ing our own ends and not the glory of God in view, are tinctured with sin. Hence the necessity of regeneration, not to smother, eradicate and destroy the passions of the mind, but by breathing into them the breath of the Holy Spirit, to give them a new and heavenly bias, worthy of man's mind and worthy of God. Then self-love holding the second place, whose first is the glory of God, becomes a noble principle, through the liberty of the Spirit by which we serve God with perfect freedom: then we endeavour not by carnal self-righteous means, of our own devising: but by those proper means devised by the Spirit and put into our hands, by him who appointeth the means as well as the end in sinner's salvation, to serve God in holiness and righteousness all our days, being regenerated by his Spirit and chosen by his grace in Christ Jesus: and from this may the necessity of regeneration be enforced.

2nd. From the love of God which man ought to cherish, whom by his sin he hateth, which love is the very element of a pure and godlike spirit, and the want of which proves inan in a state of enmity, and liable to the first and second death.

The love of God is the only noble principle that can fill the soul of a rational creature. It is that only which can give it à relish for immortality and eternal life. Love is the acme, and centre of all God's perfections: they rest upon it and they are safe, they surround it and it is safe. They stand as

it were in the forefront of battle; whilst it like the precious standard of God's sovereignty, is encircled in the middle. They feel and resent every insult offered it. It animates the rest in the cause of God and truth. Are they insulted, the tidings are borne unto it and it sends them back armed with God's hottest vengeance, to punish the rebels against God's justest will. Love! is it a principle of good will? Yes to those who have a good will to the God of love? No meek, insensible, and impassive principle: but the very essence of God's holiness, and the most dreadful avenger of sin. It arms the thunderbolts of Almighty vengeance to punish the enemies of God; and delights in nothing and will admit to communion nothing, but perfect holiness and unspotted truth. Man is called to love holiness and truth. In his upright unfallen nature he does, seeing he is made in the image of God, and filled with the breath of his Holy Spirit. The principle once imparted ought to be continued, cannot be laid aside by the creature without sin, cannot be annulled by God without proving him an enemy to his own holiness, and that he is not such, witness the strivings of his Spirit in the power and efficacy of the cross, bringing sinners in all ages and countries, in spite of the world, flesh and the devil, to love him in Christ Jesus as their chief and only desirable good. Sin is the cause of our hating God. It began in Eve before she tasted of the forbidden fruit, even when she listened to

the seducing tale of Satan persuading her she should not die, when she observed it was good for food and pleasant to the eye. It began in Adam before he tasted the forbidden fruit, even when he beheld the yieldings of Eve, without warning or reproof, and without a blush or a pang received the fruit into his hand. Alas! that fatal listening to the voice of a tempter. It hath peopled hell with ruined souls for ever. It would have ruined every soul in hell for ever, but for the intercession of Christ according to the eternal purpose of God, securing his love from all imputation of screening the offender, heightening his love by the saving of the offender, through the perfect righteousness, obedience, sufferings, and atoning death of a chosen ransom. Love it may be observed is the element of a pure and godlike spirit. 1st. In a native unsinning state, as Adam's before the fall; and 2d. In a regenerate and renewed state, as believers through the mediation of Christ, without it we are at enmity with God: for love is the fulfilling of the law. Adam before his fall, loved, (and by the light of nature and the teachings of the Spirit) fulfilled the law: after his fall, he fulfilled it not in himself, nor in the law of nature at all, nor by the beamings of the Spirit, save as it led him by faith to embrace the perfect righteousness of a typically crucified Lord, typically crucified in the slain victims with whose skins he was covered, as a lively representation of the great sacrifice of Christ in the end of the world

to put away sin. If this enmity remaineth, what is the consequence? We are liable to the first and second death, and stand obnoxious to the-righte ous judgment of God. Now the fruit of the Spirit is love. But we cannot bring forth the fruits of the Spirit unless we are born of the Spirit. Now the works of the flesh are idolatry and hatred: hatred of God, and delight in self-righteousness: we are at enmity with God and he with us: and if he go away we must die in our sins. Hence further may the necessity of regeneration be enforced.

3d. From the love of God to us, whereby he loves a chosen remnant, and hath purposed to save them through the sending of his Son.

It is no mean proof of the Necessity of Regeneration, that God resolved to save fallen man through Jesus Christ: through the visible effect of Regeneration, whereby whosoever is so born, knows and feels that he tastes and enjoys the salvation of God. God looked from Heaven, to see if any were good and his sad observation was, No not one. What then was the desert of all men? Death and all the sad variety of woe. Why then have not all experienced the desert of their rebellion against their Maker? Because he would have in saving a remnant of our race: Except "the Lord of Hosts had left unto us a very small "remnant, we should have been as Sodom, and "we should have been like unto Gomorrah," Isaiah i. 9. The love of God as observed before is in

mercy

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flexibly opposed to, and strenuously resolved to punish every sin: but when through the offered mediation of Christ, God the Father can consistently with his honor look upon, hold out pardon to, and receive into communion the sinner, then also the divine love is manifested to such a sinner, brought by the grace of God into communion with him. It may be not amniss just to take a very short and compendious view of the nature of the covenant made for the good of God's people. And first the Father says, I will, that a certain part of mankind should be saved through the intervention of my Son, these I choose, and will send my Son to redeem. The Son says I agree to die for these: and "all that the Father giveth me shall come unto “me;” and again, “ Father I will that they whom "thou givest me, be with me where I am;” and to the end that these may be brought to acknowledgment of the truth, which they cannot be without regeneration, the Holy Spirit is promised them, I will put my Spirit within them and write my law in their hearts and Christ in agreement with this, “I will pray the Father and he shall give you "another comforter that he may abide with you "for ever. Even the spirit of truth," John xiv.

16, 17.

But to consider our election more particularly. When a man by the grace of God hath been brought to see and consider himself as an immortal and eternal being: who after having passed the dark