No sir: so far is this essay from being unfriendly to those doctrines, commonly, and very properly, called " the doctrines of grace," that it acknowledges, it confirms, it illustrates them every one. In truth the very intention of that little performance was to rescue them from the reproach to which they have been so long exposed, and to fix their demonstration on immoveable foundations. At present I refer you chiefly for my proofs, to several quotations in the circular before you; and only beg leave to add to that collection, a single passage from the third number of the essay. It is a paragraph on which the Presbytery have founded the eighth count of their libel: You would therefore be compelled to attend to it at any rate. And as it will serve to illustrate my real views, I presume there can be no objection made against your attending to it now.

"We seek, then, for some other, some unchanging, some permanent, universal bond of union that serves in fact, as well as in form of law, to unite the people of God to their exalted Head, and at the same time renders them members one of another. This indispensable, universal, everlasting bond the Scriptures every where point out. Without controversy it may be asserted of every infant, and of every ideot, as well as of all others, "if any man have not the SPIRIT OF CHRIST, he is none of his." In every case, without so much as one exception, it may be safely said, "if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness." And yet more clearly to our purpose, "if the SPIRIT of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you.' And hence the Apostle, in the first of the verses just quoted makes the question of regeneration, and by consequence of justification too, depend entirely upon the fact of the Holy Spirit having taken possession of the man: " ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, IF SO BE THAT THE SPIRIT OF GOD DWELL IN YOU." We read that "it is by one Spirit" that both Jew and Gentile have access through Christ unto the Father. And when believers, under the emblem of "living stones," are spoken of as parts of " the building fitly framed together, and growing unto an holy temple in the Lord," we read that they "are builded together for an habitation of God THRO' THE SPIRIT." In fact, that very faith which is said to justify the sinner, is called in so many words, a "fruit of the SPIRIT," and springs up only as one among the multitude of graces that are born together in the regenerated creature. The scriptural reader will readily turn up scores of passages, in which the immediate, the uniform, the indispensable agency of the Holy

Rom. viii 9, 10, 11. + Eph ii. 3. + Id. 22. S Gal. v. 22

Spirit is asserted, not only in the commencement, but through out the whole progress of spiritual life. And by availing him. self of the full blaze of scriptural light upon this subject, he will further discover, that to the saints in heaven as well as saints on earth, to the angels who kept their first estate as well as to regenerated man, the Spirit of Jehovah is the immediate dispenser of all their measures of grace and happiness. Nay, further, the Lord Jesus Christ himself, in whom is said to dwell" all the fulness of the Godhead bodily," was quickned, was gifted for the exercise of his ministry, was raised from the dead, and even after his ascension, when speaking in vision to the prophet John, dictated his epistles to the seven churches, through the supply that was given him of the Holy Spirit, with whom he was anointed with out measure; and who is, in fact, the communicator of every thing we call life to every creature in the universe of God.

We do not, however, intend a descant on the doctrine of the Spirit's agency. The few remarks offered, and scriptual passages adduced, are designed merely to bear upon the point in hand, by showing upon what grounds we now explicitly assert, that the Holy Ghost is the actual bond of union, and in the strict sense of the words, exclusively the bond of union by which the members become identified with the head, and united to one another. Not that federal union necessarily follows from the fact that all creatures partake of spiritual life, through a participation of the same Spirit. This angels do, and yet they stand in no such federal relation to man, or to one another, as is asserted of the church of the Firstborn. Had they been thus compacted in one federal body, they must have had a common Head, they must have inherited a common lot: it never could have been, as it actually has fallen out, that some should fall into perdition, while others kept ther first estate. But when we see the Lord Jesus constituted the Head of a great system, we see a foundation laid for the development of such a system in the gradual production and increase of its parts. He takes upon him a nature common to a multitude of That assumption of their nature does not unite them to him, but it lays a basis upon which such union may take place. As the wearer of human nature, he is baptized with an immeasurable effusion of the Holy Spirit upon himself: The fulness of the Spirit dwells in the God-man. Communications of that Spirit are therefore emphatically communications of "the Spirit of Christ;" and doubtless it is under this very view that the Holy Ghost is called the Spirit of Christ. Hence it follows, that if out of that fulness by which he himself is endowed with grace and qualified with gifts, he communicates a measure to any other being wearing the same nature, he becomes the Head of influences, the principle of life, the heart as it were to that being; and thus not merely in law, but in fact, unites him to himself; and the

men.

• See especially 1 Cor. xii. 13.

66

reason of recognizing the union in law, is because it exists in very fact. And it is by thus baptizing an innumerable multitude, with that baptism wherewith he was himself baptized, that he becomes to them a federal head, and they become the members of his body, and of one another. As the heart of this system, he propels the life's blood through every limb; and just in propor tion to the measure of his communications, makes them partakers of all that is in himself. In proportion as they are thus made partakers of the divine nature,' "the propensities and qualities of that nature manifest themselves directly-naturally-necessarily, in heart and life. And as they are sinful corrupted creatures, that are thus identified with the Saviour and made partakers of his nature, such participation infers a change in their nature, and that change we call regeneration. All that cluster of graces then, faith not excepted, which the scriptures call "fruits of the Spirit," are the product of regeneration; and regeneration itself is the product of union with the Son of God. So that in the order of nature, union with Christ stands first; next to this regeneration, as a native and immediate consequence; and all graces follow regeneration, as the acts of a renewed creature. The enmity is destroyed, the eyes are opened, the affections are regulated-and then, when truth is presented they discern it, they love it, they. obey it."-P. 42-46.

I will only ask you if it is possible that a system of which these truths are the prominent parts, can really be so erroneous, and of a tendency so injurious, as you have been taught to imagine. I grant you, if it contained every thing ascribed to it in the libel, it might very well challenge the harshest inquiry. But then, could it be reconciled with the doctrines thus avowed, thus illustrated, thus established in its pages? Moderator, you have already had a sufficiency of facts to warn you, and let these suggestions still farther warn you, how little credit you are bound to attach to the contradictory allegations of this libel. With these remarks we will proceed to the really weighty charges it contains.

The first point on which the libel misrepresents the doctrines of the book, relates to the structure of the covenant of works; or rather of the system. compacted by that covenant. It imputes the sentiment that Adam was the representative of human nature, but not of human persons; and that the covenant which bound him, and still binds his descendants, had no respect" no particular respect" they say either to persons or definite numbers. These are the charges of the first and second counts: and it winds up, in the third count, with imputing to me as an error, the 2 Pet. 1. 4

approximate in

rating on his

a 1 eine aber. The

X NEXIUM Vhether the inscar ni personally namCRA A he covenant itself. wiren excer nisl expect to ARS Perry, it ought DER me žily dhe errors of

ArAction of the libel se nensisency may be cedes encradicts itCF ne ird count, Y mivimaly into the mga ne treguing counts,

KURU JETSAs a Per-
gy remer their allegations

may make out such contradiction. To the book then we appeal. They refer you to the 35th, 174th, 176th, 186th, 187th pages.

Now what is the doctrine contained in these passages? It is that Adam stood the representative of a great moral system; that the system was first summed up in himself as a germ, and from him was to be evolved in countless myriads. It is said, these myriads were to consist of men. It teaches that " upon every man to whom he might afterwards stand in that relation" (i. e. the relation of a covenant head,)" its influence was to be direct." It speaks of these men as so many individuals, and individuals produced in pursuance of God's plan. It speaks expressly of their specification in the covenant, when once they have a being; and of their individual representation as resulting from their union; and of guilt thence descending to every soul of man. Now, though I still say that no man till created can be recognized in terms by the covenant of works, yet does it not follow that if all who are created, are thereupon recognized as represented and adjudged in the terms of the covenant itself-does it not, I say, follow that the parties represented are always human persons: and the objects specified, definite in their numbers? But the words "human nature," in these unfortunate pages, have conjured up, it would seem, these mists and spectres. I hope the circular has already satisfied you that the term thus employed is really very harmless: have patience, and I will show you that it is likewise very common.

But first, sir, I must ask, how came your Presbytery to charge it as an error, when I teach that natural generation is the only bond of the covenant of works? How dare they attack that confession of your faith which always specifies this, and never so much as hints at the being of any other? Hear, I pray you, those passages of the confession, on which the Presbytery profess to impugn the sentiment.

"They being the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed, and the same death in sin and corrupted nature conveyed, to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation." Ch. vi. sect. 3.

"God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which he bound him, and all his posterity, to personál, entire, exact, and

D