Greek; but to them that believed, both Jews and Greeks, Christ became the power of God and the wisdom of God.'

It is a lamentable fact, that the generality of those persons who are perpetually talking of the mercy and goodness of God, are very far from being eminent for sanctity of life. It should seem therefore from this circumstance, that there is a strong propensity to believe, either that sin is not so hateful as represented, or that the Almighty will not finally punish it. But this is an awful deception. He is not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness: neither shall evil dwell with him.' It is a fact-an incontestable fact, 'That God is angry with the wicked every daythat he will by no means clear the guilty.' That the soul that sinneth, shall die, is the irrevocable decree of heaven. Men may attempt to extenuate the turpitude of their own actions, and bless themselves in their hearts, saying, We shall have peace, though we walk in the imaginations of our hearts, to add drunkenness to thirst: but the Lord will not spare them-He will render to them that are contentious, and obey not the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile.'

The profane scoffer may walk after his own Justs, and insultingly ask, in the language of similar characters of old, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation-Let him make speed, and hasten his work that we may see it: and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know it!-But the Lord is not slack concerning his promises, as some men

count slackness-he will be exalted in judgment, and God that is holy, sanctified in righteousness.' Whatever the incorrigible sinner may think, his 'damnation slumbereth not-the day of his calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon him make haste.' Divine justice is not asleep, but watchful. The Lord is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed→ His eyes are in every place, beholding the evil and the good: Whence it is evident that God not only can know, if he will, but likewise that he actually wills to know all that we do.' He is a Judge infinitely wise, and infinitely powerful; whom the sinner can neither deceive, escape, nor resist.' Not a word, not a thought eludes his notice: all deviations are faithfully recorded;" and a tribunal erected where, as one expresses it, the proofs for conviction are ready to produce, the evidence unexceptionable, and the awards of Justice exactly proportioned to the guilt. Though the adulterer wait for the twilight, and disguise himself,' yet shall he not avoid detection: the hidden things of darkness shall be brought to light: for there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known. Whatsoever has been spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light; and that which has been spoken in the ear in closets, shall be proclaimed upon the house-tops.'

That dreadful evil, which, with equal force and propriety, is called the Second Death, should not, surely, be disregarded, merely because it has been long impending; and as there is no equivalent for which a man can reasonably determine to suffer, it cannot be considered as the object of courage. How it may be borne, should not be the inquiry, but how it may be shunned. And if in this daring age it is impossible to prepare for

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eternity, without giving up the character of a hero, no reasonable being, surely, will be deterred by this consideration from the attempt; for who but an infant, or an idiot, would give up his paternal inheritance for a feather, or renounce the accla mations of a triumph for the tinkling of a rattle?"

The truth is, all men by nature possess a radical aversion to the government of God. They practically say concerning him as the Jewish nation did of Christ, We will not have this man to reign over us: and the reason is obvious: his word, like that of the prophet's to the king of Israel, never speaks good to them, but always evil. There is therefore a perpetual contest between him and them for sovereign dominion; or as Charnock expresses it, Whose will, and whose authority shall stand.' As rector of the world, he has enacted a law worthy of infinite wisdom and of infinite benevolence; that is adapted to promote the divine glory and the happiness of man. But this law, since the fall, though supremely excellent in itself, is so repugnant to the propensities of depraved nature, that it is constantly opposed; is represented as rigorous and cruel; as not suited to man in his present circumstances, and therefore incompatible with the be nignity of God. The heavenly statute is treated as an obsolete rule, and the will of depraved and perverse mortals set up as the standard of duty; or at least the authority of the divine legislator in the law, is trampled on without regret, and the vilest atrocities frequently committed without remorse and without shame.

Let it however be remembered that one grand end of the incarnation, the sufferings, and the death of Christ, was to honour the divine governs ment. The objects whom he came to redeem, were violaters of the law of God, and subject to

its curse. As delinquents, it had a legal claim upon them; which claim was a bar to the bestowment of happiness: in order therefore to remove this impediment, he, as their surety, conformed to all its precepts in his life, and suffered its penalty in being made sin and a curse for them in his death. Now Christ, in bearing this curse, practically declared both to angels and to men, That the law which renounced it is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good; that the persons for whom he died, deserved to suffer its penalty; and that they could not, consistently with the honour of the divine government, possess the kingdom prepared for them, till this curse was entirely removed.

If the purity and perfection of the law of God be not fully admitted: if the curse it pronounceth on the sinner be not strictly equitable; the death of Christ, as an expiatory sacrifice, was the most unjust, and the most cruel event that heaven or earth ever witnessed! What need was there for such an expiation, if man could have been saved without it! To imagine that the Father of mercies required the death of his own Son to atone for crimes which the law could not righteously punish, or which could have been remitted in a way less rigorous, is such an impeachment of the divine wisdom and the divine goodness as excites horror.

But the period is swiftly approaching when all the impious cavils of men will be effectually silenced: when it shall be made manifest that the government of God is according to truth. Think not,' said Christ, 'that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil: nor shall one jot, or one tittle pass from the law till all be fulfilled.' A day pointed of God, in the which he will judge the

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world in righteousness by that Man who died to maintain the rights of divine Justice. For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son; that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. And who so fit to vindicate the divine government, or to administer divine justice, as he who voluntarily laid down his life in obedience to that law which thousands wantonly contemn, but by which, however reluctant, they must finally be judged?

It has been supposed that one reason among others for which a judgment-day is appointed, is for putting honour on the Son of God. It is highly proper,' says Dr. Smith, that this holy and divine Person who was buffeted and affronted, condemned and crucified by an ungrateful and injurious world, should now judge his judges, and be as far advanced above the pinnacle of human greatness as he was once below it. It is fit that Herod may see that he persecuted, not the infant king of a petty province, but the Sovereign of angels and of men; and that Pilate and the Jews may be convinced that he whom they called a King in scorn, is really a greater Emperor than Cæsar.' I am yours, &c.'