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sinner, but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live. To deny the doctrine of original Corruption is not only to reject the testimony of the Almighty, to refuse to set to our seal that God is true; but to despise the expressions of his love and mercy; to betray the foulest ingratitude, no less than the most daring pride and the most impious presumption.

2. But while we thankfully receive, let us also profitably use the information vouchsafed. To this end let us wisely appropriate it. The truths of Scripture, unless faithfully applied and brought home to our own hearts and circumstances, will conduce little to our improvement. The text sets before us the picture of mankind in general. Let us remember that it sets before us our picture in particular. Is the heart of the sons of men full of evil? Such is our heart. Such is the radical, the total, the innate Corruption of our souls. Born of the flesh, we are flesh. Nor let us stop even at this conclusion. Let us seek to acquire a deep, an experimental conviction of the truth. Let us compare our hearts with the word of God. While we

read with attention the statement there delivered of man's depravity, let us observe whether we do not find a corresponding depravity within our own bosoms: whether

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we do not find, with respect to spiritual things, that blindness in the understanding; that perverseness in the will; that ungovernableness in the affections; that impurity in the imagination; that vanity in the mind; above all, that alienation of the heart from God, which the Scriptures designate as characteristic of fallen man. Let us examine

ourselves in one single instance. If our hearts be not alienated from God, communion with him will be our chief delight: prayer and praise will be the natural language of our souls. But does this on experience prove to be the case? On the contrary, what indisposition do we not feel to such holy exercises? What backwardness in commencing them? What dulness and formality in performing them? How difficult, nay, how impossible do we find it, with all our watchfulness, with all the force which we are able to apply, to maintain, for the shortest period, and even on the most solemn occasions, an undivided attention, a spiritual frame of mind. Can we then doubt of the native enmity of our hearts to God? The very necessity of applying force to the mind, shews what is its inherent tendency; in what direction the current, if not opposed, would naturally flow.

Nor let us rest satisfied with this conviction. Let our experience of the violence and

of the inveteracy of the malady, lead us earnestly to seek for help from Him who alone can heal our disordered souls. This is the great improvement which we are required to make of the information vouchsafed. To bring us humbly unto God for the renovation of our corrupt nature; this is the great practical end, which the conviction of our natural Corruption is intended to promote. To attempt this important work in our own strength, or by means of our own devising, will be a presumptuous and an unsuccessful attempt. With as much facility may we

create a world as create our own hearts anew. The preparations of the heart of man are from the Lord. He who alone searcheth the heart, alone can renew it unto holiness. To Him then let us apply for the blessing. We have the strongest assurances that our application shall not be in vain. He hath given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by these we might be partakers of the divine nature. The promise of the new heart is the leading promise of the new covenant. This shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.

* Prov. xvi. 1.

† 2 Peter, i. iv.

A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh; and I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgements and do them*. Encouraged by these gracious promises, let us pray with the penitents of old, Turn thou us unto thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned. Let us cry out with the psalmist, Create in us a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within us. Let us come boldly unto the throne of grace, and in the language of our church intreat the Lord, who is the giver of all good things, to write his laws in our hearts; to create and make in us new and contrite hearts; to grant that we, being regenerated and made his children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by his Holy Spirit, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with the Father, and the same Spirit, ever one God world without End. Amen.

* Jer. xxxi. 38. Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27.

SERMON V.

ON THE GIFT OF THE SPIRIT.

JOHN, IV. 10.

Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the Gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

TRUE charity is distinguished by a tender concern for the souls, as well as for the bodies of men. Seeing by faith the end of the ungodly, it confines not its exertions in their favour to the attainment of transitory comforts it seeks to promote their permanent and everlasting felicity. Such is the charity which characterizes the real Christian. Acting under the influence of this heavenly principle, he is continually looking around him for opportunities of usefulness. In all his transactions, in all his intercourse with others, he seldom loses sight of their most important interests. And in a judicious improvement of common occurrences into occasions of spiritual

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