upon us, “creating us anew, by Jesus Christ, for good works." And then, there is needful, what will necessarily follow such a work-a disposition to perform good works, on true, genuine, generous, and evangelical principles. These principles must be stated be fore we proceed:

In the first place, it must be taken for granted that the end for which we perform good works is not to provide the matter of our justification before God: indeed, no good works can be done till we are justified; before a man is united to Christ, who is our life, he is a dead man, and what good works can be expected from him? "Without me," saith our Lord, " ye can do nothing." The justification of a sinner by faith, before good works, and in order to them, is one of those doctrines which may say to the popish innovations, "With us are the gray-headed, and very aged men, much elder than thy father." It was an old maxim of the faithful, "Good works follow justification; they do not precede it." It is the righteousness of the good works done by our Savior and surety, not our own, that justifies us before God, and answers the demands of his holy law upon us. By faith we lay hold on those good works for our justifying righteousness, before we are able to perform our own. It is not our faith itself, either as producing good works, or being itself one of them, which entitles us to the justifying righteousness of our Savior: it is faith, renouncing our own righteousness, and relying on that of Christ provided for the chief of sinners, by which we are justified. All our attempts at good works will come to nothing, till a justifying faith in the Savior shall carry us forth unto them. This was the divinity of the ancients. Jerome has well expressed it. "Without Christ all virtue is but vice."

Nevertheless, first, you are to look upon it as a glorious truth of the Gospel, that the moral law (which prescribes good works) must, by every Christian alive, be the rule of his life. "Do we make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law." The rule by which we are to glorify God is given us in that law of good works which we enjoy (I will so express it) in the ten commandments. It is impossible for us to be released from obligations to glorify God by a conformity to this rule: sooner shall we cease to be creatures. The conformity to this rule, in the righteousness which our Savior by his obedience to it has brought in to justify us, has for ever "magnified the law and made it honorable." Though our Savior has furnished us with a perfect and spotless righteousness, when his obedience to the law is placed to our account; yet it is sinful in us to fall short in our personal obedience to the law. We must always judge and loathe ourselves for the sin. We are not under the law as a covenant of works: our own exactness in performing good works is not now the condition of entering into life. Wo be to us if it were. But still, the covenant of grace holds us to it as our duty; and if we are in the covenant of grace, we shall make it our study to perform those good works which were once the condition of entering into life. "Every law of religion still remains." Such must be the esteem for the law of good works, for ever retained in justified persons; a law never to be abrogated or abolished.

And then, secondly, though we are justified by "precious faith in the righteousness of God our Savior," yet good works are required of us to justify our faith,” to demonstrate that it is indeed "precious faith." A justifying faith is a jewel which may be counterfeited: but the marks of a faith which is not a counter

feit, are to be found in those good works to which a servant of God is, by his faith, inclined and assisted. It is by the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit that faith is wrought in the hearts of the chosen people: now the same grace which in regeneration disposes a person to fly by faith to the righteousness of Christ, will dispose him also to the good works of a Christian life; and the same faith which applies to the Savior for an interest in his righteousness, will also apply to him for strength to perform the good works which are "ordained that we should walk in them." If our faith be not of this kind, it is a lifeless faith, and will be without good fruits. A workless faith is a worthless faith.

Reader, suppose thyself standing before the judgment seat of Christ! a necessary, a prudent supposition: it ought to be a very frequent one. The Judge demands, "What hast thou to plead for a portion in the blessedness of the righteous?" The plea must be, "O my glorious Judge, thou hast been my sacrifice. O thou Judge of all the earth, permit dust and ashes to say, my righteousness is on the bench. Surely, in the Lord have I righteousness. O my Savior, I have received it, I have secured it on thy own gracious offer of it." The Judge proceeds: "But what hast thou to plead that thy faith should not be rejected as the faith of the hypocrite?" Here the plea must be, "O Lord, my faith was thy work. It was a faith which disposed me to all the good works of thy holy religion. It sanctified me. It brought me to thee, my Savior, for grace to perform the works of righteousness: it embraced thee for my Lord as well as Savior: it caused me, with sincerity, to love and keep thy commandments, and with assiduity to serve the interests of thy kingdom in the world."

Thus you have Paul and James reconciled. Thus you have good works provided for. The aphorism of the physicians is, "By a man's outward acts of vigor, you judge of his internal health." The actions of men are more certain indications of what is within, than all their sayings.

But there is yet another consideration upon which you must be zealously affected to good works. You must consider them as a part of the great salvation which is purchased for you by Jesus Christ. Without a holy heart you cannot be fit for a holy heaven, "meet for the inheritance of the saints in that light" which admits no works of darkness, where none but good works are done for eternal ages. But a holy heart will induce a man to do good with all his heart. The motto on the gates of the holy city is, "None but the lovers of good works to enter here:" this is implied in what we read, "without holiness no man shall see the Lord;" yea, to be saved without good works, were to be saved without salvation. consists in doing good works. earth when we are so engaged;

Much of our salvation

Heaven is begun upon and doubtless, no man

will get to heaven who is not so persuaded.

TUDE.

I shall mention but one more of those principles from which good works proceed: it is that noble one, GratiThe believer cannot but inquire, "What shall I render to my Savior?"-the result of the inquiry will be, "with good works to glorify him." We read, that "faith worketh by love." Our faith will discover the matchless and marvellous love of God in saving us; and the faith of this love will work on our hearts, till it hath raised in us an unquenchable flame of love to him who hath so loved and saved us. These, these are to be our dispositions: "O my Savior! hast thou

done so much for me! now will I do all I can for thy kingdom and people in the world. O! what service is there that I may now perform for my Savior and his people in the world?"

These are the principles to be proceeded on; and it is worthy of special observation, that there are no men in the world who so much abound in good works, as those who, above all others, have abandoned every pretension to the merit of their works. No merit-mongers have exceeded some holy Christians, who have performed good works on the assurance of being already justified, and entitled to eternal life.

I observe that our apostle, throwing a just contempt on the endless genealogies, and long, intricate pedigrees which the Jews of his time dwelt so much upon, proposes in their stead, "Charity, out of a pure heart, and a good conscience, and faith unfeigned:" as if he had said, "I will give you a genealogy worth ten thousand of theirs,”—first, from faith unfeigned proceeds a good conscience; from a good conscience a pure heart; and from a pure heart, charity to all around us. It is admirably stated!

OPPORTUNITIES TO DO GOOD.

Our opportunities to do good are our talents. An awful account must be rendered to the great God concerning the use of the talents with which he has intrusted us in these precious opportunities. Frequently we do not use our opportunities, because we do not consider them: they lie by unnoticed and unimproved. We read of a thing which we deride as often as we behold it. "There is that maketh himself poor, and yet hath great riches." This is too frequently exem