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cry from the ashes of our repentance, "Have says he, "for those who were once enlightened, mercy upon me, according to the multitude of and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were thy tender mercies, and blot out my transgres-made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have sions." Deign thou also to be present, O great tasted the good word of God, and the powers God, and "Holy one of Israel." Deign thou of the world to come; if they shall fall away, to also to be present with the goodness, the love, renew them again unto repentance." the bowels of compassion, which thou hast for poor penitent sinners! Hear, O Lord, hear, O Lord, and pardon! Amen.

SERMON LXXXIX.

St. Paul, after having pronounced these terrific words, adds; "Behold we are persuaded better things of you." Happy apostle, who, while pronouncing the sentence of celestial vengeance, could flatter himself that it would not fall on any of his audience. But we, my brethren, how shall we say to you?" Beloved,

ON THE NATURE OF THE UNPAR- we are persuaded better things of you." The

DONABLE SIN.

HEBREWS vi. 4-6.

It is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come: if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance.

"How dreadful is this place! This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." On a different occasion, there would have been nothing surprising in the fears of Jacob. Had God revealed himself to this patriarch in the awful glory of avenging wrath, and surrounded with devouring fire, "with darkness and with tempest;" it would have been surprising that a man, that a sinner, and a believer of the earlier ages of the church, should have been vanquished at the sight. But, at a period when God approached him with the tenderest marks of love; when he erected a miraculous ladder between heaven and earth, causing the angels to ascend and descend for the protection of his servant; when he addressed him in these consolatory words, "Behold I am with thee, I will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and I will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee;" that Jacob should tremble in such a moment, is what we cannot conceive without astonishment. What! is the gate of heaven dreadful; and is the house of God an object calculated to strike terror into the mind?

My brethren, Jacob's fear unquestionably proceeded from the presence of God, from the singularity of the vision, and the peculiar scenery of the discovery, which had struck his imagination. But let us farther extend our thoughts. Yes, the gate of heaven is terrible, and the house of God is dreadful! and his favours should impress solemnity on the heart. Distinguished favours give occasion to distinguished crimes; and from places the most exalted have occurred the greatest falls. St. Paul, in the words of my text, places each of the Hebrews, whom he addressed, in the situation of Jacob. He exhibits a portrait of the prodigies achieved in their favour, since their conversion to Christianity; the miracles which had struck their senses; the knowledge which had irradiated their minds; and the impressions which had been made on their hearts. He opens to them the gate of heaven; but, at the same time, requires that they should exclaim, "How dreadful is this place!" From this profusion of grace, he draws motives for salutary fear. "It is impossible,"

disposition is worthy of our wishes. May it be the effect of this discourse, and the fruit of our ministry!

To have been enlightened,-to have tasted the heavenly gift,-to have been partakers of the Holy Ghost,-to have tasted the good word of God, and felt the powers of the world to come,-and to fall away in defiance of so much grace, such are the odious traits employed by the apostle to degrade a crime, the nature of which we proceed to define. The awful characteristics in the portrait, and the superadded conclusion, that it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance, fully apprize us, that he here speaks of the foulest of all offences; and, at the same time, gives us a limited notion of its nature.

Some have thought, that the surest way to obtain a just idea of the sin, was to represent it by every atrocious circumstance. They have collected all the characteristics, which could add aggravation to the crime: they have said, that a man who has known the truth, who has despised, hated, and opposed it, neither through fear of punishment, nor hope of reward, offered by tyrants to apostacy, but from a principle of malice, is the identical person of whom the apostle speaks; and that in this monstrous association of light, conviction, opposition, and unconquerable abhorrence of the truth, this awful crime consists.

Others, proceeding farther, have searched ancient and modern history, for persons, in whom those characteristics associate; that, superadding example to description, they might exhibit a complete portrait of the sin, into whose nature we shall now inquire. They have selected two striking examples. The first is that of the emperor Julian, the unworthy nephew of Constantine the Great, designated in history under the odious appellation of apostate, who, after having been bred in the bosom of the church, and after having officiated with his brother, as reader (do not be surprised, my brethren, that the nephew of an emperor should wish to be a reader in the church, the first Christians had higher ideas than we of the sacred functions,) after, I say, having sustained this office, abandoned the faith, persecuted the church, endeavoured to refute Christianity, assumed the character of chief pontiff, carried himself to that excess as to wish to efface the impression of baptism by the blood of victims, and if we may credit a tradition reported by Theodoret, died blaspheming against Jesus Christ.*

Hist. Eccles. lib. iii. cap. 3.

The second example is that of the most sin-nary method of defaming his character. Ungular Venetian, whose memory seems handed able to destroy the force of the miracle, they down to posterity solely to excite horror, and maintained that it proceeded from an impure for ever to intimidate those who renounce the source, and that it was by the power of the truth. His name is Francis Spierra. He had devil Jesus Christ healed this afflicted class of tasted the doctrine of the Reformation, and men. This was the occasion on which he propublished his sentiments; but on being cited nounced the words we have recited. before the pope's nuncio, and menaced with the loss of his head, if he did not instantly recant, his fears occasioned his baseness, and he had the weakness to make a public renunciation of our communion. But scarcely had he made the abjuration ere he was abandoned to the horrors of melancholy. The anguish of his mind was fatal to the body; and as one endeavoured to convince him of the boundless mercy of God, "I know it," he exclaimed, "I know that God is merciful; but this mercy belongs not to me, to me who have denied the truth. I have sinned against the Holy Ghost; I already feel the horrors of the damned. My terrors are insupportable. Who will deliver my soul from this body? Who will open for her the caverns of the abyss? Who will chase her into the darkest abodes of hell? I am damned without resource. I consider God no longer as my Father, but as my enemy. I detest him; (is it possible that a Christian mouth should open with the like blasphemies!) I detest him as such. I am impatient to join the curses of the demons in hell, whose pains and horrors I already feel."*

In the course of this sermon, we shall endeavour to draw, from their method, whatever may most contribute to your instruction. But, first of all, we deem it our duty to make some previous observations, and to derive the light from its source. In the discussion of a sin, solitary in its nature, the Scriptures having excluded none from salvation, but those who are guilty of this offence, it is of the last importance to review all those passages, which, it is presumed, have reference to the crime: we must inquire in what they differ, and in what they agree, drawing, from this association of light, that instruction, which cannot be derived from any other source. ⚫

The task will not exceed our limits, there being at most but four texts, in which, it is presumed, the Scriptures speak of this sin. The first is in the gospels where mention is made of speaking or blaspheming against the Holy Ghost: "I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosover speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in that which is to come." This text, which Augustine deems the most difficult in the Scriptures, will become intelligible, if we examine the occasion and weigh the words.

The occasion is obvious to understand. Jesus had just cured a demoniac. The Pharisees had attested the fact, and could not deny its divine authority: their eyes decided in favour of Jesus Christ. But they had recourse to an extraordi*Our author thought himself justified in reciting this

sad case, there being thousands in France who had re- | nounced the reformed religion.

The import of the expressions is no way difficult to comprehend. Who is the Son of Man? And who is the Holy Ghost? And what is it to speak against the one and the other? The Son of man is Jesus Christ revealed in human form. Without staying here to refute a mistake of the learned Grotius, who pretends because the article does not precede the word, it is not to be understood of our Saviour, but of men in general. To confirm the sense here attached to the term, we shall only observe, that St. Luke, chap. xii. 8, after calling our Saviour "the Son of man," immediately adds, "Whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him:" where it evidently follows, that by "the Son of man," Jesus Christ must be understood. And though the expression may elsewhere have other significations, they have no connexion with our subject.

By the Holy Ghost, must be understood the third person in the adorable Trinity; considered not only as God, but as Author of the miracles achieved for the confirmation of the gospel. Hence, to "speak against the Son of man," was to outrage the Lord Jesus; to render his doctrine suspected; to call his mission in question; and particularly to be offended at the humiliations which surrounded it on earth. Such was their conduct who said, “Is not this the carpenter's son? Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? A gluttonous man, a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners." To speak against the Holy Ghost, was maliciously to reject a doctrine, when he who delivered it, confirmed the truth of it by so distinguished and evident a miracle as healing a demoniac; and to ascribe those miracles to the devil, which, they were assured, had God alone for their author. Here, I conceive, is all the light we can derive from the text. And as many persons determine the sense of the text, not so much by the letter as the reputation of the interpreter, we must apprize them, that we have derived this explanation not only from the writings of our most celebrated commentators who have espoused it, but also from the works of the most celebrated of the fathersI mean Chrysostom. The following is the substance of his paraphrase on the text in St. Matthew:-" You have called me a deceiver, and an enemy of God; I forgive this reproach. Having some cause to stumble at the flesh with which I am clothed, you might not know who I am. But can you be ignorant that the casting out of demons, is the work of the Holy Ghost? For this cause, he who says, that I do these miracles by Beelzebub, shall not obtain remission."

Such is the comment of Chrysostom, to whom we add the remark of an author, worthy of superior confidence; it is St. Mark, who subjoins these words: "Because the Pharisees Hence it is said he hath an unclean spirit." inferred that the Pharisees, by ascribing the

miracles of the Holy Ghost, to an unclean | fences, "a sin unto death;" but the Spirit of spirit, were guilty of the identical sin against God prompts us to attach this idea to the the Holy Ghost, of which Jesus Christ had second. There are likewise two kinds of aposspoken: as is apparently proved. tates.

The second text we shall explain, occurs in the fifth chapter of the first epistle of St. John. "If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death: there is a sin unto death; I do not say ye shall pray for it." On this question there are, as we usually say, as many opinions as parties.

Consult the doctors of the Romish church, and they will establish, on these words, the frivolous distinction between venial and mortal sins; a conjecture both false, and directly opposed to the design of those from whom it proceeds. Because, if this sense be true, the moment a man commits a mortal sin, prayer must cease with regard to him; and he who commits a venial sin, will still need the prayers of saints to avoid a death he has not deserved; this is not only indefensible, but what the Catholics themselves would not presume to maintain.

Waving the various glosses of the Novatians, and other commentators, do you ask what is the idea we should attach to these words of the apostle, and what is the sin of which he here speaks? We repeat what we have already intimated, that it is difficult to explain. However, on investigating the views of the apostle throughout the chapter, we discover the sense of this text. His design was, to embolden the young converts in the profession of the religion they had so happily embraced. With this view, he here recapitulates the proofs which established its truth: "There are three that bear witness on earth, the water, and the spirit, and the blood. It is the innocence of the primitive Christians, which is called the water; the miracles which are called the spirit; and martyrdom, by which the faithful have sealed their testimony, and which is called the blood: attesting that those three classes of witnesses, demonstrate the truth of the Christian religion, and render its opposers utterly inexcusable.

After these and similar observations, the apostle says expressly, that he wrote for the confirmation of their faith, and closes with this exhortation: "Little children, keep yourselves from idols." Between these two texts, occur the words we wish to explain: "There is a sin unto death: I do not say that ye shall pray for it." Must not "the sin unto death," be that, against which he wished to fortify the saints; I mean apostacy?

There is one class, who have made only small attainments in the knowledge of the truth; weak and imperfect Christians, unacquainted as yet with the joys and transports excited in the soul by a religion, which promises remission of sin, and everlasting felicity. There is another, on the contrary, to whom God has given superior knowledge, to whom he has communicated the gifts of miracles, and whom he has caused to experience the sweetness of his promise. It would be hard to reject the first; but the apostle had regard to the second. Those, according to St. John, who have committed the "sin unto death," are the persons who abjure Christianity, after the reception of all those gifts. In the primitive church, where some were honoured with the endowment of discerning spirits, there probably were brethren who could discern the latter apostates from the former.

These observations lead to the illustration of the two passages yet to be explained: the one is in the tenth chapter to the Hebrews; the other is our text. In both these passages, it is obvious the apostle had the second class of apostates in view. This is very apparent from our text. Throughout the whole of this epistle, it is easy to prove, that the apostle's wish was the prevention of apostacy. He especially designed to demonstrate, that to renounce Christianity, after attesting its confirmation by miracles, here denominated "distributions of the Holy Ghost," was a crime of the grossest enormity. He has the same design in the text. Let us examine the terms.

1. "They were once enlightened;" that is, they had known the truth. They had coinpared the prophets with the apostles, the prophecies with the accomplishment; and by the collective force of truth, they were fully persuaded that Jesus was the Messiah. Or, if you please," they were once enlightened;" that is,

they were baptized;" baptism, in the primitive church, succeeding instruction, according to that precept of Christ, "Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them," &c. St. Paul, at the beginning of this chapter, speaking of baptism, expresses the same sentiment. So also we are to understand St. Peter, when he says, that "the baptism which now saves us, is not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience." The answer of a good conscience, is the rectitude of conduct, resulting from the catechumen's knowledge and What! you will say, is a man lost without faith. Hence they commonly gave the appelremedy who has denied the truth; and is every lation of illuminated to a man after baptism. one in the sad situation of those for whom the "The washing of baptism," says Justin Martyr, apostle prohibits prayer? God forbid, my bre-"is called illumination; because he who is inthren, that we should preach so strange a doctrine; and once more renew the Novatian severity! There are two kinds of apostates, and two kinds of apostacies: there is one kind of apostacy into which we fall by the fear of punishment, or on the blush of the moment, by the promises Satan makes to his proselytes. There is another, into which we fall by the enmity we have against the truth, by the detestable pleasure we take in opposing its force. It were cruel to account the first of these of VOL. II.-42

structed in these mysteries, is enlightened." Hence also the Syriac version, instead of enlightened, as our reading which follows the Greek, has rendered it baptized.

2. "They had tasted of the heavenly gift;" that is, they had experienced the serenity of that peace, which we feel when we no longer fear the punishment of sin: having passed, if I may so speak, the rigorous road of repentance, into favour with God.

3. They were made partakers of the Holy

Ghost, they had relished the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come." All these various expressions may be understood of miracles performed in their presence, or achieved by themselves. The Holy Ghost himself has assumed this acceptation, in various parts of the Scriptures, as in that remarkable passage in the nineteenth chapter of the Acts, "Have ye received the Holy Ghost?"-We have not so much as heard, whether there be any Holy Ghost. The good word, says Grotius, is the promise of God, as in the twenty-ninth of Jeremiah, "I will-perform my good word towards you;" that is, my promise; and one of the greatest promises made to the primitive Christians, was the gift of miracles. "These signs," says Jesus, "shall follow them that believe; in my name they shall cast out devils, they shall speak with tongues, they shall take up serpents." In fine, the powers of the world to come," were, likewise, the prodigies to be achieved during the gospel economy; which the Jews call the age, or world to come; prodigies elsewhere called, the "exceeding greatness of his power, and the mighty working of his power."

the gift of miracles, and experienced all the graces enumerated in the text. This was the sin of those, who, after conversion, abjured the truth, and pronounced against Jesus Christ the anathemas which his enemies, and particularly the Jews, required of apostates. These St. Paul had in view, in the words of our text, and in the tenth chapter of this epistle. Of this St. John also spake, when he said, "there is a sin unto death." Hence the sin described in these three passages, and the sin against the Holy Ghost, is the same in quality, if I may so speak, though diversified in circumstances: we have, consequently, comprised the whole under the vague appellation of unpardonable sin.

After these considerations, perhaps, you already rejoice. This sermon, designed to inspire the soul with sanctifying fear, has, perhaps, already contributed to flatter your security: you no longer see any thing in the text, which affects your case; nor any thing in the most disorderly life, connected with a crime, peculiar to the primitive Christians. Let us dissipate, if possible, so dangerous an illusion. We have done little, by tracing the manner in which the first witnesses of the gospel became guilty of the unpardonable sin; we must also inquire, what relation it may have to us.

These are the endowments, with which the persons in question were favoured; their crime was apostacy. "It is impossible, if they fall In general, it is not possible to hear subjects away, to renew them again unto repentance." of this nature discussed, without a variety of To fall away, does not characterize the state questions revolving in the mind, and asking of a man, who relapses, after having obtained one's self, have I not already committed this remission. How deplorable soever his situa- sin? Does not such and such a vice, by which tion may be, it is not without resource. The I am captivated, constitute its essence? Or, falling away in our text signifies a total defec- if I have never committed it yet, may I not tion; and entire rejection of Jesus Christ, and fall into it at a future period? It is but just, of his religion. The falling away, according brethren, to afford you satisfaction on points to St. Paul, in the ninth chapter of his epistle so important. Never did we discuss more to the Romans, marks the first stage of obdu- serious questions; and we frankly acknowledge, racy in the Jewish nation. But the falling that all we have hitherto advanced, was merely away in our text, is not only a rejection of introductory to what we have yet to say; and Christ, but a rejection after having known him: for which we require the whole of the attention, it is not only to reject, but to outrage and per- with which you have favoured us. secute him with malice and enmity of heart. Here is all the information we can derive from the text. The unpardonable sin, in these words, is that of apostates; and such as we have characterized in the preceding remarks.

Though truth is always the same, and never accommodates itself to the humours of an audience, it is an invariable duty to resolve these questions according to the characters of the inquirers. The questions amount in substance This also is the genuine import of the tenth to this: Can a man in this age commit the unchapter of the epistle to the Hebrews, "If we pardonable sin? And, I assure you, they may sin wilfully, after having received the know- be proposed from three principles, widely difledge of the truth," as would be easy to prove., ferent from each other: from a melancholy, Now, if you have been attentive to all the from a timorous, and a cautious disposition. considerations we have just advanced: if you | We shall diversify our solutions, conformably have understood the explanations we have to this diversity of character. given of the several texts, you may form a correct idea of the unpardonable sin. You may know what this crime was, at least, in the time of the primitive church. It was denying, hating, and maliciously opposing the truth, at the moment they were persuaded it proceeded from God. Two classes of men might commit this crime in the apostolic age.

First, those who had never embraced Christianity; but opposed its progress in defiance of rational conviction, and the dictates of conscience. This was the sin of the Pharisees, who maliciously ascribed to the devil miracles, which they knew could have God alone for their author.

Secondly, those who had embraced the gospel, who had been baptized, who had received

1. One may make this inquiry through a melancholy disposition; and mental derange ment is an awful complaint. It is a disease which corrupts the blood, stagnates the spirits, and flags the mind. From the body, it quickly communicates to the soul; it induces the sufferers to regard every object on the dark side; to indulge phantoms, and cherish anguish, which, excluding all consolation, wholly devotes the mind to objects, by which it is alarmed and tormented. A man of this disposition, on examining his conscience, and reviewing his life, will draw his own character in the deepest colours. He will construe his weakness into wickedness, and his infirmities into crimes; he will magnify the number, and aggravate the atrocity of his sins; he will class himself, in

short, with the worst of human characters. | admit that it is not totally extinguished. I And, our reasons for self-condemnation and would assist this man to enter more minutely abasement before God, being always too well into his state; to consider the holy fears which founded, the person in question, proceeding fill, the terrors which agitate, and the remorse on these principles, and mistaking the causes which troubles his heart; and in such a way as of humiliation and repentance, for just subjects to derive from the cause of his grief, motives of horror and despair, readily believes himself of consolation. We should never stretch our lost without resource, and guilty of the unpar- subjects, nor divide what Jesus Christ has joindonable sin. ed by a happy temperature. If you look solely at the mercy of God, you will unavoidably form excuses to flatter your security; if you confine your regards to his justice, you will fall into despair. It is this happy temperature of severity and indulgence, of mercy and justice, of hope and fear, which brings the soul of a saint to permanent repose; it is this happy temperature which constitutes the beauty of religion, and renders it efficacious in the conversion of mankind. This should be our method with persons of a doubtful disposition.

Without doubt, it is highly proper to reason with people of this description. We should endeavour to compose them, and enter into their sentiments, in order to attack their arguments with more effect; but, after all, a man so afflicted has more need of a physician than a minister, and of medicine than sermons. If it is not a hopeless case, we must endeavour to remove the complaint, by means which nature and art afford; by air, exercise, and innocent recreations. Above all, we must pray that God would "cause the bones he has broken to rejoice;" and that he would not abandon, to the remorse and torments of the damned, souls redeemed by the blood of his beloved Son, and reconciled by his sacrifice.

2. This inquiry may also be made through a timorous disposition. We distinguish timidity from melancholy; the first being a disposition of the mind, occasioned by the mistaken notions we entertain of God and his word; the second, of the body. The timorous man fixes his eye on what the Scriptures say of the justice of God, without paying adequate attention to what is said of his mercy. He looks solely at the perfection to which a Christian is called, without ever regarding the leniency of the gospel. Such a man, like the melancholy person, is readily induced to think himself guilty of the unpardonable sin. Should he flatter himself with not having yet perpetrated the deed, he lives in a continual fear. This fear may, indeed, proceed from a good principle, and be productive of happy effects, in exciting vigilance and care; but, if not incompatible with the liberty of the children of God, it is at least repugnant to the peace they may obtain; which constitutes one of the sweetest comforts of religion, and one of the most effectual motives to conciliate the heart.

If a man of this description should ask me, whether one may now commit the unpardonable sin? I would repeat what I have just said, that this sin, in all its circumstances, has peculiar reference to the miracles by which God formerly confirmed the evangelical doctrine; and consequently, to account himself at this period guilty of the crime, is to follow the emotions of fear, rather than the conviction of arguinent. I would compare the sin which alarms his conscience, with that of the unhappy man of whom we spake. I would prove by this comparison, that the disposition of a man, who utters blasphemy against Jesus Christ, who makes open war with the professors of his doctrine, has no resemblance to the style of another, who sins with remorse and contrition; who wrestles with the old man; who sometimes conquers, and sometimes is conquered: though he has sufficient cause from his sin to perceive, that the love of God by no means properly burns in his heart; he has, however, encouragement from his victories, to

But wo unto us, if under the pretext of giving the literal import of a text of Scripture, we should conceal its general design; a design equally interesting to Christians of every age and nation, and which concerns you, my brethren, in a peculiar manner; wo unto us, if under a pretence of composing the conscience of the timorous, we should afford the slightest encouragement to the hardened, to flatter their security, and confirm them in their obduracy of heart.

3. This inquiry,-Whether we can now commit the unpardonable sin?-may likewise be made on the ground of caution, and that we may know the danger, only in order to avoid it. Follow us in our reply.

We cannot commit this sin with regard to the peculiar circumstances of those who lived in the first ages of the church. This has been proved, I think, by the preceding arguments; no person having seen Jesus Christ work miracles, and, like the Pharisees, having called him Beelzebub; nor has any one received the gift of miracles, and afterwards denied the truth, as those apostates, of whom we spake. But a man may commit the crime, with regard to what constitutes its essence, and its atrocity. This also we hope to prove. For, I ask, what constituted the enormity of the crime? Was it the miracles, simply considered? Or was it the conviction and sentiments which ensued, and which proceeded from the hearts of the witnesses? Without a doubt it was the conviction and the sentiments, and not the miracles and prodigies, separately considered, and without the least regard to their seeing them performed, or themselves being the workers. If we shall, therefore, prove, that the efforts which Providence now employs for the conversion of mankind, may convey to the mind the same conviction, and excite the same sentiments afforded to the witnesses of these miracles, shall we not consequently prove, that if men now resist the gracious efforts of Providence, they are equally guilty as the ancients; and, of course, that which constitutes the essence and atrocity of the unpardonable sin, subsists at this period, as in the apostolic age.

1. A man, at this period, may sin against the clearest light. Do not say that he cannot sin against the same degree of light, which irradiated the primitive church. I allow that

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