ment, and the joys of heaven; and awakens correspondent anxiety and apprehension of consequences. It invites man to repentance and salvation, by presenting to him new truths, new facts, new assistances, new prospects. All is intelligent motive, addressed to a reasonable being. The stupendous redemption, in its pardon and in its grace, places him in a situation, and discloses to him circumstances, which move and actuate his determinations and efforts.

2. Further, it places man in a new and more favourable STATE OF PROBATION - a state wholly different from that in which he was before the revelation of Christianity, because then a hopeless degeneracy rendered his condition on earth, not so much one of probation, as of gloomy forebodings and dark despair. But now man is by the gospel raised to hope, and is called on to follow the bright prospects opened before him. Invitations, warnings, calls to repentance, denunciations against pride and unbelief, proposals of reconciliation, are addressed to him. He is told that his state hereafter is to depend on his manner of passing this probation, receiving these offers, and accepting this salvation. In short, just as God's natural government places him in a state of probation as to the duties and happiness of this life; so does the dispensation of the gospel, as to spiritual and eternal blessings.2

20

3. Then it proposes to man A SYSTEM OF MEANS adapted to his powers and faculties. He is to obtain grace and help in the use of certain methods of instruction, appointed for that end, by Almighty God. The reading of the holy Scriptures, the public and private worship of God, the sacraments, the formation of habits, abstinence from scenes of temptation, the society and converse and example of the pious; these, and similar things, are the means which Christianity

20 Butler.

sets before him. Into the design of this system of means he must fall. He can obtain no grace, no divine aid, no relief, no pardon, no renewal of mind, no direction, no comfort, except as he heartily and humbly places himself in the attitude of a diligent disciple. This is altogether and most remarkably adapted for such a creature as man, and precisely agrees with all the dealings of God with him in his general providence, where little is accomplished but by the intervention of means.

God, indeed, acts according to his own merciful will, in the ways of religion, as in the operations of nature and the works of providence. He gives grace, he awakens the minds of men, he disposes of events as he pleases. But all this is designed to bring us to use the means of religious improvement, which we were neglecting. Every extraordinary operation of mercy falls into the system by which God ordinarily works.

4. These methods of Almighty God in the application of the gospel, entirely agree with THE OUT

WARD CIRCUMSTANCES OF MAN, IN THIS WORLD. Every thing around us corresponds with this particular plan.

The world is so presented to man, his duties so arise, his trials so embarrass, his social affections so excite him; he is exposed to that interchange of peace and trouble, of dissatisfaction and repose, of solicitation and forebodings-that he is manifestly in a state of things adapted to this probationary operation of the gospel and this system of means. All is unintelligible without the facts of the great remedy of salvation in its moral working-all is clear and consistent with them.

5. Once more. The remedy we are considering, both in its stupendous features, and in its method of operation, is calculated to DRAW OUT TO THE UTMOST ALL THE POWERS AND FACULTIES OF MAN. It ad

dresses his heart; it works upon him by the discovery of immense love in Almighty God giving his own Son for him. It presents God as a father in all his benignity, his grace, his pity, his long-suffering.

Now nothing can fully unlock the powers of the human heart but love-whatever addresses powerfully man's affections, in connexion with the discovery of elevating truth to the understanding, raises him to the utmost effort-terror drives him in upon himselfgratitude and love draw him out into voluntary and persevering enterprise.

Now the remedy of the Bible restores man by presenting God as a father, a friend, a compassionate and gracious sovereign, stooping with infinite condescension to succour and save his creature.

Thus all the faculties of man are carried out to the utmost. He has the very thing proposed to him which suits his nature, which excites his whole soul, which makes him most active and energetic in the noblest of all pursuits.21

6. Thus it CARRIES HIM ON TO HIS TRUE ENDan end, not narrow and earthly and debasing—but the highest, the most pure, the most ennobling that can be conceived an end which man never could have discovered, and which nothing but the divine condescension and grace in redemption could have devised or made practicable. It makes the ever-blessed Creator the end of his creature-it presents God as the centre of felicity. It sets before man the pursuit of God's favour, the preparation for the enjoyment of God, the hope of a state permanent, exalted, glorious-as the end to which he must direct all his powers; and, in doing so, the gospel falls in exactly with his nature and its capacities as originally formed by the divine wisdom.

What an adaptation, then, appears in this peculiar

21 Erskine.

discovery of Revelation. A remedy of any kind, and working in any way, would make the Bible suited to man-suited is too weak a term-a remedy would make the Bible the glorious, joyful tidings of salvation to man. But the remedy is yet enhanced in all its bearings upon him, when, though stupendous in some views, it yet, in others, meets his reasonable and responsible nature, works by motives, places him in a state of probation, proposes a system of means, corresponds with his actual situation in the world, draws out all his faculties, and carries him on to his highest end.

IV. But further, the Bible is adapted for man, because it is CALCULATED for univerSAL DIFFUSION UNDER ALL THE ENDLESS DIVERSITIES OF

HIS

STATE AND CHARACTER; and this as well in matter as in manner.

pre

For when we turn from considerations like the ceding ones, which relate to the Christian religion in its most general aspects, as speaking with a tone of decision and authority, as unfolding all the difficulties of our situation, and as discovering an adequate and surprising remedy for our misery; when we turn from all this to a view of Christianity in the form of its communications-when we ask, Is the religion suited to man generally; man in all ages, man under all circumstances; in a word, is it meant for universal diffusion ?-we find that, both in the MATTER and MANNER of Revelation, there is a remarkable correspondence with the state and wants of the whole race.

1. For as to the MATTER, it has little in it that is peculiar, exclusive, local, temporary. Its last dispensation, the Christian, is not, like the religion of Paganism, or the imposture of Mahomet, modelled for a particular people, and the vices and habits prevalent amongst them. It is not even like the limited and introductory religion of Judaism. It is adapted for

man, as man, in the essential powers and faculties of his nature. It is suited for him every where, and under all circumstances, by the authority of its dictates, by the discovery of all his wants, by the magnitude and efficacy of its salvation, by the clearness and force of its evidences, by the simplicity of its worship, by the brevity of its records.

It especially consults the case of the poor-that is, of the vast majority of mankind; the class most pressed by affliction, most in need of means of instruction, most numerous, most neglected, and even scorned by all preceding religions-which philosophy overlooks, because it has nothing essentially beneficial to propose, and no plain and important discoveries to offer. To the poor the Saviour came; amongst the poor he conversed; to them he preached the gospel; their state he consulted. The Bible elevates the intellect, enlarges the powers, increases the happiness of the poor, without flattering their vices or concealing from them their duties, or lifting them out of their station. The institution of a day of repose after the interval of six days' labour, for the worship of God, for the contemplation of his spiritual, and the preparation for his eternal, relations and destinies, is an unspeakable blessing, displays the suitableness of Revelation to the powers of man, needing recreation and rest both for body and mind. No attempt was ever made for raising the character and situation of the poor, without inspiring pride or relaxing the bonds of domestic and civil subjection, but by the gospel.

The Bible is suited to all orders of intellect; like the works of nature, where the humblest artizan can trace some of those wonders, which the greatest philosophers cannot exhaust. The child meets with what suits his opening capacities; the old and experienced, that which gives tranquillity and peace to age.

Then it follows all the improvements of mankind in learning and science, in philosophy and the arts;