this solemn and important matter. If there be persons competent to decide in such a case, these are they. If any motives, human or divine, can be supposed to se¬ cure a just and righteous decision, they exist here. If, on their souls, and as they will answer to Christ, they believe the Lord has called the person to the office; they ordain him to it, as Christ has provided, by an irrevocable act in his name, calling upon him by prayer, and with laying on of the hands of the Presbytery.1 This, briefly, is the method pointed out by God for the perpetuation of office bearers, and a government in his Church. In a settled state of the Church, its operation is per¬ fectly simple and efficacions. Once erected, all the knowledge, 1 Titus, i. 5 ; 1 Tim., iv. 14-16; Gal., ii. 9 ; 2 Tim., i. 6; ii. 2 ; iv. 1, 2; Acts, vi. 6; i. 25 ; xiii. 2, 3; Ex., xl. 12-16; Num., viii. 9-11. 646 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. piety, and zeal it contains are always free to act, and are neces¬ sarily in perpetual conflict with whatever error, ignorance, or in¬ difference may have gained entrance. The most difficult of all systems to derange, it possesses also in the highest degree of all, the forces which tend to readjustment. If by the most indis¬ criminate persecution it appears to bo destroyed, the smallest fragment that escapes the rack and the stake, is capable of re¬ producing all. If by the rich grace of God, boundless extension is given to it, it might cover the whole world as easily as a single province. The conditions of its endless triumph are few but ab¬ solute : and I have demonstrated them all. Its Faith must be pure, its Life holy, its Worship acceptable to God. III. — 1. Amongst the permanent office bearers of the Church, who have the power of Regimen and Order, I have omitted any separate mention of Teacher as one of them ; because it seems to me to be very obvious that a separate office for permanent teaching was never created by God in the Christian Church ; but the Elder who was the minister of the word and steward of the mysteries of God, was also teacher as well as Pastor of the flock, just as every Elder who had the cure of souls was bishop, over¬ seer.1 There was but one order of permanent Rulers, and they were all Presbyters, Elders, and as rulers all equal ; there was but one class of ministers of the word and doctrine, and they were all equal in rank and class, all Presbyters, Elders, to whom various names are given, according to the various functions they discharge, to teach being amongst the chief. Of the manifestly extraordinary orders of office bearers, Apostles and Prophets, to which perhaps teachers might be added, the former has been suf¬ ficiently considered ; and little need be said here concerning the latter. Very frequent mention is made of Prophets, and occa¬ sional mention of Teachers in the New Testament ; as of persons to whom the extraordinary manifestations of the Spirit of God were vouchsafed.2 They are specially classed by the sacred writers with the Apostles, miraculous gifts, and miracles :3 and the name Prophet is applied repeatedly, and with emphasis, to Christ him¬ self.4 As inspired teachers of the true sense of all former reve¬ lations from God, as inspired teachers of what Jesus himself had 1 Eph., iv. 1 ; Rom., xii. 7 ; Gal, vi. 6 2 Matt, x. 41 ; Acts, ii. 17 ; xi. 27 ; xiii. 1, 2 ; 1 Cor., xiv. 29-33. 3 Rom., xii. 28-31; Eph., iii. 5. Matt., xiii. 57 ; xxi. 11, 46; Luke, xxiv. 19 CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 647 taught, as inspired men who made known to the disciples the will of God in the providences then existing or immediately im¬ pending, or revealed the more distant future ; we easily see the relation they bore to Christ, to the Apostles, to the Church, and to the early spread of the Gospel among men. They appear to have had no connection with the government of the Church : and they ceased from it, when the extraordinary operations of the Spirit ceased. The warnings of God against false Prophets, are as emphatic and as suggestive as I have shown they are against false Apostles.1 2. There is another office bearer who is ordinary and perma¬ nent in the Church, whom I have not mentioned particularly, be¬ cause he has no power of regimen or order, in the sense in which I have used these terms. I mean the Deacon, whose creation, qualifications, and duties, are explicitly stated in the Scriptures ; and the election and ordination of the first seven Deacons, to¬ gether with their names, in the Church of Jerusalem, are handed down to us.2 The office thus created at Jerusalem, was intro¬ duced into the Church everywhere : and special honour seems to have been put on such as discharged the office well, while special care was taken to fill it only with men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost, and wisdom.3 These officers are servants of the Church, in things having more immediate relation to the manner in which Christianity affords a remedy or solace under temporal trials and sorrows ; in like manner as the ministers of the word are servants of the Church, in things more entirely spiritual. Their Greek name, which is nearly transferred into English, is very widely applied in the Scriptures to many sorts of service, and many kinds of officers who performed them. But this affords no pretext for any mistake about this office ; much less for the gross perversion of it ; as equally appears, whether we consider the divine example so particularly given us, or the true relation of the service to be performed, whether to Christ himself or to the nature of his Kingdom. I will add a few words as to both. As to the former, nothing can be more precise. The twelve celled the multitude of the disciples ; that is they convened a Church meeting of the saints in Jerusalem, and desired them, for reasons 1 Matt., vii. 15; xxiv. 11 ; 2 Peter, ii. 1; 1 John, iv. 1 ; Rev., xvi. 13 ; xix. 20 xx. 10. 2 Acts, vi. 1-7. 3 Phil., i. 1 ; Acts. vi. 3 ; 1 Tim., iii. 8-13. 648 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. given, to make a careful selection from among themselves of seven men of peculiar qualifications which are stated, whom the twelve would appoint over the things they desired to separate from their special work. The ministration being then constant and daily, decided the number recommended ; — seven, one for each day. The whole multitude being pleased, they chose, selected, elected, seven such members of the Church as the Apostles had described ; one of them was a proselyte — that is had been first a heathen and then a Jew — and the bulk of the others, apparently not natives of Judea ; whom they set before the Apostles ; and when they had prayed they laid hands on them. That is, they ordained them to he Deacons by prayer and the imposition of hands ; which is the way all ordinary office bearers were set apart to their office. The only matters about which the least uncertainty can exist, is who prayed and who laid on hands. Probably the Apos¬ tles did both ; probably the tribunal in that Church did both ; possibly the Apostles prayed, and the tribunal laid on hands, as the Greek text seems rather to indicate — and as all the congre¬ gation of Israel did when the Levites were consecrated.1 The es¬ tablishment of the office by the Apostles, and the ordination of the officers by prayer and the imposition of hands, in their pres¬ ence and by their direction, together with the free election by the Church, and the full concurrence of whatever tribunal existed in it, and the peculiar qualifications, and future duties of the persons chosen : all these things are beyond question. Touching the other point, the general nature of the office of Deacon, and its relation on one side to Christ and his Church, and on the other to those temporal duties which the miseries and misfortunes of our fellow creatures and especially those of our brethren in Christ, lay Christians under : far more ought to be urged, than is suita¬ ble in this place. The New Obedience which we owe and profess to render to God, has for its rule the supreme love of him ; and the Good Works which are such fruits of it as relate chiefly to man, has for its rule the love of our neighbour as ourself. All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ve even so to them ; for this is the law and prophets. And these words of Jesus are so enforced by his Apostles, that one tells us our faith is dead if it is not manifested by works of mercy ; and another that the love of God cannot dwell in him whose bowels 1 Xnra., viii. 10. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEAREKS — GOVERNMENT. 649 of compassion are shut up against his suffering brother.1 I was a hungered and ye gave me meat, I was thirsty and ye gave me drink, I was a stranger and ye took me in, naked and ye clothed me, I was sick and ye visited me, I was in prison and ye came unto me : these are the actions proclaimed by the Son of man from the throne of his glory, performed by those to whom he will say, Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. And then, identifying himself in glory with those who loved him in suffer¬ ing, his words are still more wonderful, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me.2 Why then should there be any marvel, that such a Saviour as this should make it a most important part of his religion, that his followers should assuage the miseries which he regards with divine compassion ; that they should alleviate the sorrows which enter into his own heart ; that they should share with him the felicity of making others happy ; the blessedness of making sacrifices that they may be blessed who have none to help them ? Why should not such a King so organize his Kingdom, that the temporal results of the sin which has defiled his universe, should be bounded and limited by the very action and progress of his Kingdom, in its everlasting con¬ flict with sin itself ? He has done all this. How affecting is the reproach to his Church, that she so obscurely perceives it all ! 3. The angels of God are all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation.3 Unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, 0 God, is forever and ever ; and again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, Let all the angels of God worship him.4 So close is the connec¬ tion between Christ, his angels, and his redeemed. The Greek word which is nearly transferred into English, means first a mes¬ senger, and then the spiritual being who is the messenger of God. The Gospel, the Evangel, the joyful Message, is of the same coinage in Greek. And Evangelist* is another word of the same family : the minister of Christ of a peculiar order, whose work it was to hear his joyful message continually, and everywhere. i James, ii. 1-13; I John, iii. 17. 2 Matt., xxv. 31-40. 3 Heb., i. 14; Psalm civ. 4. * Ileb., i. G, 8. * Ayyr/lof — EvayyE?uoi’ — \\.vayyvXiOTT]Q — E vayyeAi^u. 650 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK V. This office hearer is expressly mentioned as one amongst the as¬ cension gifts of Christ :J being named between the obviously ordinary and extraordinary officers of the Church. Philip, the same who was one of the original seven Deacons as is expressly said to distinguish liim from the Apostle of the same name, is called, about twenty-seven years afterwards, the Evangelist ; at which time he resided at Caesarea, having four daughters who were virgins which did prophesy. It was at his house, and on this occasion, that Agabus, a prophet, showed to Paul who with his company was there, that the Jews at Jerusalem whither he was going, would deliver him bound into the hands of the Gentiles.2 Some years after this, Paul writing to Timothy at Corinth probably, and just before his own offering up, thus ad¬ dressed him : Watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an Evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. What the venerable Apostle understood by this, he had partly explained before, with the most solemn earnestness ; Preach the word, be instant in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine.3 These are the most unques¬ tionable mention I have found of this office : though the places are very numerous which may imply it, more or less clearly ; and this order of office bearers seems to have been numerous, at first. A careful consideration of the labours and acts of these two great Evangelists, as they appear in various scattered notices ; will show that they were neither of the order of Apostles, nor that of Pro¬ phets, on the one side ; nor that of ordinary Presbyters on the other, whether of the class of Ministers, or the class of Ruling Elders. But they were Extraordinary Officers, in so far as they did not appertain, in an ordinary way to the regular administra¬ tion of the settled Church. On the other hand, they are officers permanent in the Church, whenever the occasion demands their employment. They constitute the link, so to speak, between those officers, like Apostles, who have plenary power and are in¬ spired, and those like Elders, who are both ordinary and perma¬ nent : an officer excluded from interior work in a completely settled state of the Church, but indispensable in the exterior efforts of the Church to extend itself, and important in various ways on occasions of great internal languishment or destitution. The total disuse of this office is, therefore, without divine war- 1 Epk., iv. 11. 2 Acts, xxi. 8-15. 3 2 Tim., iv. 1-5. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 651 rant ; while its internal ordinary use, is contrary to the ordinance of God, and subversive in various ways of the divine polity of the Church. IV. — 1. According to the doctrine I have taught, which I think is plainly the doctrine of the Scriptures, civil society is an ordinance of God ; and its actual formation produces inevitably certain aggregate necessities and results, which with reference to government in itself considered, are perfectly distinct, and capa¬ ble of an exhaustive scientific statement. It is in society itself that all power is naturally vested by God ; and it is by the naked fact of the existence of society, that these powers manifest them¬ selves in an aggregate manner, as soon as society assumes a con¬ dition above that of its ancient tribal form. And these powers thus aggregately manifested, and the functions of society pro¬ duced thereby, are not casual, in any sense whatever ; but besides being by divine ordination they are of that ordination in such a manner, as to be responsive to the nature of man as a being having Reason, Conscience, and Will ; and also responsive to the nature of God, as the Lawgiver, the Judge, and the Ruler of the Uni¬ verse. What God leaves to the natural freedom of man, is the shaping of the government of every particular society, according to its own choice, and the creation of such particular institutions under such government thus formed, as that society shall choose ; respect being had, on one hand, to all truth and morality, and on the other to the individual and social progress of the race. The visible Church is an organized society of human beings ; and supposing it could exist independently of divine revelation, everything would be true of it, that is true concerning society absolutely considered ; and supposing it to have a divine reve¬ lation, everything in which this society differs fundamentally from all society absolutely considered, is the product of that revela¬ tion. The nature and the extent of the resemblance and the difference between the visible Church and all other societies, and the actual nature of the visible Church and its government, and its institutions, as by divine revelation ; I have endeavoured to explain and to demonstrate. As the result of ail, I suppose this divine government of this peculiar society, is capable of being clearly exhibited in a few consecutive statements. Thus : (i a ;) The first principle of this government, considered as ac¬ tually exercised, is that the whole power of it is in the hands of 652 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [BOOK Y. officebearers, whose office is ordained, defined, and limited by God himself, and every one of whom must have a personal vocation of God to bis office, attested by the election of some particular congregation, and by ordination by a Church court. It is a gov¬ ernment in the hands of Presbyters — Elders. ( b ) The second principle is, that this power and government are in their hands, not severally and man by man, but jointly and when they are met as a tribunal, and constituted as such, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, the only Head and Lawgiver of the Church ; all authority being in and from Christ, and all effi¬ cacy in and by the Holy Ghost. As having such a government, the Church is a commonwealth, and its government is by tribu¬ nals composed of a plurality of Presbyters, Elders. (c) The third principle is, that these Presbyters, Elders, are all of one order, all equal in dignity, rank, and authority as Rulers ; but that order is divided into two classes, of which one labour in word and doctrine and are stewards of the myste¬ ries of God, in which additional functions all of this class are also of equal rank, authority, and dignity one with another, the class to which each particular Presbyter belongs being determined by vocation and ordination ; and everv tribunal of the Church is constituted out of some of each class of Presbyters, Elders. The tribunals of the Church are neither clerical nor laic : they are all Presbyterial. ( d ) The fourth principle is, that the whole visible Church of Christ, is one Church, and might all be embraced under one ad¬ ministration. Its division into national and denominational Churches, is a necessity arising under the actual course of Provi¬ dence, and is neither avoidable, nor of itself hurtful, under the Gospel dispensation. The division of a particular denominational or national Church into smaller parts, such as congregations, Presbyteries, and Synods, is by the ordination of God, and so far from breaking its unity or efficiency, consolidates both. The congregations with their tribunals are the elemental particulars of the government ; and each one possesses a part of all possessed by the whole Church. Their union constitutes the Presbytery with its tribunal over those composing it; the union of Presby¬ teries constitutes the Synod with its tribunal over those compos¬ ing it : the union of all constituting the universal council, the General Assembly of the whole Church with jurisdiction over all. CHAP. XXXI.] OFFICE BEARERS — GOVERNMENT. 653 The principle of representation begins with the vocation of the office bearer by the congregation, and vitally pervades the whole system. The government of the Christian Church is a strictly limited Kepresentative Government, in the bosom of a free, spiritual commonwealth. 2. The erection of such a government as this at the very dawn of ancient society, and in the midst of Asiatic despotism ; the perfect development of it in the heart of the Eoman Empire, by a portion of one of its conquered provinces ; the wide dissemina¬ tion of it through the earth, in utter disregard of every form of human tyranny ; its perfect preservation throughout centuries of gross darkness and universal oppression ; its reappearance wherever it had been apparently extinguished ; and the august spectacle it now presents throughout the earth : all combined exhibits one of the most striking phenomena in the career of the human race. It has withstood everything, through all ages, from within and from without, before which everything else has perished. It cannot perish as long as it is true to Christ, the Son of the living God, who made it and pronounced it invulnerable even to the gates of hell, so long as it is built upon him. All that it has yet accomplished, and all it may hereafter do, for the temporal amelioration and the spiritual regeneration of mankind, is due only to him who is over all, God blessed forevermore. Of itself, and considered merely as the form through which the Church acts, it appears to be capable of producing, in the highest degree, those two opposite results which are the perfection of all government ; namely, the highest individual development, and the highest united efficiency. But what gives it its great glory and power, is that God has made it the instrument of diffusing through the Church, and of bestowing on men through her, the benefits of those inestimable Gifts, to the explanation of which this Fifth Book is devoted ; amongst which Gifts, Office Bearers and the Government in their hands, must be ranked as not the least. ■N I THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, SUBJECTIVELY CONSIDERED. ARGUMENT OF THE GENERAL CONCLUSION. The general demonstration, according to the conception I have of the Knowledge of God subjectively considered, and according to the method I adopt in the statement of that Knowledge, seems to me to be concluded at the end of the preceding Book. The following chapter, therefore, has two objects, and is divided into two parts. The first object, to which the first large division of the chapter is devoted, is to point out the fundamental nature of religion and of salvation : to disclose the absolute and universal identity of Immanuel, with true religion and with salvation : to explain the nature of the covenant of Grace, and its relation to the nature of God, and to the possibility of true religion in man : to disclose the manifestation of that eternal covenant, in the creation and progress of the Kingdom of God in this world, from the first proclamation of the covenant to the present time: and to exhibit the actual point reached in the manifestation of the covenant, and in the progress of the Kindom of God under it. The second object, to which the second large divi¬ sion of the chapter is devoted, is to disclose — in brief — the further manifesta¬ tion, and the consummation of the covenant of Grace, and the further progress, final triumph, and eternal state of the Kingdom of God : which is attempted, not at all in the way of prophetical interpretation, but wholly as matter of Christian doctrine. In doing this, a general and condensed survey is attempted, of the chief of those infinite future realities, which the Scriptures connect with the person, and work, and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ; and their relation to the Godhead — their effects upon the created universe, especially upon this earth — their relation to the Church in its Gospel, its Millennial, and its Eternal state — their influence upon the mortal and the immortal existence of the human race, considered as a whole and as individuals, considered as united to Christ and as without Christ — and finally their relation to the second coming and Millennial Reign of the glorified Redeemer — are all sought to be disclosed in so far, as in the present state of Knowledge, light can be thereby thrown upon * 656 ARGUMENT OF THE GENERAL CONCLUSION. the future manifestation, and the consummation of God’s eternal covenant. The chapter closes with a short statement concerning the Son of God, and saving Knowledge of him. Two ideas pervade the whole. The infinite Grace of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord: — the end thereof, infinite Glory to God, and eternal Blessedness to his restored universe and his redeemed creatures. CHAPTER XXXII. GENERAL CONCLUSION: PROGRESS AND CONSUMMATION OE GOD’S ETERNAL COVENANT. L 1. The Objective Knowledge of God — and its Statement: Relation thereof to reli¬ gion. — 2. The Subjective Knowledge of God: the Means and Effects thereof — 3. The middle term between God and sinless man subverted by the Fall : Restored by the Mediator between God and sinful men: Relation of Salvation by Grace to the Nature of God. — 4. Relation of the manner of Salvation to the mode of the Divine Existence : the Eternal Covenant of Redemption : special Relation of the Son of God thereto. — 5. First Proclamation of this Eternal Covenant, and the effects thereof: the Kingdom created by and under it : Messiah the Prince : Pro¬ gress of the Kingdom to the present time. — 6. The actual Posture of the Kingdom, in the form of the Gospel Church : the Demonstration which has been attempted of the Subjective Knowledge of God unto Salvation. — II. 1. Consummation of God’s Eternal Covenant, with Relation to Him and to all his Works. — 2. Future Pro¬ gress of the Gospel Church : Millennial state : Eternal state. — 3. Every Effect of Sin upon the Universe retrieved : the consummation of the Covenant of Grace, with Reference to this Earth. — 4. Effect of that consummation upon the Human Race, individually considered: Eternal Death of the Wicked: Eternal Life of the Righteous. — 5. The Sum and Result of all, with Relation to God, and with Rela¬ tion to the Created Universe, especially the human Race. — 6. The second Coming of the Son of Man — and his Millennial Glory. — I. Jesus, and the Knowledge of him, and the Life through him. I. — 1. The objective treatment of divine truth depends for its success upon our knowledge of God, who is both the author and substance of it all. Even our knowledge of ourselves, of the created universe, of the course and event of providence — indeed of all things — depends, when objectively considered, upon this knowledge of God, the author and substance of all truth. In total ignorance of God, there can be no possibility of any treat¬ ment d priori of his nature, his Attributes, his works — or the relation of any truth to him : that is there can be no objective treatment of divine truth, in our total ignorance of it. When our d priori knowledge of God, therefore, is ridiculed by infidel philosophers, and the ridicule is extended to all attempts to treat divine truth objectively ; it is their own method, not ours, which VOL. 42 658 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. is justly amenable to their contempt. For if there is any such thing as Religion, its true nature is to he sought in the relation of an infinite personal Spirit, to a finite personal spirit — -that is the relation of God to man : and the knowledge by man of this relation, and the knowledge by him both of God and of himself thus related, is the exact measure not only of the reality, hut of the possibility of religion. And if this knowledge could he im¬ agined to he perfect, religion wmuld necessarily be perfect ; pro¬ vided we could conceive of the finite spirit arriving at such a perfect intuition of the infinite Spirit, without involving a con¬ tradiction in terms, making the finite infinite, and abolishing the relation on which the existence of Religion depends. But this mortal intuition of God, is strictly speaking, the only conceivable form of strictly mortal knowledge, a priori , of God ; and it is this, in so many empty and pretentious forms, which derides all true religion ; this, which so far from asserting, I have proved, in another place, to he absolutely impossible. God must manifest himself to man, in order that man may know him ; and I have demonstrated, in the former Treatise, in an exhaustive manner, the fact of this manifestation, all the ways in which it is accom¬ plished, and all the methods under each way. The knowledge of God thus obtained by man, is capable of distinct treatment as a body of truth ; one, and the highest of whose aspects is re¬ ligious. God manifests himself to man in the works of Creation and Providence ; in the whole work of God manifest in the flesh, and that ot God the Holy Ghost ; in the Inspired Word, and in the self-conscious existence of the human soul, created, and re¬ newed in his own image. It is not of God simply considered, therefore, that we treat a priori , upon the vain pretext that we have of ourselves, an intuition of the infinite ; but it is through Religion, the relation between God and man, revealed to us on the side of God in his manifestations of himself to us, that the sum of our knowledge of God at every stage of its progress, is capable of an exact objective statement. In proportion as our Religion is true, and our Knowledge of its elemental truths is exact ; that is, in proportion as we understand the relation between God and man ; must be the certainty and the com¬ pleteness of our statement of the Knowledge of God objectively considered. 2. In the same manner, the subjective treatment of divine CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 659 truth involves d priori knowledge of ourselves, as really as it does d posteriori knowledge of God and of Religion. It is not to in¬ fluence God — but it is to influence man, that Religion exists. God is from eternity, and is the source of all things : man is of yesterday, the creature of God, the source of nothing that rises higher than a second cause, flow vain is it to speak of his hav¬ ing, of himself, such an intuition of God, as to guide him stead¬ ily along the line of the infinite relation which God bears to him ; when he has no such intuition of himself as to enable him to take a single step along that immeasurable line, except by the light which shines from the divine source of light. Even this a priori knowledge of himself, which he must possess before it is possible for him to know what is, what ought to be, or what can be wrought in him by God's truth and God's Spirit ; is not only unreal, but is impossible to any created being, much less to a fallen sinner, independently of his d posteriori knowledge of God, and from God. We cannot know ourselves as creatures, except as we know God the Creator ; we cannot know ourselves as sinners, except as we know God as our Lawgiver ; we cannot know salvation, except as we know the Saviour. It is God mak¬ ing himself known to us by means of those manifestations of which I have already spoken, who at the same time, and by the same means, — and perhaps I should add, to the same degree, makes us known to ourselves. It is in him that we live and move and have our being : and the very conviction of his exist¬ ence which leaves all men without excuse, and by means of which his eternal power and Godhead are clearly seen and understood through the works of his hands, is a manifestation of God in them made by himself, and a revelation of his wrath against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Step by step the knowledge of God unto salvation is a revelation to us, and a rev¬ elation in us. We are the subjects of a sublime subjective work of God’s word and Spirit in us ; and at the same time, both God and our own souls, and the relation between the two, are objects of a sublime objective knowledge. Created at first in the image of God — but fallible ; after our fall, restored indeed to the lost image of God, but so restored that the Godhead has taken our human nature into eternal union with itself, and has in addition made human beings partakers of the divine nature by a divine regeneration — thus securing them from all lapse forever. The 660 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. object of the knowledge is infinite — even God himself : the means of it, his manifestations of himself ; the result of it knowledge of ourselves. The subject of the work, is lost sin¬ ners, — who being restored to the image and united to the Son of God, are made partakers of the divine nature, and eternally ex¬ alted in glory and blessedness beyond all conception of the heart of man. 3. In a certain sense, the middle term between God and man, the relation between them, namely, out of which Eeligion springs, assumes a most wonderful aspect as soon as sin enters, and grace and salvation are proclaimed. That middle term as between God and polluted rebels, lost all its original significance by the Fall of man: and what takes its place is the mediator between God and sinful men — the Godman — the Saviour of the world. Under the Covenant of Grace the formula is, God — Godman — man. Of man the statement is brief and simple. First, life ; then, immortality. Of life two possibilities ; first, pollution at¬ tended by misery ; secondly, purity attended by blessedness. Of immortality, two possibilities : first, shame and everlasting con¬ tempt, as the conclusion of the pollution and misery ; secondly, infinite glory and felicity, as the conclusion of the purity and blessedness which grace produced. Of God, in whose light every particular concerning man is seen, the statement notwithstanding all his manifestations of himself, can never appear to the thought¬ ful mind, wholly divested of the difficulty which attends its over¬ powering nature. God, the infinite, the eternal, the unchange¬ able, in his being and in his perfections : perfections, infinite in number, and each one infinite in itself — of which we know im¬ perfectly a very few in comparison of all, and even of these so little that even a classification of them above cavil, has never been suggested. This living and true God, our Creator, our Pre¬ server, our Lawgiver, our Euler, our Father, our Saviour, our Judge and Eedeemer ; so exists that in his infinite Spiritual Essence, there is absolute unity, and but one God ; and yet the mode of that existence is such that of that Essence there are three divine persons , as we express it in English, the same in sub¬ stance, equal in power and glory : namely the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. In the matter of our salvation — it is the Father, to .whose Goodness, Love, Holiness, Justice, Truth, Wis¬ dom, Power, Will, the Scriptures constantly direct our thoughts. CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 661 It is to the Holy Ghost, as the Spirit that giveth life, as the Spirit of all truth, and as the Spirit of all Holiness, that they constantly direct us ; the Spirit of the Father and of the Son — the true author of all truth unto salvation, whether revealed or only inspired — the true renewer and sanctifier of the human soul — the true comforter of God's children and Reprover of the world. Between these two, is the Son ; as between God and men, he is the Mediator. That he may be Mediator, he is God and man — Godman. As Mediator, he is Prophet, Priest, and King : as all he executes the offices of all, in Humiliation and in Exaltation. And that Word of Life, of which I have said the Holy Spirit was the true Inspirer and Revealer, is the only infallible rule to guide us in all knowledge of God unto salvation, objectively considered ; as it is the only direct instrument used by the Spirit in all his subjective work in us, unto salvation. From the moment that we find the Godman placed between God and men, as the sum of every relation involved in the word Reli¬ gion, and the complete expression of everything that points to¬ wards salvation for lost sinners ; two ideas — with their opposites • — reign throughout all the word of God, and throughout all the dealings of God with men. In this life, it is to penitent and be¬ lieving sinners Grace abounding — Grace triumphant : and in the life to come, it is Grace swallowed up in glory. On the other hand, it is in this life, to God's obdurate enemies, warnings, re¬ bukes, and threatenings, mingled with exhortations and entrea¬ ties to be reconciled to him : and in the life to come, the worm that shall never die, and the fire that shall never be quenched. 4. The fact that there is any salvation for sinners does not de¬ pend more absolutely upon the nature of God, than the manner of salvation does upon the mode of his existence. I have proved in a great variety of forms, that supposing the doctrine of the Trinity, as it is commonly called, to be plainly revealed in the Scriptures, it is not conceivable that a way of salvation at all dif¬ ferent from that disclosed in them, could accord with that mode of the divine existence ; and on the other hand, that if nothing had been directly taught concerning the mode of the divine exist¬ ence, the way of salvation disclosed in the Scriptures would be incomprehensible, upon any supposition of the mode of the divine existence, except that mode revealed therein. I will add, that seeing we know nothing concerning the peculiar mode of God's 662 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. existence developed in the revealed manner of saving sinners, except in connection with that special revelation ; we have a vast illustration of what I have just said in the fact, that every false religion that has existed, has violated in some way the fun¬ damental convictions of human nature, in the manner in which they have proposed to deliver men from the wrath of God ; and I have proved that this result was absolutely unavoidable, be¬ cause upon the fundamental convictions of human nature a way of deliverance for sinners, much more true salvation, was inscru¬ table upon any knowledge of God attainable without the revela¬ tion contained in the Scriptures. With that revelation, we are carried back into eternity ; and the foundations of the revealed wray of life, which is so closely connected with the mode of God's being, are laid bare in that very mode of being. The Scriptures speak continually of the Counsel of God, of the Purpose of God, of the Will of God, of the Decree of God. This created universe in preference to all others — this plan of salvation to the exclu¬ sion of all others — this scheme of providence in the place of all others : all are of God — all have as their chief end the illustra¬ tion of his own Glory, and the blessedness of the universe itself in the highest degree consistent with that chief end. The Scrip¬ tures plainly reveal to us — nor is it conceivable that it could be otherwise — that it is Jehovah, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, of whose counsel, purpose, wall, pleasure, decree, they continually speak ; and while all these acts and exercises of the Godhead are always characterized by the same unity which distinguishes the divine Essence, the manner of working is equally characterized by the distinctness which belongs to the personal mode of the divine existence. In a most particular manner is this true of the Plan of Salvation, and of the Eternal Covenant according to whioh that plan proceeds. Under it the office work, as it is com¬ monly expressed, of each Person of the Godhead, is perfectly dis¬ tinct from that of each of the other Persons ; and that of each varies perceptibly within certain limits, under successive dispen¬ sations of it thus far disclosed, and will incur further variations according to the revelations not yet accomplished, nor perhaps fully understood. Both according to the counsel, purpose, de¬ cree, and will of God, considered in his infinite unity ; and also according to the Eternal Covenant of Grace and Redemption be¬ tween the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, wherein that CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 663 counsel, purpose, decree, and will of God are expressed according to that manner which discriminates the peculiar mode of the divine existence ; God considered absolutely, and again consid¬ ered with relation to his threefold personality, is revealed to us concerning the whole matter of our salvation, and concerning his own infinite glory therein. Each Person of the Godhead, accord¬ ing to his special office work in our salvation under this Eternal Covenant, is a party to it not only with reference to the glory of God thereby, and with reference to every result of it upon the whole universe, but also, and very particularly, with reference to the salvation of God’s Elect, and the manner thereof. It is very obvious, therefore, that the elect of God are from eternity parties in interest to this Covenant ; and are so by and through every Person of the Godhead, every one of whom in his participation in the covenant had special relation to the salvation of the Elect, according to the special office work of each Person under the covenant. But the whole office work of the Second Person of the Godhead under this covenant, is of such a nature, and iden¬ tifies him so completely with those whom he redeems and saves ; that it is to him the Scriptures pre-eminently direct our atten¬ tion as representing the Elect of God in the covenant ; and it is absolutely by means of our union with him through a divine re¬ generation, and as our crucified and risen Saviour, that we ever become parties in fact to the covenant in his blood. Moreover, there is a special reference to him in the office work of both the other Persons of the Godhead : for the gift of him to be our Sa¬ viour is the crowning proof of the love of the Father, and it is for his sake that we are both justified and adopted by him ; while the entire work of the Spirit is with perpetual reference to him. Our salvation, therefore, is absolutely through grace, absolutely by covenant, absolutely responsive to the nature of God, abso¬ lutely decisive concerning the mode of his being. 5. The existence of this Eternal Covenant is first manifested in the proclamation of the Saviour by God, as a part of his sen¬ tence upon Satan after the Fall of Man. That proclamation changed the destiny of the universe, as completely as the Fall of Man had before changed it. Instead of executing at once the penalty annexed to the Covenant of Works, God pronounced upon Satan, upon the man and the woman, and upon the earth, what I have called an interlocutory sentence — opening up the 664 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. whole career of the Kingdom of Heaven upon earth, and adjourn¬ ing the cause, so to speak, till the earthly career of that King¬ dom should he accomplished, and the time come to pronounce final sentence. The judge of quick and dead who will pronounce that sentence in the great clay, is he who was proclaimed at first as the Seed of the woman : afterward as the Seed of Abraham in whom God promised that all the nations of the earth should he blessed. For the Kingdom itself is made up wholly of his brethren whom he has redeemed with his own blood, whom his own Spirit regenerates, whom his own Father gave to him in the Eternal Covenant, for whose sake ho took flesh, and of whom he is the Prophet, the Priest, and the King. The Word of God contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, sus¬ tains toward this heavenly Kingdom, of which Messiah — Christ — is the only Head and Lord, relations unspeakably glorious — as I have attempted in various places to disclose. The Kingdom it¬ self under many aspects, and through successive Dispensations, has survived through all time ; and the Eternal Covenant of which it is the great outbirth, has received to the present moment an accomplishment so exact and so universal, that every human being who has existed, and every incident that has influenced the career of the human race, has been a separate proof alike of its divine reality and of its unalterable steadfastness. From the Fall of Man through all time, what this world has exhibited and what all generations have seen, is the development of that con¬ dition of all things produced by the proclamation of the Cove¬ nant of Grace by God, in pronouncing the interlocutory sentence after that Fall. From the uttering of that sentence till the Flood, everything remained in such a position, that the King¬ dom of Messiah would have been the only, and of necessity a uni¬ versal Kingdom, if the world had received him : instead of which eight souls only of all living flesh escaped the Flood. From the call of Abraham, the establishment of the visible Church, the erection of human Kingdoms and thereby the visible and final change of the relation of the world to the organized Kingdom of Messiah ; all things were shaped with a more direct reference to his advent, and to the posture of his Kingdom when he should come. He came : and once more the world, which under the an¬ cient form of society had so steadfastly rejected him from Adam to Abraham ; received under the new form of society created CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 665 under God’s covenant with Noah, a distinct offer by Messiah himself to save it under this new form. The last and greatest of the universal world-powers, for answer, crucified the Lord of life ; instigated thereto by the very race — the very Church — the very commonwealth which, of all on earth, were most peculiarly his own. Can it be possible, after this, for any world-power, any commonwealth, any organized Church, any race as such, to in¬ herit the Millennial Glory ? The chosen kingdom, chosen com¬ monwealth, chosen people, chosen Church — all are guilty of the blood of the Son of God ! Where are they now ? How will they — and those of whom they were divinely-appointed types — appear at the second coming of the Son of Man P And now, last of all, more than eighteen centuries of the Gospel Dispen¬ sation of the Covenant of Grace have passed over the world ; and the living generation stands, for a little while, in its lot, to accomplish its own probation, to behold the progress of the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain together under the curse of sin, but with God’s promise of deliverance, and then to give place to another generation. And what is the result of these sixty centuries of probation for man, and progress for the King¬ dom of Messiah P What is the result of these eighteen centu¬ ries of Gospel Grace during which the glorified Godman has been exalted to the throne of the universe — and has sent the Spirit of God to abide with his people as their Comforter — with the world as its Reprover ? 6. We shall have no more sacrifice for sin, no more revelation of the saving grace of God, no more incarnation of the Son of God. When the glorified Redeemer sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, the heavens received him until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. Until Jehovah makes his foes his footstool, his place is at his right hand. And being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, and having shed it forth on Pentecost ; those last days predicted so long before by Joel, and now explained by Peter, are fully come, and God pours out his Spirit upon all flesh. And while they last, and until that great and notable day of the Lord which closes them shall come ; it is the constant and unalterable doctrine of all Scripture that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be 666 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. saved. And for the very reason that God’s Spirit is poured out, and that these last days are not ended, and that they who call on the name of the Lord shall be saved ; the Gospel Church is transcendently bound to preach to every creature that Lord who is able to save to the uttermost, that lost sinners may believe in his name, and may call upon him, and may be saved. Now we see not yet all things put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour. Just so the great Apostle of the Gentiles described the posture of the Kingdom, when these last days had but recently commenced ; just in his own words, which David had uttered in prophecy so many centuries before, we may describe the posture of the Kingdom still. What I have at¬ tempted is to demonstrate upon the word of God, the Kingdom of Messiah, exactly as it has stood since these last days began, as it stands now, and as it will stand while they continue. What I have sought is, to disclose the blessings and benefits of the Cov¬ enant of Redemption as a present possession, now and here, of inestimable grace ; and as a future and unfading inheritance of eternal glory. In this endeavour the whole Knowledge of God unto salvation subjectively considered, must of necessity pass under consideration, be classified, be explicated. But the very nature of the attempt demanded above all, two things ; first, the just statement of everything according to the divine proportion of faith : and secondly, the total omission, as far as possible, of everything uncertain, and if, in the present state of Knowledge, this should prove in any case to be impossible, then the distinct statement of the nature of the uncertainty. For my fundamen¬ tal conception is, that the knowledge of God unto salvation is a science of positive truth, both inductive and deductive. And according to the method by which I attempt to develop that conception, the demonstration of the subjective aspect of the knowledge of God, to which this Treatise is devoted, was ex¬ hausted at the conclusion of the Fifth Book. All that com¬ monly passes under the term Eschatology, or last Things, which it has been usual to discuss separately, and at the end of works on Theology ; I have considered it more proper to discuss in im¬ mediate connection with those topics in the body of the work, from which they cannot be separated without a certain violence. And in proceeding now to make some general statements with CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 667 regard to them, my object is not to repeat any discussion of them ; but to indicate generally the consummation of the Covenant of Grace, for all the future beyond the point now actually reached ; in a manner somewhat analogous to that in which I have just been exhibiting its progress through all the past, up to the consummation it has now reached. II. — 1. It is not possible to doubt that God has objects worthy of himself, in all his works of creation, of providence, and of grace ; or to doubt that those objects will be perfectly ac¬ complished. What those objects are, he has informed us in his blessed word, to a certain extent ; and what he has there said, accords with all we are able to gather from every other manifes¬ tation of himself to us. He purposes, by all his works, to make known his own being and perfections to all his intelligent uni¬ verse, for the glory of his own great name ; and in doing this, to bestow the highest blessedness on his creatures which can con¬ sist with that chief object. In the Plan of Salvation these two objects are identified in the highest degree, which the infinite wisdom of God could suggest, and his infinite power execute. Concerning it, therefore, he has revealed to man the knowledge of his counsel, purpose, will and decree, and also the knowledge of his Eternal Covenant relating thereto : with a distinctness and fulness, out of all comparison with the knowledge of him at¬ tainable by man, concerning anything else. So that the perfect consummation of that Covenant of God, and the complete ac¬ complishment of everything embraced in it, are invested with the highest conceivable certainty. 2. The existence of the Kingdom of God is the immediate result of the proclamation by him of his Eternal Covenant. The perpetuity of that Kingdom, is as certain as the perpetuity of the Covenant ; as certain as the perpetuity of the existence of God. The accomplishment of the mission of the Church of the living God is as certain, as that the will of God cannot he resist¬ ed ; as certain as that each person of the Godhead will continue to perform, as each has performed since the foundation of the world, the mutual stipulations between them all for their own eternal glory. And the eternal ‘triumph, glory, and blessedness of the Church cannot be called in question, without impeaching the immaculate truth of God, which has a thousand times de¬ clared it all ; without impeaching the infinite power of God, who 668 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. has pledged his very life for it all ; without impeaching the infinite fidelity of God to his own glory, to which that Church is the eternal witness, and his infinite faithfulness to the Church herself, whose endless renown and felicity depend on her endless service and enjoyment of him. In the accomplishment of her mission of gathering and perfecting the saints to the end of the world, the vicissitudes she may incur, the persecutions she may endure, the perils she may encounter, the struggles she must make, before she can enter upon her Millennial glory ; may far transcend her own habitual expectations, and would probably appal her if she saw them clearly. But all these things, like all things besides, will work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. What is certain is, that her mission of Evangelization must be accom¬ plished in her present Gospel form. It is this Gospel Church, founded upon the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone, once crucified, now made of God both Lord and Christ ; which constitutes the visible Kingdom of God from the day of Pentecost to the second coming of the Son of Man. How much this Church accomplished during the first age of its existence — we know, to a certain extent, from the statements and intimations of the New Testament Scriptures. What it has accomplished since — -what it is capable of accom¬ plishing in its present condition — what it has endured without being extinguished — what is required for its complete deliverance from the polluting contact of the world, and its thorough extri¬ cation from the horrible incumbent mass of merely nominal Christianity ; all these are topics which, alas ! it is easy to over¬ look, but which lie very near to the heart of every one that sighs and that cries for all the abominations that be done in the midst of Jerusalem — every one that takes pleasure even in the stones of Zion and favours the very dust thereof. Concerning the com¬ ing glory of the Church, and the consummation of the Covenant of Grace with respect to her ; the Scriptures appear to me to re¬ veal, as yet future, two states very distinct from each other : namely, her Millennial state and her Eternal state. The former I judge to be upon, and connected with this earth delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God ; — as the Apostle Paul expresses it, explaining at the the same time that we ought to hope with confidence, and wait CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 669 with patience, for that glorious manifestation of the sons of God. That Millennial glory seems to me to be a dispensation of the Covenant of Grace, as distinct and as real as any preceding dis¬ pensation under that Covenant ; and that it can no more be con¬ sidered merely the perfection of the Gospel Church, than that Church can be considered merely the perfection of the Jewish Dispensation. The whole analogy of the past dealings of God with his Kingdom, the whole economy of the Covenant of Redemp¬ tion, and the explicit revelation of God concerning the Millennial state of the Church ; appear to set that glorious state distinctly forth, as a separate dispensation of the Kingdom of Messiah. Besides this, there are two considerations, one of which enters vitally into the nature of the present, and the other into that of the coming state, both of which seem to be decisive. Concern¬ ing the coming state, there does not appear to be the least rea¬ son to believe, that any part of its object is to offer grace and salvation to impenitent men ; while to offer grace and salvation to every creature is the pre-eminent characteristic of the pres¬ ent dispensation. On the other hand the condition of glory and blessedness, of perfection and felicity, which is absolutely characteristic of the Millennial state ; is one historically, prac¬ tically, dogmatically and ethically superior to the condition which is attainable either by the Church, or by individual Christians in this life, under the present Dispensation. I do not, however, understand that the Millennial state is the final state of the Kingdom of God ; nor that this earth is the final theatre of its glory ; nor that its organization and its ordinances, will adhere to it forever. Its Eternal state is still higher, still more glorious ; and its entrance upon it will be prepared by the Millennial state, according to its manner, in a way analogous to the preparation by its Gospel state for its Millennial state. It is the second coming of the Son of Man, which initiates the Millennial glory of his kingdom. It is at the delivery up of the Kingdom by the Son to the Father, upon the Lamb's Book of Life, after he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power — all his enemies under his feet, and death the last of them destroyed ; that the Eternal Glory of the Church begins — all things subdued unto the Son — the Son himself subject unto him that put all things under him — God all in all. Concerning the Millennial Glory, one apostle has said, Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet 6T0 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. appear what we shall be ; but we know, that when he shall ap¬ pear, we shall he like him ; for we shall see him as he is. And another has said, When Christ, who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. And concerning all the blessedness that awaits the redeemed forevermore, Isaiah has said and Paul repeated, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath pre¬ pared for them that love him. Blessed is the man who can add, with the Apostle, But God hath revealed unto us by his Spirit ! — I speak with great hesitation upon topics so sublime, so remote from human thinking, and upon which the mind of this generation of God's true children seems to be at once so anxious and so un¬ settled. What I insist on is, the consummation of the Covenant of Grace with reference to the Kingdom of God, first in the Mil¬ lennial Glory, and then in the Eternal state of immediate fruition of God ; both of which await the Church of Christ. 3. It is impossible to follow the chains of thought perpetu¬ ally suggested in the Scriptures concerning the origin, career, and consummation of the Kingdom of God under the Covenant of Grace ; without perceiving that at one point or another, and in one way or another, everything in the universe is implicated in the result. God's work of creation is the basis of all his other works ; and the extent to which the entrance of sin, first amomrst the angels in heaven, and then into our world through the seduc¬ tion of Eve by a fallen angel, deranged the created universe ; and the manner of retrieving, restoring, and avenging that fearful de¬ rangement, by means of this Eternal Covenant ; draws within the pale of Christian doctrine, or at the least of Christian spec¬ ulation, the whole creative work of God. In like manner the Covenant of Works which God in boundless mercy entered into with Adam after his creation, has failed in nothing except that its breach rendered man incapable of life by it ; and every cre¬ ated thing, and every living soul, can find refuge from its just and fearful penalty, only by means of the Covenant of Grace. So also God's work of Providence, wrought out under those com¬ plications which seem to us so stupendous, of the Law of Nature indelibly fixed by creation itself, the Law of covenanted perfec¬ tion whose penalty is incurred every instant of our mortal exist¬ ence, and the Law of infinite Grace through the blood of Christ ; must shape itself with a boundless wisdom, power, justice, good- CONCLUSION. 671 CHAP. XXXII.] ness, and truth, so that the nations which forget God shall be turned into hell, and the people whose God is the Lord shall he blessed forevermore, and death and hell shall be cast into the lake of torment, and Messiah the Son of God, and the Saviour of the World shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied. It is to our faith that everything is revealed — to our curiosity nothing : and all is so revealed that our faith must stand in the power of God, and not in the wisdom of men. Simple, brief, and direct, are all the words of God ; topics the most overwhelming to us, treated in the same manner as topics which we esteem the most humble ; the smallest thing that im¬ mediately concerns our salvation carefully explained, and things the most august which do not immediately concern it, passed over with a notice as incidental as their relation to our destiny. And that is the measure of our knowledge, concerning the man¬ ner in which the consummation of the Covenant of Grace, will affect the universe and every particular existence in it. Of the whole effect of the sin that entered heaven, upon the universe of God, we only know so much as concerns the angels that fell, and so much as involves our ruin through theirs ; but we know that the retribution of their sin — is the vengeance of eternal fire. Of the effect of the Fall of Man upon the created universe, be¬ yond the range of our own planet, many very remarkable state¬ ments of the Scriptures exist, — which it wrould be unprofitable to discuss in a cursory manner, here : but we know that what¬ ever they were, they will all be retrieved. The earth we inhabit was cursed for our sake, and the whole creation thereof groaneth and travaileth in pain together under that curse. And we know that the whole will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God ; that there shall be new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness shall dwell ; and last of all, that the earth, and all the works that are therein shall be burned up, and the heavens being on fire shall be dis¬ solved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. And my understanding is, that this period of the New Heavens and the New Earth, so distinctly stated by Isaiah and Peter, and de¬ scribed with so much detail by John, is the period of the Millen¬ nial Glory of the Church ; and the commencement of her state of Eternal Glory, is the Day of God, synonymous with that dis¬ solution and passing away of the heavens and the earth, s> dis- 672 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. tinctly stated by the blessed Saviour, aud so often mentioned throughout the Scriptures. 4. But it is our individual relation to these vast subjects, their relation to our personal destiny, which so deeply concerns us ; and it is in this aspect of them that God has taken so much pains to inform us, and to excite our interest in them. It is not easy, — perhaps not possible — to conceive what more God could have done, that he has not done, to accomplish in us both of those merciful designs : to explain which, would only be to recapitu¬ late, in brief, the chief contents both of the present Treatise and of the one that preceded it. In one aspect of the case of each human being, it is precisely like that of every other human being : for all are born in sin, all put off their mortal existence, all incur in another state of being a resurrection, an eternal judgment, and a just recompense of reward. But in another aspect, the case of each human being is deeply affected by the condition of all things, and especially of all divine things, in the midst of which his own mortal probation is cast by the sovereign disposal of God. Whether we would exist at all, and under what circumstances, are matters which could never be submitted to our consideration. And as they are matters which put our destiny, both for time and for eternity, absolutely in the hands of God ; one would suppose that the last thing that would occur to us, would beany attempt to evade or to resist his boundless dominion over us ; and that the last thing which would become us, would be voluntary igno¬ rance of him, and deliberate disobedience to him. This sovereign disposal of God concerning the fact and the circumstances of each individual existence, proceeds, so to speak, in a double manner. For a whole generation, or many successive generations, are brought into existence, for example, at a certain stage of the pro¬ gress of God’s Kingdom, under the Gospel Church for instance : and besides this aggregate discrimination, there is a strictly per¬ sonal discrimination by God, in the exercise of which each indi¬ vidual in every generation, is born to the peculiar lot and makes his mortal probation under the personal circumstances, which dis¬ tinguish him from every other being. Besides these things, over¬ whelming as they are, other two must be added, which ought to stop every mouth forever — except to make confession of God unto salvation. The first of these is the constitutional peculiari¬ ties, physical, mental, and moral of each particular being, which CONCLUSION. 673 CHAP. XXXII.] affect his destiny ; and the second is the special dealings of God both providential and gracious, with each particular being, after he has been launched, in the sovereign manner I have attempted to portray, upon a mortal existence which can have no issue but in immortality — of glory and blessedness on one side, or of shame and contempt on the other. The generation that now is, finds itself in living contact with the work of God's infinite grace, ad¬ vanced to a certain point of its sublime oeconomy, considered with reference to each individual, to the human race, and to the Eter¬ nal Covenant. We ask ourselves, what relation have we as sepa¬ rate existences, and what as composing the present mortal portion of a race so wonderfully and fearfully made, to the awful future, and the infinite consummation of the Eternal Covenant ? As to the whole race of man, nothing seems to me to be more certainlv revealed, than that its mortal existence, both individual and ag¬ gregate, will be utterly extinguished — and that the personal ex¬ istence of every individual of it, after his mortality is done, will be immortal. An eternal judgment awaits every human being ; but it awaits us, not in our mortal state, but after death and after the resurrection of the body ; if we except those who may be alive at the second coming of the Lord, among whom the righteous will incur an instantaneous change, and the wicked will be accursed, and go away into everlasting punishment. Whatever may be the Millennial glory of Christ and his Church in other respects, the enemies of God can have no part therein. Whatever may be the nature of the eternal judgment in other respects, it is impos¬ sible for sinful men who are without God, without Christ, and without hope, in all things concerning which they will be judged, to be acquitted as sons of God and brethren of Christ. What¬ ever may be the nature of the heavenly and eternal state of the righteous who have followed Christ in the regeneration, and reigned with him in Millennial glory ; they whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life can form no part of the glo¬ rious host, which he delivers to the Father in its perfect state, upon that Book of Life. It is manifest, therefore, how the whole progress of the eternal covenant, and how the complete consum¬ mation of it, alike involves the perdition of ungodly men. The endless existence of the wicked, and their utter perdition, are just as certain as the endless existence of the righteous, and their great glory and blessedness. And the certainty on both sides is vol. ii. 43 (174 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. such, that to natural reason and conscience it is perfectly una¬ voidable, according to all the knowledge we have of God and of ourselves. Besides which, all the spiritual insight we obtain of divine things, in the whole progress of God’s work of grace within us, settles more and more deeply in every pious soul, that this is the result, on one side and the other, manifested in the entire dealings of God with man ; that it is declared times without number in his blessed word ; that it is involved in his very na¬ ture and ours, as well as in the relation between the two which itself involves the possibility of religion ; and that the result flows from the nature of that relation whether it is considered in its original form, or in the form created by the Covenant of Grace. With regard to the hope of eternal life so deeply seated in the human soul, and the assurance of it which is so thoroughly the Essence of the Gospel of God ; nothing need be urged here in vindication of the truth that the realization of that hope, and the possession of that blessed immortality, are possible only through the Lord Jesus Christ — possible through him only to such as are made conformable unto him. I have traced as clearly as I could, the common progress of every human being, to the point at which God’s distinguishing mercy makes the lost sinner an heir of sal¬ vation ; and then I have traced with the greatest care the indi¬ vidual career of each child of God in the progress of the work of grace within him, and the manifestation of that work by him in the great offices of Christianity ; and then the creation, and gifts, and life, of the Gospel Church composed of these children of God. And now we ask ourselves, what more concerning these heirs of the infinite inheritance, individually considered, will the further progress, and the complete consummation of the Covenant of Grace, bring forth P The most comprehensive answer is, that whatever awaits them will always exalt them — always increase the glory of their Lord and their own conformity unto him. Tem¬ poral death will release them forever from mortality and sin, and exalt them to companionship with Jesus in Paradise. The res¬ urrection of the body will exalt them still higher, and bring them to a still closer conformity to the glorified Kedeemer. The judg¬ ment of the great day will inconceivably magnify the glory of the Lord and of his grace ; wherein they will be openly acquitted and acknowledged as reigning together with Christ in infinite bless¬ edness, and the place of each one in the host of the glorified saints CONCLUSION. 675 CHAP. XXXII.] be proclaimed. And then when the whole work of grace is com¬ pletely accomplished, and the whole work of glory resulting there¬ from arrives at the point, where the Kingdom in its absolute completion is handed over to the Father, into its eternal heavenly state ; the final exaltation pointed out by the Scriptures, is reached by every child of God, in that immediate fruition of God, and the glory and blessedness and eternal increase spring¬ ing therefrom. The eternal covenant of God is consummated as to the elect of God ; and this eternal heavenly state is the result as to them, of grace condescending so low that God became man, rising so high that man partakes of God. Exactly what we shall be — and what it all signifies — the two mortals, who of all that ever lived perhaps could have best answered, have answered. To the first question, John has answered, it doth not yet appear what the sons of God shall be : but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him ; for we shall see him as he is. To the second question Paul has answered, it means that — God giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ : it means that everything has reached that consummation, that God may be all in all. 5. There can he but one supreme will in the universe : there can be no salvation for sinners, except through grace. The rela¬ tion of these two propositions to each other, and to the infinite Spirit who is the true and living God, becomes comprehensible to human reason as soon as the mode of God's being is known. The eternal purpose of that supreme will to save sinners, finds expression in a way responsive to the inscrutable nature, and the inscrutable mode thereof : and the consummation of the will, and of the grace, and of the way of manifesting all three, as completely illustrates the infinite God, as mortals are capable of understanding him. The Eternal Covenant of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, expresses with reference to the three¬ fold personality which is the form in which the unity of the divine essence subsists, the same infinite purpose, will, decree, which are expressed by the mere use of such terms with reference to that infinite Spirit, considered in the absolute unity of its essence. And so the consummation of the Eternal Covenant brings us back to that infinite Spirit in its unity. As for the sons of God — what we know is that when the glorified Redeemer appears, they will see him as he is, and be forever like him. But as to God himself, what will occur when his will, and his grace, and 676 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. his covenant concerning the salvation of sinners, shall have re¬ ceived their infinite consummation ; is that he will he all in all. God the infinite Spirit whose essence is one : God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, three Persons in one Substance : God will he all in all, with reference to the consummation of this Eternal Covenant — and to all the effects of that consummation. It has been worked through with reference in a special manner, to the personal mode of the divine existence : its consummation is, in a special manner, unto the infinite unity of God. The Son deliv¬ ers up the Kingdom — not in the sense of separating himself from it — hut in the sense of having absolutely accomplished and per¬ fected every part of the divine will, purpose, decree — every stip¬ ulation of the Eternal Covenant ; more especially everything relating to God’s elect who had been given to him in that cove¬ nant — of whose names there is the record in the Book of Life, which is delivered up with them. The covenant has perfectly accomplished that which it was the will of God it should accom- plish ; what remains is, that God is all in all — and that all his sons are like him : which, as to them, is going so high — that nothing seems to he higher, hut the Godman. And herein, the glory of the Being, Perfections, Counsel, and Work of God, are complete. The Fall of man is retrieved : the Bride of the Lamb rejoices eternally : the universe receives from innumerable hosts of redeemed souls — true witness of God : all created things are purged from all defilement, delivered from all travail under the bondage of corruption, freed from the curse of God, and exult¬ ing under his blessing : all the enemies of God are shut up in hell forever. The Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost, have perfected grace, and caused it to he swallowed up in glory : and the end of all God’s counsel and work in the promotion of his own declarative glory, and the highest blessedness of his cre¬ ated universe, is eternally accomplished. From eternity it was, God is all in all : to eternity it will be, God is all in all. Glori¬ ous manifestations of God are scattered all along the track of these eternal ages. Somewhere in the midst of them, begins this fearful episode of sin. Far along in their course, is this divine solution of it, with its threefold effect, of eternal glory to God, of boundless increase of the knowledge of him throughout his universe and everlasting blessedness thereby, and of endless perdition of .Devils and damned spirits ! CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 677 6. We must return, for a few moments, to sum up as well as we can in the present state of divine knowledge, the special relation of the divine Redeemer to that portion of the future career of his Church, which lies this side of that complete con¬ summation of the covenant of Redemption, of which I have already spoken with reference to the chief matters involved therein. It is not as a question of prophecy, — hut as a matter of Christian doctrine, that I make any statement here, upon the subject of the immediate connection of Christ with the future progress and coming glory of his Kingdom. As a question of mere doctrine, no reason can be assigned which tends to limit the period of the struggle between good and evil in this world, or to determine any positive issue of it. It is only by express revelation we could know that the Kingdom of God will triumph completely and possess the whole earth ; and I have already said that the Scriptures seem to me to teach, that in order to this triumph that Kingdom must assume a new form, and exist under another dispensation. Whoever will assert that the Church of God — independently of some divine change in the elements of the problem which it has been working out, under its Gospel form, for more than eighteen centuries — can have a future very mate¬ rially different from her past history ; or that the human race can have a future spiritual history essentially variant from that which is past — without some further and marvellous interposition of God ; will, in each instance as it appears to me, contradict the whole current of divine revelation, and disregard the absolute oeconomy of the Plan of Salvation. The augmentation of the present saving operation of the divine Spirit' — is not that super¬ natural change in the elements of the problem, is not that further interposition of God, which will extinguish sin and misery in this world, and give to the saints their Millennial glory and reign with Christ. It is the second coming of the Son of Man, which is that change in the elements of the problem, that further inter¬ position of God, which will give the victory. As to the fact that the glorified Redeemer would return again ; he declared it as dis¬ tinctly as he did the fact that he would ascend to the Father, or the fact that he would send the Comforter : and not even his resurrection from the dead, is more thoroughly wrought into the system of Salvation disclosed in the Scriptures of the New Tes¬ tament, than his second coming in infinite glory is. It is com- 6T8 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. monly alleged that this assured coming of the Lord is in his glory, and all his holy angels with him : and this is true, for it is repeatedly so declared in the Scriptures. Moreover, that the resurrection of the dead will occur at that time ; which is true, hut not exactly in the sense generally understood : for it is ex¬ pressly declared by the Apostle John that none hut such as he describes will reign with Christ a thousand years, or have any part in the first resurrection — and that the rest of the dead live not again until the thousand years are finished : while it is as expressly declared by the Apostle Paul, that every one whose life is hid with Christ in God, shall appear in glory with Christ, when he appears, and that this appearing of Christ is his descent from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God — at which the dead in Christ shall rise. Again, that the instantaneous change of the saints then alive, will im¬ mediately follow the resurrection of the righteous dead — at the appearing of the Lord : which is true, according to the direct and repeated statements of Scripture. With regard to the wicked found alive at the coming of the Lord, the declaration is express, that when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, not only shall all kindreds of the earth wail because of him, but he will take vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ : who shall be punished with everlasting destruc¬ tion from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe. Thus every class of men is disposed of: the righteous dead rise, and the living saints are transfigured— and all reign with Christ : the living wicked are destroyed — and the wicked dead live not again, till the thou¬ sand years are finished. And when Jesus was asked by the dis¬ ciples, as he sat upon the mount of Olives, to tell them when the things of which he had been speaking in the Temple, should happen, and what should be the sign of his coming, and of the End of the World : he answered them as recorded by Matthew, at considerable length — and then pointed out particularly that as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be — and then illustrating the condition of his Kingdom at his coming, by the parable of the ten virgins, as before the condition of the world by the case of Noah, he closed the wonderful discourse CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 679 by a statement of bis actual coming, and the actual gathering of all nations, and his treatment of the righteous and the wicked. I take this full and remarkable statement of the Lord, to be perfectly intelligible and conclusive upon many points which I need not recapitulate ; and, as it seems to me, it settles all ques¬ tion as to the whole race of mortals, good and bad, who are alive at his coming — and in the light of other Scriptures settles the question of the extinction of the mortal existence of the human race, during that Millennial Kingdom which flesh and blood can¬ not inherit, any more than corruption can inherit incorruption. It is after this glorious appearing of the Lord that he will judge the world in righteousness : and pronounce that final Sentence, which the promise of the Seed of the woman suspended. He will judge the quick and the dead. I suppose that what has just been stated, relates especially to the quick or living. Of the dead, all will rise — and all be judged. But as stated by Paul, every man will rise in his own order ; and the order is given. First Christ — the first-fruits ; more than eighteen centuries ago. Af¬ terward they that are Christ’s at his coming ; the day and hour of which coming, Christ repeatedly told his disciples, no man, not even the angels in heaven, not even the Son — but only the Father, knew ; and distinctly bade them, for that very reason, to watch and pray. Next in the divine order, is the end : before which is the reign of a thousand years — declared by John, which cannot end according to Paul, till Christ has put all enemies under his feet — the last of whom that shall be destroyed is death ; and at the end of which John assures us that Satan shall be loosed from the bottomless pit in which he had laid bound during the thousand years ; and the wicked dead shall rise to shame and everlasting contempt: and they and the Devil that deceived them, shall be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever, which is the second death ; which judg¬ ment and perdition of ungodly men, delayed since Messiah was first proclaimed, is the event and period as Peter asserts, unto which the heavens and the earth are kept in store, reserved unto fire — that day of God, after which the eternal heavenly state of the glorified saints will begin — and God be all in all. Surely there can be no doubt that the judgment of the just and the un¬ just, is directly connected with the second coming of the Son of 680 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. Man; whose resurrection is the assurance given by God to all men, that he will judge the world by him. I do not see that the Scriptures leave us any alternative, but to identify the judgment of the world by Chrst, with the Millennial reign of Christ : the resurrection of life — the resurrection of the just — the judgment of the saints and their reign, being altogether distinct from the resurrection of damnation — the resurrection of the unjust — the judgment and perdition of ungodly men. The judgment of the saints is not to ascertain their salvation, but to disclose and to proclaim the special grounds upon which each crown is given — the special manner in which each crown was won ; all, to the in¬ finite glory of the Lord — the unutterable joy of the redeemed. The Scriptures call it a day — but seem to declare the duration of it, to be a thousand years : I do not know whether literally, or whether each day of all those years, is a year itself, according to the prophetic manner. Along the line between the Gospel and Millennial dispensations — all those great and intricate ques¬ tions, so hard to be satisfactorily and harmoniously expounded, will have their solution : the question of God's ancient people, the question of the great Apostasies of Borne and Mahomed, the question of heathenism, the question of the world-powers — and the like : concerning which it would be out of place to enlarge here. And as the resurrection, judgment, and reign of the saints with Christ — fill up the period of the New Heavens and the New Earth, so the resurrection, judgment, and perdition of the wick¬ ed, the passing away of the heavens, the burning up of the earth, and the melting of the elements with fervent heat — all lie along the line which separates the Millennial reign — from the eternal and heavenly state of the saints. The Word was from eternity and had an inbeing with God, and was God. But though he thought it no robbery to be equal with God, when he was in the form of God ; yet being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and took the form of a servant, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God highly exalted him, and gave him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth ; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Nay God so exalted the risen Sa¬ viour as to seat him in his own throne, at the right hand of the CHAP. XXXII.] CONCLUSION. 681 Majesty on high, gave him all power in heaven and on earth, and made him head over all things, as head of his Church which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all. But Jesus himself called the throne on which he will sit, at his appearing, the throne of his glory ; and speaking from heaven, after his ex¬ altation, said, To him that overcometh will I grant to sit down with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his throne : and his promise is express to make all his followers kings and priests unto God. Yet it is written that the Son himself becomes subject unto him that put all things under him, when the Kingdom is delivered up perfect, and God is all in all ; and the throne he has after that, is the throne he had as God, before his incarnation. It seems to follow, beyond doubt, that this Millennial throne, is the proper throne of the Mediator ; the one that he called my throne , when he was seated in the Father’s throne — after his ascension ; the one he promised to share with every one that overcometh. In every point of view, therefore, the glory of the Messiah seems to be immediately and transcendently involved in his second coming and Millennial reign. And his loving and trusting children, ought to beware of dis¬ honouring him and deadening their own high and spiritual hopes, by low and carnal allegorizing about these sublime mysteries ; as well as of deluding themselves by vain and shallow dogmatizing concerning them, as if they were perfectly simple and elemental. For myself, I speak concerning them after many years of anxious meditation, as one who would prefer not to speak, and who feels assuredly that they who will follow us, will get a clearer insight as they draw nearer to them. The grand and leading ideas which belong to the future progress and glorious consummation of God’s eternal covenant, seem to me to be perfectly clear. Around these are other ideas, carrying with them apparently, the highest prob¬ ability of truth, but not a satisfying assurance that we compre¬ hend them justly. And then around these in circles perpetually enlarging, are topics vast and numerous, involving God, and man, and the universe, and questions the most intricate and overwhelming concerning them all ; in which a single inspired word misunderstood, or even a shade of thought wrongly con¬ ceived, may involve us far beyond our scanty knowledge and feeble powers. And how could it be otherwise P It is the infinite and eternal thought of God, not yet realized in its actual accomplish- 682 THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. [CONCLUSION. ment, which mortals are striving to penetrate and disclose. Above all, they who conceive of the knowledge of God unto salvation, as a science of positive truth, are the last who ought to assert as of faith, anything which does not appear to be positively certain ; the last who ought to be willing to be held accountable for more than it is yet given to mortals to know — much less for the infi¬ nite breadth of knowledge which may still lie hid in the Word of God, and the infinite possibilities which may be realized in ac¬ cordance with it. 7. The Son, as a Person of the Godhead, stands between the Father and the Spirit. With reference to the created universe, he so stands between it and the Father and the Spirit, that the existence of all created things is ascribed in a special manner to him. With regard to the infinite dominion and providence of God — bis position is the same, and all power in heaven and in earth is given to him, as head of the Church. Touching the hu¬ man race this position becomes so special, that a new name — Immanuel — is given to him, a new office — Mediator — is created for him — a new kingdom is erected for him as the Messiah — the Christ. The redeemed come to God, only through him as their Saviour : the damned perish forever under his sentence. Knowl¬ edge of this Saviour, is the immense want of humanity ; conform¬ ity to him, its immense necessity. Considered in this light, two convictions have grown upon me, throughout the whole of my Christian profession. The first is, that the extrication of the simple, living and glorious truth concerning Jesus and eternal life through him, and the presentation of it in its own perfect revealed proportion ; is the supreme means of all the good which the Church of God can accomplish on earth. The second is, that this is actually accomplished now, and probably has been ac¬ complished in all ages, in the inward life of God’s unknown chil¬ dren, and so in the aggregate life of his Church ; to a far higher degree, than is exhibited in the teachings of those who, in all ages, have appeared to men to be the instructors of the saints. If these convictions are just, how immense are the explanations they afford — the results to which they point ! INDEX. The Numbers refer to the Page and the Paragraphs. A. Ability, Our natural, 124, § 3. Adoption, The Scriptural account of, 182, § 1. “ An act of the Father, 184, § 2. ‘ “ Relation of, to the outward act, and inward work of God, 1 85, § 3. “ Definition of, 187, § 4. “ Our relation to sin changed by our, 188, § 1. “ Our relation to the Law of God changed by our, 189, § 2. “ Our relation to all earthly things and God’s providence changed by, 191, § 3. “ The relations of our inner life to God changed by, 192, § 4. “ Sanctification compared with, 206, §4. Agreement, Points of, between the Covenants of works and of grace, 84, § 2. Almsgiving, 312, § 7 ; 529, § 3. Analogy between the two Sacraments, and the two conditions of Salvation, 70, § 2. “ between the two Covenants, 73, § 7. Apostles, Authority and organizing work of the, 385, § 6. “ The Baptism of, during Christ’s personal ministry, 543, § 4. “ The practice of, in baptizing, 578, § 1. “ The Doctrine of Baptism, deduced from the practice of} 591, § 5. Armor of Light, 341, § 6. Assembling, Stated Congregational, 529, § 3. Assistance, Salvation only through Divine, 74, § 3. Assurance, 237, § 7. “ of Faith, 267, § 2. Attributes, Analogy between their treatment and that of the Graces of the Spirit, 118, § 1. “ The treatment of the, 179, § 2. Authority, Administrative, 409, § b. “ Judicial, 410, § c. “ 442, § 3. B.. Backsliding, 237, § 7. Baptism, Institution of by the risen Saviour, 544, § 5. “ Relation of the outpouring of the Spirit to, 545, § 6. “ Relation between it and the Blessings sealed, 548, § 1. “ Relation between the title to the Blessings and the seal of, 549, § 2. 684 INDEX. Baptism, The right of Infant Seed of Believers to, 549, § 3. “ Effect of the neglect, and of the exercise of 561, § 4. “ Effect of the Mode of on the validity of, 562, § 1. “ Exposition of the Scriptural Doctrine of, 566, § 3. “ Various Scriptural Senses of the Term, 568, § 4. “ The Authority of Christ to fix the sense and mode of, 568, “ Proof of the Mode of, intended by Christ, 570, § 5. “ Apostolic Practice of, 578, § 1. “ On the Day of Pentecost, 578, § 1. “ The Pirst Gentile, 585, § 3 ; 586, § 4. “ The doctrine of deduced from Apostolic Practice, 591, § 5. Believers in covenant with God, 43, § 5. Bonds, nature of those involved in the church, 377, § 3. Bread, representing the Body of Christ, 605, § 5. c. Calvin, the Institutes of, x. Censures, The infliction of by the church, 530, § 5. “ wholly spiritual, 534, § 3. “ Administration of, against the Enemies of God, 535, § 4. Charity, 309, § 4. Chastenings of the Lord, 334, § 9. Children, What God purposes concerning his, 293, § 1. “ What God requires of his, 293, § 2. “ What God is preparing them for, and how, 294, § 3. Christ, The willingness aud sufficiency of, 25, § 6. “ Fellowship with, 118, § 1. “ Communion with in Grace, 119, § 3. “ Communion with in Glory, 120, § 4. “ Recapitulation of the Work of, 164, § 3. “ The Death and Resurrection of, 224, § 5. “ The Satisfaction of, 284, § 2. “ The Love and Faithfulness of 291, § 3. “ The Mediatorial work of 366, § 9. “ His absolute relation to his saints, 378, § 4. “ The Advent of, 385, § 6. “ The broken body of, 602, § 2. “ The Body and Blood of, 603, § 3. “ Efficacy of the Body and Blood of, 607, § 6. Christ’s Crown, as exclusively his as his cross, 422, § 3. Church, The Idea of the, 376, § 2. “ not commensurate with the Human Race, 379, § 5. “ under its various forms, 384, § 5. “ The new form of the, 385, § 6. “ The Future of the, 387, § 8. “ The perpetuity of the Ordinances of 389, § 1. “ A Kingdom exclusively Spiritual, 392, § 1. “ An everlasting Kingdom, 393, § 3. “ To be a universal Kingdom, 394, § 4. u Its nature and end, 398, § 8. TNDEX. 685 Church, The Sole Law of the, 412, § 5. “ Judicial and Executive Functions of, 413, § 6. “ The, 414, § 1 ; 415, § 2. “ The Life and Unity of, 433, § 3. “ The Vital Test of, 453, § 7. “ Symbolical Statements of the, 455, § 2. “ The true Life of, 479, § 1. The Relation between Christ and the, 494, § 4. “ The Condition of, as possessing Christ, 495, § 5. “ The witnessing work oi} 498, § 8. “ Appreciation of} as possessing God’s supreme Gifts, 515, § 6. “ The actual origin of, 632, § 1. “ The Holy Catholic, 496, § 6. Church Government, Summary of the fundamental principles of, 651, § 1. “ Origin, Development, and progress of, 653, § 2. Church Power, The nature of, 639, § 3. “ Relation of, to Christ’s offices, 639, § 3. Church State, The Gospel, 387, § 7. Church and State, Distinct nature and separate Mission of} 417, § 6. “ The impossibility of confounding the, 419, § 8. Church Visible, The organization of, 379, § 1. “ Position of false professors and sects in, 400, § 11. “ Relation of the Infant Seed of Believers to, 401, § 12. “ Definition of, 413, § 1. “ Relation of the Glorified Redeemer to. 420, § 1 “ Recognition of, 441, § 1. Churches, Corrupt and apostate, 456, § 3. Circumcision, Effects of the sacrament of, 380, § 2. ‘‘ Origin and nature of} 539, § 1. “ Relation of, to Christian Baptism, 541, § 2. Communion, with Christ, fruits of are, 119, § 2. “ with Christ in Glory, 230, § 1. “ with Christ in all states, 241, § 3 ; 243, § 5. “ of saints, 375, § 1. “ of the Body and Blood of Christ, 604, § 4. Commonwealth, Relation of Christian duty to the, 416, § 3. Condition of Man, Combined result of the Covenants of works and grace upon, 24, § 4. Conscience, Peace of, 240, § 2. “ Self-condemnation of the natural, 281, § 5. “ Sense of Blameworthiness of the renewed, 281, § 5. “ Healthfulness of, 282, § 6. Consciences, Tender, 322, § b. Councils, Spiritual authority of, 323, § d. Counsel of God, 91, § 3. Covenant of Grace, The essence of, 83, § 1. Covenant of Redemption, The disclosure and precise conception of, 27, § 1. “ The Mediator of, 28, § 2. “ The result of the eternal purpose and counsel of God, 29, § 3. 686 INDEX. Covenant op Redemption, known only by Revelation, 31, § 1. “ The form ofj 32, § 2 ; 33, § 3. “ The Primary and Secondary Conception of, 45, § 6. “ Importance of a practical appreciation of, 46, § 7. “ Illustrated, 54, § 4. Special conditions of, 67, § 1. “ Gradual Disclosure of, 90, § 1 ; 90, § 2. “ First Proclamation of, 663, § 5. “ Consummation of| 667, § 1; 670, § 3. Covenant of Works, Revealed Will of God anterior to, 4, § 2. “ The Penalty thereof, 4, § 3. Covenant, The Abrahamic, 96, § 6. Covenants, Fundamental points of agreement in the two, 84, § 2. “ Fundamental points of difference in the two, 86, § 3. “ Advantage of a comparison between, 89, § 4. Creature, The dependence of the, 55, § 5. Creed, The Apostles’, 110, § 1. Cup, The Blood of Christ, 605, § 5. D. Deacons, Divine authority, nature and permanence of their office, 647, § 2. Death, Relation of, to the saints, 242, § 4. “ Relation of, to the triumph of the Mediatorial Kingdom, 242, § 4 “ Eternal, of the wicked, 672, § 4. Demonstration, Order of the General, xv. Devil, Our warfare with the, 340, § 5. Difference, Fundamental points of, between the Covenants of Works and of Grace 86, § 3. Difficulty in the treatment of Effectual Calling, 123, § 2. Discipline, Nature and Efficacy of, 531, § 1. “ Manner and Object of the administration of, 533, § 2. Discipleship, Conditions of our, 227, § 1. Dispensation. The Adamic, 94, § 3. “ The Noaliic, 95, § 4. “ The Abrahamic, 96, § 6. “ Of Christ and the Gospel Church, 1.00, § 9. “ The Future, 101, § 10. Distrust, 236, § 6. Dominion of God, Infinite certainty, rectitude and completeness of, 9, § 4. State of the fallen universe under, 9, § 5. Dominion of Christ, Freedom and Blessedness of the church in, 421, § 2. Doubt, 236, § 6. Duty, Summary of all, 296, § 3. “ Relation of Truth to, 359, § 4. E Earth, God’s sentence upon the, 20, § 6. “ The promised Deliverance of, 20, § 6. Effectual Calling, Significancy and relations of, 122, § 1. “ The work of the Spirit in, 129 § 2. INDEX. 687 Effectual Calling, Analysis of, 131, § 4; 133, § 1. “ The Root and Substance of) Divine and gracious, 134, § 2. “ Inefficacies of man’s endeavours after, 136, § 5. “ Relation of the New Birth to, 139, § 1. “ Compared with Sanctification, 206, § 4. Elders, Church Government exclusively in the hands of, 628, § 6. Elect, Relation of the Father, Son, and Spirit respectively to, 34, § 4. “ They only born again, 147, § 4. “ Defeasance of Satan’s claim and power over, 162, § 1. “ Consummation of the Redemption of, 163, § 2. “ Infallible certainty of the Justification of, 165, § 4. “ God’s Justice in the justification of) 165, § 5. Element, The Historical, in the question of the church, 427, § 1. “ The Logical, in the question of the church, 431, § 1. “ The force of the Logical, 432, § 2. “ The Supernatural, 434, § 1. “ Supremacy of the Supernatural, 480, § 2. Elements of the Question of the True Church, 427, § 2. Enemies, Our spiritual, 335, § 1. “ Our spiritual all resolved into Three, 336, § 2. “ Our spiritual vanquished by Christ, 336, § 2. Essence of the Covenant of Grace, 83, g 1 ; 91, § 3. Estates of Man, Relation of the Two Covenants to the Four, 80, § 1. Eternal Life, The true God and, 497, § 7. Eternal State of the church, 667, § 2. Evangelization, An ordinance of God, 536, § 1. Obligation of the church in respect to, 536, § 1 . “ Appreciation of the church’s endeavour towards, 537, § 2. Evangelists, Divine Authority, and peculiar nature of their office, 649, § 3. Evidence, of fitness for the enjoyment of God, and life everlasting, 234, § 5. “ of things not seen, 259, § 3. Existence, True end, and mode of attaining, 354, § 1. Faith, One of the conditions of salvation, 68, § 3. “ The double office of, 69, § 1. “ Saving, summarily explained, 71, § 3. “ Salvation impossible without, 72, § 5. “ Means proposed by God to lead men to, 76, § 5. “ Proportion of, 160, § 3; 200, g 1. “ Relation of Sanctification to, 212, § 4. “ A manifestation of the New Life in man, 256, § 4. “ Divine Definition and Illustration of, 257, § 1. “ A Grace of the Spirit, 260, § 4. “ A scriptural, 261, §5. “ The threefold aspect of, 262, § 1. “ Nature, use and effect of, 263, § 2. “ The objects of, 264, § 3. “ Neither an efficient nor a meritorious cause, 265, § 4. “ Relation of) to the Word of God and the means of Grace, 266, § 1. 688 INDEX. Faith, Boundless c-ompass of, 271, § 5. “ Competent only to restored sinners, 272, § 2. “ Implicit, 322, § b. “ Revelation the infallible Rule of, 357, § 3. “ Relation of Righteousness to, 359, § 4. “ Relevancy of Cod’s work and Institutions to, 362, § 6. “ Purity of, 447, § 4. “ The infallible Arbiter of, 447, § 1. “ The regulative Power ofj 454, § 8. “ Our Judgments concerning, 454, § 1. Fall of Man, Statement of the case, 11, § 2. “ What Cod did after the, 23, § 3. Fallen Man, His Condition, 54, § 4. “ Requirement made of, 134, § 3. “ Divine Guidance and Support necessary to, 352, § 7. Fallen Universe, Modified State of the, 9, § 5. Family, The, 414, § 1 ; 415, § 2. Fasting, 299, § 6. “ Public, 530, § 5. Fatalism, 40, § 4. Feeling, Moral Judgments and, 278, § 2 ; 279, § 3. Flesh, Our Warfare with the, 337, § 3. Free Church, Relation of all States to Christ’s, 424, § 8. Freedom, Human, 40, § 4. “ Distinction between the Church’s inward and outward, 419, Root of our inward, 422, § 4. “ The Church’s true, 423, § 5 ; 423 § 6. “ Condition of the visible Church possessed of) 424, § 7. Free Will, nature and limitation, 125, § 4. of Adam, before his Fall, 126, § 5. “ of all men, since the Fall, 126, § 5. Gr. Gentiles, Call of the, 385, § 6. Gifts of God to his church, 491, § 1. Glory, Communion with Christ in, 228, § 3 ; 229, § 4; 231, § 2. “ Origin, growth and reality of the First Fruits ofj 231, § 3. God, Display of his infinite nature, 61, § 3. “ Grounds of separation between man and, 67, § 2.