"Enthusiasts, pretenders to new revelations, bigoted sectaries, and imposing churchmen, on the one hand, with infidels and sceptics on the other, and all who, to maintain their unscriptural tenets, or to exclude those mysteries which they reject, would either expunge part of the sacred canon, or invalidate its divine authority, with all those who think or say that it is of no consequence what men believe, have abundant cause to tremble at this solemn warning.* Critics, who are continually proposing conjectural alterations, or expunging from the text of Scripture, and adding to it, often on frivolous grounds, on slight authority, are in no small danger; and expositors in general have abundant cause to be cautious and humble. Indeed I am ready to tremble at the awful responsibility to which I have subjected myself when I write upon this testimony of Christ, and think of the work in which I have been during so many years engaged. But the merciful Saviour will no more condemn unintentional mistakes, in the honest writer, who desires to help men to understand his word, and proceeds in simple, humble dependence on his teaching, than he will the honest preacher; and I trust this effort to explain his Holy Scriptures, though feeble and defective, has been conducted from proper motives, and in dependence on the Lord. I can confidently appeal to my heart-searching Judge, that I have, as far as I know, written" and spoken "word for word, what I supposed he would have me write" and speak, “without adding, altering, or keeping back the sense of any passage, willingly, to save any personal end or party interest, from fear of incurring reproach or opposition, or desire of conciliating the favour of any man or set of men whatever; and that the mistakes which have been made were involuntary, the effects of ignorance and error, not of design."

*See Rev. xxii. 18, 19.

THE FIFTH WITNESS.

Such

"I," the FIFTH WITNESS, "have been an instructer of youth for forty-seven years, and a preacher of the gospel thirtyfour. In studying the Scriptures, as a theological employment, I have found no small difficulty in permitting them to speak for themselves. I have found texts in them, in various instances, thwarting opinions which I had entertained, with little or no suspicion that they could be erroneous. opinions, by an authority which I durst not oppose, I have been compelled to give up. Whether I have adopted better in their place is yet to be determined. One consideration furnishes me with a satisfactory hope, that what I have taught is, substantially at least, the truth of God. It is this the substance is the same with that which is found in almost every Protestant Creed and Confession of Faith; and with the scheme adopted in every age by that part of the Christian church, which has gained every where the appropriate name of Orthodox." (But it is said that "the views of my own attainments as a Christian are unaffectedly humble; that on this subject I am always reluctant to converse, conceiving-that mere professions are of little value that rarely, if ever, have I been known to mention it; and that I never speak of myself as a Christian; that my humility in this respect is striking; that when speaking of the Christians present, I never include myself among them that my declarations on this subject, in health and in sickness, always are that I do not know that I have any personal interest in the mediation of Christ: that I am usually free from distressing doubts and apprehensions, and that my hopes are often bright and supporting.")

:

"The Scriptures are a law, possessed of divine authority and obligation; they are the word of God, dictated by his

wisdom, goodness, and truth. They are the word of Him who cannot mistake, deceive, nor injure. Consequently they contain 'all things necessary for life and godliness,' whatever we need to know, and whatever we ought to do, for the attainment of his approbation. We are bound on the one hand not to question the truth, and on the other not to dispute the wisdom and goodness, of that which is revealed. All things which this sacred book contains are to be received as they are. Our own opinions are implicitly to bow before them, and we are ever to be ready to believe that what we think the foolishness of God to be wiser than men,' than all the substituted opinions of ourselves or others. Let God be true,' ought to be our invariable language, but every man who opposes his declarations a liar. The gospel contains whatever it expresses, and whatever it implies, but it contains nothing more. Nothing more, then, can be lawfully inculcated by any teacher as a part of the gospel.

"In examining the express declarations of Scripture, we are bound to give them that sense which the words obviously convey, the current of the context demands, and the circumstances in which they were uttered point out.

"Beyond this we cannot go, without adding to the words of God, and exposing ourselves to be reproved by him, and found liars. This sense we cannot change at all for one which we conceive will better suit, and support any part or the whole of a preconceived system, a doctrine of our own philosophy, or a tenet of the church, sect, or party to which we belong. Thus saith the Lord, is to every Christian a pole-star, an infallible guide over the ocean of doubt. To know that any thing is the will of God is enough. He obeys, and asks no reasons to prove his obedience wise and safe.

"A man, employed in supporting a darling point, will, when hardly pushed, very naturally feel, that, as he undoubtedly must be right in his own system, so the Scriptures must somewhere declare that which he, at the time, wishes to teach. With these views he will naturally hunt for the— passages which come nearest to the doctrine in question;

and will as naturally believe that the meaning which he wishes to assign to them is their true meaning. Hence he will attribute to them the implication which he wishes to find. The whole of this process is wrong from the beginning. Every man, particularly every minister, is bound to take up the Bible with a desire and an intention not to find it supporting his own doctrines, but to learn merely what it actually declares, and to conform both his opinions and wishes to its declarations. In this way, he may humbly hope to discover the truth; in the other, he may be almost assured that he will be left in error.

"It is a hard thing for a man to believe the Scriptures, and not an easy one for a preacher. Generally, he may believe the great doctrines contained in them, and perhaps with no great difficulty. But when particular passages appear to thwart his own opinions, he will ever be in danger of bending them into a conformity to those opinions. His whole soul, on the contrary, ought to be yielded to the dictates of the Scriptures, and humbly to receive whatever God hath spoken. All persons who assemble to hear the gospel are here taught the manner in which they are bound to receive the truth. They are bound to receive it in its purity and simplicity, just as it was taught by Christ. They are bound to hear it with a reverential, ready, and obedient mind, as the law of life, and the only means of salvation.

"Our Saviour declares, 'He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned;' that is, he who cordially believes the gospel preached by the Apostles, shall have eternal life; and that he who does not thus believe the gospel, shall not have eternal life. It will be remembered, that the Apostles alone published the gospel to mankind. Of course, the only belief of which Christ can be supposed to speak in this passage, is the belief of the gospel which they have published.

"On the belief of this gospel, then, Christ has made the salvation of the whole human race absolutely to depend; that is, so far as it should be published to them. And every one who reads the gospel must know, that to be baptized in

the name of Christ, is to make a public and most solemn profession of faith in him as the Redeemer of mankind. Evangelical faith and repentance are indispensable to the existence of any moral good in the soul of man, and are in all instances the beginning of that good, for no man ever obeys, in a scriptural sense, until after he has believed.

Regeneration is of the highest importance to man, as a subject of the Divine Government. With his former disposition, he was a rebel against God: with this, he becomes cheerfully an obedient subject. Of an enemy, he becomes a friend; of an apostate, he becomes a child.

"Regeneration is exclusively the work of the Spirit of God, as the following passages shew: 'But to as many as received him gave he power to become the Sons of God; even to them that believe on his name. Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.'* In this passage of Scripture it is asserted, that the birth by which mankind become the Sons of God, is derived not from blood, or natural descent; nor from the will of the flesh; nor from the will of man; that is, not from human contrivance and determination in any form; but from God.

"The natural character is considered by the apostle Paul as differing from the regenerated, according to the full import of these two names; the old man, and the new man.

"The regenerated character is a new character. The assumption of this new character is equivalent to being renewed, or created anew; both of these expressions being used to denote it.

"The former character, or old man, is a corrupt character, conformed to deceitful lusts, or under the influence of such lusts. The new man, or new character, is created after, or in, the image of God.

"This image consists in knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness. For we are his workmanship; created in Christ Jesus unto good works.'+ Here the Ephesian Christians are declared to be the workmanship of God, as to their + Eph. ii. 10.

* John i. 12, 13.