ქვი. For a man to trust in his own righteousness, is to hope that God's anger will be appeased or abated, or that he will be inclined to accept him into favor, upon the sight of some excellency that belongs to him; or to have such a view of things, that it should appear no other than a suitable and right thing for God's anger to be abated, and for him to be inclined to take him into favor, upon the sight of, or out of respect to some excellency belonging to him.

§ 31. The word wıçısı. , faith, seems to be the most proper word to express the cordial reception of Christ and of the truth, for these reasons. First, this revelation is of things spiritual, unseen, strange, and wonderful, exceedingly remote from all the objects of sense, and those things which we commonly converse with in this world, and also exceedingly alien from our fallen nature; so that it is the first and principal manifestation of the symphony between the soul and these divine things, that it believes them, and acquiesces in them as true. And, secondly, the Lord Jesus Christ, in the gospel, appears principally under the character of a Saviour, and not so much of a person absolutely excellent; and therefore, the proper act of reception of him, consists principally in the exercise of a sense of our need of him, and of his sufficiency, his ability, his mercy and love, his faithfulness, the sufficiency of his method of salvation, the sufficiency and completeness of the salvation itself, of the deliverance and of the happiness, and an answerable application of the soul to him for salvation; which can be expressed so well by no other word but faith, or affiance, or confidence, or trust, and others of the same signification; of which, wss or faith, is much the best, the most significant; because the rest, in their common significations imply something, that is not of the absolute essence of faith. Thirdly, we have these things exhibited to us, to be received by us, only by a divine testimony. We have nothing else to hold them forth to us.

§ 32. Justifying faith is the soul's sense and conviction of the reality and sufficiency of Jesus Christ as a Saviour, implying a cordial inclination of soul to him as a Saviour. It is the soul's conviction and acknowledgment of God's power in

the difficult things, of his mercy in the wonderful things, of his truth in the mysterious and unseen things, of the excellency of other holy things, of the salvation of Christ Jesus. Faith prepares the way for the removal of guilt of conscience.

Guilt of conscience is the sense of the connexion between the sin of the subject and punishment; 1st, by God's law; and 2d, by God's nature and the propriety of the thing. The mind is under the weight of guilt, as long as it has a sense of its being bound to punishment, according to the reason and nature of things, and the requirements of the divine gov

ernment.

Faith prepares the way for the removal of this. Therefore there must be in faith, 1. A belief that the law is answered and satisfied by Jesus Christ; and 2. Such a sense of the way of salvation by Christ, that it shall appear proper, and be dutiful, and according to the reason of things, that sin should not be punished in us, but that we nevertheless should be accepted through Christ. When the mind sees a way that this can be done, and there is nothing in the law, nor in the divine nature, nor nature of things to hinder it; that of itself lightens the burden, and creates hope. It causes the mind to see that it is not for ever bound by the reason of things to suffer; though the mind does not know that it has performed the condition of pardon. This is to have a sense of the sufficiency of this way of salvation. When a man commits sin and is sensible of it, his soul has a natural sense of the propriety of punishment in such a case, a sense that punishment, according to the reason of things, belongs to him; for the same reasons as all nations have a sense of the propriety of punishing men for crimes.

The blood of bulls, and goats, and calves, could never make them that offered them perfect as to the conscience, because the mind never could have a sense of the propriety and beauty, and fitness in reason, of being delivered from punishment upon their account. This kind of sense of the sufficiency of Christ's mediation, depends upon a sense of the gloriousness and excellency of gospel things in general; as, the greatness of God's mercy; the greatness of Christ's excelVOL. IV.

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lency and dignity, and dearness to the Father; the greatness of Christ's love to sinners, &c. That easiness of mind which persons often have, before they have comfort from a sense of their being converted, arises from a sense they have of God's sovereignty. They see nothing either in the nature of God, or ef things, that will necessarily bind them to punishment; but that God may damn them, if he pleases; and may save them, if he pleases. When persons are brought to that, then they are fit to be comforted; then their comfort is like to have a true and immoveable foundation, when their dependence is no way upon themselves, but wholly upon God. In order to such a sense of the sufficiency of this way of salvation, it must be seen, that God has no disposition, and no need to punish us. The sinner, when he considers how he has affronted and provoked God, looks upon it, that the case is such, and the affront is such, that there is need, in order that the majesty, and honor and authority of God may be vindicated, that he should be punished, and that God's nature is such, that he must be disposed to punish him.

COROLL. Hence we learn, that our experience of the sufficiency of the doctrine of the gospel, to give peace of conscience, is a rational inward witness to the truth of the gos. pel. When the mind sees such a fitness in this way of salvation, that it takes off the burthen, that arises from the sense of is being necessarily bound to punishment, through proper desert, and from the demands of reason and nature; it is a strong argument, that it is not a thing of mere human imagination. When we experience its fitness to answer its end, this is the third of the three that bear witness on earth. The Spirit bears witness, by discovering the divine glory, and those stamps of divinity that are in the gospel. The water bears witness; that is, the experience of the power of the gospel to purify and sanctify the heart, witnesses the truth of it; and the blood bears witness by delivering the conscience from guilt. Any other sort of faith than this sense of the sufficiency of Christ's salvation, does not give such immediate glory and honor to Christ, and does not so necessarily and immediately infer the necessity of Christ's being known. Nothing besides makes all Christianity so to hang upon an actual respect

to Christ, and centre in him. Surely, the more the sinner has an inward, an immediate and sole and explicit dependence upon Christ, the more Christ has the glory of his salvation from him.

In order to this sort of sense of the congruity of our sins being forgiven, and of punishment's being removed, by the satisfaction of Christ, there must of necessity be a sense of our guiltiness. For it is impossible any congruity should be seen, without comparison of the satisfaction with the guilt. And they cannot be compared, except there be a sense of them both. There must not only be such a sense of God's being very angry, and his anger being very dreadful, without any sense of the reasonableness of that anger; but there must be a proper sense of the desert of wrath, such as there is in repentance. Indeed it is possible there may be such a sense of the glory of the Saviour and his salvation, that if we had more of a sense of guilt than we have, we should see a congruity.

§ 38. Sinners, under conviction of their guilt, are generally afraid that God is so angry with them, that he never will give them faith in Christ. They think the majesty and jealousy of God will not allow of it. Therefore, there goes with a sense of the sufficiency of Christ, a sense of God's sovereignty with respect to mercy and judgment, that he will and may have mercy in Christ, on whom he will have mercy, and leave to hardness whom he will. This cases of that burden.

§ 34. For a man to trust in his own righteousness, is to conceive hopes of some favor of God, or some freedom from his displeasure, from a false notion of his own goodness or excellency, and the proportion it bears to that favor; and of his own badness, and the relation it bears to his displeasure. It is to conceive hopes of some favor of God, from a false notion of the relation which our own goodness or excellency bears to that favor; whether this mistaken relation be supposed to imply an obligation in natural justice, or propriety and decency, or an obligation in point of wisdom and honor; or if he thinks that, without it, God will not do excellently or

according to some one at least of his declared attributes, of whether it be any obligation by virtue of his promise; whether this favorable respect be the pardon of sin, or he bestowment of heaven, or the abating of punishment, or answering of prayers, or mitigation of punishment, or converting grace, or God's delighting in us, prizing of us, or the bestowing of any temporal or spiritual blessing. This excellency we speak of, is either real or supposed; either negative, in not being so bad as others, and the like, or positive. Whether it be natural or moral excellency, is immaterial: Also, whether the sinner himself looks upon it as an excellency, or supposes God looks upon it as such. For men to trust in their own righteousness, is to entertain hope of escaping any displeasure, or obtaining any positive favor from God, from too high a notion of our own moral excellency, or too light a notion of our badness, as compared with or related to that favor or displeasure.

§ 35. This is to be observed concerning the scriptures that I have cited respecting faith, that they sometimes affix salvation to the natural and immediate effects of faith, as well as to faith itself. Such as, asking, knocking, &c. Rom. x. 12, 13, 14. In the 14th verse, faith is distinguished from calling upon him.'

§ 36. All trusting to our own righteousness indeed, is expecting justification for our own excellency. But they that expect that God will convert them for their excellency, or do any thing else towards their salvation upon that account, do trust in their own righteousness. Because, the supposing that God will be the more inclined to convert a man, or enable him to come to Christ for his excellency, is to suppose, that he is justified already, at least in part. It supposes, that God's anger for sin is at least partly appeased, and that God is more favorably inclined to him for his excellency's sake, in that he is disposed to give him converting grace, or do something else towards his conversion upon that account.

§ 37. The difficulty in giving a definition of faith is, that we have no word that clearly and adequately expresses the whole act of acceptance, or closing of the soul or heart with