be allowed his obedience to stand for mine; and that all the wonderful perfections of his life, all the matchless merit of his death, may be as much mine own, as if I had walked in perfection from my cradle to my grave, and had been one in whose every secret thought, and word, and action, thou hadst as a GOD of purity dwelt. What, then, my brethren, would be the feeling with which you would hear in reply, from the lips of the living GOD," Son, it is done as thou hast required. The Saviour, whom I have sent, is called or appointed to be the Lord thy righteousness; not only all thou hast ever owed, has he abundantly and fully paid; not only all thy sins have been once, and for ever laid upon him, but all his righteousness is once, and for ever, laid on thee. Henceforth thou art to me as one clad in the garments of righteousness and salvation, which belong to the only begotten Son." I would ask, can you conceive any thing more blissful to the soul of the poor trembling sinner than an assurance such as this? Pardon, and grace, and strength, and perseverance, are, indeed, most blessed boons; but here, is one which outweighs them all; which restores to the human soul that image of GOD which Adam defaced and ruined; that clothes it in a righteousness not only as perfect, but infinitely more perfect, infinitely more valuable in the sight of GOD than Adam's righteousness could ever have been, had he remained from the day of his creation to this present hour, the spotless tenant of his earthly paradise. But, delightful as is the belief, that such is really the statement of the Divine word with reference to this great subject, there are some, perhaps, who would most willingly and gratefully apply it to themselves, if only they could believe that it was the statement of God's own word, and not a mere portion of the divinity system of some human teacher. We shall proceed, then, to demonstrate that which I have now asserted, that you may examine the word of GoD for yourselves, to see whether these things be so. First, let us clearly understand what we mean by this imputation of Christ's righteousness. And for this purpose let us refer to the epistle of Paul to Philemon, which has often been considered as furnishing a peculiarly plain and simple illustration of the doctrine. We there find the great Apostle to the Gentiles condescending to entreat with Philemon, the master of Onesimus, because of his runaway servant, and thus expresses himself, "If he," Onesimus, "hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account. I Paul have written it with mine own hand, I will repay it." Onesimus, although guilty of running away, guilty, probably of theft and other enormities, worthy, therefore, of bonds, or even of death, was to be received by his former master; not as a culprit, not even as a servant,“ but,” as St. Paul says, "above a servant, a brother beloved." So the Apostle affectionately stipulates; he himselfun dertaking to make good every wrong to fulfil every broken obligation, and to take upon himself every debt, and every penalty, which Onesimus bad incurred. Here, then, you see the doctrine of imputation fully exem plified. All that Philemon had a right to demand St. Paul undertakes to pay. All that GOD could demand from each of us has been rendered, fully and entirely rendered, by our ever blessed Redeemer. (To be continued.) THE PREACHER. SERMON BY THE REV. H. BLUNT. No. 166.] THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1833. (The Rev. H. Blunt's Sermon concluded.) The illustration is not, however, perfect; for in the case of Onesimus, the surety beseeches, nay, entreats the master of Onesimus to accept him. In our case the master himself, even GOD the Father, finds a surety; and both are agreed, and both are concerned in every operation of this act of love... Having thus examined what we intend by using the term "imputed" or "reckoned," which St, Paul so frequently adopts in the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, let us proceed to examine, what declarations of divine writ there are on which to build the doctrine that in this sense the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ is our righteousness. I shall pass by all those declarations of Scripture "In the Lord I have righteousness and strength;" and "The righteousness of GOD is unto all, and upon all them that believe," and many similar passages, confining myself to the application of a single passage; for if the mouth of Him, who cannot lie, hath spoken it, it will be as convincing to his people, and as certain, and unquestionable to their hearts, if it be but a single word, as it if were blazoned on every page, and written in every chapter in the Bible. The passage, then, I should select as one among the many foundation stones of this great doc VOL. VI. [Price 3d. trine is to be found in the close of the fifth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." The Apostle here distinctly draws a parallel between the disobedience of the first Adam, and the obedience of the second; and he says, as by the first many had been made sinners, so, in the same manner, by the second, shall many be made righteous. It is evident, then, that there is no force whatever in the assertion of the Apostle, unless the method by which the righteousness of Christ is to make us righteous, be precisely analogous to the method by which the sin of Adam has made us sinners. Now no true christian, however he may feel on the point immediately before us, will hesitate for a moment as to the scriptural view of the imputation of Adam's sin. No true christian denies that all mankind fell when Adam fell; that, as our federal head, what he did, we are considered to have done; and thus," as God's word repeatedly declares, we come into the world with a load of unpardoned guilt upon our souls; born in sin, " for in sin did our mothers conceive us," the most innocent infant in the world is a child of wrath even as others. This was the manner, D D then, in which by the disobedience | death, that is, from the cradle to the of one, all have been made sinners. Not by merely following the example of Adam, as the Platonians too vainly taught, and as our Ninth Article too plainly contradicts; but by the inherent corruption of human nature, stamped with the deadly impress of its great progenitor in a primeval sense, This, then, is the manner also in which many, nay, every child of GOD is made righteous before GOD. The moment you are born into the family of the earth, the sin of Adam is laid upon you, and cleaves to you, and becomes your sin; the moment you are born into the family of GoD, the righteousness of Christ is laid upon you, and remains upon you, and becomes your righteousness. From that hour you are, as the Apostle expresses it, complete in Christ; and being so complete, you claim (with reverence and deep humility be it spoken) you claim your acceptance at the hands of God's justice, according to the terms of the covenant with the everlasting Son; and that covenant having been fulfilled, GOD is, as St. John expresses it, righteous and just to forgive you your sins and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness. For it is thus, and thus only, that the words of the Holy Ghost can be fulfilled, that, "as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." It is thus, "that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth; and that compels GOD to admit, and to reward, as if it were the personal righteousness of his incarnate Son. In the day, then, that, by the act of sovereign grace, you close with the offers of your Redeemer, he be"the Lord your righteousIn his obedience even unto comes ness." cross, you are by God's mercy clothed: a wedding garment was well worthy of that wedding feast to which he has purchased your admittance. Arrayed in this, the poorest, weakest, most ignorant sinner in this house to day, shall not be ashamed, when he sits down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and all the saints of God at the marriage supper of the Lamb; for the highest, and most glorious guest in that assembly shall have no better, and, I may say, shall have no other wedding garment than yourself. "We overcame by the blood of the Lamb," we are told in Revelations, shall be the only watch word which shall enable you to pass the gate of the heavenly citadel; “We are clothed in the righteousness of the Lamb," shall be the only declaration which shall admit you to the wedding of the Lamb.. In conclusion, brethren, the prac tical inquiry we rest on, is simply, the question which each man's heart alone can answer. Is the Saviour of whom I have this day heard, “ the Lord my righteousness?" Do you ask how shall this be determined-what is the act of faith which is to make him mine? We reply, the first great point is, that which we endeavoured to set before you in the last discourse, the deep heartfelt uncompromising conviction, abhorrence and renunciation of sin--all sin—even the dearest sin-whatever is contrary to God's will and God's law. This once wrought in you, by that Holy Spirit, whose prerogative it is, as we have heard this morning, to convince the world of sin, we advance one step further, we come to the act of justifying faith which you require; that of which all Scripture, all experience, all living believers, all dying saints, all blessed martyrs, all hardened sinners stand in need a single thought, a single desire, a single word; but it consists of a state of mind, of affections, of heart-that state which the Holy Spirit alone can work in any corrupt, polluted child of fallen Adam—that state which enables you to live all for Christ, to seek all from Christ, and to find all and more than all, in Christ. of. Now this act is not comprised in, than that this may be not a momentary impulse, as it too often is, strongly affecting the mind, but like a cloud, retaining its appearance only for a moment, and then passing away for ever; but an abiding, habitual hold on your affections and heart, enabling you to say, not once, but for ever, what the great Apostle of the Gentiles said of himself, "The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of GOD, who loved me, and gave himself for me. No desire so near my heart as to obey and honour him in my day and generation-no grief so great as when I am from him—no pleasure so heartfelt and sincere as when I hope I am living most to his honour and glory. What things were once gain to me I now count loss for Christ, Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith." With these feelings, "to you to live, will be Christ, and to die will be gain." Your life will be holy My brethren, is this your state at this moment? Can you say, from your hearts, there is no sin, no thought, no action, no thing, which I would not willingly sacrifice and desire to sacrifice if Christ desired it—there is no act, no thought, no word, no righteousness of man, with which I would wish to approach GOD. I not only acknowledge, but I feel that my best is nothing worth; all is vile, all polluted, all deserving rather punishment for their short coming, than a reward for their merits. I give up all, I renounce all, I abhor all, if put in competition with what my Saviour has done and suffered for man. To that, and to that alone I look, my only hope, my only solace, my only, and all sufficient Saviour, is Jesus Christ, the Rock of Ages. Then, brethren, as regards each individual among you, who is able by self-adaptation to make it his own, this is the name whereby GoD, at this moment, calls his Son, "The Lord your righteousness;" this is that justifying faith which makes you one with GOD, and GOD with you; this is that state of heart and affections which all preaching, all reading, meditation, and prayer, is intended instrumentally to produce-to build up to establish. We ask nothing more for you, or for ourselves, your death peaceful-your eternity glorious; and when your heart and your strength fail, he, whom you have loved, and worshipped, and obeyed here, shall be "the strength of your heart, and your portion for ever." "The Lord your righteousness," shall be the Lord of your everlasting happiness in the kingdom of his Father, Amen. A Sermon, DELIVERED BY THE REV. H. MELVILL, AT CAMDEN CHAPEL, CAMBERWELL, NOVEMBER 18, 1833. Exodus, xx. 5.-" I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me." warned back from sin. All that is really advantageous in this life, is represented as procurable by righteousness; so that if a man consult nothing but his temporal interests; it is thought that he would best gain his end by the cultivation of piety; and then the future is made to strugglē THERE is this great difference be- | expostulations by which men are tween physical and moral evil, that men will use all their carefulness to avoid the one, while every imaginable prohibition is ineffectual to deter them from the other. It is not need ful that you should issue enactments to restrain them from rushing over precipices, or throwing themselves into fires; the principle of self-pre-into a kind of present existence, servation supplies the place of all law, and renders useless the interference of the magistrate. Now it is quite evident that there is not in our nature the principle of, what we may call, a moral self-preservation. Had we never fallen, but kept holy and undefiled the properties with which humanity was originally endowed, there might, we think, have been as great a sensitiveness to moral evil, as there confessedly is still, to physical evil; but as the case now stands, the sense of physical evil is nothing corresponding to moral evil; on the contrary, the confessed bias of the soul is on the side of unrigh teousness, and so far from instinctively shunning, we run eagerly into the practice of iniquity. Hence it is, that whilst the Governor of the universe has not thought it necessary to interpose the precepts of his statute book, that we may be warned against physical evil, he has heaped together edicts and motives which all bear on the avoidance of moral evil. If you examine well the Bible, you cannot fail to be struck with the variety of arguments and bringing all that is august and awful in the human destiny, to deter from evil and animate to virtue. We know, indeed, that such is the desperate proneness of man to misdoing, that all this wonderful apparatus is praetically of no effect; but it is singular to observe, how every motive, by which our nature can be plied, is brought into play; so that the Divine legislator has left nothing unturned in order to win us from iniquity. If a man be wrapped up in selfishness, it is told him that health, and peace, and reputation, and property will be best consulted in his seeking, “first the kingdom of GoD and his righteousness." Does he care only for himself, then, if he would not hate his own flesh, and mar his own hap piness, let him cultivate that “godliness which hath the promise of the present life as well as that which is to come." And if the man be incapable of this kind of attack, if he be content for the gratification of his senses, and the indulgence of his passions to brave the penalties of the law of the Almighty, the Bible will open upon him another battery, and seek to |