the obedience and fatisfaction of Christ, by which the law is magnified and made honourable, and with which God is well pleased; and will be pleafed with every finner that takes the benefit thereof.

4. The commandment is exceeding broad, reaching to every motion, defire, and affection of the heart, as well as to every action we perform. It is a rule both for our hearts and our lives. Let us then study to know this holy law of God in its fpirituality and extent, and yield that obedience to it which it requires; fincere, flowing from right principles in the heart, and directed to right ends; univerfal, in refpect of parts, without mincing; cheerful, in regard of the manner; and constant and perpetual, as to the duration. And the Lord give us understanding in all things, to know and do our duty, to the glory of his

name.

LOVE TO GOD AND OUR NEIGHBOUR, THE SUM OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

MATTH. xxii. 37. 38. 39.-Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy foul, and with all thy mind. This is the firft and great commandment. And the fecond is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

MARK Xii. 30.-Thou shalt love the Lord thy God,-with all thy ftrength.

HIS is an answer made by our Lord to a captious queftion put to him by a learned fcribe. If Christ had pitched on any particular command of the ten, the lawyer, for fo the querift is called, would certainly have excepted in fome other, and accufed him of vilifying fome other commands; but Christ gives the summary of both tables of the law, yea, of the whole fcriptures touching a holy life: Thou fhalt love the Lord thy God, &c. In which words may be noticed,

1. The fum of the first table of the law that is, love to the Lord, and that fuch love as is fuperior and transcendent; fuch love as gives the whole man to the Lord, with all the strength of all the powers of foul and body.

2. The fum of the fecond table; that is, love to our neighbour, and that fuch love as we bear to ourselves, (but not as to God), fincere and conftant.

3. Christ compares the two together, fhewing that love to God is the command first to be looked unto, and by which the other is to be regulated, whether as to the loving ourfelves or our neighbour. The fecond is like unto it, as having the fame authority, and must be joined with the first, and is the fountain of acceptable obedience to the fecond-table commands, as the first is the true fpring of acceptable obedience to the firft-table duties.

4. He fhews the whole law and the doctrine of the prophets, touching holinefs, to depend on these as the fum of all.

The doctrine arising from the words is,

DOCT. "The fum of the ten commandments is, to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our foul, with all our strength, and with all our mind; and our neighbour as ourselves."

The fum of all the commands (ye fee) is love. So the ten commandments are the law of love; they are a law that is chiefly converfant about the heart, which is the feat of love. The scope of them is to unite men to God and to one another; for there is no fuch cement of hearts as holinefs.

The text and doctrine confists of two parts.

I. The fum of the firft table of the law is love to God. II. The fum of the fecond is love to our neighbour.

I. The fum of the first table of the law is love to God.. Here I fhall fhew,

1. The ingredients of this love to God, whereof it is made up.

2. The properties of it.

3. Why this love is due to God.

4. How love to the Lord stands in relation to other commands.

5. Lastly, Apply,

First, I fhall fhew the ingredients of this love to God, whereof it is made up.

1. Knowledge of him. An unfeen but not an unknown God can be loved with all the heart, foul, ftrength, and mind. Ignorant fouls cannot love God; what the eye fees not, the heart likes not. Hell fire may have heat without light but all heavenly fire has light as well as heat. Thou must know God, (1.) Who he is, to wit, the Lord Jehovah, the one God in three perfons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. These are the object of divine love. (2.) What he is in his attributes, as an infinite, eternal and unchangeable Being. Comprehend him ye cannot, but apprehend him ye must, as he has revealed himself. And fo when love is fhed abroad in the heart, the vail is first taken from the eyes.

2. Chufing of him for our God, our chief good and portion, Pfal. lxxiii. 25. “Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I defire befides thee." Thou shalt love the Lord with all thy heart. If we love him not above all, we do not truly love him; if we chuse him not for our portion, we love him not above all. The foul that loves the Lord, fees that in him which may fatisfy it, nothing out of him that is neceffary to make the foul happy. Hence it does, by choice, take up its everlasting reft in him, and finds a match to itself in him.

3. Cleaving to him as our God: Love the Lord thy God. Love is an uniting thing; it makes the foul cleave to the object. Thou must cleave to the Lord, to his ways, word, &c. Not to be separated from him by whatsoever wedge the devil or the world may drive. Not to be bribed from him, nor boasted either, Cant. viii. 7. "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it.' And cleave to him as thy God; for fo he will be loved. He must be thy God, before thou canst love him aright. Thus was it with Adam, and Chrift; and thus it is with believers.

Hence it is evident, (1.) That faith is the first spring of all true obedience. There is no obedience but from love, no love but from faith, whereby God becomes our God.How can it otherwise be? for although God is in himself the chief good, if he be not ours, the more perfect Being he is, the more terrible an enemy he is.

(2.) That the way prefcribed by God himself for us to attain love to him, is to apprehend him by faith to be our

God; which now can be no otherwise but by faith in Christ. So that to love God, that he may love us, is a prepofterous method. But let us labour to embrace Christ, and so to believe God loves us in him; then fhall the heart natively flow out in love to him: 1 John iv. 19. "We love him, because he first loved us."

4. High thoughts and a tranfcendent esteem of him, Cant. v. 10. "My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefeft among ten thoufand." He is the best of beings, the moft amiable and lovely, that fhines with unparalleled perfections; and therefore is to have the fupreme place in our estimation as well as affections. Here our esteem cannot go too high, more than we can reach beyond what is infinite. We cannot launch out too far in admiration of his glory. Thus fhould we highly and honourably think of him as the best and greateft. It is a fad character of the wicked man, Pfal. x. 4. that "God is not in all his thoughts."

5. Defire towards him, Pfal. lxxiii. 25. Whatever other defires we have, the main ftream of our defires muft run towards the Lord, Pfal. xxvii. 4. to the enjoyment of him in this life, and the perfect enjoyment of him hereafter; fo that God not being perfectly enjoyed here, it is natural to the lovers of God to defire to" be with Chrift," Phil. i. 23. 2 Theff. iii. 5.

6. Laftly, Complacency in him, Cant. i. 13. The foul must delight in him, have a pleasure in him. The lover of the Lord is well pleafed there is fuch a being, well pleased with all his attributes, all his relations to us, all his words, ways, and works. And the want of this makes men haters of God in the fcripture-fense.

Secondly, I fhall fhew the properties of this love required of us. It is,

1. Sincere, not in word and tongue only, fhewing much love, Prov. xxiii. 26. but inwardly, our hearts being with him, to him, and for him.

2. Moft ftrong and vigorous, even as much as we are capable of, all the ftrength we are mafters of. Love may be fincere, though not most intenfe, and that the gofpel may accept but the law requires a perfection of degrees as well of parts. The greatest fervour of affection is due to God, and the greatest ardency of love, beyond which we cannot go. 3. Pure and abfolute, for himself. Not that we are not to

love God as our benefactor, Pfal. cxvi. 11. but we muft love him alfo and mainly for thofe excellencies that are in him, Cant. i. 3. for his truth, juftice, mercy, holiness, &c.

4. A fuperlative and tranfcendent love. We must love God above all creatures whatsoever, ourselves or others, Luke xiv. 26. And fo must all other loves be fwallowed up in his; we must love nothing befide him, but for him, and in due fubordination to him.

We must love him

5. An intelligent love, Mark xii. 33. as thofe that fee good caufe to love him. There is no blindnefs in this love; for there are no faults in the object to be hid; but the better we fee, the more we love.

6. Laftly, An efficacious working love, 1 John iii. 18. Therefore fays the apoftle, Rom. xiii. 10. "Love worketh no ill to his neighbour:" therefore "love is the fulfilling of the law." Love devotes the whole man to God, to ferve his glory in the world, Rom. xiv. 7, 8. and makes him ready to forego what is dearest to him in the world for God, Acts xx. 24. and fets a man on doing and fuffering at his call.

Thirdly, I will fhew why this love is due to God. It is due because of his tranfcendent excellency, and abfolute loveliness. There is nothing in him but what is good; all goodnefs is in him, and nothing wanting; and each part of goodness is in him infinitely. No love, then, is fuitable to him but fuch a love. There is nothing lovely in the creatures, but what is eminently in him, Matth. xix. 17.; but there is fomething wanting in all the creatures, that must ftint our love.

Fourthly, I fhall fhew how love to the Lord ftands in relation to other commands.

1. It is the chief duty. It is what God mainly requires, and what we ought mainly to aim at. It is the end, to which even faith itself is but the mean, and in that refpect is by the apostle preferred to all others, 1 Cor. xiii.

2. It is the comprehenfive duty of all, Rom. xiii. 10. As is our love, fo will our obedience be. Were our love perfect, our obedience would be fo too. It is the fruitful womb out of which proceed all other duties.

3. It is an universal duty; it goes through all. Whatever acceptable service we do, must be done in love; and if it be not done fo, it is not accepted. Other duties are the meat, but this is the falt to feason all.