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we are the peculiar people of God:-no, blessed forever be his name, we have not so learned Christ. Those who have yielded obedience to the law of God written in the heart; who have been melted down as it were under the operation of his power; who have been broken off from the wild olive tree, and ingrafted into Christ, who remains to be the true and living vine, the living head of his own Church; those who have been. washed in the laver of regeneration, been born again from above; those, and those only, are members of the true Church, wherever their lot is cast.

We may be bowing down to outward things, to outward ordinances, to outward washings; we may be sprinkled in infancy; we may have promised for us, "to renounce the devil and all his works, the pomps and vanities of the wicked world, and all the sinful desires of the flesh; to keep God's holy word and commandments, and to walk in the same all the days of our lives; and that we shall believe all the articles of the Christian faith." I mean nothing reproachful to any religious society, the Searcher of hearts knows my innocency; but you know this is often promised for thousands and tens of thousands in the land of my nativity, and for many in this land; and even in this enlightened age of the world, there are many who are found, I was going to say, daring and presumptuous enough to promise this for their chil-. dren, when without breach of charity, it must be acknowledged that in many instances they have

not attained to that experience themselves. We may be sprinkled in infancy-we may be immersed in water in advanced years-and this may be repeated a thousand times over; and it is very possible, (experience hath taught us-we cannot close our eyes or take leave of our senses—we must be convinced,) that many of those who have passed through these outward observations, are as great strangers to the life of God in the soulthat life which is hid with Christ in God, as many are, who make no profession at all. My dear friends, religion is an inward work. We may be washed again and again; and it is possible, indeed I have known instances, where persons have proved rank infidels after all this; and have denied the efficacy of the power, and the divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ!

And where is the foundation of these who are denying the divinity of our Lord? I bear my testimony in his name, that in the day when our foundations will be deeply tried, those who are denying the divinity of our Lord and Saviour will have nothing to stand upon. I can have no person or persons in view in this meeting, for I have no reason to believe there is an individual within the audience of my voice, who is denying or even doubting his divinity. This may not be my business to stop to inquire into; but, I bear my testimony, that it is the only ground of my hope for present and everlasting acceptance-even the mercy and goodness of

God, revealed in and through Jesus Christ our Lord; whom I believe to be the procuring cause of all our acceptance, from the day of Adam's transgression, when our great and Almighty Creator was pleased to promise, that the "seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head;" that there has been no other means for our acceptance from that day to the present moment, than by and through the offering of Christ Jesus, who in the fulness of time, came and suffered for us.

There may be those present who are ready to say, and I think I hear the inquiry in the intellectual ear of my soul, How could those be benefitted by the offering of Christ Jesus, who lived before he made his appearance among men? My friends, all who were saved prior to our Lord's appearance among men, were as effectually saved upon the credit of that offering, which in the fulness of time was made for us, as we are, who have lived since that awful period, when he offered himself up, without the gates of Jerusalem, a holy propitiatory sacrifice for our sins, and for the sins of the whole world." "I would not that you

should be ignorant," was the testimony of an Apostle of Christ Jesus, a man of great experience, and who had the power of working miracles to confirm the doctrine he preached; "Brethren," said he, "I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses, in the cloud and in the sea; and

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did all eat the same spiritual meat, and did all drink the same spiritual drink; for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ."

I have no wish to amuse this assembly, even had I the talent so to do. I had not previously thought upon any of those subjects in this meeting, nor had I any apprehension when I stood upon my feet, that I should express any thing of this nature. We have more exalted views of the ministry of the gospel of Christ Jesus, than to consider it the product of study or of man's wisdom. And although we are constrained sometimes to stand up in the exercise of the small degree of faith received, it is only as these things are unfolded unto us, that we endeavour in simplicity and Godly sincerity, to communicate them. This is old fa shioned preaching. We have no account that in the primitive Church the Apostles were trained up as at Oxford or Cambridge, or in any such seminaries as abound in the day in which we live, where men are instructed in the art of preaching! My friends, there is a great difference between the art of preaching, and the exercise of a living gift in the ministry of the Gospel of Christ Jesus. I say, this is old fashioned preaching! We may remember how the Apostle speaks of his preaching: "A necessity," said he, "is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me if 1 preach not the Gospel:" He went not among them with excellency of speech or of man's wisdom. His object was not

to amuse and gratify itching ears, nor to seek the applause and popularity of the world. No; "I was with you," said he to one of the Churches, "in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling and my speech, and my preaching, was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power."

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I have no desire to cast reflections on any religious society. I only drop these things in Christian simplicity, for the relief of my own mind, as they have altogether unsought opened to my view while I have been standing on my feet. I wish we may all turn our attention to the inward convictions of God's holy spirit, that we may find we have an instructor at home, one of a thousand, that can never be removed into a corner. I have

no doubt but there are many minds in this meet ing, who would candidly acknowledge that they have often felt the inward conviction of God's holy spirit, and have been sensible that they are living in the day spoken of by the prophet, when the "spirit should be placed in the inward parts, and the law of God written in the heart," and have been ready at times to close in with the convictions which they have felt, and to follow the law written in their hearts; and are almost constrained to say: I delight in the law of God after the inward We may remember what the Apostle said, when he described the state he had passed through: "I delight in the law of God after the inward man;""but, I see," said he, another law in

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