salvation of true believers, are secured from all oppositions whatever.

§9. 1. No persons whatever ought to be on any consideration secure against those sins to which present circumstances give an efficacy.

2. It is an effect of spiritual wisdom to discern what is the dangerous and prevailing temptation of any season, and vigorously to set ourselves in opposition to it.

3. It is much to be feared, that in great trials some will draw back from that profession of the gospel wherein they are engaged.

4. This defection is commonly durable, continued by various pretences; this is included in the original word (utocleiλelwi) gradually and covertly to subduct himself.

$10. 1. It is our duty to look diligently that we are of that holy frame of mind, that due exercise of faith, as the soul of God may take pleasure in us,

2. Though there appear as yet no outward tokens of the anger and displeasure of God against our ways; yet if we are in that state wherein God hath no pleasure in us, we are entering into certain ruin.

3. Backsliders from the gospel are in a peculiar manner the abhorrency of the soul of God.

4. When the soul of God is not delighted in any, nothing can preserve them from utter destruction.

5. The scripture every where testifieth, that in the visible church there is a certain number of false hypocrites, whose end and lot it is to be destroyed.

6. It is our most urged duty to evidence to our own consciences, and give evidence to others, that we are not of this number.

7. Nothing can free apostates from eternal ruin.

CHAPTER XI.

VERSE 1.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of

things not seen.

$1. The apostle's great argument recapitulated. His present design. §2. His definition of faith $3, 4. (I.) The substance of things hoped for. $5. (II.) The evidence of things not seen. 66, (II) Observations. $7. Great objec tions are apt to lie against invisible things when externally revealed. §8, 9. Remaining observations.

§1. THE general nature of this epistle, as hortatory, hath been repeatedly noticed; and the apostle--having evidently declared from the scripture itself that the state of the gospel church in its high priest, sacrifice, covenant, worship, privileges, and efficacy, is incomparably to be preferred above that of the Old Testament; yea, that all the excellency and glory of that state, and all that belonged to it, consisted only in the representation that was made thereby of the greater glory of Christ and the gospel, without which they were of no use, and therefore pernicious to be persisted in;-having fixed their minds in the truth, and armed them against the temptations which they were continually exposed to, the opposition which befell them, and the persecutions they were like to undergo from the obstinate members of the Jewish church;— having hinted, at the close of the last chapter, that the only way and means on their part, whereby they may be kept constant to their profession, notwithstanding all the evils that might befall them, is by faith alone;being thus delivered from temptations by the doctrine of truth, and from the opposition made to them by faith in exercise; -the apostle, I say, proceeds to shew what this faith is, and produces abundant evidence to

prove that it is able to effect this great work of preserving men in the profession of the truth, under bloody and destructive persecutions.

This being the design of the apostle, the missing of it hath caused sundry contests about the nature of justifying faith, which is here not at all spoken to; for the apostle treats not of justification, or of faith as justifying, but of its efficacy and operation in them who are justified, with respect to constancy and perseverance in their profession, notwithstanding the difficulties which they have to conflict with; as it is treated of James ii.

And here, before we descend to a particular discussion, we may remark, that it is faith alone, which, from the beginning of the world, under all dispensations of divine grace, and all alterations in the church state and worship, hath been in the church the only principle of living unto God, of obtaining the promises, and of inheriting life eternal.

2. "Faith is the (Urorlaris) substance of things hoped for;" this word is used, besides, 2 Cor. ix, 4; xi, 17, thrice in this epistle; in the first it is applied to express a distinct manner of subsistence in the divine nature, chap i, 3. In the second a firm persuasion of the truth, supporting our souls in the profession of it; chap. iii, 14. In this place, we render it substance; more properly it is a real subsistence, as opposed to appearing phantasms. The sense of the place is well expressed in the Greek scholiast; "whereas things that are in hope only, have no subsistence of their own as being not present; faith becomes the subsistence of them, making them to be present after a certain manner;" and the Syriac, "a persuasion of the things that are in hope, as if they were to them in effect;" which goes a great way towards the true exposition of the

words. I shall, however, retain the word "substance," as opposed to what hath no real being or subsistence, but only an appearance of things.

Unto this faith two things are ascribed; that it is the substance of things hoped for—and, the evidence of things not seen; having discussed these two things, we shall subjoin some observations.

§3. (I.) Faith is the substance (ελTIOμLevov) of things hoped for; these, in general, are things good, promised, future, expected on unfailing grounds; all things of present grace and future glory. Hope in God for these things, to be received in their appointed season, is the great support of believers, under all their trials in the whole course of their profession, obedience, temptation, and sufferings; things hoped for, and things unseen, are not absolutely the same; for there are things unseen which are the objects of faith, and yet not hoped for; such is the creation of the world, wherein the apostle gives an instance. To the things intended, faith gives present subsistence as they are real, and evidence as they are true; their futurity, and distance, faith supplies, and gives them a real subsistence; and where do they subsist as if they were actually in effect, whilst they are yet hoped for? "In them," saith the Syriac translation; that is, in them that believe.

$4. There are several ways whereby faith gives a present subsistence to things future and hoped for:

1. By mixing itself with the promises wherein they are contained; divine promises do not only declare the good things promised, that there are such things which God will bestow on believers; but they contain them by virtue of divine institution; hence are they called the "breasts of consolation," Isa. lxvi, 11; as those which contain the refreshment they exhibit and convey; they are the treasury in which God hath laid

them up; hence "to receive a promise," actively, is to receive the things promised which are contained in them, and exhibited by them, 2 Pet. i, 4; now faith mixeth and incorporateth itself with the word of promise, whereby what is in the word becomes its own, the things themselves believed are enjoyed, and this is their subsistence in us.

2. By giving the soul a taste of their goodness; yea, making them its food, which they cannot be unless they are really present to it; we not only by faith "taste that the Lord is gracious," 1 Pet. ii, 3; that is, have an experience of the grace of God in sweetness and goodness of the things promised and bestowed, but the word itself is the meat, the food, the milk, and strong meat of believers; because it really exhibits to their faith the goodness, sweetness, and nourishing virtue of spiritual things; they feed on them, and they incorporate with them, which is their present subsistence.

3. It gives an experience of their power, as to all the ends for which they are promised. Their use and end in general is to change and transform the whole soul into the image of God, by a conformity to Jesus Christ the first-born. This we lost by sin, and this the good things of the promise restore us to, Eph. iv, 2024. It is not truth, merely as truth, but truth as conveying the things contained in it unto the soul, that is powerfully operative to this end. This is an eminent way of faith's giving a subsistence to things hoped for, in the souls of believers. Where this is not, they are to men as clouds afar off, which yield them no refreshing showers. Expectation of "things hoped for," when they are not in this power and efficacy brought by faith into the soul, are ruinous self-deceivings. For them to have a subsistence in us is for them so to abide in us in their power and efficacy as to answer all the ends of our spiritual life, see Eph. iii, 16-19