from Jerusalem. Add to this, by visiting your neighbours under affliction, you would be furnished with many an opportunity of conversing with them to advantage. Men's consciences are commonly awake at such seasons, whatever they have been at others. It is as the month to the wild ass, in which they that seek her may find her.

Finally Enable us to use strong language when recommending the gospel by its holy and happy effects.-Unbelievers con stantly object to the doctrine of grace as licentious; and if they can refer to your unworthy conduct, they will be confirmed, and we shall find it impossible to vindicate the truth of God without disowning such conduct, and it may be you on account of it but if we can appeal to the upright, the temperate, the peaceable, the benevolent, the holy lives, of those among whom we labour, it will be of more weight than a volume of reasonings, and have a greater influence on the consciences of men. A congregation, composed of kind and generous masters, diligent and faithful servants, affectionate husbands, obedient wives, tender parents, dutiful children, and loyal subjects, will be to a minister what children of the youth are said to be to a parent: As arrows in the hand of a mighty man.-Happy is the man that has his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

These, brethren, are some of the principal ways in which we affectionately solicit your assistance in promoting the interest of Christ. In doing this, we virtually pledge ourselves to be ready on all occasions to engage in it. We feel the weight of this implication. Let each have the other's prayers, that we may both be assisted from above, without which all the assistance we can render each other will be unavailing. Should this address fall into the hands of one who is yet in his sins, let him consider that the object of it is his salvation; let him reflect on the case of a man whom many are endeavouring to save, but he himself with hardened unconcern is pressing forward to destruction; and finally, should he bethink himself, and desire to escape the wrath to come, let him beware of false refuges, and flee to Jesus, the hope set before him in the gospel.

ON MORAL AND POSITIVE OBEDIENCE.

DEAR BRETHREN,

In addressing these our Annual Letters to you, it is our desire to lead you on in the divine life, that, not contented with a superficial acquaintance with religion, you may clearly understand its most discriminating principles. The winds of doctrine which abound, by which many, like children, are tossed to and fro and carried away, require that you grow up into Him in all things, who is the head, even Christ.

Concerning the subject of our present address, namely, Moral and Positive Obedience, suffice it to say, we think we perceive some serious evils growing up in certain parts of the Christian world for want of distinct ideas concerning it, and wish to arm your minds against them. All we shall attempt will be to give a clear statement of the distinction, and to point out the use of it in the Christian religion.

An unreserved obedience to the revealed will of God, in whatever form it is delivered, is the scriptural test of faith and love. You have professed to believe in Christ for salvation, and have been baptized in his name; but this is not all: the same commission which requires this, directs also that the disciples should be instructed in the whole mind of Christ; Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. As the command ments of Christ, however, are not all of the same kind, so neither is our obedience required to be yielded in all respects on the same principles.

The distinctton of obedience into moral and positive, is far from being novel. It has been made by the ablest writers, of various denominations, and must be made if we would understand the scriptures. Without it, we should confound the eternal standard of right and wrong given to Israel at Sinai, (the sum of which is

love to God and our neighbour,) with the body of carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation. We should also confound those precepts and examples of the New Testament which arise from the relations we stand in to God and to one another, with positive institutions which arise merely from the sovereign will of the Lawgiver, and could never have been known had he not expressly enjoined them. Concerning the former, an inspired writer does not scruple to refer the primitive Christians to that sense of right and wrong which is implanted in the minds of men in general; saying, Whatsoever things are TRUE, whatsoever things are HONEST, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are PURE, whatsoever things are LOVELY, whatsoever things are of GOOD REPORT; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. But concerning the latter, he directs their whole attention to Christ, and to those who acted under his authority. Be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ. Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ORDINANCES as I delivered them to you. The one is commanded because it is right; the other is right because it is com. manded. The great principles of the first are of perpetual obligation, and know no other variety than that which arises from the varying of relations and conditions: but those of the last may be binding at one period of time, and utterly abolished at another.

We can clearly perceive that it were inconsistent with the perfections of God not to have required us to love him and one another, or to have allowed of the contrary. Children also must needs be required to obey their parents; for this IS RIGHT. But it is not thus in positive institutions. Whatever wisdom there may be in them, and whatever discernment in us, we could not have known them had they not been expressly revealed; nor are they ever enforced as being right in themselves, but merely as being of divine appointment. Of them we may say, Had it pleased God, he might in various instances have enjoined the opposites: but of the other we are not allowed to suppose it possible, or consistent with righteousness, to require any thing different from that which is required.

The design of moral obligation is to preserve order in the creation; that of positive institutions, among other things, to prove us, whether, like Abrabam in offering up his son, we will yield implicit obedience to God's commandments, or whether we will hesitate till we perceive the reason of them. The obligation of man to love and obey his Creator was coeval with his existence but it was not till God had planted a garden in Eden, and there put the man whom he had formed, and expressly prohibited the fruit of one of the trees on pain of death, that he came under a positive law. The former would approve itself to his conscience as according with the nature of things: the latter as being commanded by his Creator.

Having briefly stated our views of the subject, we proceed to point out the uses to which it is applicable in the exercise of Christian obedience.

Far be it from us to amuse the churches we represent with useless distincctions, or speculations which apply not to the great purposes of practical godliness. If we mistake not, brethren, a clear view of the subject, as stated above, will furnish you with much important instruction.

We need only remind you of the use of this distinction in reducing to a narrow compass the babtismal controversy. Your ablest writers have shown from hence the fallacy of all reasonings in favour of infant baptism from the Abrahamic covenant, from eircumcision, or from any ground of mere analogy and not your writers only for the principle is conceded by a considerable number of our most learned opponents. In instituted worship, we have only to understand the will of our divine Lawgiver in relation to the subject in question, and to obey it.

But this is not the sole, nor perhaps the principal use to be made of the distinction. We are not only taught by it to look for express precept or example, in things positive, but not to look for them in things moral. In obedience of the latter description there is not that need of minute rules or examples, as in the former; but merely of general principles, which naturally lead to all the particulars comprehended in them. To require express precept

See Booth's Pedobaptism Examined, Vol. I. Chap. I.

or example, or to adhere in all cases to the literal sense of those precepts which are given us, in things of a moral nature, would lead to very injurious consequences. We may, by a disregard of that for which there is no express precept or precedent, omit what is manifestly right; and by an adherence to the letter of scriptural precepts, overlook the spirit of them, and do that which is manifestly wrong.

If we do nothing without express precept or precedent, we must build no places for Christian worship, form no societies for visiting and relieving the afflicted poor, establish no school, endow no hospitals, nor contribute any thing towards them, nor any thing towards printing or circulating the Holy Scriptures. Whether any person pretending to serious religion would deny these things to be the duty of Christians, we cannot tell some, however, on no better ground, have thought themselves at liberty to lay aside family-worship, and the sanctification of the Lord's day. There is no express precept or precedent for either, that we recollect, in the New Testament. But the worship of God, being of moral obligation, extends to the various relations and situations in life. In duties of this description, it is not God's usual, at least not his universal method, to furnish us with minute precepts, but rather with general principles which will naturally lead us to the practice of them. We have no account of any particular injunction given to Abraham respecting the order of his family. God had said to him in general, Walk before me, and be thou perfect; and this was sufficient. I know Abraham, said the Lord, that HE WILL command his children, and his household after him, that they shall keep the way of the Lord, and do justice and judgment. And with respect to the sanctification of the Lord's day, so far as it relates to its being the day appointed for Christian worship, rather than the seventh, that is to say, so far as it is positive; though we have no express precept for it, yet there are not wanting precedents, which amount to the same thing. As to the keeping of the day holy unto the Lord, this is moral, and not positive, and is therefore left to be inferred from general principles. If God be publicly worshipped, there must be a time for it; and that time requires to be devoted to him. Whatever was moral in the set