every edifice of your lame morality, however highly reared in your own eyes, will be but a Babel in the matter of justification. That God, whose judgment is always according to truth, will write upon it utter confusion, and everlasting disappointment. It is an house built upon the sand, and therefore, soon as the rains begin to descend, the floods to roll, and the winds to blow, it shall fall; and from the tower, become the tomb of the builder. Renounce, therefore, all your own righteousnesses as the ground of your plea before God. They cannot endure the scrutiny of his all-pervading eye. Like stubble or chaff the fiery law will burn them up, and the man that puts his confidence wholly or partly in them. I say, partly, for Christ's righteousness and ours cannot possibly mix in the matter of justification, any more than the iron and the clay in the monarch's dream. Justification, no less than election, must be either wholly of works, or wholly of grace, it cannot be partly of both. If by grace, to use the apostle's words, Rom. xi. 6. then it is no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more of grace: otherwise work is no more work. Grace and works can no more stand together here, than the ark of God and the image of Dagon. Either grace will exclude works, or works grace. The sinner must cleave to the one, exclusive of the other. Grace is so pure that it admits of no mixture. A sinner bringing in his own righteousness along with Christ's, is much as if one should patch some filthy rags on fine linen, clean and white, and thus adorned in his apprehension, approach the royal presence. Such an action would be an affront both to royalty and to the robe. He who joins his own work to Christ's, pours contempt both on the Surety and the Judge. On the Surety, as if his work were incomplete and on the Judge, as if knowledge, holiness, and justice were imperfect. Such a blasphemous attempt is the most daring unbelief. It is utterly inconsistent with faith in Jesus Christ. Faith, as we have often heard, rests upon Christ alone.

It in effect excludes itself as a work, in the matter of justification. It is not a thing upon which a sinner rests: it is his resting on the Surety. Therefore that man who would bring in his faith, as a part of his justifying righteousness before God, thereby proves that he has no faith in Jesus Christ. He comes as with a lie in his right hand: for such is the absurdity, that he trusts in the act of his faith, not in its object, i. e. He believes in his faith, not in Jesus Christ. Having taken Christ, as he pretends, he would have that very act whereby he received him, sustained at the divine tribunal, as his righteousness. Thus Christ is bid to stand at a distance, and the sinner's own act is by himself bid to come near, in the case of justification. This is nothing else but works under another name. It is not faith, for that necessarily establishes grace.

This being a matter of the utmost importance, we cannot be too plain or precise upon it. The proud deceitful heart of man has a diabolical dexterity, so to speak, in destroying the doctrine of grace, and therewith himself. The sinner will seek a thousand lurking holes at the foot of Sinai, burning as it is, rather than repair to mount Zion. Men may dispute with others, and deceive themselves as they will, but as Christ's surety-righteousness only could be sustained as satisfactory to law and justice, so nothing but it can support a sinner at a dying hour. Every thing else will then be sweeped away as a refuge of lies, and the sinner, not in Christ, exposed to one eternal storm. Memorable is the case of Bellarmine, who ransacked all the stores of learning, and prostituted all the powers of his mind to defend justification by works. When standing as on the confines of the two worlds, a trying place in deed, and where, sooner or later, we must all set foot, he confessed that the way of Christ was safest. It will not be improper here to relate the manner in which it is said they comforted the sick even in the darkest ages of popery. It was asked the dying person, “ Do you believe that you cannot be saved unless by "the death of our Lord? Having declared that this

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was his belief, they said to him, Praise God there"fore, and give him thanks as long as ye live, and your soul is in you: and place all your confidence, "and hope, and love in him, and in nothing else, and "commend yourself to the passion and death of our "Lord Jesus Christ. And if the supreme Judge will

judge you, then say, Lord I put the death of "Christ between me and thy judgment, and I attri"bute no other work to myself. And if then the "Lord say, Thou hast deserved condemnation; answer, "O Lord, I put thy own mercy, and thy bitter death "betwixt thee me. To conclude this point, whatever different relations the various blessings of the covenant may bear to one another, some as means leading to others as the end, as faith to justification, and holiness to eternal glory; yet they all bear one and the same relation to Christ's surety-righteousness, the condition of the covenant. They are all related to it as effects to their cause. And therefore in none of them, but in it only, must we put all our trust. It purchased our persons and our privileges. On it therefore, on it alone let us ever fix our eyes, as the only solid ground of our acceptance in the sight of God. Rejecting every thing else as empty chaff or sliding sand, in point of confidence, on it as the rock of ages let us ever build. It was finished work, John xvii. 4. and xix. 30. so finished, that even Jehovah's pure and piercing eye could see no defect. In it therefore, in it alone let us ever glory.

6thly. Let such as know that they are in the covenant of grace rejoice and be exceeding glad. Rejoice, my brethren, for the consolation, for strong it is, rising as high as the oath of God. Sure, as it cannot be revoked, ye shall enjoy the heavenly inheritance. The Lord having sworn, he will not repent: repentance, he has declared, shall be hid from his eyes, Hos. xiii. 14. His gifts and his calling are without repentance, Rom. xi, 29. So true is that which is written, Not as the world giveth, give I unto you,

Pictet. Theol. Chret. vol. 2, p. 138, Compend, p. 485.

John xiv. 27. Having given you the new heart, he will at last receive you into the new Jerusalem too. Having given you the earnest of the Spirit, 2 Cor. i. 22. v. 5. he will doubtless put you into the full possession of the inheritance, Eph. i. 14. iv. 30. All this he has not only said, but sworn, and therefore it is as impossible that ye can perish, as it is impossible for God to lie, Heb. vi. 18. The dispensations of his providence toward you he may often change, but that of his grace he never will. Troubles in troops may come, and ye in your haste be ready to say with the hoary headed patriarch, All these things are against me. Meanwhile, they shall work together for your good. A black and a boisterous night of affliction may succeed a prosperous day, but still grace shall be carrying on her great design. The smiting providence, no less than the smiling, shall issue in your good, Psal. cxix. 67, 71. and the waves of affliction shall waft you to the shores of glory, 2 Cor. iv. 17. You have the highest possible security for all this, God having sworn that in blessing he will bless you. That all doubting might be for ever banished, and that your joy might be full, he has pledged the richest jewel of his crown, that he will never, never cast you off. He has sworn by his holiness, Psal. lxxxix. 35. His holiness is that which diffuses a lustre over all his other attributes. It is that which seraphs in joyful responses celebrate, Isa. It is holiness which gives a radiance to wisdom, power, and goodness. Let them be but in idea separated from it, and all their beauty evanishes in a moment. Of all the attributes of Deity, holiness seemed most hostile to sinners: for God is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity, Hab. i. 13. In respect of his holiness he seemed to be devouring fire to them who were as dry stubble. Being necessa rily holy, how could he but abhor sinners who were all as an unclean thing? Thus holiness seemed to oppose their happiness, as the flaming sword did Adam's approach to the tree of life, Gen. iii. ult. But, O the riches, the exceeding, the unsearchable riches of di vine grace! What in God seemed to be most against

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you, by that hath he sworn that he will not be wroth with you, so as to cast you off. Your transgression he will visit with the red, and your iniquity with stripes; nevertheless, his loving kindness will he not utterly take away, nor suffer his faithfulness to fail. His cove nant will he not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of his lips. Once has he sworn by his holiness, that he will not lie unto David, Psalm lxxxix. 32—35. Good reason therefore have ye to sing unto the Lord, ye saints, and to give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness, Psalm xxx. 4. It is that which he hath laid as in pledge that ye shall be happy. Amidst all the storms of life, look unto the oath in the covenant, as did Noah to the bow in the cloud, Gen. ix. 13-17. For sure as the one was a token that the waters should no more go over the earth, so is the other, that God will not enter into judgment with you, nor condemn you for all that ye have done. I mention not this that ye may thence take occasion to sin, laying your head as on the pillow of carnal security, (abhorred be the thought!) but that ye may serve the Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of your life, Luke i. 74, 75. True assurance of God's love, instead of cutting, greatly strengthens the sinews of obedience. So argued one who perfectly understood the connection between grace and duty. Let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for an helmet the hope of salvation. For God hath not appointed us to wrath; but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, 1 Thess. v. 8, 9.

7thly, We may learn that good works are the evidences of our interest in the covenant of grace. They are the necessary fruits, and therefore the infallible evidence, of our union with Christ. Three things deserve our attention here, the foundation of faith, faith itself, and the fruits of faith. The first may be, and alas! in innumerable instances is, without the second: For though there be a broad and a firm foundation in the gospel offer, yet men will not believe. But the