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our beft fecurity against any ill confequence of our defects and frailties, is a godly forrow. And therefore I wonder not if David charge himself more severely than God does, My fins are more in number than the bairs of my head. This was a confeffion that became the humility and folicitude of a penitent; that became the reflections of a wife and perfect man, and the corruption of human nature; the alloy of human performances; the flips and defects, the interruptions, neglect, and deviations of the best life.

CHAP. VI.

Of liberty, as it imports freedom or deliverance from mortal fin. What mortal fin is. How the perfect man must be free from it. And which way this liberty may be beft attained; with fome rules for the attainment of it.

H

ERE I will inquire into three things;.

1. What mortal fin is; or what kind of fins they be, which are on all hands acknowledged to be inconfiftent with a state of grace and favour.

2. How far the perfect man must be fet free or delivered from this kind of fins; or how remote he is from the guilt of them.

3. Which way this liberty may be best attained.

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§. 1. The first thing neceffary is, to ftate the notion of that fin, which paffes under the name of mortal, wilful, prefumptuous, or deliberate fin: for these in writers are equivalent terms, and promifcuoufly used to fignify one and the fame thing. Sin (faith St. John, 1 Ep. iii. 4.) is the tranfgreffion of the law. This is a plain and full definition too of fin: for the law of God is the rule of moral actions 'tis the ftandard and measure of right and wrong, of moral good and evil. Whatever is not within the compafs of the law, is not within the compass of morality neither: Whatever cannot be comprehended within this definition, cannot have in it the entire and compleat notion of fin; or, which is all one, it cannot be fin, in a ftrict, proper, and adequate fenfe of the word. Hence St. John in the fame verfe tells us, that whofoever finneth, tranfgreffeth the law. And St. Paul. Rom. iv. 15. Where there is no law, there is no tranfgreffion. Sin then must always fuppofe a law; without which there can be neither

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neither vice nor virtue, righteousness nor wickedness for thefe are nothing else but the violation or obfervation of the law of God; or habits and states refulting from the one or the other. But this is not all two things more must be remarked, to render this definition, which the a poftle gives us of fin, clear and full. First, The law must be fufficiently revealed. Secondly, The tranfgreffion of it must be truly voluntary.

1. By fufficient revelation of a divine law, every one understands, that the law must be fo published to the man who is to be governed by it, that the authority and fenfe of it may be, if it be not his own fault, rendered evident to him. If the divine authority of any rule or precept be doubtful and uncertain, the obligation of it will be fo too: and it is as neceffary that the fenfe of the law fhould be evident, as its authority. The law, that is penned in dark and ambiguous terms, is, properly fpeaking, no law at all; fince the mind of the Lawgiver is not fufficiently made known by it. Whatever is neceffarily to be forborn or done by us, must be fully and clearly prefcribed in the law of God; and if it be not, it can never be neceffary. Men through weakness or defign may enact laws that are but a heap of letters, a croud of dubious Delphick

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fentences: but God can never do fo, because this is repugnant both to his wisdom and goodness, and to the very end of a law too, which is to be a rule, not a fnare; 'tis to give understanding to the fimple; to be a light to our feet, and a lamp to our paths; not like an Ignis fatuus, to betray us into brakes and precipices, and ruin, and death.

2. The tranfgreffion must be a voluntary one. And this imports two things: 1.A knowledge of the law. 2. Consent to the breach of it. First, As to the knowledge of the law. All that I have to say here in a few words, is, that ignorance of the law excufes a tranfgreffion, when it is it felf excufable; but if the ignorance it felf be criminal, the effect of it must be fo too. We must never think of excusing our fins, by alledging an ignorance into which, not our own incapacity, or any other reasonable cause, but neglect or contempt of the truth, or fome other vicious luft or paffion, has betrayed us. Secondly, As to the confent of the will; this is neceffary to demonstrate any action finful or virtutuous; without this the mind will be no partner in the fin, and by confequence cannot be involved in the guilt of it. Whatever we cannot help, is our misfortune, not our fault; actions merely natural, or merely forced, can neither be good

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nor evil.

The concurrence of reafon and choice is indifpenfably neceffary to the morality of an action. All this is plainly taught us by St. James i. 14, 15. But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own luft, and enticed. Then when luft hath conceived, it bringeth forth fin; and fin when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Which words do certainly imply, that the Spring and principle of fin is within our felves; that 'tis our natural corruption that entices and allures us; and 'tis our consent to its enticements that gives being to fin, and defiles us with guilt.

From all this now put together 'tis eafy to conclude what fort of a defcription we are to form of mortal fin: 'tis fuch a tranfgreffion of the law of God, as is vicious in its original, deliberate in its commiffion, and mischievous in its tendencies or effects the heart is corrupted and mifled by fome luft or other, and fo confents to the breach of the moral law of God, a law of eternal and immutable goodnefs or if the fin confifts in the breach of any pofitive law, it must yet imply in it fome moral obliquity in the will, or it the tendency of the action, or both. So that prefumptuous, or mortal fin, call in by what name we will, is a deliberate tranfgreffion of a known law of God, tending to the dishonour of God, the inju

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