pire extends to the inward as well as the outward man, and all the powers of our natures are controuled by it. It takes cognizance of the thoughts, and judges every word, and action ; and the leaft contrariety to the righteous nature and will of God, be it either in the heart or in the life, is forbidden by it. So abfolutely pure and perfect is the law of God.

This holy and perfect law of God, as it was admirably fuited to the ftate of man in innocency, was given him for two great and important purposes: The one, to regulate and direct his obedience or be the ftanding rule of his duty in all the parts of it; for as the law is nothing else but the fignification of the will of God as enjoined by his authority, what can be a rule of duty to his reasonable creature if this is not? The other, to be a covenant between God and him, according to which man was to expect life and bleffedness, or death and mifery, either as he fhould or fhould not come up to the terms of it. For God having, for wife and holy ends, delivered out his law to man in form of a covenant, hath annexed a fuitable and folemn fanction to it. On the one hand, in cafe of perfect obedience performed unto it, there was the promise of life and blessedness; On the other, in cafe of the failure of fuch obedience, there was the threatning of death and mifery; obey and live, fin and die, these were the equal and righteous terms of this covenant. The latter of thefe fanctions is exprefsly mentioned in the original contract, which was entered between God and man in Paradise, Gen. . 17. In the day thou eateft thereof, thou shalt

furely

Jurely die. And I cannot but think, that the reward in cafe of obedience, would have bore a full proportion to the punishment to be inflicted in cafe of difobedience. As the Apostle fpeaks of the commandments being ordained to life, Rom. vii. 10. and, defcribing out of Mofes the nature of that righteousness which the law calls for, he tells us, that the man that doeth thofe things ball live by them. Rom. x. 5. Agreeable to which we read of the tree of life in the midst of the garden, Gen. ii. 9. which man would have had a right to eat of, had he continued in his obedience; and which, I fuppofe, was fo called, not because it had, as fome have fondly imagined, a natural virtue to maintain and preferve the animal life of man without being fubject to any decays, untill God fhould have feen fit to have tranflated him; but becaufe it was a fymbol, or facramental fign and pledge, of immortality, from which therefore man was reftrained, as having no right to eat of it after the fall. But however it be as to that, the threatning in cafe of difobedience was exprefs and plain, the foul that finneth fhall die.-

Now man finning, violating his holy and righteous law, and breaking covenant with his God, falls under its curfe and penalty; becomes fubject and liable to that, and in confequence thereof as a guilty finner is bound over to mifery and death. And this the fcripture reprefents in the plaineft and ftrongeft terms, as the fad cafe of all mankind by reason of fin-For we have before proved, both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under fin.- Now we know that what things foever the law faith, it faith to them who C 3

aré

r

God.

are under the law that every mouth may be Stopped, and all the world become guilty before Wherefore as by one man fin entered into the world, and death by fin; and fo death paffed upon all men, for that all have finned And the offence is by one man to condemnation. This is what is commonly and properly called the covenant of works, the holy and righteous conftitution, under which man was originally placed.

It only remains to confider, whether this-law is abrogated, or whether it is still obligatory and in force; and then we fhall foon bring the enquiry to an iffue, what the nature of that righteoufnefs is, which is neceffary to our juftification. It is readily granted, that the law confidered as a covenant is vacated and abrogated, and vacated and abrogated never to be renewed more, The firft fin that man committed fuperfeded all ufe of the law for this purpofe, and rendered our juftification by it abfolutely impoffible; and the introduction of another covenant, a covenant of grace, in which we are to be juftified in a quite different way, and upon quite different terms from thofe of the law, did ipfo facto as much abrogate the law as a covenant, as if there had been an explicit and formal repeal of it. And as things are now confti. uted upon the foot of this covenant, the attempting juftification by our own righteousness, or, which is the fame thing, by an obedience performed to the law as a covenant, is fubverfive of the whole gofpel. The prefent enquiry, therefore, only refpects the commands of the law; and can any thing be more plain, than

that

that they are ftill obligatory upon us, and are indeed, of perpetual and unchange ble obligation? They are founded in the neceffary, and unalterable relation between God and man, as the one is the Creator, and the other his creature; and we must first extinguish this relation, before the duties which refult from it, and are required in the law in confequence of it, can ceafe. Our Saviour gives us the fum of the moral law in fupreme love to God, and the moft ardent love to our neighbour, Matth. xxii. 37, -40. And will any lay, that we are not under the law that requires these? Or that the law, that requires them, is not of perpetual and unchangable obligation? is abrogated or indeed ever can be? and what is there that can be fuppofed to vacate and abrogate it? What--Shall the entrance of fin abrogate it? either weaken its obligations, or any ways narrow or entrench upon its commands? because man has dared to fin, muft God quit his throne, and recede from his own righteous commands? Because man has seen fit to make a stop in his du, fhall the law make a ftop in its obligations? Or, can it ever be imagined, that God gave man fuch a law, a law of fuch purity and perfection, and that was infcribed all over with his own image and authority, to be vacated and fet afide as foon as given? If the law loft its power as foon as man departed from his duty fuch a glorious law was given to man, only for a day or two, perhaps but for an hour or two; or as one

C 4

*

fays,

* Mr. Thomas Cafe, a pious and good writer of the laft age, who has feveral feful hints upon this fubject.. See his Mount Pisgah, Part II. p. 144.

says, the moment of man's integrity. And the Apostle abhors the thought, that there fhould be any thing in the grace of the gofpel that fhould have a tendency this way. Rom. iii. 31. Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid we establish the law: Establish it for ever, and in its utmost extent, as a rule of duty, being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ, 1 Cor. ix 21. And in what ftrong and exprefs terms has our Lord declared, Matth v. 17, 18. that he came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it ; And, that till heaven and earth pass, one jot or title fhall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled?

Nor is it any objection against what hath been faid concerning the neceffary and unchangeable obligations of the law, that the Apoftle fays, 1 Tim. i. 9 that the law is not made for a righteous man. Some Interpreters place the emphafis in the word xerai, is not made, is not laid upon a righteous man as a burden *. So it is made for the wicked, and lies upon them as the greatest burden they have in the world; nothing fo burdenfome to a carnal mind as the way of duty, they faid, moreover, what a weariness is it, Mal. i 13. whereas the good man delights in the law of God, after the inward man, and none of his commandments are grievous to him But I rather think, that the Apoftle fpeaks here of the law as armed with its penalty and terror †. So

*Lex jufto non eft pofita; i. e. impofita tanquam

onus.

+ In lege Dei poft peccatum duo funt confideranda. I. Norma & directo izolayiv. II. Vis frenandi, &

com