to the terms of acceptance, as to miss of eternal life. The mere fact that a Savior died, if fully known, is not sufficient to secure salvation. The bare atonement, if there be no application of it to the soul, will avail nothing. Christ fulfilled the demands of the law in behalf of all who, in the appointed way, shall become interested in his blood. But if this atonement be neglected; if we listen to a gospel that on this point misdirects us; and we do not become qualified to enjoy salvation, it will no otherwise affect us, than as an aggravation of our condemnation. My plan will be, to show what is not adequate instruction on this subject, and what is.

I. I am to show what is not adequate instruction on this subject. 1. When men are urged to a reformation, as what will put them into the way of life, the instruction is inadequate. If men quit their grosser iniquities, and become decent and civil, still no promise of heaven reaches them on this condition merely. Where in the gospel are any such terms stated? I know that men are obligated to break off their sins by righteousness, forthwith. John directed some bad men who came to him, to cease from violence and become honest, and contented: but John did not mean to leave them here: hence he did not say, that on these terms Christ would receive them. These were rather the conditions on which they could be prepared to receive his instruction to advantage. If I should meet with a drunkard, or a thief, and they should ask me about the gospel, the first lessons I should give them, would be on the subjects of sobriety and honesty. Men are sometimes too far gone in the by-paths of death, to give the gospel a candid hearing, and learn what the terms of salvation are; and then the first lesson given them may have respect to their waywardness; and when the gospel has gained this footing, then you may tell them of salvation to advantage.

But there may be this external reformation, and there often has been, while yet there was no preparation of heart to receive the Savior, but sin was loved, and rolled as a sweet morsel under the tongue. Men may quit their sins from motives of interest or ambition. Gross iniquities are scandalous and expensive, and may babandoned from the supreme love of something else beside Christ.

The fear of the wrath to come, while yet there is a prompt and a total alienation of the heart from God, may induce men to break off some habit, that threatens their sure and speedy perdition. But there is not a text in one of the pages of inspiration, that ex

hibits this superficial reformation, as the condition of pardon and acceptance through a Savior. The young man that would know what good thing he must do to inherit eternal life, was civil and decent, and still was unfit for the kingdom of God, and was sent away very sorrowful. It will not be denied but that he had become a moral man, but he still loved supremely the good things of this life.

2. When men are directed, not merely to break off some of the grosser iniquities, but to perform some of the mere external duties of piety, the instruction given them is still inadequate. The very same motives that led to the one, will often lead to the other. The very same man, who would cease his profaneness, and his Sabbath-breaking, and his lewd song-singing, and his drunkenness, and his midnight revelings, because he had become ashamed of their vulgarity; will have prayer sometimes in his family, and will attend upon a preached gospel, and have a Bible in his house, and read it occasionally, because all this is civil and decent.

And sometimes this cheap and superficial religion is the high way to preferment. Men will be to some extent religious, if they can obtain character by it, and can make it a stairway to office, and influence, and wealth too. They will bow and cringe to men, and God too, if they may obtain suffrages by it. Men will consent to be anything, if it will make them great in the life that now is.

And they will perform duties, in hopes to gain heaven by this means. If God will excuse them for hating his law, and character, and government, they will attend upon his ordinances, and pay an outward respect to his Sabbaths, and repeat their creed, and rehearse their prayers; and account it a cheap salvation. And this it will be found is not an unusual resort of ungodly men. In every period of alarm, away they fly to Christian ordinances. So, in the darker times of Israel, they would steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and then come and stand before God in his house. And it is declared, in that case, that they trusted in lying words that could not profit.

God has never spoken of this external attention to religious things, as the terms of acceptance with him: for there may be still an evil heart of unbelief. The prayers uttered by the lips, may neither have their source in the heart, nor throw back upon it the least impulse to piety. They may not even engross the thinking powers, but may be in the ears of Jehovah like the prating of the parrot. Men have no doubt uttered prayers, while the hostility of

their hearts, could they have been conscious of it, to the God invoked, and the Savior whose name was used, would have driven them from their knees, and sealed up their lips in the sullenness of perdition. And the Scriptures have been read, while the heart quarrelled with every doctrine and duty they enforced. And ordinances have been attended, and Sabbaths kept, and charities given, and confessions made, while there was the deadliest hostility to all that is holy in God, or purifying in truth.

3. If you add to all this a profession of godliness, the instruction given is still inadequate. In professing godliness, men often add perjury to their other deeds of wrong. A profession is not unfrequently the very climax of their impudence, and their daring. Ah, how mistaken have ministers and churches been, in supposing that when they had persuaded the ungodly to enter professedly into covenant with God, they had secured to some extent the object of the gospel institutions. They have not unfrequently lived to see their convert a more daring sinner than previously to his hypocritical adoption of the covenant; and have been grieved that they had not left him without the enclosures of the fold. They brought him up to sealing ordinances, sprinkled clean water upon him, and made his lips touch the consecrated symbols of a dying Christ, but the heart remained a mass of moral putrefaction; and the sacrifice offered was but a smoke and a stench in the nostrils of an insulted Savior. They painted and varnished the sepulchre, while within it was full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. It is many a time obvious, that so far from there having been any thing gained, by thrusting the worldling into this religious atmosphere, you have but the more effectually blocked up the last .avenue to his conscience, and thus placed him, perhaps, beyond the reach of hope and of heaven.

But suppose, if you please, the very best case, and tell me, if in this visible transformation, the Lord Jesus Christ will see any thing that he will consider a compliance with the terms of life and salvation which he offers! And I have left out of view the question whether it be right to do so? Whether, without the bidding of Jesus Christ, we may thus administer his holy ordinances to unsanctified men? Are we, in such a procedure, honest to souls is now the question. May we encourage them thus to compass themselves about with sparks of their own kindling, and walk in the light of their own fires? Are they safe, or we honest, while we watch no better the gates of the sheepfold? The press that men make toward sealing ordinances, is a proof that they are

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Sirs,

uneasy and unhappy; and if we grant their wish, do we answer honestly and fairly the question thus silently put to us, what must I do to be saved?" Do we not rather seal them up to a perpetual stupidity, and shall we not have to answer for their blood, in the day that inquisition shall be made for it?

II. Having thus endeavored to show, what is not adequate instruction on this subject, I proceed to inquire, what is? In stating the terms on which the sinner can become interested in the Lord Jesus Christ, I should choose to say:

1. He must explicitly avow his approbation of the law he has broken. Here begins, under every government, where there has been revolt, the exercise of a right temper. Christ came not to destroy the law but to fulfil it. This declaration is found on the very title page of his gospel. Repent, said he, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And what is repentance, more or less, than a cordial approbation of the precept that has been violated?

Hence the language of penitence in all ages has been the same. "The law is good, its penalties just, and its whole design benevolent. God had not been kind, had he given us any other law, or been willing that it should be broken with impunity, or had affixed any lower penalty, or accepted any meaner sacrifice than his own Son, as the atoning Lamb. O, I am a wretch for having broken this law, and can offer no possible plea that shall excuse or palliate the smallest deviation from its precepts. If God should cast me off for ever, he would but treat me as I deserve to be treated, and expect to be." Thus the sinner takes to himself the punishment of his sins, and thus places himself in an attitude, where Christ can begin to notice him, and still be the friend and patron of the Divine law.

With this principle we are all familiar. The child sees you pouring your frowns upon his disobedience, and would be glad if you would agree with him in reprobating the precept he has violated. But your authority is lost, and your child ruined, if you cease to frown, till he confesses that he has broken a good law. Then, and not till then, can you relax the sternness of that countenance which frowns upon his disobedience. The teacher places the rebellious child at his feet, and he must be there till he confesses the precept just, that he violated. And the same principle is acted upon in all governments that admit of pardon.

So the Lord Jesus Christ, if he would not do a rebellious world incalculable mischief, must suffer the sinner to make no approach

to him, till he is grieved for his transgressions, or has avowed his full approbation of the law he has broken. Then he can be saved, and the law of God be sustained.

Now the whole of repentance may be summed up, as I suppose, in this retrospect of a humbled sinner, upon his guilty and inexcusable violations of a good law; including, however, his abandonment of the transgressions which he disapproves. Thus is performed one of the conditions, on which the Lord Jesus Christ will receive us to his favor, and wash away our sins in his blood. 2. The sinner must become willing to owe his escape from the curse of the law to Jesus Christ. One may know that he has broken the law of God, and that the law he has broken is a good law, and still be too proud to receive pardon on the terms of the gospel. We have known cases when men have starved and perished rather than receive alms. The pride of their hearts would not suffer them to eat the bread they had not purchased. And men have gone down to hell, because they would not cast themselves upon that Savior, whose help was seen to be necessary, in order to their escape from the wrath to come. Not merely must the sinner see that he is perishing, and that there is no help out of Christ, but he must become pleased with Christ, else he will not feel himself secure in his hands, nor apply to him for life.

It is believed that many a soul has perished, hesitating whether it would be prudent or safe to cast himself upon the Savior. To do this is faith, and implies that already the temper of the heart is changed: but all men have not faith. It is by no means certain that awakened sinners have faith. Some may have; for none can say how early in the process of alarm God may renew the heart. But of this we are sure, that when renewed, it is prepared to believe, soon after the character of Jesus Christ is presented.

Sinners often wonder, and sometimes quarrel, that on making the inquiry of the text, the answer we give them implies a new heart; whereas the inquiry they intended to make was, how they should obtain a new heart. They wish to know how they must operate, with their evil hearts of unbelief, so as to have them renewed. Now to this question we can give no answer. We know of no process by which an ungodly man may work himself into the kingdom of God, but by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. We can tell them to do nothing, that does not imply holiness; and if we should, they might do as we direct them, and still be lost; whereas they ask us, what they must do to be saved. If to this question they wish an honest answer that