PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION THE subjects upon which these Sermons are written are the most momentous that can engage the attention of man. The positive denial of them by someand these not a few-and the awful, and as general perversion of them by others, who yet profess to be Christians, are imperative calls upon those who occupy the high station of Ministers of the Gospel, to "take unto them the whole armour of God," "earnestly to contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the Saints" (Jude, verse 3). It is deeply to be lamented, although not matter of surprise, that any men, professing to be "Masters in Israel," Teachers of "the common Salvation," should be ignorant of, or opposed to the Doctrines enforced in the following pages - that they who stand up as bearers of Jehovah's message should not know what are "the first principles of the oracles of God:"-that instead of preaching the "unsearchable riches of Christ," and declaring "the way of salvation," they should "desire to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm" (1 Tim. i. 7). It is also much to be deplored, that men should be so indifferent to their own best interests as to adopt the sentiments of their Ministers, or of the Denomination with which they find themselves connected, without comparing, with a scrutiny the most rigid, and investigation the most patient, whatever is advanced by the one or maintained by the other, with the Scriptures of God. To this indifference we may trace the gross ignorance that prevails among Protestants generally, upon those glorious truths in the knowledge of which eternal life is had, and in the conscientious and intelligent abiding in which, victory over "the desires of the flesh and of the mind" is achieved; truths-to establish which, 66 holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" truths-which, embodied in the articles of the Church of England, have ever been her only glory, her only safeguard. Impressed with the responsibility which attaches to him to whom the mind of Christ has been made known by the teaching of the Eternal Spirit, the Author is desirous, so far as in him lies, to record and to disseminate, so plainly and intelligibly "that he may run that readeth," "the Testimony which God hath given of his Son." The Lord has not left Himself without witness to the power of the truth set forth in these Sermons. Many precious instances have occurred in Marbœuf Chapel, during the last year, which demonstrate that, however "the preaching of the Cross is, to them that perish, foolishness," it is now, as it ever has been, and as it will be unto the end, "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth" (Rom. i. 16). In order not to break the continuity of the subjects treated in these Sermons they are each printed as a whole. Yet the substance of twelve Sermons is contained in the six, each having formed two discourses when delivered from the pulpit. MAN'S HELPLESSNESS. "Without me ye can do nothing." HOWEVER repugnant to the taste of the world the doctrine of man's native helplessness be, it is a truth, not merely derived by inference from certain doctrines, clearly and unequivocally laid down in the Sacred Volume, but is one that is fully, and frequently, and unambiguously defined: and were there no other passage upon which to found it, the words that I have read from the 15th of John are sufficiently explicit for its establishment. The want of relish for a statement purporting to proceed from the Spirit of God-the want of disposition towards it, becomes no argument |