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the natural man? why, that the carnal mind is enmity against God; that it is not fubject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. Therefore the Holy Ghoft concludes, that if a man have all knowledge, and understand all mysteries, and speak with the tongue of men and angels; and if he give all his goods to feed the poor, and his body to be burned, and hath not charity, or love, it profiteth him nothing. 1 Cor. chap. xiii. He is ftill of the works of the law, and as many as are of the works of the law are under the curfe for by the deeds of the law fhall no flesh living be justified. Thus you fee that your legal conftruction upon that text runs foul of half the word of God. Is not this darkening counfel by words without knowledge? Job xxxviii. 2. Will not God say of you, that ye have not spoken the thing that is right of me? Job xlii. 8.

Now let me fhew you my opinion of that text. What is God's command concerning Chrift and his gofpel? The text, you know, mentions doing his commandments. Why he fays, I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee [Mofes], and will put my words in his mouth, and be fhall fpeak unto them all that I shall command bim. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not bearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will requite it of him. Deut. xviii. 18, 19. John brings this in, And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his fon Jesus Chrift, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.

mandment. I John iii. 23. Now, fuppofe God should open the door of faith to a man, Acts xiv. 27; and fulfil all the good pleasure of his goodness in him, and the work of faith with power, 2 Thes. i. 11; insomuch that God fhould purify his heart by faith, Acts xv. 9; would not the above commands be obeyed by fuch a man? be bath received grace (by Christ) for obedience to the faith, Rom. i. 5; or, in other words, he hath been enabled to believe through grace; or, by God's gracious gift of faith, he is enabled to believe and obey the gospel.

Abimaaz. Certainly the above commands are done, or obeyed, by fuch a man; because, as you fay, he has received grace for obedience to the faith; and if the grace of God doth not produce obe dience to the doctrines of faith, what does? John fays, This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith; but the world always overcomes an unbeliever, and ever will. It is faith that purifies the heart; and he that is deftitute of this grace filled with guilt, enmity, and errors, and therefore as far from doing the commandments as Satan himself.

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Cufbi. Very true. Well, you find that all the law and the prophets hang on the hinge of love; but no man by his natural power can reach this hinge, because the carnal mind is enmity. Now, fuppofe God fhould fulfil this promise to a man, namely, circumcife his heart to love the Lord God with all his heart, and with all his foul, that be

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might live, Deut. xxx. 6, and enable a man to fay, as John did, we love him because he first loved us, -and fuch a man doth in his heart love both God and his neighbour-would not such an one do the commandments, feeing the fcriptures declare, that love worketh no ill to his neighbour, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law? And what fays God of the faith of that man? why, he that believes fhall be faved. And what fays the Holy Ghost of the love of him? why he fays, be that loveth dwelleth in God, and God dwelleth in him.

If this be the truth of the matter, does not fuch a man do the commandments? when God himself works in him both inclination and motion; or, to speak in the dialect of fcripture, it is God that works in him both to will and to do of his good pleafure. Phil. ii. 13. And if it be God's work in him, what has fuch a man to glory in but the grace of God? Faith is the gift of God, and the work of God; this is the work of God, that ye believe on bim whom he bath fent. John vi. 29. It is real faith in Jefus Chrift, and pure love to God, that produces evangelical obedience: as it is written, the grace of God teacheth men to deny ungodliness and worldly. luft, and to live foberly, righteously, and godly, in the world. Tit. ii. 12. Therefore we may conclude, that whofoever does not attribute his obedience to the grace of God, robs God of the glory of his own work; and he that afcribes it to free-will and human power, deifies himfelf.

Abimaaz.

Abimaaz. I am fweetly inftructed, and abundantly fatisfied, with your opinion of the text, it tallies fo exactly with my own experience; nor do I believe that all the advocates for free-will and felfrighteousness upon earth could erafe your evangelical fentiments from my judgment. I evidently fee that it is the faithful man to whom the great: reward is promised; and it is audacious pride in men to attribute that glory to fleshly works which is due only to the God of grace: the humble believer is preserved, while the lofty work monger meets with his juft deferts. Well might the Pfalmift fay, O love the Lord all ye his faints; for the Lord preferveth the faithful, and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer. Pfalm xxxi. 23. It is clear to me that your doctrine wifely fecures the glory of our falvation to God, and affords comfort and establishment to his adopted children; and, if I am not much. mistaken, the glory of God, and the falvation of his elect by Jefus Chrift, was the ultimate end that God had in view when he created the world; and that end he still aims at in his redeeming and reconciling finners to himself; yea, his government of the world, as well as his works of creation and redemption, of providence and grace, was from the first the great and grand defign of the Almighty; which will be accomplished when God difplays the riches of his grace in glory by Jefus Chrift. Then fhall be known by the church, to the principalities O

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and powers, in heavenly places, the manifold wisdom of God. Eph. iii. 30.

Cufbi. Now you fpeak like one of the true circumcifion, which worship God in the Spirit, rejoice in Chrift Jefus, and place no confidence in the flefh. But in fome things I think you favour fo much of the old cafk, that you are, like Moab, Jettled on your lees. Jer. xlviii. 11.

Abimaaz. Though you are not a professor of Greek or Hebrew, yet I find you are a very nice critic in the language of Canaan. Ifa. xix. 18.

Cufbi. I have often heard of gentlemen who have endeavoured to tear me to pieces for a breach of grammar, which is but a breach of fenfe and founds at most, and can only communicate a jargon to the ear; while fuch have made fifty breaches in divinity in one difcourfe, which minifters deftruction to the foul. Therefore an ungrammatical divine is ten thousand times better than a learned and eloquent deift, though he be dignified with the title of learned. The bleffed Saviour never made one breach in divinity, though, according to our rules, he made one in grammar, when he said, Before Abraham was I am.

But to return to our fubject; the glory of all good works wrought in men ought to be attributed to God, from whom every good and every perfect gift cometh. Hence the real church of God owns, to the honour of her head, that the Lord bad

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