justification, held out to the ungodliest of us all. To give us an interest in the saying, that God justifieth the ungodly, it is enough that we count it a faithful saying, and that we count it worthy of all acceptation. It is very true, that we will not count it a faithful saying, unless, from some cause or other, (and no cause more likely than a desire to escape from the consequences of sin) we have been induced to attend to it. And neither will we count it worthy of all acceptation, unless our convictions have led us to feel the need of a righteousness, and the value of an interest therein. But if your concern about your soul has been such, that you have been led to listen and that for your own personal behoof, to the offer of the gospelthat is warrant enough for us to explain to you the terms of it, and to crave your acceptance of them. Whatever your present alienation, whatever the present hardness of your heart under the sense of it, whatever there be within you to make out the charge of ungodliness, and whatever to aggravate that charge in your wretched apathy amid so much guilt and so much danger-here is God with a deed of righteousness, by the possession of which you will be accepted as righteous before Him; and which to obtain the possession of, you are not to work for as a reward, but to accept by a simple act of dependence. It becomes yours by believ ing; and while it is our office to deal out the doctrine of the gospel, we do it with the assurance, that, wherever the belief of its truth may light, it

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will not light wrong; but that, if the faith of this gospel be formed in the bosom of any individual who now hears us, it will be followed up by a fulfilment upon him of all its promises.

But thirdly, while the office of a righteousness before God is thus brought down, so to speak, to the lowest depth of human wickedness, and it is an offer by the acceptance of which all the past is forgiven-it is also an offer by the acceptance of which all the future is reformed. When Christ confers sight upon a blind man, he ceases to be in darkness; and when a rich individual confers wealth upon a poor, he ceases to be in povertyand so, as surely, when justification is conferred upon the ungodly, his ungodliness is done away. His godliness is not the ground upon which the gift is awarded, any more than the sight of a blind man is the ground upon which it is communicated to him, or than the wealth of a poor man is the ground upon which wealth is bestowed. But just as sight and riches come out of the latter gifts, so godliness comes out of the gift of justification; and while works form in no way the consideration upon which the righteousness that availeth is conferred upon a sinner, yet no sooner is this righteousness granted than it will set him a-working. So that while we hold it a high privilege, that we can say to the ungodliest of you all, Here is the free and unconditional grant of a justification for you, the validity of which you have simply to rely upon the privilege rises inconceivably higher in upon—the

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our estimation, that we can also say, how the unfailing fruit of such a reliance will be a personal righteousness emerging out of the faith which worketh by love, and which transforms into a new creature the man who truly entertains it.

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LECTURE XIV.

ROMANS iv, 9-15.

"Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also? for we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness. How was it then reckoned? when he was in circumcision, or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised: that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also: and the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham which he had being yet uncircumcised. For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect. Because the law worketh wrath; for where no law is, there is no transgression."

In the passage which stands immediately before Paul had asserted of Abraham, that it was his faith and not his obedience which was counted unto him for righteousness; and that it was through the former medium, and not through the latter, that he attained the blessedness of those to whom God did not reckon the guilt of their offences. And from this particular instance, does he proceed, in the verse before us, to a more general conclusion upon the subject.

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V. 9, 10. He resolves the question proposed in the 9th verse by adducing the case of Abraham. In what state was he when righteousness was imputed to him? The historical fact is, that he found acceptance with God, several years before the rite of circumcision was imposed upon him. The case of their own Abraham, was the case of one who was justified in uncircumcision. agreement between him and God had previously been made. A covenant had previously been entered upon. There was a promise by God; and there was a faith by Abraham, which gave him a right to the fulfilment of it—and all this antecedent to his being circumcised. And when it was laid upon him as a binding observation, it was as the token or the memorial of what had passed between them. It was not the making of a new bargain. It was the sealing or the ratifying of an old one. It was not another deed of conveyance, but an infeftment upon the deed that had already been drawn out; and though circumcision should at any time be abolished, and some other form, as that of baptism, be substituted in its place, this no more affected the great principle upon which man acquires a right of property to a place in Heaven, than the great principles of justice upon which an earthly possession is transferred from one man to another, would be affected by a mere change in the forms of an infeftment. The promise of God who cannot lie makes it sure; and yet a visible token may be of use in impressing