Were this command, so inevitably productive of that peculiarly Christian injunction of doing to others as we would they should do unto us,' uniformly observed, the whole frame of society would be cemented and consolidated into one indissoluble bond of universal brotherhood. This divinely enacted law is the seminal principle of justice, charity, patience, forbearance, in short, of all social virtue. That it does not produce these excellent effects, is not owing to any defect in the principle, but in our corrupt nature, which so reluctantly, so imperfectly obeys it. If it were conscientiously adopted, and substantially acted upon, received in its very spirit, and obeyed from the ground of the heart, human laws might be abrogated, courts of justice abolished, and treaties of morality burnt; war would be no longer an art, nor military tactics a science. We should suffer long and be kind, and so far from 'seeking that which is another's,' we should not even seek our own.'

But let not the soldier or the lawyer be alarmed.— Their craft is in no danger. The world does not intend to act upon the divine principle which would injure their professions; and till this only revolution which good men desire actually takes place, our fortunes will not be secure without the exertions of the one, nor our lives without the protection of the other.

All the virtues have their appropriate place and rank in Scripture. They are introduced as individually beautiful and as reciprocally connected, like the graces in the mythologic dance. But perhaps no christian grace ever sat to the hand of a more consummate master than Charity. Her incomparable painter, St. Paul, has drawn her at full length in

all her fair proportions. Every attitude is full of ́grace, every lineament of beauty. The whole delineation is perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

Who can look at this finished piece without blushing at his own want of likeness to it? Yet if this conscious dissimilitude induce a cordial desire of resemblance, the humiliation will be salutary. Perhaps a more frequent contemplation of this exquisite figure, accompanied with earnest endeavours for a growing resemblance, would gradually lead us, not barely to admire the portrait, but would at length assimilate us to the divine original.

CHAP. X.

CHRISTIAN HOLINESS.

CHRISTIANITY then, as we have attempted to show in the preceding chapter, exhibits no different standards of goodness applicable to different stations or characters. No one can be allowed to rest in a low degree, and plead his exemption for aiming no higher. No one can be secure in any state of piety below that state which would not have been enjoined on all, had not all been entitled to the means of attaining it.

Those who keep their pattern in their eye, though they may fail of the highest attainments, will not be satisfied with such as are low. The striking inferiority will excite compunction; compunction will stimulate them to press on, which those never do

who, losing sight of their standard, are satisfied with the height they have reached.

He is not likely to be the object of God's favour, who takes his determined stand on the very lowest step in the scale of perfection; who does not even aspire above it; whose aim seems to be, not so much to please God as to escape punishment. Many however will doubtless be accepted, though their progress has been small; their difficulties may have been great, their natural capacity weak, their temptation strong, and their instruction defective.

Revelation has not only furnished injunctions but motives to holiness; not only motives, but examples and authorities. Be ye therefore perfect' (according to your measure and degree,) as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.' And what says the Old Testament? It accords with the New Be ye holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.'

This was the injunction of God himself, not given exclusively to Moses, to the leader and legislator, or to a few distinguished officers, or to a selection of eminent men, but to an immense body of people, even to the whole assembled host of Israel; to men of all ranks, professions, capacities and characters, to the minister of religion, and to the uninstructed, to enlightened rulers and to feeble women. 'God,' says an excellent writer,* had antecedently given to his people particular laws, suited to their several exigencies and various conditions; but the command to be holy was a general (might he not have said a universal) law.'

'Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like unto thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?' This is perhaps the sub

* Saurin.

limest apostrophe of praise (rendered more striking by its interrogatory form,) which the Scriptures have recorded. It makes a part of the first song of gratulation which is to be found in the treasury of sacred poetry. This epithet of holy is more frequently affixed to the name of God than any other. His mighty name is less often invoked, than his holy name. To offend against this attribute is represented as more heinous than to oppose any other. It has been remarked that the impiety of the Assyrian monarch is not described by his hostility against the great, the almighty God, but it is made an aggravation of his crime that he had committed it against the Holy One of Israel.

When God condescended to give a pledge for the performance of his promise, he swears by his holiness, as if it were the distinguishing quality which was more especially binding. It seems connected and interwoven with all the divine perfections. Which of his excellences can we contemplate as separated from this? Is not his justice stamped with sanctity? It is free from any tincture of vindictiveness, and is therefore a holy justice. His mercy has none of the partiality or favouritism, or capricious fondness of human kindness, but is a holy mercy: His holiness is not more the source of his mercies than of his punishments. If his holiness in his severities to us wanted a justification, there cannot be at once a more substantial and more splendid illustration of it than the noble passage already quoted, for he is called 'glorious in holiness' immediately after he had vindicated the honour of his name, by the miraculous destruction of the army of Pharoah.

Is it not then a necessary consequence growing out of his perfections,' that a righteous God loveth

righteousness,' that he will of course require in his creatures a desire to imitate as well as to adore that attribute by which He himself loves to be distinguished? We cannot indeed, like God, be essentially holy. In an infinite being it is a substance, in a created being it is only an accident: God is the essence of holiness, but we can have no holiness, nor any other good thing, but what we derive from him -It is his prerogative, but our privilege.

If God loves holiness because it is his image, he must consequently hate sin because it defaces his image. If he glorifies his own mercy and goodness in rewarding virtue, he no less vindicates the honour of his holiness in the punishment of vice. A perfect God can no more approve of sin in his creatures than he can commit it himself. He may forgive sin on his own conditions, but there are no condįtions on which he can be reconciled to it. The infinite goodness of God may delight in the beneficial purposes to which his infinite wisdom has made the sins of his creatures subservient, but sin itself will always be abhorrent to his nature. His wisdom may turn it to a merciful end, but his indignation at the offence cannot be diminished. He loves man, for he cannot but love his own work; he hates sin, for that was man's own invention, and no part of the work which God had made. Even in the imperfect administration of human laws impunity of crimes would be construed into approbation of them.*

The law of holiness then, is a law binding on all persons without distinction, not limited to the period nor to the people to whom it was given. It

*See Charnock on the Attributes.