returning to more congenial engagements, in which it is soon lost or forgotten.

Now to such a person I appeal, whether this be not the very feeling of mind with which he abandons his presumed inquiry for salvation? And, while he will find little reason for hesitating in his reply, he may see a most powerful motive to awaken him to a more permanent sense of danger, in a consciousness that it is the love of sin which holds him back from embracing the gospel. It is ignorance of this truth, or indifference to it, which suffers him to pass so easily again to listlessness and folly.

There is another difficulty, which deserves some consideration; both because it is a misrepresentation of an important doctrine, and because it affords to many what is considered a plausible pretext for secret despair or presumptuous neglect. I mean a difficulty originating in a misconstruction of the doctrine of election. This is not only a stumbling block in the way of the inquirer, but it is a frequent excuse in the mouths of the careless. The complaints of the two kinds of persons are substantially the same, though they may differ in form. The latter is expressed somewhat as follows: "If I am elected, I shall be saved if not, it is useless to apply for salvation." The former affirms, that an effort has been made :

and an unfavourable conclusion is drawn from its failure. "I have tried; but in vain. I see I am not elected, and therefore I dismiss the subject," Is it not strange that men who, in other concerns, are not deficient in good sense, should make the secret counsels of God a rule for their own action? That they should profess to be governed by a law of which they are confessedly ignorant? That they should discard, in their spiritual affairs, the simple process of reasoning which they adopt in the common things of life? Or shall we account for all this, by affirming that the caviller neither means nor believes what he says? And that the inquirer intends only to avow the weariness of his pursuit? We have great reason to believe that this is indeed the case. And if it be so, what wickedness does not this trifling evince! What horrible impiety, in uttering a known falsehood under circumstances rendered so solemn by the loud calls of the Holy Spirit!

To either objector, the following remarks and questions may be worthy of attention. You cannot but feel and know, that you have the choice of holiness or sin? You are certainly conscious that you lie under no restraint from good, or compulsion to evil? You are at liberty, so far as your own agency is concerned, to adopt the line of conduct to which you are really and sincerely

Ex

inclined, whether it be worldly or spiritual. perience and scripture coincide in the proof of this position. The freedom of the will is not a matter in dispute. But if your difficulties on the subject of predestination were consistent, you would reason thus: " I am fore-ordained to the commission of good or evil; I know not which: but until I can ascertain this, I will make no choice of either." And the consequence would, at least, be an honest effort to avoid iniquity. Now no such reasoning, or effort, ensues. You continue in the way of the transgressor: and in doing so, you shew which you prefer; you are deliberately choosing and fixing your own destiny. Is your complaint, then, any thing less than a cover of hypocrisy; a cloak thrown over the criminal resolutions of a depraved and treacherous heart?

Again: you cannot find any decree which forbids your acting righteously, or that can extinguish a desire of salvation in your bosom. What, then, has this doctrine to do in the question before you? All the invitations of the gospel are distinct from it; they are never given with a design that we should pry into the secret counsels of God, in order to discover their application to us; and those counsels can never contradict them.

Take the following case. A ruler offers pardon to certain rebellious subjects, on condition

Some of them

that they lay down their arms. comply, and are pardoned. One refuses, and thus he gives his reason: "I am not among the number whom the Sovereign designed to save, and it is therefore useless to accept the terms of forgiveness." Now would you not say of this man, that he falsifies the assertions of the gracious ruler, and multiplies his own guilt? But the offers of our Divine Sovereign are not less explicit; and the conduct of the rejecting sinner is not less flagrant.

Why do you conclude with such certainty, that you are not among the elect? Has any one revealed this awful truth? If not, your conclusion has no higher origin than conjecture. And what is this, but a criminal intermeddling, or a profane trifling, with things that belong only to God? If such a conjecture detains you from the love of Jesus Christ, is it not criminal? Are you not destroying your soul with weapons of your own fabrication?

The Holy Scriptures, as well as the economy of the divine government, abundantly prove that non-election can never be the ground of condemnation. God will judge us by our own works, and not by his secret decrees. The doom of the lost will be, because they "love darkness rather than light," because they prefer iniquity to holiness.

In a practical sense, at least, the following expostulation, which Milton puts into the mouth of the Creator, is applicable here:

Nor can justly accuse

Their Maker, or their making, or their fate:
As if predestination overruled

Their will, dispos'd by absolute decree

Or high foreknowledge. They themselves decreed
Their own revolt, not I. If I foreknew,
Foreknowledge had no influence on their fault;
Which had no less prov'd certain, unforeknown.
So, without least impulse or shadow of fate,
Or ought by me immutable foreseen,
They trespass, authors to themselves, in all
Both what they judge and what they choose.

Can it be true, that, "whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved," and that God "commandeth all men every where to repent," and yet that he secretly means to reject the prayer of the penitent? If it be so, then you have a singular ground of security; for the condemnation is, that the sinner wilfully refuses the offer of salvation ; whereas no such offer was made to you; or, it was not in your power to accept it. Are you prepared to take this plea to the judgment seat? Will you not shudder at so bold a presumption, at an appeal so daring?

In any such instance as this, it should be remembered, that there cannot be a serious sense of danger, a deep conviction of sin, or any sincere