believeth on Jesus,' so it follows, ver. 2; that though he doth justify out of the freest grace, yet he is in the most absolute manner just in doing of it; thus to bring mercy and the extremity of justice to meet, what a reconciliation is this! I'll give you another, for indeed the doctrine of the gospel is nothing else, it is made up of these. God requires satisfaction of his Son Jesus Christ in his human nature, and God must be satisfied with something that is not his own, for you can never satisfy any one with what is his own already. How can this be reconciled? Why, my brethren, the human nature being joined to the second person, he hath that right in it that the Father and the Holy Ghost hath not, it is his own in a more peculiar manner; for it is one person with him, which it is not with the other two persons. No creature could have made satisfaction unto God, for whatsoever the creature had was God's own already; but this second person, Jesus Christ, he could say to the Father, I will give you that which is mine own, I have such a propriety in it as you have not; and yet all things are God's. This you see is reconciled in Christ, and therefore it is put upon redeeming us with his own blood.

To come to justification. What an amazing wonder is it that a man should be ungodly at the same time that he is justified, and at the same time that he is sanctified too. The Scripture is clear for this, Rom. iv. 5. Abraham, not only at his first conversion, but a long time afterward, yea, in his whole life, looked upon himself as a person ungodly, and to be justified by God as ungodly, considered in himself.

So if you come to conversion, there is no man that truly turns to God, but he turns freely to him; it is the freest act that ever man did, or else he will never be saved; yet notwithstanding, though it hath the highest freedom in it, it is wrought in him by an almighty power, even the same power that raised up Christ from death to life. Here is the highest freedom of will, and God's everlasting purpose and power mixed together.

Come to the life of a Christian after conversion; take it as the gospel hath revealed it, and it consisteth of nothing but seeming contradictions. The apostle, in Gal. ii. 20, reckons up together two contradictions in appearance; saith he, I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live;' well, yet not I'—this is strange-' but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God.' My brethren, for one soul to live in another, and by another one's living in him, and that should be his life, it is only the doctrine of the gospel that makes these things true. Adam knew no such thing, there was no such art and skill in his life. That likewise in Phil. ii. 13, God should work in a man all, both the will and the deed, and yet the man work freely with God, this is a seeming contradiction, and yet made good by the gospel.

I have mentioned these, and have given you Scriptures which hold them forth to you in very terms. I might mention a thousand others, and I'll give you the reason why I mention them: it is not only to confirm the point in hand, but let me tell you this, and know it for a truth, the cause of all the errors that have been in the world hath been the want of reconciling these things together.

The Arians found great things spoken of the manhood of Christ, as of a divine man, and therefore they denied that he was God. They could not reconcile these two, how God should be man, and man should be God, that both should be joined together; therefore, taking part with one, they exclude the other.

Our Lord and Saviour Christ is God blessed for ever; therefore, say the papists, he did not suffer the displeasure of God in his soul. Why, say they, can God love his Son and be angry with him at the same time? And he that is God blessed for ever, can he be made a curse in his soul? Yes, take him as a surety. They take part with one truth of the gospel to exclude the other, whereas the gospel is a reconciliation of both these, and therein lies the depth of it.

So in point of justification. Say the papists, Can a man be justified by the righteousness of another? Are not the saints holy in themselves? And doth not that make them holy? Is not the wall white with the whiteness that is in the wall? It is the want of reconciling these seeming contradictions that is the ground of that error. I will give you a greater contradiction in appearance to human reason: a man is ungodly and godly, a sinner and justified at the same time. This is true, the Scripture holds it forth to be so.

As for the Socinians, they say there is no satisfaction for sin; for if God Whereas the Scrippardon freely, how can he pardon for a satisfaction? ture is clear, that there may be the freest grace in it, and yet satisfaction too; and the truth of the gospel lies in reconciling these two, and that is the depth of it; but they take part with one truth to exclude another.

Take Antinomianism, as you call it. All those glorious truths of the gospel, that a man is justified from all eternity, yea, and glorified from all eternity too, &c.; men cleave to all these truths, whereas other truths are to be joined with them. A man, before he believeth, is unjustified, therefore he is said to be justified by faith; and he is a child of wrath until he believe. All believers are now glorified, and sit now in heavenly places with Christ, considered in their head, Christ; yet notwithstanding, what poor miserable creatures are they here below. Take believers in their own person, they are not so; but considered in Christ, they are thus. I am perfectly sanctified, and perfectly holy, considered in him, and I was cruciAll men fied with him, yea, but the remainders of corruptions are still. would desire to be more glorified than they are here, yet they are perfectly glorified in Christ, considered in him. Here is still taking part with one truth to exclude another, whereas both must be taken in. So others object they cannot conceive that God should be angry with his elect, and chastise It is easily for sin; for if he nothing but love me, how can that be? answered: there is anger that proceeds from love. Though men's sins are forgiven without interruption, yet there is a binding of sins in heaven, so saith Mat. xviii. 18 expressly.

Take Arminianism. What is the foundation of their error? It is merely a want of reconciling seeming, though not real, contradictions in the gospel. As, for example, they know not how to reconcile man's free will with God's peremptory decree. Say they, If God, out of his unchangeable peremptory love to a man, work irresistibly upon his will, how can his will be free? Why, the freest that can be for all this. For consider this, who hath more freedom of will than the human nature of Jesus Christ? For if he had not had the height of freedom of will, we could never have been saved by him. Yet infallibly and irresistibly, and with the greatest necessity that ever could be, was his will carried on always unto good. I say, the taking part with one truth, without reconciling it to another, hath been the foundation of many errors, and therein lies the depth of the gospel, in reconciling all seeming contradictions whatsoever.

All these mysteries, I say, hath God knit up in the gospel, to shew his

own wisdom, and to befool the wise men of the world. So that now, considering all those poor and petty plots of reconciling nations and kingdoms, all the ways of accommodation, whereby the greatest difficulties are resolved between men and men, and kingdom and kingdom, wherein the wise men and the princes of the world so glory (for their wisdom lies in ways of accommodation, and reconciling things, and in them they spend their thoughts, and in them they pride and magnify themselves)-I say, take all those depths of state, and the least of these depths that are in the gospel makes all the wisdom and policy of the world to vanish before it as mere folly. It confoundeth the wisdom of the wise, and brings to nothing the understanding of the prudent;' so the apostle saith, 1 Cor. i. 19.

6

I might likewise shew you that the gospel, in the knowledge of it, is excellent in respect of the depths that are in it, so in respect of all that harmony and correspondency that there is in the gospel of one truth with another. The excellency of knowledge lies as well in the suiting of one thing with another, as in the profoundness of the things themselves. Now there was never such an invention as this, that as it is said in Ecclesiastes, 'God hath set one thing against another,' so the harmony, the suiting of all truths one with another here, in that glorious manner, is nowhere to be found in any wisdom or art whatsoever. The philosophers found a great deal of harmony in the things of this world, for the skill and art that God hath stamped upon the creatures consisteth in the harmony that is between one thing and another.

Now the observations would be infinite that might be made of this kind. How our sinfulness and Christ's satisfaction and obedience answers one another there is nothing in thy soul that thou canst object, but there is that in the gospel which will answer it particularly. And so of all other truths, it may be said they kiss each other. My brethren, it is the thread that runs through all divinity; therefore a man must make a whole body, a system of divinity, that will do this, and when it is done, there is nothing more glorious.

Now, the gospel is not only a mystery and a depth in respect of wisdom, but let me give you another depth, and that is a depth of love, which is laid up and revealed in this doctrine and knowledge of the gospel, Eph. iii. 18, 19, That you may comprehend, with all saints, the height, and depth, and length, and breadth, of the love of God, which passeth knowledge.' Sin is a great depth, which the law lays open; therefore, saith Jeremiah, chap. xvii. 9, The heart of man is desperately wicked, who can know it?' And Solomon saith, in Eccles. vii. 25, I thought myself wise enough, I set myself to find out and to know the wickedness of folly.' But he could not find out that depth of wickedness that is in man's heart, or make an anatomy of the heart. And poor souls, when they are humbled, find it so, and the damned spirits in hell find it so; for what is it they study, and shall do to everlasting? Their own sinfulness and God's wrath, their parts being extended and set upon the utmost tenter-hooks, and their sins being set in order before them, they study nothing but their sins, and meditate nothing but terror; and this is hell. But now there is a mystery of love as well as of wisdom revealed in the gospel, a depth that swalloweth up all the depths of sinfulness that is in the elect, yea, and if they were a thousand times vaster than they are. The apostle, in that place I quoted even now, Eph. iii. 18, speaks of heights, and depths, and lengths, and breadths in the love of God; he compares it to a mighty sea, which swalloweth up hills like molehills, a sea which is of that depth that the thoughts of men, though

they shall be diving to all eternity to the bottom of it, shall never come thither, a sea of that length and breadth, that though they are sailing over it to everlasting, yet they shall never come to shore. It passeth knowledge, saith he. God's heart, my brethren, is as deep in love as it is in wisdom; yea, and his love was it that set his wisdom to work, to find out all those depths whereby to shew his love. And, therefore, it is an observable place in Rom. xi. 33, which I quoted at the first, O the depth,' saith he, of the riches of the knowledge and wisdom of God!' You would think that the apostle there speaks only of the knowledge and wisdom of God. No; he means mercy and love, as well as wisdom, or rather, wisdom set a-work by love. And it is clear by the context, for he had spoken in the words before of God's shewing mercy to the elect, That through your mercy,' saith he, they might obtain mercy;' For God hath concluded all under unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all;' O the depth,' &c. Having spoken of love and mercy, which God intends to his elect, and the ways and contrivances that wisdom hath to shew mercy, he cries out, O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!' And there, in Rom. xii. 1, where he comes to make application to all, what saith he? 'I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you' do so and so. We have two gulfs in us, two vessels, understanding and will, and both these must be filled. Why, the gospel contains two depths in it, the one to fill your understanding, the other to fill your will and affections for ever. It contains a depth of wisdom, and it contains a depth of love; it is a mystery of wisdom, and it is a mystery of love. And so now I have despatched the first property of the excellency of the gospel, that it is a mystery.

I shall but make a short use of it, and that is only this. These are great invitements unto men to become saints, and being so, to search in a more especial manner into the things of the gospel. You know great understandings seek after depths, as good swimmers do after great rivers, and will not go to shallows. It is said of the leviathan, that he plays in the sea. There is room enough to do so. If anything invites the understanding of man to be searching and prying, the depths of the gospel will do it.

And let me add this to it, which, as it enhanceth the worth of the gospel, so it should set on our spirits after the knowledge of it, and the knowledge of it as saints, the depths of it are so great that it will always produce new knowledge; though you know but the same things again, yet your knowledge shall be always new. Why? Because it passeth knowledge.' Go, take all other things that are the greatest riddles and secrets in the world, and when you once know them, you know them, and they become trivial when you once know them. There was a secret in nature which the world almost for three thousand years did not know-I am sure the heathens did not-and that was the cause of the eclipse of the sun and the moon, and they stood all wondering, as of late the West Indians did, when such a thing happened. Now, we know that the moon's coming between the sun eclipseth it, and the shadow of earth coming between the moon and the sun eclipseth it; and this great riddle that amazed the world, we count it, now we know it, but a trivial thing; and who almost, when the sun or moon are eclipsed, thinks of it with any admiration? But when the depths of the gospel are unfolded to you, you may still search into them, and search further with new pleasure, and to a renewed understanding they are always new and fresh. There is no new thing under the sun, saith

Solomon in Eccles. i. And he speaks of natural, moral knowledge. But there is nothing but new things which are above the sun, which believers know. Therefore, as the mercies of God are new every morning, so the thoughts of these mercies, they are to an holy heart precious, sweet, new every morning. And you shall find this, that as you grow up more in holiness, still the things you knew before will be new to you, the very same things, besides your enlargement in other things that you did not know before. So the apostle clearly saith, in 1 Cor. xiii. 10, When that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I understood as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things.' Every new degree of spiritual light swallowed up what he knew before, that he thinketh that he did not know it before, the knowledge of it, or that new light, being so pleasant to him.

Now, my brethren, to have the mind of man not only to have depths made the object of it, but the holier he grows to be carried on to further depths, to be led along thus with continual new knowledge, there is nothing more pleasant; and yet this the gospel is, and all the depths of it. And then, when you shall have depths of love added, a sea of love breaking in upon your hearts at every thought (if the apprehension be wound up high), to fill a man's will and affection, as the other filled his understanding, this must needs fill the heart with unspeakable pleasure and joy and contentment in the view and contemplation of this great and high mystery. Now, if we had holiness enough, and love enough, and faith enough, and grew in these, this would certainly be our case. And so much now for this first property of the gospel that is here mentioned, that it is called a mystery.

CHAPTER III.

Another demonstration of the excellency of the gospel, that it is a secret mystery, a hidden and concealed wisdom.

Which hath been hidden from ages and from generations,' dc.- COL. I. 26.

2. I come now to the second of those properties or adjuncts that are attributed or ascribed unto the gospel, mentioned in this 26th verse, to set forth the glory of it, and that is the secrecy and hiddenness of it. Hidden,' saith he, from ages and from generations.'

That which is here translated hid is, in Rom. xvi. 25, silent, not spoken of; it was kept secret, at least the mystery of it. 'Now to him,' saith he, that is of power to stablish you, according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began.' The apostle Paul, in all the foregoing part of the epistle, had laid open the great things of this gospel, and now at the latter end of all, in the conclusion of it, because that it is the revelation of the gospel for which we are most of all to bless God, he makes that doxology, or closeth it with this praise and thanksgiving unto God, 'Now, to him that is of power to stablish you, according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest, to God only wise be glory, through Jesus Christ. Amen.' He doth involve and interweave the mention of the glory and excellency of this gospel as that for which there is glory to be given to