Israel!" We have in the character and declarations of this remarkable man, an epitome of the ungodly, who like him" gaze and admire, but hate the change" wrought in the disciples of Jesus, which is uniformly discoverable amongst men by their conduct and conversation.

All men by nature are reduced by sin to one common level of ruin and degradation in the sight of God, to an extent which human wisdom cannot penetrate; and all the apostate race of Adam are alike involved in guilt and misery, and amenable to the sentence of condemnation and curses of a broken law. "Cursed is every one," &c. Gal. iii. 10. The degrees of moral turpitude are doubtless more or less aggravated, according to circumstances; but it cannot rationally be denied that aggravated as they are, they would be infinitely more appalling, but for the constant display of the almighty power of Jehovah's arm; which restrains their operations to their prescribed bounds, and limits their exercise to a contracted circuit. Yet, notwithstanding which, how truly it may be said of all, in the language of holy writ," they have gone from the womb speaking lies, and the way of peace (till renewed by grace) they have not known." And speaking to the Corinthian church the apostle of the gentiles said, "Such were some of you, but ye are washed, ye are sanctified," &c. Oh the riches of sovereign grace! how distinguishing! how free! All merit perpetual banishment, but sovereign mercy has held out her peaceful and righteous sceptre to the objects of her eternal choice, and to them alone and since it is all of mercy, none have reason to complain. And surely it betrays the most arrogant presumption in the creature, to quarrel with the absolute exercise of the divine prerogative, and arraign his conduct at the bar of shallow subtle reason. sufficient for the impenitent to know, that for the more open revelation of the divine glory, all the purposes of discriminating love were devised in eternity, and are consequently brought forth and executed in time; and for the more open and brighter developement of that glory, as the grand end of the glorious scheme of redeeming love, the salvation of every elect vessel of mercy, according to the good pleasure of his will, is effected independent of any cause remote from himself, or merit in them therefore they become the happy recipients of its benign blessedness, while no principle of justice or mercy is violated or infringed by the exclusion of the non-elected enemies of the cross, and by leaving them in a state of nature to reap the just demerit of their sins.

Be it

The Holy Ghost has drawn an irreversible line of distinction between the beloved of the Lord, whom he has so fitly designated the salt of the earth, and the children of the present evil world. It is true it cannot be positively and unerringly ascertained, in every instance, who are the monuments of divine forgiveness; nor can we limit the Holy One in the extenuation of mercy; still we are assured from divine writ there are goats and sheep, tares and wheat, ungodly and godly, some who believe not and others who believe; and the reality of this declaration is manifest here, but will be more fully revealed at the

justice, whose every claim has met with ample retribution in his finished work. Unspeakably great was the sacrifice offered upon Calvary's mount; but the unsullied perfections of Deity required it: nor was it possible for his attribute justice to relax one particle of his claims void of full payment, without tarnishing the honour and glory of the Most High.

The man whose transgression is forgiven, is lost in Adam, but found in Christ, and in him he has redemption; having been bought with the price of his precious atoning blood, which for the remission of his sins was abundantly shed in the garden of Gethsemane.

The children of the promise, on the ground of atoning mercy, are the happy recipients of divine clemency and long forbearance; and the exercise of these covenant blessings is constantly realized by them through all the days of their unregeneracy, by their preservation in Christ,, until called by grace, Jude verse 1. but after they are called by grace, they are the objects of peculiar favour in a more endearing and demonstrative sense. All they receive is mercy, wholly unmerited, flowing to them freely according to the riches of his grace, and communicated by their covenant God from the upper and overflowing springs of everlasting love, through Christ, by the all-efficient power and influence of the Holy Ghost.

Pardon of sin, and justification of the sinner through the obedience and blood-shedding of Jesus, according to covenant agreement, as a judicial act, is of eternal date, and the one blessing is a consequence of the other, and both are coeval, having neither beginning or end. In the fulness of time, and through all its diversified stages their sovereign virtues are sweetly opened up and realized, nor is their exercise the least precarious or uncertain. There is a set time to favour Zion appointed, and in due time all the inhabitants of the rock shall sing for joy! And surely to the participants of superabounding grace, who are heaven-bound captive pilgrims, divine forgiveness on terms so honourable and just to God-so safe and free for man, must, when made known to his heart by experimental acquaintance, prove most captivating melody.

By calling grace the heirs of pardoning love are introduced into the liberty of the sons of God, and become evidentially what they were eternally, children of the Most High, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ. Oh how surpassing rich is their portion! all things are theirs; and no needful good can be withheld from them, being one with him who is their mystical Head. Incomparably blessed therefore must be the state of such, though for a season they may not be able to enter into its sweet enjoyment; they however possess that truly precious hope, which is a choice gem big with immortality.

Well might Balaam the false and ungodly prophet, the eyes of whose natural understanding were so far illuminated as to view the blest security of Israel abiding in his tents,-well might he, under constraining and irresistible influence prophetically exclaim, though contrary to his mission, "how goodly are thy tents, O Jacob! and thy tabernacles, O

Israel!" We have in the character and declarations of this remarkable man, an epitome of the ungodly, who like him " gaze and admire, but hate the change" wrought in the disciples of Jesus, which is uniformly discoverable amongst men by their conduct and conversation. All men by nature are reduced by sin to one common level of ruin and degradation in the sight of God, to an extent which human wisdom cannot penetrate; and all the apostate race of Adam are alike involved in guilt and misery, and amenable to the sentence of condemnation and curses of a broken law. "Cursed is every one," &c. Gal. iii. 10. The degrees of moral turpitude are doubtless more or less aggravated, according to circumstances; but it cannot rationally be denied that aggravated as they are, they would be infinitely more appalling, but for the constant display of the almighty power of Jehovah's arm; which restrains their operations to their prescribed bounds, and limits their exercise to a contracted circuit. Yet, notwithstanding which, how truly it may be said of all, in the language of holy writ," they have gone from the womb speaking lies, and the way of peace (till renewed by grace) they have not known." And speaking to the Corinthian church the apostle of the gentiles said, "Such were some of you, but ye are washed, ye are sanctified," &c. Oh the riches of sovereign grace! how distinguishing! how free! All merit perpetual banishment, but sovereign mercy has held out her peaceful and righteous sceptre to the objects of her eternal choice, and to them alone and since it is all of mercy, none have reason to complain. And surely it betrays the most arrogant presumption in the creature, to quarrel with the absolute exercise of the divine prerogative, and arraign his conduct at the bar of shallow subtle reason. Be it sufficient for the impenitent to know, that for the more open revelation of the divine glory, all the purposes of discriminating love were devised in eternity, and are consequently brought forth and executed in time; and for the more open and brighter developement of that glory, as the grand end of the glorious scheme of redeeming love, the salvation of every elect vessel of mercy, according to the good pleasure of his will, is effected independent of any cause remote from himself, or merit in them therefore they become the happy recipients of its benign blessedness, while no principle of justice or mercy is violated or infringed by the exclusion of the non-elected enemies of the cross, and by leaving them in a state of nature to reap the just demerit of their sins.

The Holy Ghost has drawn an irreversible line of distinction between the beloved of the Lord, whom he has so fitly designated the salt of the earth, and the children of the present evil world. It is true it cannot be positively and unerringly ascertained, in every instance, who are the monuments of divine forgiveness; nor can we limit the Holy One in the extenuation of mercy; still we are assured from divine writ there are goats and sheep, tares and wheat, ungodly and godly, some who believe not and others who believe; and the reality of this declaration is manifest here, but will be more fully revealed at the

great and decisive day of account. We are, however, assured by the inspired penman, that what they ever were they will be, whether goats or sheep; if goats, such they must remain; as it would be equally possible to change the leopard's spots, Jer. xiii. 23. or "to wash the Ethiopian white," as to change their native character; if sheep, such they ever were and ever shall remain, though they were born in sin, and shapen in iniquity, because in the secret purposes of God they were elected heirs of righteousness. There can exist no neutral character: to the one class or to the other, all created intelligencies must belong; aud all must act on the stage of time in their natural station, whether reprobate silver, or pure gold, chosen in the furnace of affliction to be refined from the tinsel and dross that surrounds it.

It is, however, very possible to form a correct judgment of the real state of many of the Lord's chosen people, who are made to bear most luxuriantly the fruits of godliness, and whose conduct and experience testify the reality of their adoption-character; and of them we may assuredly say, their state is blessed. But, although it must be admitted we cannot accurately discern who are the objects of eternal pardon, until an evidence is given by their calling; yet it is by no means impossible correctly to state, without fear of contradiction, who are not so manifestatively, from the kind of fruit they bear.

Without further introduction I shall come immediately to the words of the text, and treat the important subject in the following way.

First, I shall endeavour in a negative point of view to shew, that the blessing couched in my text is not a favour universally bestowed; as is inferrible from the words, "blessed is the man."

Secondly, and positively, I shall point out the character, and trace a few of the leading features by which the man whose transgressions are forgiven, is known.

Thirdly, I shall describe some of the blessings of this most precious gift to the happy participant of divine favour.

Fourthly, I shall endeavour to illustrate some of the happy effects which result from so unspeakable a display of covenant mercy.

Fifthly, shall sum up the whole with a few reflections.

In the first place I am to point out who are not the characters alluded to in the text, in an experimental sense; and this proposition being obvious, I shall find no difficulty in its solution; for of the following class we may speak with perfect confidence, as their conduct evinces whose they are and whom they serve. It is not the openly profligate and daringly licentious sinner, who flagrantly violates the laws of decency in his aggravated rebellions against the author and upholder of his being, who lives in open sin, and pursues with breathless avidity the fleeting vanities of this present evil world,-not the man of pleasure, who lives in the full gratification of all the evil propensities of his nature, indulging his sinful lusts, and desiring no greater gratification than to wallow in sin and sensuality. Nor the mere professor or moralist, who has no other foundation for his hope than his self-supposed goodness, on which he ever either partially or

totally relies for salvation; if partially, vainly trusting to the righteousness of Christ to cover his defects, as though that law which weighs the thoughts and intents of the heart, could remit its sentence on the guilty; and, what is still more egregious folly, to suppose the righte ousness of God could condescend to stoop to the frailties of men. Awful delusion this! but such it is. Such men are ranked among our Lord's most bitter enemies, and are most appropriately represented in the parable of the pharisee in the days of Christ's humanity. Pride, self-conceit, and ignorance cover them; and soon their hopes, more slender in their texture than the spider's web, and no firmer than a rope of sand, will yield them no support, but must be cut off for ever. In the view of these self-righteous ones, true genuine spirituality of mind is no more than wild enthusaism; and gladly would they say to its possessor, as did the pharisees of old to our Lord and Master, "away with him, crucify him, crucify him !" As they were of old, so are they now; implacable enmity to the sublime doctrines of the cross; rancour, spleen, and malevolence; gross darkness (as to spiritual perceptions) blindness, and spiritual death, may be deemed the genuine marks of their lost estate. The tree must first be made good -made good did I say? not merely modelled, but a new tree must be first planted, before good fruits can be gathered.

""Tis thus our self and pride must fall,

E'er Jesus can be all in all."

Secondly. The portrait of the man who is the subject of divine forgiveness is livelily drawn in the written word:-he is therein described as regenerated by the Holy Ghost. Jesus Christ himself in the days of his incarnation preached this doctrine to Nicodemus, see John iii. 3. He is also described as quickened by supernatural influence, Eph. ii. 1. as born of God of incorruptible seed, 1 Peter i. 23. as brought into newness of life, Rom. vi. 4. and as a perfect man in Christ Jesus, Eph. iv. 13.

Thus the man of God is perfect in principle as a new born babe, and complete in all his constituent parts, though totally and entirely dependent, in all the stages of his pilgrimage, on divine agency for the exercise of every grace implanted in him. The graces of faith and hope, of love and joy, and all that is newly created in him, are called forth into action by the divine power, and only that power which first breathed in him the breath of eternal life. The man of God is now thoroughly furnished for every good word and work; all of which are fruits of the Holy Spirit's production, proceeding from right principles implanted in him, see 2 Tim. iii. 17.

Introduced by God himself into spiritual life, he evidences its existence by the exercises of his spiritual senses, which are equally discernible spiritually, as they are in the new born babe naturally; thus the reality of this great work is as conspicuously manifest in the child of grace, as in the child of nature, by the senses of sight, feeling, hearing, smelling and tasting. Taking this proposition for granted,