stances, be a kind of debt of charity, and Christian condescension, lying upon the injured party, to endeavour to reclaim and pacify the offender by soft and healing ways: but as that is a very nice affair, and the office such as many are not fit for, there lies no strict obligation in such a case, or at least not upon Christians at large, but upon those only who are peculiarly fitted for it. Therefore it falls not properly under the question now in hand, nor within the precept of the text, which is general, extending equally to all Christians. From the summary view here given of what the ancients thought of those words of our Lord, (besides the clearing an important case of conscience, which I chiefly aimed at,) it may be noted by the way, that the gift there mentioned was understood of spiritual sacrifice only, and the altar also of course must have been spiritual, while considered as an altar: which I take notice of as a confirmation of what hath been advanced in a preceding chapter. But I proceed.

2. As making restitution for any offences we have committed, is one necessary article of sacramental preparation, so is a readiness to forgive any offences committed against us, another as necessary an article, and much insisted upon by the ancient churches $. This is a rule laid down by our blessed Lord in his Gospel, and made an express condition of our own forgiveness, and left us, for the greater caution, as an article of the Lord's Prayer to be daily repeated. All the difficulty lies in clearing and ascertaining the true and full meaning of the forgiveness required. Our Lord in one place says, "If thy brother "trespass against thee, rebuke him, and if HE REPENT, "forgive him ;" and so again and again, as often as he repents, forgivet. May we then revenge ourselves upon an enemy, if he does not repent? No, by no means: vengeance is God's sole right"; man has nothing to do with

See Bingham, xv. 8, 13.

+ Luke xvii. 3, 4. Matth. xviii. 21, 22.

u Deut. xxxii. 35. Rom. xii. 19. Hebr. x. 30.

it. Even magistrates, who, in some sense, are revengers, or avengers, to execute wrath, yet, strictly speaking, are not appointed to dispense vengeance. They do not, they cannot award punishments in just proportion to demerits, as God can do: but they are appointed to act for the safety of the State; and what they do, is a kind of selfdefence, in a public capacity, rather than a dispensing of vengeance. So that even they, properly speaking, are not commissioned to revenge: much less can any private persons justly claim any right to it. Forgiveness, if understood in opposition to revenge, is an unlimited duty, knows no bounds or measures, is not restrained to any kind or number of offences, nor to any condition of repenting: but all offences must be forgiven, in that sense, though not repented of, though ever so cruelly or so maliciously carried on, and persisted in. Therefore the forgiveness which our Lord speaks of, as limited to the repentance of the party offending, can mean only the receiving a person into such a degree of friendship, or intimacy, as he before had: a thing not safe, nor reasonable, unless he shows some tokens of sorrow for his fault, and some signs of a sincere intention to do so no more. Forgive him in such a sense, as to meditate no revenge, to wish him well, and to pray for him, and even to do him good in a way prudent and proper: but admit him not into confidence, nor trust yourself with him, till he repents: for that would be acting too far against the great law of self-preservation. Only take care, on the other hand, not to be over distrustful, nor to stand upon the utmost proofs of his relenting sincerity, but rather risk some relapses. This, I think, in the general, is a just account of Gospelforgivenessy.

But to prevent all needless scruples, I may explain it a little further, in some distinct articles, 1. Gospel forgiveness interferes not with proper discipline, nor the bringing

x Rom. xiii. 4.

y Compare Abp. Tillotson, Serm. xxxiii. p. 392. vol. i. fol. edit. Towerson on the Sacraments, p. 298.

offenders in a legal way to public justice. An informer may prosecute, a witness accuse, a jury bring in guilty, a judge condemn, and an executioner dispatch a criminal, without any proper malevolence towards the party, but in great benevolence towards mankind. 2. Gospel forgiveness interferes not with a person's prosecuting his own just rights, in a legal way, against one that has grievously injured him in his estate, person, or good name: for a man's barely doing himself justice, or recovering a right, is not taking revenge. A person wrongs me, perhaps, of a considerable sum: I forgive him the wrong, so as to bear him no malice; but I forgive him not the debt, because I am no way obliged to resign my own property or maintenance to an injurious invader. 3. Gospel forgiveness interferes not with a just aversion to, or abhorrence of, some very ill men; liars, suppose, adulterers, fornicators, extortioners, impostors, blasphemers, or the like: for such hatred of aversion is a very different thing from hatred of malevolence, may be without it, and ought to be so. We cannot love monsters of iniquity with any love of complacency, neither does God delight in them as such: but still we may love them with a love of benevolence and compassion, as God also does 2. 4. Neither does Gospel forgiveness interfere with any proper degrees of love or esteem. A man may love his enemies in a just degree, and yet love his friends better, and one friend more than another, in proportion to their worth, or nearness, or other circumstances. Our Lord loved all his disciples, even Judas not excepted: but he loved one more particularly, who was therefore called "the disciple whom Jesus loved a;" and he loved the rest with distinction, and in proportionate degrees. 5. I have before hinted, that Gospel forgiveness interferes not with rejecting enemies from our confidence, or refusing to admit them into our bosoms. We may wish them well, pray for them, and do them good; but still at

2 See Towerson as above, p. 298, 299.

• Johu xiii. 23. xix. 26. xx. 2. xxi. 7, 20.

a proper distance, such as a just regard for our own safety, or reasons of peace, piety, and charity may require. 6. I may add, that cases perhaps may be supposed, where even the duty of praying for them may be conceived to cease. "There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he "shall pray for it b." But in this case, they are not to be considered merely as private enemies, but as public nuisances, and as offending of malicious wickedness, not against man only, but against God and religion. Indeed, charity forbids us to pass such a censure, except it be upon very sure grounds; which perhaps we can but seldom, if ever, have: but I was willing to mention this case, for the better clearing up St. Paul's conduct in this very article. It may deserve our notice, that he prayed for those who had meanly, and through human infirmity, deserted him in the day of trial, that the sin might not be "laid to their charge:" in the same breath almost, speaking of Alexander, a wicked apostate, who had most maliciously opposed him and the Gospel, he says; "The "Lord reward him according to his works d." He would not honour him so far, as to pray for his conversion or forgiveness: or he knew his case to be too desperate to admit of either. Nevertheless, he left the vengeance entirely to God, whose right it was; and he took not upon him so much as to judge of the precise degree of his demerits, but committed that also to the unerring judgment of God. I am aware, that very considerable Divines, ancient and modern, choose to resolve the case another way, either into prediction by the Spirit, or into apostolical authority : but I humbly conceive, that there is no need of either supposition, to reconcile the seeming difficulty. Only, as I before hinted, an Apostle might better know the desperate state of such a person, than any one can ordinarily know at this day; and so he might proceed upon surer grounds on which account, his example is not lightly to be imitated, or to be drawn into a precedent. Enough, I

b1 John v. 16.

2 Tim. iv. 16.

d 2 Tim. iv. 14.

presume, has been here said of the nature, measure, and extent of Gospel forgiveness, and I may now proceed to a new article of sacramental preparation.

3. Another previous qualification, much insisted upon by the ancients, was a due regard to Church unity and public peace, in opposition to schism in the Church or faction in the State. The reason and the obligation of both is self-evident, and I need not enlarge upon it. It may be noted, that the Corinthians, whom St. Paul reproved, were much wanting in this article of preparation; as appeared by their heats and animosities, their sidings and contests. They did not duly consider this Sacrament as a symbol of peace, a feast of amity: they did not discern the Lord's body to be, what it really is, a cement of union, and a bond of true Christian membership, through the Spirit.

4. A fourth article was mercy and charity towards the poor brethren f. The equity of which is manifest: and it is a duty which has been so often and so well explained, both from the press and the pulpit, that I may here spare myself the trouble of saying a word more of it.

Having shown, first, that repentance, at large, is a necessary part of sacramental preparation, and having shown also of what particulars such repentance chiefly consists, (not excluding other particulars, for repentance means entire obedience,) I may now add, for the preventing groundless scruples, that allowances are always supposed for sins of infirmity, sins of daily incursion, such as are ordinarily consistent with a prevailing love of God and love of our neighbour. The slighter kind of offences ought never to be looked upon as any bar to our receiving, but rather as arguments for receiving, and that frequently, in order to gain ground of them more and more, and to have them washed off in the salutary blood of Christ.

As to the length of time to be taken up in preparing, there is no one certain rule to be given, which can suit all