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bly well for another, how he ought to act or feel in particular circumstances; and this same judgment must sometimes take cognizance of his own conduct and feelings. Even that very self-love which so often gives a wrong direction to our conduct, shows us what is due to others, by its demands in our own favour. Moral ignorance, therefore, is never innocent; though it is more or less aggravated according to the opportunities of moral knowledge which have been neglected. A man who rejects the Gospel when it is presented to him in its truth and simplicity, is in a very different situation from a man who has either never heard it at all, or has heard it accompanied by absurd superstitions. The one has fairly been confronted by a message of holy love, and what he cannot help suspecting to have some strong claim upon his attention and regards, and he has turned his back upon it. This of course gives an additional firmness and acrimony to the opposition which his mind feels for it. Its presence in some degree rebuked him, and this he cannot suffer without irritation. The others, who never heard the Gospel at all, or never heard it intelligibly, cannot have the same acrimony of opposition to it. Besides, they may have learned, perhaps, by the teaching of the Spirit, that truth concerning the Divine character which is revealed in the testimony of conscience, and in the works of creation and providence; and in this case, they would receive the Gospel if they heard it; for true natural religion is elementary Christianity.

The perception of the importance of the Gospel is not only essential to the correctness of our knowledge and belief of it, but it is necessary also in order to the accomplishment of its great design in our hearts. Unless the truth is much present to our affections, unless it abides in us, it cannot influence our characters. And unless we feel its importance, it will not abide in us. That Christianity is not worthy of the name which just chooses a particular day in the week, or a particular hour in the day, for itself, and leaves the rest of the time and the duties of life to the influence of other principles. It ought to be in us as a well of water springing up unto eternal life; its joy, its hope, its love should be ever cheering the heart, purifying the affections, and stimulating the conduct. It ought to be the root, from which the duties of life, in all their branches, should derive their life and vigour. The great truths of revelation should be ever present with us, that we may be assimilated to their principles, and preserved from opposite impressions. We are invited to walk with God, to walk in the light of his countenance, to take him for our portion, and hiding-place, and exceeding joy, and under the shadow of his wings to make our refuge until all calamities be overpast. He has been pleased to illustrate his relation to us by all the most endearing ties of nature, that we may more easily and constantly realize his presence. has presented himself even to our senses, clothed in our nature, walking and conversing as a man amongst men, fulfilling all the offices and

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suffering all the sorrows of life, that we might think of him not only without terror and strangeness, but even with respectful confidence and intimacy. In the work of atonement, he has given a tangible form to the high attributes of Deity-he has made them there stand forth before our eyes in the substantial reality of living action, and at the same time in all their grandeur and loveliness,—he has rendered them intelligible to our understandings, without lowering their dignity, he has fitted them to address the feelings of human nature, whilst they call forth the praise and the rapture of angels who surround the throne. And in the language of his word, in its rich and beautiful variety of parables and allegories, and poetical allusions, what is the object in nature, which has not been employed to explain and illustrate his truth? He has thus, so to speak, written his name upon every thing that surrounds us. And are they not all his works? Ought they not to declare his glory? God hath thus enveloped us with his glory, he hath made himself our dwelling-place-and all this, that we may feed upon his love, that we may be conformed to his likeness, and that we may enter into his joy. And is it possible for us, in such circumstances, to forget God? He even

embitters other things that we may be drawn to himself he takes away an earthly friend, that we may be led to a Friend from whom nothing can separate us--our hopes are blasted here, that we may learn to plant them in a soil where nothing dies--he arms sin with remorse, that

we may be persuaded that it is a bitter thing to depart from God. If it were possible to believe in the Gospel without remembering it, faith would be of no use to us; but the belief of its importance fixes it in the heart. The moral effects of it on the character, constitute the great reason of its being urged on our belief. We are not to think that pardon is created by believing the Gospel, as if faith were the ground of forgiveness. No; the Gospel itself is the proclamation of pardon through the perfect atonement of Christ, and it is the belief of the all-sufficiency of this proclaimed ground of pardon remaining in the memory, and operating on the heart, which makes meet for the inheritance of the saints in light. The Apostle Peter accordingly, in his second epistle, stirs up the pure minds of Christians by way of remembrance, and presses upon their attention truths with which he knew they were acquainted. In the 9th verse of the 1st chapter, he ascribes the deficiency in Christian virtues and graces, to a forgetfulness of the atonement, that great work in the belief of which they had before found deliverance from guilt. "He that lacks these "things is blind, shutting his eyes, and forget"ting that by which he was formerly washed "from his sins." The knowledge of the atonement it was, which first produced these qualities in the heart, and it is the continued remembrance of the atonement which alone can keep them in life, and strengthen and expand them. All things pertaining to life and godliness, he says, are given to us in the knowledge of him

who hath called us to glory and virtue. And hence when we forget him, we lose the things which pertain to life and godliness.

In the Epistle to Titus, ii. 11, it is said, that "the grace or forgiving mercy of God, that bringeth salvation or a cure, hath appeared unto all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world." Now the forgiving mercy of God is not a precept it does not produce these effects by authority, but by its natural influence it moulds the character into this form. But it can only do so whilst it is remembered. In the next chapter of the same Epistle, Paul exhorts Titus to inculcate upon the Cretans an attention to the relative duties of life; and then, as if to remove his despondency of success, he reminds him, that all the most advanced Christians had been themselves but a short time before in a state of enmity to God and man, and that they had been delivered from this state only by the knowledge of the kindness and love of God our Saviour. Then in the 8th verse, "This is a faithful saying, and these doctrines (of free grace, contained in the four preceding verses) I will that thou affirm constantly, in order that they who have believed God in this matter, may be careful to maintain good works;" or, in order that the same good effects which have been produced in us by the belief of this gospel, may also be produced in them. "These doctrines are good and profitable in their effects on the characters of men. But avoid doctrines of a

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