God whom he hath not seen? On this point, however, there will be little dispute. Men are instinctively led to measure, by their social effects, all pretensions of love to God. The question before us, and of which the scriptural decision will be far from uniting the mass of suffrage, is, how faith works by love?

The apostle asserts, that the faith of a Christian, instead of being a merely speculative assent to the abstract truth of the gospel, is an active moral principle, which cannot have its just course without embodying itself in deeds of goodness. The reasons are many and manifest-By faith in Christ Jesus we are justified before God, our natural enmity against him is slain, and his love finds access to our hearts. By faith we embrace the exceeding great and precious promises, and, in embracing them, are made partakers of the divine nature; so that we are filled with all the fullness of God; and out of the abundance of the heart, not only does the mouth speak, but the man act; by faith we converse with our Lord Jesus Christ; are conformed to him; follow him in the regeneration; and learn to imitate that great example which he left us when he went about doing good. By faith we obtain the promised Spirit who sanctifies our powers both of mind and body, so that we yield our members instruments of righteousness unto God. By faith in Christ's blood, which re

deems us from the curse of the law, we are also liberated from the vassalage of sin for the strength of sin is the law; and, receiving the law as fulfilled and satisfied by his righteousness, come under its obligation in his covenant, and are enabled to keep it by his grace. Now the fulfilling of the law is love; love and kindness to God and our neighbor, in all our social relations: It is, therefore, impossible that faith should not work by love.

All the directions of the book of God for the practice of the moral virtues, consider them as the evolution of the principle of love residing in a heart which has been purified by faith. Our Lord's sermon on the mount, by the perversion of which many have seduced themselves and others into a lying confidence in their own fancied merits, was preached, not to the promiscuous multitude, but to his disciples, who professed faith in his name. And the scriptures of the apostles, especially the apostle of the Gentiles, follow the same order. They address their instructions to the church of God—to the saints-to such as have obtained like precious faith with themselves. Not a moral precept escapes from their pen, till they have displayed the riches of redeeming love. But when, like wise master-builders, they have laid a broad and stable foundation in the doctrines of faith, they rear without delay the fair fabric of VOL. I.

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practical holiness. It is after they have conducted their pupils to the holiest of all, through the new and living way which Jesus hath opened, that you hear their exhorting voice, Mortify, therefore, your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Put off also all these, anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing ye have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him; where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision; barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free; but Christ is all and in all. Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, (for this very reason that ye are his elect,) holy and beloved, put on bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving one another if any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ for gave you, so also do ye. And above all these things, above bowels of mercies, above kindness, above humbleness of mind, above meekness, above long-suffering, above forbearance, above forgiveness, above all these things, put on CHARITY, which is the bond of perfectness. If the apostles, then, understood their own doctrine; or rather, if the Spirit by whom they spake

knows what is in man, we are not to look for real love, i. e. for true morality, from any who are not the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. And, on the contrary, this faith is the most prolific source of good actions; because it purges the fountain of all action, and sends forth its vigorous and healthful streams, purifying the heart, and working by love.

I should be unfaithful, my brethren, to truth and to you, were I to dismiss this subject without employing its aid for repelling an attack which is often made upon the Christian religion-for refuting the calumny which pretended friends have thrown upon its peculiar glory, the doctrine of faith-for correcting the error of those who, separating faith from holiness, have a name to live and are dead-and for stimulating believers to evince by their example both the truth of their profession and the power of their faith.

The enemies of the gospel have invented various excuses for their infidelity. At one time, there is a defect of historical document; at another, they cannot surrender their reason to inexplicable mystery. Now, they are stumbled at a mission sanctioned by miracle: then, the proofs of revelation are too abstracted and metaphysical and presently, they discover that no proof whatever can verify a revelation to a third per

son.

But when they are driven from all these

subterfuges: when the Christian apologist has demonstrated that it is not the want of evidence, but of honesty; that it is not an enlightened understanding, but a corrupted heart, which impels them to reject the religion of Jesus, they turn hardily round and impeach its moral influence!! They will make it responsible for all the mischiefs and crimes, for all the sorrows, and convulsions, and ruins which have scourged the world since its first propagation.

Before such a charge can be substantiated, the structure of the human mind must be altered, the nature of things reversed, the doctrine of principle and motive abandoned forever. It is only for the forlorn hope of impiety to engage in an enterprise so mad and desperate. Say, can a religion which commands me to love my neighbor as myself, generate or foster malignant and murderous passions? Can a religion which assures me that all liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, encourage a spirit of dissimulation and fraud? Can a religion which requires me to possess my vessel in sanctification and honor, indulge me in violating the laws of sexual purity, in breaking up the sanctuary of my neighbor's peace, in throwing upon the mercy of scandal's clarion the fair fame of female virtue? Can a religion which forbids me to be conformed to this world, cherish that infuriate ambi