the same time that he was created innocent, and ignorant of evil, he was created a free agent, and, as such, with a power of obeying or disobeying his Creator. We know too well how he disobeyed him; and God, in his unalterable system of conduct towards man, which declares he will by no means clear the guilty, was therefore under the necessity of punishing him with that death which he had previously informed Adam should be the penalty of his disobedience: enmity was likewise hereafter to exist between the Tempter and mankind ; woman was to conceive in sorrow; the ground was cursed, and in sorrow man was to eat of it all the days of his life.

How fully and clearly each of these pénalties have been inflicted and fulfilled, every man and woman is sufficiently sensible: but God's invariable system of conduct equally declares him "longsuffering, and abundant "in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for "thousands, and forgiving iniquity, trans

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gression, and sin." Before he punishes man with temporary death, he is pleased graciously to give him obscure hopes of pardon, and of a restoration to his favour, by declaring, that "the seed of the woman

"should bruise the serpent's head." This is afterwards again virtually repeated to Abraham, and more generally to mankind, by the prophet Isaiah; "The Lord himself shall

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give you a sign: behold, a virgin shall con"ceive, and bear a son." The conquest of death is likewise foretold by the prophet Hosea*, in these remarkable words; "I will "ransom them from the power of the grave; "I will redeem them from death: O death, I "will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy "destruction."

Now as we are convinced by our senses and feelings that that part of God's denunciation on the tempted is literally fulfilled, which informs us, that the ground is cursed, and shall bring forth thorns and thistles; that woman should conceive in sorrow; and that man should be subject to sorrow all the days of his life; that there should be enmity betwixt the Devil and man, that is, a perpetual warfare in every human being, between the flesh and the spirit, between reason and passion: we ought by analogy to imagine that the remaining part of the denunciation passed on the Tempter would be equally ful

* Hosea xiii. 14.

filled; namely, that the serpent's head should be bruised; in other words, that death should be vanquished, and man restored to a capacity of being accepted by God, and rendered capable of enjoying that immortality he had forfeited, on his performing the conditions required of him for this purpose, viz. on his believing in the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and acquiring in this life such holiness, as every one must possess before he can be admitted into the presence of God.

Whoever will attentively consider the words of God and his actions relative to this most important of all important concerns, must allow an exact conformity and coincidence between them; and that in the gracious scheme of man's redemption a plan is clearly discernible, at one and the same time gratifying God's attribute of mercy, and satisfying that of his justice; and that in that scheme God is "abundant in goodness,

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keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving "iniquity, transgression, and sin;" and yet that he by no means clears the guilty, till, by the sacrifice of his Son on the cross, a due compensation and atonement is made for the offence committed against him.

The next proof to be adduced of the same

coincidence is his conduct to the antediluvians. It is expressly mentioned in Scripture, that "God saw the wickedness of man was

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great in the earth, and that every imagina"tion of the thoughts of his heart was only "evil continually. But Noah was a just "man, and perfect in his generation, and "Noah walked with God: and Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord."

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Here the conduct of God is exactly agreeable to the proclamation he was pleased to make of it: he is not extreme to mark what is amiss, and his mercy winks at errors arising from frailty; but when the heart is so exceedingly corrupt, that the thoughts of it are only evil continually, God's declaration, that he will not clear the guilty, necessarily applies to such abandoned sinners; they de serve the punishment they suffer, and it is no imputation on the goodness of God to inflict it. But Noah, who is a just man, is saved with his family; and thus God's mercy and goodness are equally shewn with his justice.

Another illustration of the present proposition is God's conduct to the people of Sodom. These people, it is well known, were a branch of the descendants of Ham ; so it may well be supposed that they in

herited something of the corrupt disposition of the original stock. When Lot came first among them, it is expressly said, that “the "men of Sodom were then wicked and sin"ners before the Lord exceedingly *;” that they were men who had rebelled against the true God, had set up the worship of false deities, and in consequence of that worship had plunged themselves into all kinds of vice and immorality, even the detestable practice of unnatural lusts. Their guilt was heinous, habitual, and general: they were not only abominable in their doings, but unanimously abominable; they all combined together in the same detestable purpose; "the "men of Sodom compassed the house

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around, both old and young, all the people "from every quarter;" a combination proving them to have been universally depraved, beyond imagination and beyond recovery. Their corruption was advanced to its last stage; and, there being no good principle among them that could be worked on, they were ripe for destruction. In this strong and particular case the longsuffering and good

*Gen. xiii. 13.

+ Colebant cultum alienum, et rebellabant in nomen Domini valde. Targum in loc.

Vide Owen's Sermons on the Scripture Miracles, vol. i. p. 224.