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audience were shut against them. Such has never been, and we trust never will be the case.

On such an occasion, and with this audience, I need not, I am sure, say more. The objects before you have, I trust, commended themselves to your best feelings; and the effects, I trust, will appear in your enlarged benevolence. Many have been the occasions, for more than twenty years, which has called us forth in the support of the charitable institutions of this metropolis; and gladly have we obeyed the call. We should not, however, be faithful to the cause of truth, or to the feelings of gratitude, if we did not add, that in every instance the benevolence of the hearers has more than repaid the anxiety of the society, and the hope of the preacher.

Let me, then, now dismiss you to the pleasing discharge of the sacred duty, in the last place, by reminding them whose hearts and hands are open with a warmth of feeling to the necessities of these otherwise wretched beings, that a day will come when those who are now deaf will hear your praises, and when the tongue of those who were dumb will plead for you before the throne of God. The Royal Dispensary for Diseases of the Ear, and for the Deaf and Dumb, the only institution in the metropolis having these objects in view, was founded in the year 1816: and it appears that upwards of nine thousand persons afflicted with deafness and other diseases of the ear have been cured. It has thus been the means of very extensive good to the poor. In consequence of its extensive sphere of true Christian benevolence, but feeling the inadequacy of the present dispensary-house, it is the wish and intention of the governors, either to enlarge the present, or to erect a more commodious building, for the reception of a greater number of the children of calamity. This institution, like every other charity, had at first, and still has, many difficulties to contend against, and many discouragements to bear up against. Still it has never relaxed in its efforts, trusting to the liberality of the British public, and finding their reward in the testimony of an approving conscience. It will be also gratifying to a Christian audience to hear, that no inconsiderable number of those who were under the pressure of poverty, and have applied to this Dispensary and obtained relief, have since become enabled, from their altered situations and circumstances in life, themselves to come forward to support that institution, to which they were in their days of misery so deeply indebted. Though it may be truly said, that nature—that is, that the Almighty, the most benevolent of beings-rarely is wanting in the perfection of all his works, and that it is in very insulated cases that any striking difference in the organs of hearing exist, it is a fact remarkably indicative of the almost total neglect with which this disease has been treated, that in England alone there are upwards of one hundred and thirty-seven thousand persons who are deaf. Surely, then, this is the strongest additional proof of the necessity of such an institution as this; as also the great misery it may in future prevent. If proof were wanting of the good effect of the Dispensary, it may now be seen. Children may now be seen in the vestry of this church, who were born deaf and dumb, who will answer any question which you may put to them.

Surely, then, nothing now remains, but that the patrons of the institution entrust their cause to your feelings and your liberality. I need say no more. "Give, and it shall be given to you, pressed down, and shaking down, and running over, shall men give into your bosom."

THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MINISTER'S REWARD ON THE SPIRITUAL PROGRESS OF HIS HEARERS.

REV. H. MELVILL, A.M.

CAMDEN CHAPEL, CAMBERWELL, JULY 19, 1835.

"Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward."-2 JOHN, 8.

It has often been said, and we quite assent to the truth of the saying, that the Christian Church must stand or fall with the doctrine of justification by faith: and nothing is more unfair than the reproach which has been frequently thrown upon the upholders of this doctrine, that in their zeal to magnify the power of faith, they depreciate the necessity of works. In maintaining with St. Paul, that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law, we are only anxious to maintain that salvation must be reached in point of fact, only through the merits of Christ, and not through deservings of our own. It is not that we ascribe any justifying energy to faith in itself, as though faith were to save us; we would just as soon ascribe justifying energy to works, as though works were to save us. We regard Christ Jesus as exclusively and undividedly the Saviour: and when we speak of ourselves as saved by faith, we mean only, that faith associates us with the Saviour, and is, in fact, the condition on which we participate the results of his mediation. Faith may be the appointed link which binds us to the Redeemer, the ordained channel through which the blessings procured by his death flow down into our souls: and therefore may we describe ourselves as justified by faith, though all the while it is to Christ alone we ascribe our justification.

And when this is borne in mind, it is easy to see, that we may as truly say with St. James, that we are justified by works, as with St. Paul, that we are justified by faith. We often hear disquisitions on the apparent contradiction between the apostles, as though in the one case works, and in the other faith, were put forth as the procuring cause of salvation. If this were a true account of the controversy, there would indeed be a difficulty, not so much in reconciling the apostles with each other, as in shewing that either maintain doctrines consistent with the general tenor of Scripture. But these objections vanish when you have settled as a preliminary, that both apostles refer the procuring cause of salvation exclusively to Christ. St. Paul and St. James are to be considered as equally decisive on the truth, that, so far as what deserves or obtains it is concerned, salvation must be ascribed undividedly to the Redeemer. The one, therefore, cannot be arguing that faith is meritorious, and the other cannot be arguing that works are meritorious: they are simply speaking of the condition on which the merits of Christ become applied to the individual; and the only question is, whether they give different conditions, or the same in different language. The answer to this question is easily given; for since what St.

Paul means by faith cannot exist without producing what St. James means by works, and what St. James means by works cannot be wrought unless produced by what St. Paul means by faith, it is evident enough, that the two apostles assign virtually the same condition to justification, though the one states it in the form of a principle, and the other in fruits which that principle invariably generates.

And you will also perceive, if we are correct in these remarks, that faith and works must be of equal importance; and the one should be as much insisted on as the other, if we would deliver and maintain a form of sound doctrine. There is just as much danger in pointing men to faith, as in pointing them to works, as intimately connected with their justification before God. The danger is, in either case, that of their ascribing to the condition of salvation that energy, or that merit which resides in none but the Saviour. And we have our fears, that many who are most vehement in contending for justification by faith, and most earnest in denouncing justification by works, overlook the important truth, that faith and works are precisely on a par. They battle as though faith were the justifier, and the introduced works were the usurper, in that mighty office; whereas the simple fact is, that works justify, exactly in the same sense and the same degree as faith, each being a necessary condition to salvation, and neither of them the procuring cause of salvation.

We may also speak of the reward of good works, and represent them as obtaining a recompense from God. We feel it, indeed, important, that whatever is advanced on such a topic should be carefully weighed and digested. It is so easy to fall into mistake, and to gather an erroneous impression from statements not sufficiently explicit, that the reward of good works should never be asserted but with the greatest caution, and in well-considered language. Yet there can be no doubt, that the reward of good works is as much a Scriptural doctrine as any other: it is as broadly announced and as urgently taught. The representations which the Bible furnishes of the last judgment, set before us the eternal state of men as determined by their works; so that not only are works to decide generally whether happiness or misery shall be their portion, they give also a standard by which may be found the degree of the one or of the other. We read of "a prophet's reward," and of "a righteous man's reward;" of this individual having rule over ten cities, and of that over five. So that we have every reason for believing, that the nicest possible pro portion will be kept up at last between the actions and the mental operations of man; that to every degree of holiness there will be a corresponding degree of happiness; and to every degree of wickedness a corresponding one of misery. And, indeed, we know not how any other arrangement could be exactly adapted to our nature and our circumstances: for placed as we are in a state of probation, and acted on by the fears and the hopes of another state of being, it would be hard to say how the dispensation could accord with our condition, unless there were an instituted and indissoluble connexion between what is done here, and what is received hereafter. You take away its fitness for creatures constituted and circumstanced as we are ourselves—you deny, in short, the peculiar economy beneath which we live-if you deny that as to every sin there will be meted out a proportionate punishment, and as to every good work there will be meted out a proportionate reward.

But now the difficulty is, to avoid confounding the notion of reward with the

notion of merit. Undoubtedly when we speak of reward between man ar man, we suppose that the man has in some way deserved what he receives from the other. We should never call what is bestowed a reward, if he who bestows it bestows it only out of generosity, without any, the least claim on the part of the receiver. It is the manifest danger of attaching some notion of reward between God and man, and the manifest injustice of imagining that man can deserve any thing from God, from which springs that jealousy of the doctrine of a recompense for good works, which has been comparatively banished from our creed. Yet the jealousy is unfounded: it may be in thorough consistency with the confessed truth, that no creature can merit from the Creator. We cannot do good works but through the grace of God: they are, in fact, the results of God's working in us. It is not possible, therefore, that they should be strictly meritorious: but God, out of his infinite condescension, and in order to encourage us to a diligent use of the strength he imparts, may determine that such and such allotments shall be assigned to such and such attainments. This being the case, the allotments may be justly described as the reward of the attainments, seeing that they are contingent upon them, and increased with them, and diminished with them, just as retribution between man and man. But if all the while it be God that worketh in us both to will and to do, the attainments cannot in themselves be deserving of recompense by us, they having in short been wrought by divine agency, and therefore cannot have claim on divine justice. It was a saying of old Wycliff, that "what God rewards is his own work in us:" and this simple admonition, whilst it excludes the claims which the most righteous would advance, leaves in full force all those assertions of recompense which stimulate to diligence, and yet make labour seem light.

Now we have gone into these remarks on the reward of human actions, because the matter on which we would discourse places this doctrine in a very prominent light. The evangelist speaks of recompense as that which may be gained, and then lost; and thus represents every fraction of conduct as exerting a direct influence on our everlasting portion. He evidently supposes that we shall be dealt with according to the laws of a most accurate retribution; just as though we had the power of deserving, and were to regain in the way of payment the gladness of the future.

We have thought it best thus to state at the outset, what appears the Scriptural doctrine of the reward of good works, and its thorough accordance with all that is told us of the perfect gratuitousness of salvation, and in order that our minds may not be perplexed by the assertion of St. John, or by those to which it may give rise, as though there were forgetfulness of the fundamental principle, that "we are not sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves," and that "eternal life is God's free gift through Christ."

Now having thus guarded you against misapprehension, we proceed to consider the Apostle's exhortation, remarkable as it is on many accounts, and especially as addressed from a minister to his people. We are not distinctly informed to whom this epistle of St. John was addressed, whether to a church or to an individual; but it is at least evident that the party was one with whom the Apostle had what we may call a ministerial connexion, whom he had been instrumental in converting or confirming in the faith: and this settles, with sufficient accuracy for all practical purposes, the relative circumstances of the

speaker and those to whom he speaks; making the exhortation that of a pastor to his flock, and therefore sanctioning its transfer to our own day, and our own pulpit. It is when thus considered, and thus applied, that the words. of our text, as we have before said, appear most remarkable: for the minister is not exhorting his people to take heed to their own reward. but only to his; as though they had the power of increasing or diminishing, not only what might be awarded hereafter to themselves, but what might be awarded hereafter to their spiritual teacher: "Look to yourselves"-not "that ye lose not the things which ye have wrought," and not "that ye receive a full reward;" but, "Look to yourselves that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward." The minister is thus represented as in some way dependent on his people for his degree of future happiness; so that they may heighten or lower that degree, just as it is universally admitted they may their own. They are to look to their own, in order to provide that their minister's labour may not be in vain, that he may not lose the things which he has wrought, and that their faults and deficiencies may not cause a diminution in his everlasting portion, but that he may "receive a full reward.” We own at once, that there is something in this statement which it is hard to understand, something which it is hard to reconcile. Ordinarily we are accustomed to think, (and there is every appearance of fairness in the thought) that if a man have done faithfully his duty, he shall enter on a happiness commensurate with his faithfulness; and that the conduct of others with whom he has been associated will have no material influence on his reward, than as it can be traced to his own want of energy. Once allow that a man has not failed in the performance of duty, but that he has discharged it to the full measure of his ability, and you seem to exonerate him from all blame, however the objects of his solicitude remain without benefit from his labours. There would be much that is disheartening in any contrary opinion: for the moment you make the minister's recompense contingent on the success, and not on the fidelity of his exertions, you turn him adrift on a wide sea of uncertainty, with scarcely a resting-place on which hope can settle. The most comforting thing, we believe, to those who are labouring in the ministry, is, that through God's grace they may free themselves from the blood of their hearers: and if they do but preach earnestly and affectionately the Gospel, "rightly dividing the word of truth," and being instant in season and out of season, then, indeed, though they may not prevail to the winning over the obdurate to the faith of the Redeemer, they will at least have provided that none of those to whom they have dispensed holy things shall rise up against them at the judgment; none charge home as a fault upon their pastor, that they died in ignorance or unbelief, and therefore come up from the grave unprepared for a trial which they cannot avoid.

We cannot, (for example) indeed, presume to say, if we take our own case in illustration, that we have discharged towards you the solemn office of the priesthood with that earnestness, that fidelity, that zeal, that affection, and that disinterestedness, which the vows that are upon us have pledged us to exhibit. We cannot dare to hope that there are none amongst you, if we were now face to face on our trial, who could bring any just accusation against their minister, or trace to a defect in his ministration the hardness of heart, the indifference, and the ignorance, which have never yet yielded to the moral

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