which God will possess to all eternity, be completed, and they completely glorified, and settled in the heavenly possession, which is the glorious kingdom that the saints of the Most High shall possess for ever, even for ever and ever, Dan. vii. 18.

Thus the redeemed shall never perish; they shall return with songs, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away; they are sealed to the day of redemption, and have got an earnest of the purchased possession in their hearts; they shall possess the kingdom for ever and ever. These were chosen in Christ before the world was, and had life given them in Christ before Adam was formed; they were predestinated to the adoption of sons; and because they are sons, by predestination and pre-adoption, God sends forth the Spirit of his Son into their hearts, crying, Abba, Father, Gal. iv. 6. They are called sheep before they are called by grace, and sons of peace, before ever they hear any thing about peace: "Into whatsoever house ye enter, say, Peace be to this house; and if the son of peace be there, your peace shall rest upon it; but if not, it shall turn to you again." To these predestinated heirs of promise were the promises made in Christ; to these God has sworn that he never will be wroth with them, nor forsake them: and when God can be perjured by free thoughts, and made a liar, then shall the elect fall from grace, but not till then. "Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew to the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath that by two immutable things [his promise and oath], in which it was

impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast."

When our author has done his best, he will find, that those who were chosen in Christ, and given to Christ, were redeemed, and no more. Those that were left out of this choice are in old Adam. They are called the children of the flesh; Adam is their father, and Hagar is their mother, in the allegory; for the seed was not to be called in Ishmael, but in Isaac, who was a child of promise in every sense. Cain and Abel; Shem and Canaan ; Ishmael and Isaac; Esau and Jacob; the son that promised to go into the vineyard, and went not, and the other that said that he would not, but went; the elder son displeased at sovereign grace, and the younger, called the prodigal, that was saved by it; are all set forth, to shew the difference between the elect and non-elect; the children of the flesh and the children of the Spirit; the heirs of wrath and the heirs of promise; the children of God and the children of the devil, 1 John iii. 10. And how our author will bring these two families together, I know not. 'The elect are in no danger of perishing,' because they have got better security than our author's free thought; they have the absolute decree of God, the promise of God, and the oath of God, besides the covenant of grace, the atonement of Christ, and the seal of God's Spirit. This is their security, and all these things must become a blank before one elect soul can perish.

Our author goes on to prove universal redemption by the following scriptures. "I exhort, therefore, that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth; for the Mediator gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time," 1 Tim. ii. 1—6. The Spirit of supplication never put up one petition in this world for the eternal salvation of all men. Nor did Christ ever pray for all men. "I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world. I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me out of it," John xvii. 6, 9.

It is true, Christ prayed for some of his murderers: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Yet it is clear, those that he then prayed for were some of them that his Father gave him out of the world, upon whose consciences Peter charged the blood of Christ. "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." These were pricked in their hearts, received the word, and were added to the church; while the children of the bond-woman stood mocking the heirs of promise, as Ishmael their father did before them, saying, "These men are full of new wine," Acts ii. 13.

The apostle's exhortation, that prayers may be

made for all men, is with this restriction, for kings, and all that are in authority, that the saints may lead a quiet and peaceable life, 1 Tim. ii. 2; that is, that God might put a stop to the persecution of these kings and governers, as all hearts are in his hands, and incline them to minister justice unto evil doers, and defend them that do well; that we may lead quiet and peaceable lives in godliness and honesty; or that God might convert them, if it were his will; as some kings and queens have been, and are yet to be, nursing fathers and mothers to the church, who are to come to the light and to the brightness of Zion's rising.

Christ gave himself a ransom for all, signifies no more than a ransom for some of all nations, agreeable to the promise made to Abraham, "In thee and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." Some of all ranks, some of all sorts of sinners, agreeable to the oracles of God; some out of every nation, kindred, tongue, and people, Rev. v. 9. It may have reference to the time. coming, when the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ; which there is little sign of at present.

The word, all, does not mean the whole human race, ransomed from the curse of the law, the wrath of God, and damnation of hell; this cannot be proved, until it can be proved that the gate that leads to destruction is locked up; which never will be while so many free-willers, free-thinkers, and universal liars, get into pulpits. Before the king

doms of this world become the kingdoms of God and of his Christ, the mouths of them that speak lies must be stopped, Psalm lxiii. 11; and the everlasting gospel must be preached to every nation under heaven, Rev. xiv. 6. When this day appears, free-thinkers shall be discovered by the light of the Lord, and free-agency consumed by the breath of his lips; for it cannot be supposed that the free thoughts of carnal men can be called the everlasting gospel, or that life and immortality should be brought to light by them. If the words, all, and every man, mean the whole human race, our author would make a strange hand of the Bible by his thoughts on the following texts: "They be all adulterers," Jer. ix. 2; "and great grace was upon them all," Acts iv. 33; "that they all might be

damned," 2 Thess. ii. 12;

"that all should come

to repentance," 2 Peter iii. 9; "they went out, that they might be made manifest, that they were not all of us," 1 John ii. 19; "if one died for all, then were all dead," 2 Cor. v. 14; "for all seek their own, not the things that are Christ's," Phil. ii. 21; "every man shall eat the flesh of his own arm," Isa. ix. 20; "then shall every man have praise of God," 1 Cor. iv. 5; therefore "every man's heart shall melt," Isa. xiii. 7; every man in the chambers of his imagery," Ezek. viii. 12; "God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith," Rom. xii. 3; "every man is a friend to him that giveth gifts," Prov. xix. 6; "every man was determined to send relief to the brethren," Acts

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