2. Is the inability of the unregenerate of such a nature as to excuse them from the obligation of worshipping God in spirit and truth? And if it be, of what fault are they guilty who attend worship regularly and decently, and are moral in their conduct? And whence is their condemnation?

To this it may suffice to reply, That the inability of the sinner to love and serve God arises from, or rather consists in, his groundless aversion to God and his holy law; and the stronger that aversion is, the more guilty and inexcusable must he be; for if hating God and duty would exempt from an obligation to love him, the devil would be thoroughly excusable, as well as all his children. If no man is bound by the law, whose heart cannot brook subjection to the law, the law is absolutely made void, and its authority is nugatory. At best, it is no more law, but merely good advice to good men to do what they like to do; while bad men are left to do the contrary, if they like it better: and if the first great commandment be binding only so far as it suits the actual disposition of a rational creature, one would suppose the second, which is like unto it, must be relaxed in an equal degree. At least, if the sinner's aversion to the duties of the second table be strong enough, it must release him from obligation to perform them, as truly as his aversion to those of the first can exempt him from all spiritual worship of God. Thus, he that is quite opposed to the fifth commandment, may plead, "I cannot abide my parents; I despise them for their religion; I hate their puritanical way." He that is disposed to violate the sixth, may say of his neighbor, "I VOL. III.

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abhor him, and cannot speak peaceably to him; and though I shall take care not to expose myself to be hanged for murder, yet I cannot help wishing him dead." He that dislikes the seventh, may plead; "I have eyes full of adultery, and cannot cease from sin;" while another may say of the eighth, "I ought not to be bound to observe this law, for I never could keep my hands from picking and stealing." He that is blamed for violating the ninth, may exculpate himself by say. ing, “I am a liar, and the truth is not in me; and have discovered this propensity ever since I could speak." While another, to obtain exemption from the tenth (which to be sure is the strictest of all, or rather was intended to shew the spirituality of all the rest) may appropriate the character which Jeremiah gave of Jehoiakim, and say, "Mine eyes and mine heart are only for my covetousness: how unreasonable then must it be to require me either to commiserate the poor, or to refrain from envying the rich!" Any of these are quite as good excuses as it would be for sinners to say, "We are alive unto sin, but alienated from the life of God; and, therefore, nothing should be required of us which implies a right spirit towards God. We cannot love God, for our carnal minds are enmity against him; we cannot serve him, for we cannot abide subjection to his law; we cannot believe his testimony concerning his Son, for we see neither form nor comeliness in him wherefore we should desire him. The gospel is too humiliating in its import for us to stoop to it; and too holy in its tendency for us to comply with it."

3. Is not a minister culpable, who, while he tells the people that formality in worship is detestable to God, tells them also, that this is the whole of their duty, while destitute of the Spirit?

I WOULD be very unwilling to excite disaffection towards a minister who appeared to have his heart right with God, and sincerely to love Christ and the souls of men, and who was concerned to promote holiness, though I might think him mistaken in some of his views; but I own I should fear that a defect on this subject would have a very prejudicial influence on any man's ministry. I would, therefore, earnestly beseech such a minister to re-examine his sentiments, and compare his mode of address with that of Christ and his apostles. I should request him particularly to consider the following remark, which I remember to have heard introduced in the charge at an ordination, many years ago; viz. "That if the natural tendency of his opinions led a preacher to be shy of scriptural exhortations, so that there were many addresses used by the prophets and apostles, and by Christ himself, which, instead of adopting and enforcing, he was always apt to shun, or mentioned them only for the purpose of explaining them away, this must surely be a sign that he had not got quite the right clue to orthodoxy."

I would also beseech him to examine, Whether those views, which tend to lessen the duty of sinners so exceedingly, must not tend equally to lessen the obligations of the saved to free grace and the blood of Christ? I have, ere now, proposed a like statement with the following, to persons who had such an unscriptural no

tion of the duty of the unregenerate. Let us review our own past lives, according to our different opinions on this subject, that we may try which of us must feel most indebted to Christ, upon the estimate which our respective sentiments will lead us to form of our quantity of guilt. When you reflect upon the days of your unregeneracy, you suppose that you neglected a number of external duties which you ought to have performed, and might have done without any special grace; e. g. The same feet which carried you to an alehouse, could have taken you to a place of worship; the same hands which played at cards, could have given alms; the same eyes that often beheld vanity, could have looked into the Bible; the same tongue which sung wanton songs, could have sung hymns; the same ears which listened to evil conversation, could have hearkened to sermons: for the omission of these duties, therefore, you blame yourself; and also on account of various sins, of falsehood, profaneness, &c. which you could have forborne to commit, without any love to God or Christ. On the whole, you can think of a number of sins, both of omission and commission, for which you needed to repent, and for which you have sought pardon: and as you hope that you have found mercy, you ascribe the forgiveness of all these sins to the riches of grace, displayed through the mediation and atonement of Jesus Christ. Christ then, acccording to your estimate, has done somewhat considerable for you, in redeeming you from the curse of the law, which was due to all these sins. You owe him much on this account. But now, when I review the days of my unregeneracy, according to my ideas of duty and sin,

how much more do I owe to Christ, if I am forgiven my sins for his sake! There was nothing which you suppose to have been your duty, but what I equally consider as having been my duty. There is no sin which you charge upon yourself, but what I think as criminal as ever you can do; but over and above what you allow of yourself, I am convinced that I was bound, by the strongest obligations, to revere and esteem the ever blessed God; to love him with all my heart, and serve him with all my might, aiming constantly at his glory. I charge myself, therefore, with unspeakably greater criminality than you, for as much as I lived so many years without any supreme regard to God; in all which time I did nothing for the sake of glorifying him: yea (as though it had been a small thing to disregard that law which is holy, just, and good, and which is spiritual, extending to the heart, and taking cognizance of the springs of action) I also slighted the Lord Jesus Christ, and rejected the counsel of God against myself, making light of the great salvation, and treating God as a liar, by disbelieving his testimony concerning his Son: all this I view as sin, horrid sin, aggravated sin? If, therefore, my sentiments are just, I must view myself as infinitely more criminal than your opinions would lead you to esteem yourself; and if I am pardoned, my obligations to Christ and free grace must ap pear unspeakably greater than yours.