jecting him and his spiritual heavenly kingdom. They did not imagine, that, in the kingdom of their Messiah, wickedness and profanity was to take place; very far from it: they expected he would reform the corruptions that were complained of among them; and that, in exalting their nation, he would revive and confirm the covenant made with their nation on Sinai, in all the articles of it, and establish the law of Moses over all nations who were to be blessed in the observation of that law, and in coming within the bond of that covenant, at the same time that they came in subjection to the Jewish nation. And in this they had by far the advantage of any of them that now profess the greatest zeal for national covenants, or any national form of a church, that can pretend to no more of an interest in divine institution, but as they are a copying after that national covenant and church which the Jewish builders opposed to the king. dom of Christ, that was the end of that covenant and church; and can pretend to no other divine institution, but such a sense of the prophecies of the Old Testament as that whereby the Jewish builders rejected Christ and his kingdom.

Though this seems plainly inconsistent with some part of Mr Erskine's fermon, yet it agrees not ill with a private letter of his some time ago published, and is perfectly consistent with the sense and true scope of the passage in the fermon that was proposed in the beginning to be illustrated. And it has likewise some countenance from another part of the sermon, where he says, p. 36. inference 6. "See from what is faid "what it is makes a flourishing church. It is not her exter"nal peace and plenty or prosperity, not her connection in

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politics with kings or parliaments, patrons, heritors, or any other set of men: but her connection with the chief "corner-stone. This, and this only, is what beautifies the "whole building, and makes her increase with the increase of "God." It will not be very easy to declare how far a national church and covenant, and shutting the door unto places of civil or military trust on such as are not well affected to that church and covenant, can take place without some connec tion in politics with kings and parliaments, or with the legiflative civil power. And, seeing this connection at least adds nothing to the beauty of the building, there can be no real lofs in dropping it, that we may give ourselves wholly to the maintenance of the connection with the chief corner-stone, which alone beautifies the building, and makes the church increase with the increase of God. The natural tendency of a national covenant and a national church, depending on that connection with kings, parliaments, and armies, is external peace, by the destruction of sects, plenty or riches to the clergy of that church, and worldly profperity; which, Mr Erskine says, is far from being that which makes a flourish, ing church. And he reckons that the increase of the church that comes that way is not the increase of God; that only is with him the increase of God that comes by holding the head, which was the kind of increase before any king or kingdom of this world owned Christianity.

Here is a question, If there be any real ground in fcriptureprophecy for this sense of the words of the prophets, that the nations of this world are to be churches, and in covenant with God as Ifrael was? And the Apostle James seems to determine it, in that speech he made Acts xv. in the church in Jerufalem, to which the other apostles and the elders of that church, with that whole church, agreed; he says, "Si"meon hath declared how God at the first did visit the na" tions to take out of them a people for his name, and to " this agree the words of the prophets." If we consider these words with the words that follow, we cannot be at a loss to understand the Holy Ghost's sense of his own words in the scripture-prophecy, when he speaks of the nations being brought into the church, and called by God's name, or ha ving his name called on them; and among all the private interpretations and different sentiments of men about what it is that the words of the prophets agree to about the nations, this is the mind of the Holy Ghost, the inspirer of the prophets. We may also see from that context, that the king. dom of Christ, as it stood when James made that speech, was the antitype of the kingdom of David: and that the subjects of that kingdom were but a remnant of the Jewish nation, and a remnant of every other nation where he had any fubjects. This is Christ's kingdom, his church, of which the prophets spake; and for this sense of the prophets, the apostles contended against such as would not admit the nations upon whom God's name was called into the church, without the Jewish national covenant.

Another reason of the mistake of the Jewish builders about the Messiah's kingdom spoken of in the prophets was, that they took not the scripture by itself to compare it with Christ's doctrine, but according to the tradition of their fathers. And the tradition of the fathers about the Meffiah's kingdom being more agreeable to their worldly lufts, where

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with their zeal for their religion was not inconsistent, than Chrift's doctrine was; this, with the high esteem they had of these fathers, laid them under such a byass against Chrift's kingdom, which is not of this world, as nothing but the power of God's grace could conquer. The gratifying of their pride and other lufts, in a connection with zeal for their religion, and the authority of their worthy ancestors, whose greatnef and goodness, and capacity to understand the prophecies, it was not lawful to call in question, made up a three fold cord not easily to be broken.

And thus were Jewish builders led into that fatal carnal notion of the Messiah's kingdom, wherewith our Lord's appearance and doctrine was so inconsistent, that they could not beat it, but rejected him. They could not endure a Meffiah deftitute of worldly honour and wealth, a man of forrows, and acquainted with grief, a pattern of self-denial in all respects, and calling all his followers to deny themselves, and take up their cross and follow him, and, instead of a worldly kingdom, telling them of the kingdom of heaven, a kingdom not coming with observation, a kingdom within men, and a kingdom that they could have no part in by virtue of that birth of which they boafted as they were the feed of Abraham, and which gave them a part in the Old-Testament kingdom, unless they should be born again of the Spirit, born from above; and, inflead of these great things they were looking for on earth by the Meffiah, promifing nothing in this world without perfecution, and raising mens expectations from this world to the world to come. This was as alien from the Jewish sente of the prophecies, as the following questions are alien from the prophecies and the New-Testament sense of them, viz. Whether these called malignants should have places of truft civil or military? Whether a national church should be governed by a fubordination of courts, composed of prefbyters acting in parity, or also by a fubordination of officers? and, Whether the national clergy should manage the king and parliament, &c. or the king and parliament manage then? And there has been as much zeal as the Jews could boaft of fpent upon these same questions.

Now, as the carnal notion of Chrift's kingdom lay at the bottom of the rejection of our Lord by the Jewish builders, fo, thinks Mr Erskine, lies it at the bottom of the rejection of Chrift in the day we live in. And, when we come to the application of what has been faid of the Jewish builders unto the evils and corruptions of the day we live in, it is needless

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to go further than that instance that gave occafion to all the zeal expressed in the fermon; which is, the depriving of the Christian people of their right of chusing their own pastors, by the late act of assembly, whereby it is put in the hands of heritors, many of them disaffected to the church, and of elders or representatives of the people, the majority of both together; and this, together with patronages, by law established, which the church calls a grievance, and yet fubmits.

Mr Erskine is of the mind, that a carnal notion of Christ's kingdom lies at the bottom of this evil and corruption of the day we live in; but how? is indeed the question; which, till he do it to better purpose himself, must be answered by way of inference from the hints he has given. And how should this evil come, but by the church's connection in politics with the powers of the earth, that serves unto the external peace, plenty, and profperity of the church? This connection began in the days of Constantine, when the man of fin was brought forth. The churches had been pregnant with this conception of iniquity before; but then it was brought forth, and from thence nursed up by the Christian emperors, till the Roman empire was broke into ten kingdoms, and yet remained united in the one clergy when the man of fin, being come to age, sat down on his throne, and began to have poffeffion of the superiority over the nations, in the bounds of the Roman empire, that the rulers of the empire had before.

In the days of Constantine, the Christian builders, feeing a door opened for worldly honour, riches, and ease, and forgetting the old doctrine of self-denial, mortification to the world, and of the spiritual heavenly nature of Christ's king. dom, which they could not but think of under the cross, began to infift on the old Jewish sense of the prophecies, and to compliment Conftantine, a Christian catechumen, with David's throne, and fo to call upon him to act such a part about the church, as the good kings of Judah did about the temple: and the good man accepted the compliment, complied with the exhortation of his teachers, and thought he could not do too much for the church, to make her flourish with external peace, plenty, and profperity; and that was all that was in his power.

The Chriftian builders had men of divers occupations profeffing Chriftianity before; but they never imagined, that the profeffion of Chriftianity made any further change in these occupations, cupations, than to make the men more upright and self-denied in them: so that there was no difference betwixt a Heathenish and a Christian physician or mechanic, but in the principles and ends of their actions in these occupations. But they made another kind of diftinction betwixt a magistrate and a Christian magistrate. He had such duties incumbent on him as the kings of Judah had, about the worship of God; as, to cut off heretics and fchifmatics, to establish Christianity as the religion of the empire, in the room of Heathenism, and to fuffer the open exercise of no other religion, and to make provision for the maintenance of the clergy.

When such duties were incumbent on the Christian magistrate, and such services to be done by him, he behoved to have some privileges connected with these services. The nature of the thing required it; yea it was not disagreeable to "the nature of the Christian law, that always connects privileges with fervices': so that if Christ's law required these services of the magistrate, and if the New Testament made him the executer of the laws of Christ, it is very peculiar, if it granted him therewith no privilege. It is certain, at least, it was not so in the case of the kings of Judah.

When the earth helped the woman at the Reformation, or when some of the powers of Europe interposed, no doubt with political views, to stem the tide of Romish perfecution, the preachers and professors of the gospel, being thus eased, began to do the same thing with the kings and princes of the earth, that the ancients did with Constantine, and required of these kings and states, that there should be a legal provifion for the maintenance of the ministers set in the room of the parish-priests; and this after the church-lands had been alienated. It was, no doubt, every way reasonable, that, in consequence of this, the legislative power of the state should have something to say, as to these that should enjoy that maintenance which the law provided.

The connection of the church with the powers of the earth, could not but make a different outward state of the church from that which was before there was any such connection, and produce effects, that all the influence of the gospel, and the ablest minifters of it, and the connection of the church with the corner stone, did not produce before. For it made the people of the nations come into a profession of Chriftianity, not of free choice, nor by the influence of the gospel itself upon their minds, but by the influence of the powers of the earth. And in consequence of this, the moft

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