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be laid, before the church can be again that virgin spouse of Cbrist which it was at the beginning. “If any man," says St Paul," will be wise, let him become a fool in this world." This admits of no exception; it is a maxim as universal and unalterable as that which says, "If any man will fol low, Christ, let him deny himself;" for no man has any more to deny than that which the wisdom and spirit of this world are and do in him. For all that is in this world, the lusts of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, are the very things in which alone the wisdom of this world lives, and moves, and has its being. It can be no other, can rise no higher, nor be any better than they are and do. For as heavenly wisdom is the whole of all heavenly goodness, so earthly wisdom has the whole evil of all the earthly nature.

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St Paul speaks of a "natural man, that cannot know the things of God; but to whom they are mere foolishness." This natural man is only another name for the wisdom of this world; but though he cannot know the things that be of God, yet he can know their names, and learn to speak that which the saints of God have spoken about them. He can make profession of them, be eloquent in their praise, and set them forth in such a desirable view, as shall make them quite agreeable to the children of worldly wisdom. This is the natural man; who, having got into the church, and church

or work, but that of changing a sinner into a saint. But this can only be done, just as the change of night into day is done, or as the darkness is quite lost in the light. Something as contrary to the whole nature of sin, as light is to darkness, and as powerful over it, as the light is powerful over darkness, can alone do this. Creeds, canons, articles of religion, stately churches, learned priests, singing, preaching, and praying in the best contrived form of words, can no more raise a dead sinner into a living saint, than a fine system of light and colours can change the night into day. For, (N. B.) that which cannot help you to all goodness, cannot help you to any goodness; nor can that take away any sin, but that which can take away all sin.

On this ground it is that the apostle said, "Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing;" and on the same ground it must be said, that Popery is nothing, and Protestantism is nothing; because all is nothing, as to salvation, but a sinner changed into a saint, or the apostle's new creature. Call nothing, therefore, your holy salvation-church, but that which takes away all your sins; this is the only way not to be deceived with the cry about churches, reformations, and divisions. If it be asked, What is meant by taking away all our sins? The whole is fully told us in these words, "To as many as believed, to them he gave power to become sons of God," This is

the true taking away, or forgiveness of sins; not a strong imagination, or brain-fancy, that on such an hour, on such a day, or in such a place, you felt and knew assuredly that all your sins were forgiven you. By such a forgiveness of sins, that which made you a sinner is not destroyed, but you will have every day the same necessity of confessing yourself a miserable sinner, as you had that morning, when your sins were not forgiven you till the afternoon. The true forgiveness of sins is only then, when that which sinned in us is done away, or become powerless in us; but nothing can do this, but that power by which we become sons of God. A blind man has then only a deliverance from his blindness, when he is put in full possession of seeing eyes; this is the only doing away of his darkness. Just so, and no otherwise, are our sins forgiven us, or done away, when the power by which we become sons of God, or the new creature, is so given to us, so possessed by us, as seeing eyes are given to and possessed by the man who before that was all blindness. And as our old man can only then be said to be truly put off, when the new man in Christ is raised to life in his stead, so our sins are only then truly blotted out, or done away, when an unsinning nature, or a birth of God that sinneth not, is come to be the ruling life in us.

Many are the marks which the learned have

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given us of the true church; but be that as it will, no man, whether learned or unlearned, can have any mark or proof of his own true church membership, "but his being dead unto all sin, and alive unto all righteousness." This cannot be more plainly told us, than in these words of our Lord, "He that committeth sin, is the servant of sin;' but surely that servant of sin cannot at the same time be a living member of Christ's body, or that new creature, who dwells in Christ, and Christ in him. To suppose a man born again from above, yet under a necessity of continuing to sin, is as absurd as to suppose, that the true Christian is only to have so much of the nature of Christ born in him, as is consistent with as real a power of Satan still dwelling in him. "If the Son," says Christ, "shall make you free, then ye shall be free indeed." What is this, but saying, if Christ be come to life in you, then a true freedom from all necessity of sinning is given to you. Now if this is hindered, and cannot come to pass in the faithful follower of Christ, it must be, because both the willing and working of Christ in man is too weak to overcome that' which the devil wills and works in him. All this absurdity, and even blasphemy, is necessarily implied in that common doctrine of books and pulpits, which teaches that the Christian can never have done sinning as long as he lives. Well, therefore, may Christendom sleep

as securely as it does, under the power of sin, without any thought, hope, or desire of doing "God's will on earth, as it is done heaven;" without any concern at their not being pure, as he who has called them is pure, or walking as he walked.

The Scripture knows no Christians but saints, who in all things act as becometh saints. But now, if the Scripture saint did not mean a man that eschewed all evil, and was holy in all his conversation, saint and no saint would have only such difference, as one carnal man will always have from another. Preachers and writers comfort the half Christians with telling them, that God requires not a perfect, sinless obedience, but accepts the sincerity of our weak endeavours instead of it. Here, if ever, the blind lead the blind. For St. Paul, comparing the way of salvation to a race, says, “In a race all run, but ONE obtaineth the prize; so run that ye may obtain." Now if Paul had seeing eyes, must not they be blind who teach, that God accepts of all that run in the religious race, and requires not that any should obtain the prize. How easy was it to see, that the sincerity of our weak endeavours was quite a different thing from that which alone is, and can be the required perfection of our lives. The first God accepts, that is, bears with. But why or how? Not be

cause he seeks or requires no more, but he bears

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