as our Father who is in heaven is perfect; " that is to be lacking in nothing which his goodness is willing to impart, or to qualify us to attain, let us be earnestly concerned that the transcript of his Divine perfections may be brought forth in our hearts and lives; we "being not conformed to this world, but transformed by the renewing of our minds, that we may prove," from time to time, "what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God concerning us;" which "is our sanctification" and salvation.

Lecture V.

ON GRACE AND DUTY.

"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

Every Christian virtue consists of two essential parts-Grace and Duty. Grace in whatever proportion communicated, is a Divine gift; duty is that reception and occupation of the gift which are required of the creature, being that obedience which is placed equally within his power to yield or to withhold. This power may at first be very limited, extending only to the resistance or nonresistance of the grace bestowed; but it is enlarged by every visitation of the grace duly received. Thus its sphere of operation, though in the beginning it was that only of passivity and non-resistance, becomes that of activity, and co-operation with the measure of grace, to the effecting of the Divine

may be either purely mental, or both mental and coporeal, according to the nature of the Divine requiring.

Man is a complex being, consisting of a twofold nature, distinguished in Scripture by the inward and the outward man.' His bountiful Creator and merciful Redeemer, demands the dedication of both to his service; and accordingly has endowed him with a progressive capacity for the fulfilment of his active duty, as well as with power resulting from this grace, to resist and gradually overcome, all those corruptions of his nature and temptations of the enemy, which would oppose the work of salvation: and when this "enemy shall come in like a flood," there is a promise of a super-added measure of grace, even that "the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him.”

Some of the operations of the grace and good Spirit of the Lord in the soul of man, are or may be antecedent to any, the most passive acquiescence of the will of the creature; such as the drawings of the Heavenly Father's love-the sense of his goodness, mercy, and truth, to attract to the knowledge of Himself also convictions

for sin, calls to repentance, and condemnation for disobedience. There are likewise other operations of the Grace and good Spirit of the Lord which appear to be equally gratuitous, and independent of any concurrence of the will of man.

The fruits of the Spirit, as enumerated by the apostle, appear to embrace both descriptions of operation, and might be distinguished by the respective similes of spontaneous and of cultivated fruits; or by the more appropriate denominations of Christian graces, and Christian virtues. The first three enumerated by the apostle are confessedly of the former class-love, joy, peace; and the six following are evidently of the second class-long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance; to which might be added-patience and charity. All these of the second class are acts consisting both of grace and duty. That such is their true character is obvious by their being enjoined and enforced by many spiritual precepts; and the deficiency of them condemned, because the concurrence of the will is necessary to their production, and the withholding of that concurrence is reprehensible. Thus Thomas said: " Except I shall see in His

into His side, I will not believe;" which exhibits faith as an act of the will, as well as an effect of grace. But who was ever reprehended for his inexperience of love, joy, peace? unless this inexperience, this want of a sense of the love of God shed abroad in the heart, were attributable to his having violated the manifested will of his Creator, or so persisted in the violations as to become a stranger to His love and peace; and unsusceptible of the joys of His salvation.

The Christian duties just enumerated may indeed be considered, some of them especially, as deeds of the mind, or as mental rather than as bodily exercises, and especially that of faith. But let it be remembered, how imperfect in its operation, how inefficacious in its result, would be the gift of faith without its appropriate works!-the works resulting from the obedience of faith, as exemplified in numerous instances in sacred record, by confession, contrition, and repentance with correspondent action; and also patient submission to all the trials by which true faith becomes proved and purified. See the instances of each kind as rehearsed in the eleventh chapter to the Hebrews; also those exhibited in the conduct of Stephen, and of all the faithful disciples of our