the true spirit of service, is no more that we are bound to do for Him "who loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood."

It will be for Christ to say, knowing the love we bore Him, and the labour which proceeded of that love; "Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful in a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

ARTICLE XV.-" Of Christ alone without Sin."

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. . . . And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth." "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death." "Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people." "For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted." For He "was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin."

We see by the above quotations, and many similar passages, how our Saviour was truly "Emmanuel," "God with us," "perfect God and perfect man, of a reasonable soul and human flesh. subsisting." And "as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and Man is one Christ."

It is evident the Divine could not have been united to the sinful: Christ has most surely taken our nature upon Him in all but its sinful aspect. The lamb offered as His prototype in the Jewish sacrifices was strictly ordered to be without blemish. or spot, in token of "the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world."

Only twice has man been created sinless. Adam was the first; he was without sin until being tempted, he fell, being but man, and brought sin into all the world, so that every descendant of his is born a child of wrath. Adam's sin was not original, but actual; humanity is ever since guilty of both, till the "second Adam the Lord from heaven" came into the world, who not only, as Adam, was sinless in His human nature, but in the power of the Divine resisted and overcame temptation, and destroyed for ever the power of the tempter on all who believe in Him. All who truly believe are granted to be partakers of His nature, as He once partook of ours. "Now are we the sons of God:" but of the first Adam as well, therefore, so long as we remain in this world his evil nature must be ours too; the old man and

the new can never agree, for "what communion hath light with darkness?" Each will continually be struggling within us for the mastery: we have constant need to pray to Him whose blessed Son was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil and make us the sons of God and heirs of eternal life, that He, having granted us this hope, will enable us by His grace to purify ourselves even as He is pure, that when He shall appear again in power and glory, we may be made like unto him in His eternal and glorious Kingdom; for we know that "as we have borne the image of the earthy we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." And "it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." "And when we awake up after thy likeness, we shall be satisfied with it."

ARTICLE XVI.-" Of Sin after Baptism."

The last group of Articles were those touching the great truth of Justification. In this we enter upon that class which deals with the main doctrines which shortly after the Reformation were brought under discussion by the Calvinistic controversies.

"I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand."

"It is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, . . if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame."

The apparently contradictory statements here given have been the ground for two extremes of doctrine; on the first the Calvinists found their theory of the attainment by the elect in this world. to a state from which it is impossible to fall away; from the other conclusions have been drawn that those who commit wilful and deadly sin after having received the Holy Ghost in Baptism, and thus blasphemed against Him, can never turn again and repent, but are in a state of hopeless perdition.

Our Church, in dealing with this difficult and delicate question, has by her careful, moderate handling of the subject, adhered to the rule on which her reformers strove to keep the mean between superstition and latitudinarianism, laid down in the celebrated phrase, "the middle way between two extremes;" and in this as all other matters of doctrine follows closely the Word of God alone as her authority.

The first of the above quotations is no warrant for the dogma of the attainment in this life to a secure state of salvation, from which departure is impossible; else what mean the exhortations of our Lord

and His Apostles continually repeated in the New Testament, addressed to those who are in Him, to watch, pray, hold fast, fight, and having done all, to stand?

This promise of our Lord taken as meant, without being twisted and turned to suit particular views, then stands thus ;-those who are united to Him and determined to abide in Him, so long as they endure He will not fail. He that shall endure to the end, shall be saved. Neither the world, the devil, nor temptation, shall prevail against those who rest in, and look to Him for safety and strength. But this is no argument against the possibility of our forsaking Christ. Indeed that such apostasy is possible is evident from the passage in Hebrews; they "who were made partakers of the Holy Ghost," as all we who have been baptised are, may fall from their present state of salvation, and by wilfully hardening their hearts against the warnings of the Spirit so effectually banish His influence from their souls, that He will at last leave them unrebuked to their chosen course of sin in this life, and perdition in the next. We may not say of such that they were never in a state of grace.

But we are taught not to fall into the other extreme, and deny that all who wilfully and deliberately fall into even the greatest sin while in a regenerate state, can repent and turn again to the Lord by the working of His yet unquenched Spirit in their hearts. A man who is truly a Christian,

G