There is another ground on which the doctrine of total depravity has been denied. It being undeniable that the scriptures offer life to every one, and that man, in his present situation, has ample power to obey the divine commands, those who still adhere to the doctrine of unconditional reprobation but wish to keep its odious features out of sight, admit the truth of the position, but attribute the power by which the reprobate can serve God and obtain life to nature, and call it a natural ability. Now the idea of a natural ability, if it means anything, must be the ability which a man has by nature. Well, when man was first created, his nature being pure, having the image and likeness of God, he of course had, by the nature in which he was created, power sufficient to obey the precepts of his Maker. But if man by the fall, totally lost that power, he certainly does not now possess it. Yet, it is evident to the common sense of every man, that he has power to serve God, but to attribute this to grace, (where it belongs) would be to say that every man might be saved, to avoid which, the power is attributed to nature. Well, if man now possess natural powers to serve God, he must have retained them in the fall, or they must have been restored to him since he fell. But anything restored, in this case, must be of grace, as it could have been restored only through the mediation of Christ, which renders it a gracious ability. But this not being admitted, and the powers which man possesses being attributed to nature, he must have retained them in the fall, and of course he could have but partially fallen. And to be consistent, when the total fall or depravity of man is denied, there being no need of a divine redeemer, if any redeemer at all, the divinity of Christ is denied. Perhaps this view of the subject, will account for the turning of so many advocates of natural ability, into UNITARIANS.

But all these difficulties and dangerous errors would be avoided by admitting the total fall and consequent total depravity of man, as the Scriptures evidently set forth; that this state called for, and received from the fountain of goodness, a divine redeemer; and that this depravity, in consequence of the interposition of our divine redeemer, continued total, only during the interim between the fall and the promise; man being then so far restored as to be placed on salvable ground. With this view of the subject we can better understand and reconcile those Scriptures which speak of man's deep depravity, with those which speak of his powers, and it attributes our salvation to grace instead of nature; and, also, properly portrays the glory of the Redeemer in saving a world which was irrecoverably lost, and which would have remained so, except for his interposition. This leads us to notice

II. The character of the Saviour provided for this lost world. He is called in the text the son of man,' from which some have conclud

ded that he was only man. But it should not be forgotton that in this Son of Man' dwelt the fulness of the godhead bodily,' for 'God was manifest in the flesh,' and he being in the form of God' and thus connected with the divine nature thought it not robbery to be equal with God.' (Col. ii. 9;-1 Tim. iii. 16;-Phil. ii. 6.)

But the very nature of his office and mission, that of Saviour, proves him to be superior to a creature, though of the highest order of intelligences. We have already seen the depth to which man had fallen, and the impossibility of his saving himself, and that no power short of that which first made him, could possibly remake him; and of course the Saviour provided for him, if competent to the design of his office, must be God as well as man. And to this, the common sense of every reflecting mind must cordially agree, and his feelings must revolt at the idea of trusting in any being short of God, to save him. If we fix our eye upon the greatest man who ever graced the earth, either for science as a philosopher, for wisdom and eloquence as a statesman, or for prowess as a military chieftain, we shudder at the thought of trusting in him for the salvation of our souls. No intelligent reflecting mind could be persuaded to do so. And who could trust in Christ to save him, if he were only man? If we turn our thoughts to the highest order of created intelligencies, and survey the highest graded archangel in glory, we feel the same reluctance to trust in him to save us. For when Gabriel was commissioned to comfort Daniel, (chap. 10.) the devil, called the prince of the kingdom of Persia, withstood him one and twenty days' till Michael came to his assistance.

And when this same 'Michael contended with the devil about the body of Moses,' (Jude. 9.) 'he durst not bring a railing accusation against him,' but prayed for God to rebuke him' which is no more than we can do. But if Gabriel and Michael, the two highest angels in heaven, could not by their own personal powers resist the onsets of the devil upon themselves, who would trust them to save their souls? But if it be objected that an angel will bind the devil during the millennium, we answer that he who will bind him is 'the angel who redeemed us,' for whose divinity we are contending.

Thus the common sense of man corroborates the declaration of holy writ, as well as the argument drawn from the necessity of the case, to prove the divinity of our blessed Saviour. And I must confess, with all the charity I am capable of mustering, I cannot see how a person can have saving faith; that is, exercise a saving confidence in the willingness and ability of Jesus Christ to save him, unless he believe in his essential divinity. I will not say but that some few individuals who have doubted on this subject, may have obtained the forgiveness of sins, but if they have, it is morally certain that their

hearts were better than their heads, and that in a moment of happy inconsistency with themselves, they have exercised a confidence in Christ, infinitely above what their erroneous sentiment would justly authorise.

III. We are in the next and last place, to inquire into the nature and extent of the salvation provided by this divine Redeemer.

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This salvation is of a two fold kind; 1. universal and unconditional; and 2. conditional and limited. The first kind applies to the moral guilt of the original offence of man, and the second to our personal sins. The Apostle says when speaking of Christ, he is the Saviour of all men, especially of those that believe.' (1. Tim. iv. 10.) That is he saves all men from the guilt of Adam's first offence, and this being done before we had an actual existence it was impossible, and of course not required of us to observe a condition. And as Adam was utterly helpless after he fell, till he was restored to salvable ground, he could not have observed any condition in obtaining pardon for his first offence. But in our personal sins, or sins we commit in person, we are personally active, and nothing can be more reasonable than that we should be personally active in obtaining a pardon. But as no personal actions of ours can be meritorious in this case, our acts must be confined to the use of means.

This universal salvation from the guilt of the original offence of man, is announced by the Apostle, (Rom. v. 18.) in these words, Therefore, as by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.' If all were condemned in Adam, they were all justified in him also; for he was identically the same person when he was justified, that he was when condemned, and he represented his posterity in just as full a sense when he was pardoned as when he fell. It is upon this ground that we plead against the doctrine that men are universally liable to be damned for Adam's sin; and it is on this ground also, that we plead for the initial salvation of all men, and the final salvation of those who die in infancy. To illustrate this point, we will refer to the case of a young man who, in the late war, was condemned to be shot for being found asleep on his post as a sentinel. But being pardoned by the clemency of the general, he afterwards married and raised a family. Now when he was condemned to die, his unborn posterity were condemned also,-not to die, for they were not alive, but to remain where they were, that is, in a state of non-existence. But when he was pardoned, his posterity were pardoned in him, in the same seminal sense in which they were condemned in him. As in his condemnation to death his unborn posterity were condemned to remain unborn, so by his being pardoned they were permitted to be born: but who would now think of arraigning and shooting his children for an of

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fence for which he was pardoned before they were or could be born.' We have read and heard of children suffering with the parent, who were born before the offence, and participated therein, but the veriest tyrant that ever lived in the most barbarous land upon earth, was never known to put children to death for a crime for which he had pardoned their father before they were born.

So it was with Adam; had the sentence of death which was passed upon him, been executed on the day in which he sinned, nothing can be more certain than that his posterity would have remained unborn: but in consequence of his being pardoned, he was permitted to propagate his species upon the earth. But how persons, actuated by the benevolence and kindly feelings which the gospel inspires, could ever imagine that a holy, just and merciful God should consign the posterity of Adam or any part of them, to the eternal burnings of an irrecoverable hell, for a crime for which he pardoned him before his posterity had or could have been born, is the ninth wonder of the world!! Indeed, such views are contrary to the express declaration of God's holy word, for he says (Eze. xviii. 20.) The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father.'

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As Adam was pardoned and permitted to multiply and replenish the earth' in virtue of the atonement of Christ, it follows that if any part of his posterity, which might have existed in the eye of Omniscience, were not designed to have been benefited by the atonement, that part could never have been born; because it was only in consequence of this interposition that any part were born. But so far from the human family's being diminished, in this respect, from what was originally contemplated in the organization of man, we find, that since the redemption, it has been greatly increased in number. For when God called Eve to an account for her sin in the garden, he .said I will greatly multiply thy conception.' If, therefore, there ever was such a being in the eye of Omniscience, as is called a reprobate, or one for whom Christ did not die, that being could not have been born. But so far from this being the case, or the family of Adam being diminished thereby, we find that the constitution of things was so changed that it was greatly increased.

But why this great multiplication of our species? Probably the reason was this. The world, it seems, was made as a place of probation for intelligent man, and was to continue as such, a certain length of time, probably about seven thousand years; and as men were designed to live till the end of the world, (for all that we can discover to the contrary,) before their probationary state ended, it is probable that in the first organization of man, provision was made for multiplying just part enough to fill the world by the time its duration would terminate. But in consequence of leaving man subject. to the ravages of death, the world could not have been peopled be

fore its termination. The probable object, therefore, of thus 'greatly multiplying' the conception of the woman, was to supply the ravages which death was about to make in the family of man.

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But if God pardoned Adam for his first offence, why was he not freed from the consequences of the crime, and restored to his pristine immortality, and not left subject to disease and death? The most probable reason may be found in the following consideration. In all good governments, when the work for which an office was established, is fully accomplished, the office, being no longer needed, is abolished, and of course the holder of it, goes out of office. So if the work of mediation had been accomplished at the restoration of man to his probationary state, the office of mediator would have been done away, and man would have been left without cate with the Father;' but by leaving man subject to death and its attendant evils, the work of redemption is not, and will not be accomplished, until man is restored to the state of immortality in which he was created, which will not be the case till the resurrection of the body. The Apostle says (1 Cor. xv, 25, 26.) For he' (the Mediator) must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death;' which will be accomplished by raising the dead. And when this is done, then cometh the end of his Mediatorial reign,' and he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, who shall be all in all.' That is, the godhead shall then reign in the person of the Father, as he now does in the person of the Son. But until the resurrection of the dead, the mediatorial office will be continued, and of course being left subject to disease and death, continues to us all the advantages of having an advocate with the Father.'

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To see the force of this truth, we must notice that before the fall, man was required to keep the commands of God by his own natural powers, or the powers he derived from his creation; but since our redemption, we are required to do these things by the grace of God which we derive through the mediation of Jesus. Before the fall, the least deviation from the perfect law would insure irrecoverable ruin; and had the work of redemption been completed on the day it commenced, and man restored to his pristine immortality, the office of mediation would then have been abolished, as being no longer needed, and we should have been left without a Saviour. And as all Adam's posterity would have been as liable to sin, as was himself at first, and as sin without a Mediator was unpardonable, there would have been great danger, if not a strong probability, that universal damnation would have ensued. But in our present relation to the Saviour, if we sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.' (1 John ii, 1.) And as angels and men in their first state of innocence did sin, and since by the grace