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Adam, after his fall, was no longer a public person; he was saved by grace, through faith: but the depravity he had brought upon human nature remained. His children, and so all his posterity, were born in his sinful likeness, without either ability or inclination to keep the law. The earth was soon filled with violence. But a few in every successive age were preserved by grace, and faith in the promise. Abraham was favoured with a more full and distinct revelation of the covenant of grace; he saw the day of Christ, and rejoiced. In the time of Moses, God was pleased to set apart a peculiar people to himself, and to them he published his law with great solemnity at Sinai: this law consisted of two distinct parts, very different in their scope and design, though both enjoined by the same authority.

The decalogue, or ten commands, uttered by the voice of God himself, is an abstract of that original law under which man was created; but published in a prohibitory form, the Israelites, like the rest of mankind, being depraved by sin, and strongly inclined to the commission of every evil. This law could not be designed as a covenant, by obedience to which man should be justified; for long before its publication the Gospel had been preached to Abraham, Gal. iii. 8. But the law entered that sin might abound; that the extent, the evil, and the desert of sin might be known; for it reaches to the most hidden thoughts of the heart, requires absolute and perpetual obedience, and denounces a curse upon all who continue not therein.

To this was superadded the ceremonial or Levitical law, prescribing a variety of institutions, purifications, and sacrifices; the observance of which, were, during that dispensation, absolutely necessary to the accepta

ble worship of God. By obedience to these prescriptions, the people of Israel preserved their legal right to the blessings promised to them as a nation, and which were not confined to spiritual worshippers only: and they were likewise ordinances and helps to lead those who truly feared God, and had conscience of sin, to look forward by faith to the great sacrifice, the Lamb of God, who in the fulness of time was to take away sin by the sacrifice of himself. In both these respects the ceremonial law was abrogated by the death of Christ. The Jews then ceased to be God's peculiar people; and Jesus having expiated sin, and brought in an everlasting righteousness by his obedience unto death, all other sacrifices became unnecessary and vain. The Gospel supplies the place of the ceremonial law to the same advantage as the sun abundantly compensates for the twinkling of the stars, and the feeble glimmering of. moon-light, which are concealed by its glory. Believers of old were relieved from the strictness of the moral law by the sacrifices which pointed to Christ. Believers under the Gospel are relieved by a direct application of the blood of the covenant. Both renounce any dependence on the moral law for justification, and both accept it as a rule of life in the hands of the Mediator, and are enabled to yield it a sincere, though not a perfect, obedience.

If an Israelite, trusting in his obedience to the moral law, had ventured to reject the ordinances of the ceremonial, he would have been cut off. In like manner, if who are called Christians are so well satisfied any with their moral duties, that they see no necessity of making Christ their only hope, the law by which they seek life will be to them a ministration unto death.

Christ, and he alone, delivers us, by faith in his name, from the curse of the law, having been made a curse for us.

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A second inquiry is, How we came to know the law to be good? For naturally we do not, we cannot think SO. We cannot be at enmity with God, and at the same time approve of his law; rather this is the ground of our dislike to him, that we conceive the law by which we are to be judged is too strict in its precepts, and too severe in its threatenings; and therefore men, so far as in them lies, are for altering this law. They think it would be better if it required no more than we can perform, if it allowed us more liberty, and especially if it was not armed against transgressors with the penalty of everlasting punishment. This is evident from the usual pleas of unawakened sinners: some think, "I am not so bad as some others;" by which they mean, God will surely make a difference, and take favourable notice of what they suppose good in themselves. Others plead, "If I should not obtain mercy, what will be"come of the greatest part of mankind?" by which they plainly intimate, that it would be hard and unjust in God to punish such multitudes. Others endeavour to extenuate their sins, as Jonathan once said, I did but taste a little honey, and I must die. "These pas"sions are natural to me, and must I die for indulging "them?" In short, the spirituality and strictness of the law, its severity, and its levelling effect, confounding all seeming differences in human characters, and stopping every mouth without distinction, are three properties of the law, which the natural man cannot allow to be good.

These prejudices against the law can only be removed by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is his office to en

lighten and convince the conscience; to communicate an impression of the majesty, holiness, justice, and authority of the God with whom we have to do, whereby the evil and desert of sin is apprehended: the sinner is then stripped of all his vain pretences, is compelled to plead guilty, and must justify his judge, even though he should condemn him. It is his office likewise to discover the grace and glory of the Saviour, as having fulfilled the law for us, and as engaged by promise to enable those who believe in him to honour it with a due obedience in their own persons. Then a change of judgement takes place, and the sinner consents to the law, that it is holy, just, and good. Then the law is acknowledged to be holy: it manifests the holiness of God; and a conformity to it is the perfection of human nature. There can be no excellence in man, but so far as he is influenced by God's law: without it, the greater his natural powers and abilities are, he is but so much the more detestable and mischievous. It is assented to as just, springing from his indubitable right and authority over his creatures, and suited to their dependence upon him, and the abilities with which he originally endowed them. And though we by sin have lost those abilities, his right remains unalienable; and therefore he can justly punish transgressors. And as it is just in respect to God, so it is good for man; his obedience to the law, and the favour of God therein, being his proper happiness, and it is impossible for him to be happy in any other way. Only, as I have hinted, to sinners. these things must be applied according to the Gospel, and to their new relation by faith to the Lord Jesus Christ, who has obeyed the law, and made atonement for sin on their behalf; so that through him they are delivered from condemnation, and entitled to all the

benefits of his obedience: from him likewise they receive the law, as a rule enforced by his own example, and their unspeakable obligations to his redeeming love. This makes obedience pleasing, and the strength they' derive from him makes it easy.

We may now proceed to inquire, in the last place, What it is to use the law lawfully? The expression implies, that it may be used unlawfully; and it is so by too many. It is not a lawful use of the law to seek justification and acceptance with God by our obedience to it; because it is not appointed for this end, or capable of answering it in our circumstances. The very attempt is a daring impeachment of the wisdom and goodness of God; for if righteousness could come by the law, then Christ has died in vain; Gal. ii. 21. iii. 21.; so that such a hope is not only groundless, but sinful; and, when persisted in under the light of the Gospel, is no less than a wilful rejection of the grace of God. Again, It is an unlawful use of the law, that is, an abuse of it, an abuse both of law and Gospel, to pretend, that its accomplishment by Christ releases believers from any obligation to it as a rule. Such an assertion is not only wicked, but absurd and impossible in the highest degree: for the law is founded in the relation between the Creator and the creature, and must unavoidably remain in force so long as that relation subsists. While he is God, and we are creatures, in every possible or supposable change of state or circumstances, he must have an unrivalled claim to our reverence, love, trust, service, and submission. No true believer can deliberately admit a thought or a wish of being released from his obligation of obedience to God in whole or in part; he will rather start from it with abhorrence. But Satan labours to drive unstable souls

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