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good of early obedience, p. 429, fays with great truth : Maintain an holy, filial fear of God: This is an ex'cellent prefervative against apoftacy, By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil, fays Solomon; and he tells you, The fear of the Lord is the fountain of LIFE, whereby men depart from the fnares of DEATH; and backfliding from Chrift is one of the great fnares of ' death. Think much of the day of recompenfe, and of the glorious reward of perfeverance in that day: Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. It is not thofe that begin well, but those who end well, that receive the crown. It is not mercenary fervice to quicken ourselves to obedience by the hope of a recompence. Omnis amor mercedis non eft mercenarius, &c. David said, I have hoped for thy falvation, and done thy commandments. He encouraged himself to duty by the hope of glory, &c. Hope of that glorious recompence is of great fervice to quicken us to perfeverance. And to the fame end does the apostle urge it: Be unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for as much as ye know that your labour is not in vain in • the Lord.'

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(9) When voluntary humility has made us wife above what is written by the apoftles, and by our forefathers, it will make us look down with contempt from the top of our fancied orthodoxy upon the motives, by which the prophets took up their cross, to ferve God and their generation. When St. Paul enumerates the works of Mofes, he traces them back to their noble principle, faith working by a well-ordered felf-love [a love this, which is infeparable from the love of God and man; the law of liberty binding us

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tion to the general tenor of the fcriptures, thus fummed up by St. John, In this, namely committing, or not committing fin, the children of God ARE MANIFEST, and the children of the Devil. What this author fays is true, if it is understood of the Alamic law of innocence; bt if it is extended to St. Paul's law of Chrift, and to St. James's law of liberty, it is one of the dangerous tenets that fupport the chair of de antinomian man of fin.

to love our neighbour as ourselves, and God ALOVE ourfelves] He chofe, fays the apolle, to fuffer affliction with the people of God, rather than to enjoy the pleasures of fin, &c. But why? Becaufe he was above locking at the prize? Juit the reverie: because he had respect to the recompence of reward, Heb. xi. 26.

(10) In the next chapter, the apostle bids us take Chrift himself for our pattern in the very thing, which our gofpel-refiners call mercenary and bafe: Looking to Jefus, fays he, who, FOR THE JOY that was fet before him, endured the cross, defpifing the frame, and is fet down at the right hand of the throne of God: the noble reward this, with which his mediatorial obedience was crowned, as appears from these words, He became OBEDIENT unto death; WHEREFORE God also hath highly exalted him. If the fcheme of those who refine the ancient gofpel appears to me in a peculiarly-unfavourable light, it is when I fee them impofe upon the injudicious admirers of unfcriptural humility, and make the fimple believe, that they do God fervice when they indirectly reprefent Chrift's obedience unto death as imperfect, and him as mercenary, actuated by a motive unworthy of a child of God. He fays, Every one that is PERFECT, fhall be as his master: but we I [ fuch is our confiftency!] loudly decry perfection, and yet pretend to an higher degree of it than our Lord and Mafter: For he was not above enduring the cross FOR THE JOY of fitting down at the right hand of the throne of God: but we are fo exquifitely perfect, that we will work gratis. It is mercenary, it is beneath us to work for glory!

(11) I fear, this contempt is by fome indirectly poured upon the Lord of glory, to extol the fpurious free-grace who is filter to free-wrath; and to perfuade the fimple, that "Works have nothing to do with our final justification and eternal falvation before God:" a dogma this, which is as contrary to reafon, as it is to fcripture and morality; it being a monftrous impofition upon the credulity of proteftants, to affert, that works, which God himfelf will REWARD with

final juftification and eternal falvation, have nothing* to do with that juftification and that falvation before Him: Juft as if the thing rewarded had nothing to do with its reward before the Rewarder!

(12) The moft rigid Calvinists allow, that St. Paul is truly evangelical; but, which of the facred writers ever fpoke greater things of the rewardableness of works than he? What can be plainer, what stronger than these words, which I muft quote till they are minded: Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, &c. knowing [i. e. confidering] that of the Lord ye fhall receive the REWARD of the inheritance. But he that doth wrong, shall receive for the wrong which he hath done for there is no respect of perfons, Col. iii. 23, &c. Again: Whatfoever a man foweth, that fhall he also reap: for he that foweth to his flesh, shall of the flesh reap perdition; but he that foreth to the fpirit, fhall of the Spirit reap everlasting life. Gal. vi. 7, 8.

From thofe fcriptures it is evident, that doing good or bad works is like fowing good or bad feed; and that going to heaven or to hell, is like gathering what we have fown. Now, as it is the MADNESS of unbelievers to fow wickednefs, and to expect a crop of happinefs and glory; fo it is the wISDOM of believers to fow righteoufnefs, expecting to reap in due time if they faint not. Nor do we act reasonably, if we do not fow more or lefs with an eye to reaping: for if reaping is quite out of the question with proteftants, they may as wifely fow chaff on a fallow, as corn in a plowed field. Hence I conclude, that a believer may obey, and that, if he is judicious, he will obey looking both to Jefus and to the rewards of obedience; and that the more he can fix the eye of his faith upon his exceeding great reward, and his great recompence of reward, the more he will abound in the work of faith, the patience of hope, and the labour of love.

(13) St. Paul's conduct with respect to rewards, was perfectly confiftent with his doctrine. I have already obferved, he wrote to the Corinthians, that he so ran and so fought, as to obtain an incorruptible crown; and

it is well known, that in the Olympic games, to which he alludes, all ran or fought with an eye to a prize, a reward, or a crown. But in his epiftle to the Philippians, he goes ftill farther; for he reprefents his running for a crown of life, his preffing after rewards of grace and glory, as the whole of his business. His words are remarkable: This ONE thing I DO: forgetiing those things which are behind, and REACHING FORTH unto those things which are before, I PRESS towards the mark, FOR THE PRIZE of the high calling of God in Chrift Jefus. And when he had juft run his race out, he wrote to Timothy, I have finished my courfe: henceforth there is laid up for me, as for a conqueror, a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous JUDGE fhall give me at that day -- the great day of retribution. As for St. John, when he was perfected in love, we find him as mercenary" as St. Paul: for he writes to the ele& Lady, and to her believing children, Look to yourselves, that we LOSE NOT thofe things which WE HAVE WROUGHT, but that we receive a FULL REWARD.

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(14) When I read fuch fcriptures, I wonder at thofe, who are so wrapt up in the pernicious notion, that we ought not to work for a life of glory; as to over

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Truth is fo great that it sometimes prevails over those, that are prejudiced against it, I have obferved that Dr. Crifp himself, in an happy moment, bore a moft noble teftimony to undefiled religion. Take another inftance of it. In the volume of the Rev. Mr. Whitefield's fermons taken in fhort hand, and published by Gurney, p. 119, that great preacher fays, "First we must work FOR fpiritual life, "afterwards FROM it." And p. 153, 154, he declares: "There "are numbers of poor, that are ready to perifh; and if you drop "fomething to them in love, God will take care to repay you when

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you come to judgment." I find but one fault with this doctrine. The first of thofe propofitions does not guard free grace fo well as Mr. Welley's minutes do. We should always intimate, that there is no working for a life of glory, or for a more abundant life of grace, but from an initial life of grace, freely given us in Chrift BEFORE any working of our own. This I mention, not to prejudice the render against Mr. Whitefield, but to fhow, that I am not so prejudiced in favour of works, as not to fee when even a Whitefield, in an unguarded expreffion, leans towards them to the difparagement of free grace.

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look even the crown of life, with which God will reward those who are faithful unto death. And I am aftonished at the remains of my own unbelief, which prevent my being always ravished with admiration at the thought of the rewards offered to fire my foul into feraphic obedience. An idle country-fellow, who runs at the wakes for a wretched prize, labours harder in his fportive race than, I fear, I do yet in fome of my prayers and fermons. A fportfman, for the pitiful honour of coming in at the death of a fox, toils more than most profeffors do in the purfuit of their corrup tions. How ought confufion to cover our faces! Let thofe that refine the gofpel, glory in their fhame : let each of them fay, "I thank thee, O God, that I am not like a Papift, or like that Arminian, who looks. at the rewards which thou haft promifed: I deny myself, and take up my crofs, without thinking of "the joy and rewards fet before me," &c. For my part, I defire to humble myfelf before God, for having fo long overlooked the exceeding great reward, and the crown of life, promifed to them that OBBY him: and my thoughts fhall be expreffed in fuch words as thefe:

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Gracious Lord, if he that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall have a prophet's reward: if our light affliction, when it is patiently endured, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory if thou haft faid, Do good and lend, hoping for nothing again [from man,] and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the highest: if • thou animateft thofe, who are perfecuted for righteousness fake, by this promiffory exhortation, Rejoice, and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven: Nay, if a cup of cold water only, given in thy name, fhall in NO WISE lofe its reward; and if the leaft of thy rewards is a fmile of approbation; let me be ready to go round the world, fhouldst thou call me to it, that I may obtain fuch a recompence.' Since thou haft fo closely connected holiness and happiness, my duty and thy favours; let no man beguile me of my reward in a voluntary humility; nor

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