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LETTER V.

SIR,

YOUR Letter now before me, though a long one, seems not to require a long answer; because it is chiefly taken up, in conformity with the wretched fashion of the times, with indiscriminate censures of the established clergy.

You do me the honour to invest me with the office of "spokesman for the whole body." But having received no commission from my brethren to plead their cause, they may probably wish, should they think their defence necessary, to employ a more able advocate. I shall only take the liberty, therefore, of repeating what has been already said in my Postscript to occasional Separatists; that whilst I would "cordially join with you and every well-wisher to his country, in bearing the most public testimony against that lukewarmness in the cause of Christ, that indifference and even daring contempt for religion, which characterise the present age; and whilst I admit, as in truth must, that some of our clergy do not feel that interest for

the Christian cause which they ought to feel; and by their injudicious conformity to the manners of a dissipated age lessen that influence which their sacred profession ought to have in the world; I still am inclined to think, that, taken as a body, they are more wanting in zeal than in knowledge. But upon this subject, were I disposed to enlarge, it would not well become me to do so, sensible as I am of my own manifold defects."*

But though I feel myself justified in declining to enter on the general defence of my condemned brethren, yet it may be expected that I should make some answer to what is particularly addressed to myself.

In page 131 you make an extract from my book, which appears to me to speak plain language; but to you, it seems, it is perfectly unintelligible. Your comment upon it is this: "Now if any man upon earth can find out what meaning, drift, or system is to be collected from the above jumble; or, to use the words of that good old martyr Bishop Latimer, mingle mangle of law and Gospel, grace and works; I shall much extol his ingenuity, especially if he can explain the latter part of the quotation."

I thought that I had written with sufficient clearness upon this subject, not to be misunderstood by any considerate reader. The idea in my mind upon it, appeared to myself to be perfectly clear; but as an author is not always so fortunate in his expressions, as to leave his reader fully possessed of his meaning, I am obliged to you, Sir, for giving me this opportunity of reviewing my ground. It * Guide, p. 246.

is certainly most important ground. As such, if it be not maintainable upon my plan, I shall, upon conviction, be the first to give it up.

In the passage to which you so strongly object, describing it as a mingle mangle of law and Gospel, grace and works, the position laid down is thisthat fallen man, through the redemption by Jesus Christ, has been placed in a salvable condition; and that obedience to the moral law upon the Gospel plan, is necessary to render the Christian scheme complete; by qualifying fallen men for (or in the language of the Apostle, making him meet to be partaker of) the salvation that has been purchased for him, by the merits of a crucified Saviour.*

Thus far I still think the ground firm. The redemption of the world by Jesus Christ was general. The benefit of Christ's righteousness, we are informed by the Apostle, was co-extensive with the fatal effects of Adam's fall. If the redemption of the world by Christ had placed man in a state of absolute salvation, all men must in consequence have been saved.

But even among those to whom the Gospel was first preached, we are told, that many were called, but few chosen. So it is in all ages of the Church. Many are called by the preaching of the Gospel, but few, comparatively speaking, embrace it; consequently few will be saved by it. What, then it may be asked, did the redemption by Christ do for fallen man in general? I answer, it removed a fatal stumbling-block out of his way; it opened a door which had been shut against him, and at * Guide, p. 221. + Rom. v. 18.

the same time furnished him with the ability to enter in.

In a word, it restored fallen man to that right to eternal life, which had been forfeited by Adam's breach of the condition on which it was originally suspended; a right derived only from Divine promise, and which, by the mercy of the second cove nant in Jesus Christ, was re-established on a different but more secure condition. When we speak, therefore, with reference to man being removed out of the condemned state of fallen nature, into a renewed state of grace under the second covenant; we may be understood to mean, that he has thereby been placed in a state of actual salvatión; but when speaking with an eye to his final condition, we say that redemption by Christ placed him, not in a state of actual, but of possible or conditional salvation; a salvation in some measure dependent upon his conduct under the appointed means of grace. A conclusion which evidently follows from the nature of that judgment which is finally to be passed upon him: for the Son of Man "shall come in the glory of his Father, with his angels; then he shall reward every man according to his works.”*

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Possessed of this leading idea, the reader will be prepared for the explanation of the latter part of the quotation. "The line between the covenant of works and covenant of grace cannot, I say, too exactly or too frequently marked out; because, as man is now circumstanced, the one is a covenant of death, the other a covenant of life."

* Matt xvi. 27.

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