duty to make to ourselves a new heart, and a right spirit. But if this change requires a renewal of constitutional properties if it implies that there are obstacles which cannot be removed by the sincere desire of obedience, then the duty of making a new heart vanishes, and with it every other spiritual duty. Let the Scriptures decide what is truth in this important case. But let not the sinner perish leaning on philosophy, falsely so called. If the truth makes him free, he must be the voluntary slave of sin: for truth can neither give nor take away the capability of acting from choice, nor annihilate the duty of choosing and doing righteousness.

I am not denying the fact of the sinner's dependence on the gracious and sovereign influence of the Spirit. Of his own will begat he us. It is his office to take away the stony heart, and give the heart of flesh; and the ruined must submit themselves to his mercy, and beseech him to create in them a clean heart, and to renew within them a right spirit. But the need of his influence arises from the inexcusable blindness, and obstinacy, and wickedness, of the lost; and therefore he may have mercy on whom he will. “By grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God. Ye will not come to me, that ye may have life. There are some of you that believe not: therefore said I

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into you, that no man can come unto me, except i were given unto him of my Father.” The enewing of the Holy Ghost, then, is a great, a sovereign and gracious work, rendered necessary by the voluntary depravity of the sinner; for free agency is a constitutional attribute. It can never be taken from us so long as we remain rational and accountable. It could not be lost at the fall, and therefore cannot be restored by grace. The emphatic language of the Scriptures, pronouncing he sinner dead in trespasses and sins, and possessing a heart hardened like the adamant stone, Henotes merely his destitution of spiritual lifehis dreadful insensibility to eternal things. The aegligent but Christian church in Sardis had a aame to live and was dead. (Rev. 3. 1.) Such expressions, therefore, are not to be understood återally as if a dead soul were like a dead body.

IV. The necessity of regeneration.

If mere outward reformation, or the formal dbservance of religious rites and duties, could fit us for heaven, we should not need the specal influence of the Spirit. But the righteousness of Scribes and Pharisees will not save us. The application of water in baptism will not cleanse the soul from pollution. This ordinance, except in its spiritual meaning, as defined by the apostle, (1 Pet. 3. 21.) must be unavailing, The “new creature” only can enter the kingdom

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of grace. By the washing of regeneration the purifying influence signified by baptism-are we saved; not by works of righteousness which we have done. The necessity of being created anew, after the image of true holiness, is evident from the explicit testimony of Christ; (John 3. 3.) but depravity is the only ground of this necessity. We need not repeat the arguments by which the truth has been demonstrated, that the natural heart is entirely destitute of holy love. It will be sufficient merely to illustrate the unfitness of the unregenerate for heaven, by contrasting the world with the kingdom of Christ. What, then, is the purity, and what the employments of the heavenly hosts? Inspiration has told us of the gates of pearl, and the streets of gold; of the pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God; of the glory of God and the Lamb, superseding the necessity of sun and moon; of the crowns, the palms, the white robes of the conquerors ; of the unutterable joys of perfect innocence and love for ever, for ever; of the spotless purity which shall not be contaminated by the entering in of any thing that defileth, or worketh abomination, or maketh a lie. But neither the sublimest elevation of thought, nor the most dazzling lustre of imagery, can shadow out the holiness and bliss of heaven. Compare now with this description, the selfishness, and oppression, and wickedness of this ruined world. Can the unwashed and unregenerated sinner be fit for the society of God, and holy angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect?

In the kingdom of God, he that is least, most humble, is greatest. Is it the natural disposition of man to esteem others better than himself? Whence then cometh envy, and slander, and unrighteous ambition, and contempt of the poor?Whence come wars and fightings, and perfidy? Can the heart which burns with ardent desire for the honour of men, and the pleasures of sin, be satisfied with the ornaments of a meek and quiet spirit? Can it be content with the lowest seat in the kingdom of grace?

In heaven the love of God constitutes the everlasting song.

Does this holy love so fill the heart of the natural man that he can joyfully ascribe all praise to God, and respond for ever to the anthem of the celestial hosts : “Not unto us, not unto us, O Lord, but to thy name give glory?" Does he give evidence of this by the spiritual reverence of the Sabbath, calling the holy of the Lord honourable? Does he love prayer and meditation, and the communion of saints ?

Can he say: Thy word is very pure: therefore thy servant loveth it? (Psa. 119. 140.) Oh! how do reason

and conscience lift up their voice with the voice of Jehovah, and the voice of his rejected Son: My soul loathed them, and their soul also abhorred me. (Zech. 11. 8.) I know you that ye have

) not the love of God in you. (John 5. 42.) How then can the transgressor, unwashed in the fountain set open for sin and uncleanness, be happy in heaven? “ The happiness of heaven is holiness, and to talk of being happy without holiness is as apparent absurdity as to talk of being well without health, or of being saved without salvation.” I ask the unsanctified, what would you do in that world of bliss ? Could

you

dwell with unspeakable joy amid the unclouded glories of the Deity? You cannot love his perfections as they shine on the page of revelation, and obscurely appear in the life of his children. Can you gaze with ecstasy on the robes of light which adorn the risen Saviour ? You would not trust him with your salvation, and have nothing to admire in the riches of his

grace.

Will

you stand in the multitude of the redeemed, and be ravished with the melody of their golden harps ? They will turn away as from an enemy of Him whose name is the glory of their song.

Whither will you wander in search of employment, or rest? Forsaken and neglected, you must sit down in the streets of the golden city, a solitary stranger, and be compelled to exclaim :