to edify one another; either do good or take good. * Rom. xiv.

19.

4. Long-suffering, is to moderate our anger and desire of revenge, when many and great wrongs are done us. It is an excellent fruit, but it takes very hardly in these parts. For our manner is, a word and a blow: a word and a writ.

Set and sow this plant in the furrows of your hearts; and that the weed of revenge overgrow it not, use these remedies. 1. God's commandment forbids rash anger, James i. 19. for it is a degree of murder. 2. The example of God, who is slow to anger, and of Christ, who is meek and lowly. Matt. xi. 29. 3. All wrongs done to us by men come by God's providence, to which we are to subject ourselves.† 4. The goodness of God, who forgives more to us than we can forgive. 5. There is danger of God's anger. For unless we forgive, we are not forgiven. And we crave forgiveness as we forgive. 6. It is the duty of love to suffer and bear. 1 Cor. xiii. 7. 7. It is a point of injustice to revenge ourselves (for then we take to ourselves the honour of God) and against all equity; we are both the parties and judge, and witness, and all. 8. We are often ignorant of the minds of men in their actions, and of the true circumstances thereof, and so may easily be deceived.

Objection 1. Anger is a sudden affection: therefore it cannot be ruled.

Answer. Means are to be used beforehand, when we are quiet; then shall we better restrain it.

2. It is hard for flesh and blood to do this.

Answer. We are more than flesh and blood. For we have the

* A gentle (polite) acceptance of courtesies, is as material to maintain a friendly neighbourhood as (the giving of) bountiful presents.-Lord Capel.

See the conduct of David, when cursed by Shimei. 2 Sam.xvi. 10.

Spirit of God, else we are but hypocrites. See 2 Cor. xiii. 5.

5. Gentleness. Gentleness is, to give good speech, and to shew good countenances, even to them that wrong us, and abuse us, without any mind or desire of revenge. Rom. xii. 14. Ephes. iv. 32.

The courtesy of the world, in the cap and the knee, and all the compliments of humanity, is commonly severed from good affection; and it is often the mask of enmity, and therefore it is but a work of the flesh. Right courtesy is with an honest heart, to bless when we are wronged.

6. Goodness. It is a virtue, whereby we communicate to others the good things that are in us, for their good and benefit. It is prescribed by Paul in other terms, when he saith, communicating to the necessity of the saints. Rom. xii. 13.

Answer. The gifts of our minds, our temporal goods, yea, our lives too, if need be. 1 John iii. 16.

2. Why are we so to do?

Answer. We are members all of one body; and we are members one of another. Eph. iv. 25. And it is God's pleasure, that men shall be instruments of good mutually one to another.

Goodness respects either the body or the mind. Goodness, concerning the body, hath many actions as to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to harbour the harbourless, to clothe the naked, to visit the sick, and them that are in prison." Matt. xxv. 35, 26. "To bury the dead." 2 Sam. ii. 5. Lastly, to lend freely and liberally to such as be decayed and impoverished. Deut. xv. 7.

Goodness, concerning the soul, is to endeavour, partly by counsel, and partly by example, to gain the soul of our neighbour to God: and it stands in four actions: to

admonish the unruly, to comfort the distressed, to bear with them that are weak, and to be patient toward all. 1 Thess. v, 14.

Goodness is hard to be found in

these days among men. The common practice is, according to the common proverb, Every man for himself, and God for us all.' The study of men is, how to gather goods, honours, riches for themselves, and for their children; and the common good is not aimed at. Good orders hardly take place, as namely, the order for the poor; and the reason is, the want of goodness in us. If any profess any show of goodness more than the rest, they are sure to be despised and reproached at every hand; and this shews that there is little goodness among men.

7. Faith. First, we are to understand faith toward God, which is to believe the remission of our sins, and our reconciliation with God in Christ.

This faith is common to all among us yet is it but a false, dead, and ceremonial faith, in many men.

Reason 1. "Faith comes by the hearing of the word of God preached," Rom. x. 17.; but this faith in many is conceived without preaching; for they say, they believe their salvation by Christ, and withal they live in the perpetual neglect or contempt of the public ministry.

2. True faith is joined always with the exercises of invocation and repentance: yet in many among us, this faith is without any conversion or change of heart and life, and therefore it is but a dead faith.

3. True faith is mixed with contrary unbelief, so as they that believe, feel in themselves a want of faith, and much unbelief. But there are many among us that say they perfectly believe, and that they never so much as doubted in all their lives. Now such a faith is a vain persuasion.

4. Many that boast of their faith in Christ, want faith in the providence of God, touching food and raiment. And that is manifest, because they use unlawful means to help themselves: if their faith fail them in a smaller point, it cannot be found in the greatest of all.

*

now

Secondly. By faith, is meant faith toward men, and that stands in two things. One is, to speak the truth from the heart: the other is, to be faithful and just in the keeping of our honest promise and word.†

This faith is a rare virtue in these days. For the common fashion of them that live by bargaining, is, to use glosing, facing, soothing, lying, dissembling, and all manner of shifts. And with many it is a confessed principle, that there is no living in the world unless we lie and dissemble. They that deal with shopmen shall hardly know what is truth, they have so many words and so many shifts. In this respect Christians come short of the Turks, who are said to be equal, open, and plain-dealing men, without fraud or deceit.

Our care, therefore, must be, to cherish and maintain among us the virtue of faith and truth. Reasons: 1. God's commandment, Put away lying, and let every man speak the truth to his neighbour. Ephes. iv. 25. 2. By truth we are like to God, whose ways are all truth; who hates a lying tongue; Prov. vi. 17; whose Spirit is the spirit of truth. 3. Liars bear the image of the devil: he is the father of lies. John viii. 44. So oft as thou liest, thou makest thy tongue the instrument of the devil. 4. Eternal punishment in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone.

* They rely on means, without trusting in the Lord, like Asa. 2 Chron. xviii. 12. This is the sense, in which Mr. John Thornton views the word Faith, in his Essay on the Fruits of the Spirit,' where he renders it Fidelity.

Rev. xxii. 15. Here mark, that liars are entertained at the same table with murderers and thieves; and the liar never goes unpunished. Prov. xix. 5. 5. To speak the truth from the heart is a mark of God's child. Psalm xv. 2. And he whose faith fails toward men shall much more fail toward God.

8. Meekness. The same in effect with long-suffering. The difference is, that meekness is more general, and long-suffering is the highest degree of meekness.

9. Temperance. It is the moderation of desire and appetite, in the use of the gifts and creatures of God. For the better practising of this virtue, remember these four rules:

1. We must use moderation in meats and drinks. This moderation is, to eat and drink with perpetual abstinence. And abstinence is, to take less than that which nature desires, and not more. And that measure of meat and drink, which serves to refresh nature, and to make us fit for the service of God and man, is allowed us of God, and no more.

2. We must use moderation in our apparel; and that is, to apparel ourselves according to our sex, according to the received fashion of our country, according to our place and degree, and according to our ability. Here the common fault is, to be out of all order; for none almost know any measure. Every mean person now-a-days will be a gentleman or gentlewoman.

3. We must use moderation in getting of goods; and that is, to rest content if we have food and raiment for ourselves and them that belong to us. 1 Tim. vi. 8. Here is our stint, we may not desire to be rich; verse 9. The king himself must not multiply his gold and silver; Deut. xvii. 17; and yet he hath more need of gold and silver than any private man.

4. There must be a moderation in the spending of our goods: contrary to the fashion of many, that spend their substance in feasting and company, and keep their wives and children bare at home.

Against such there is no law. Here Paul sets down the benefit that comes by the former virtues. The words carry this sense: Against such virtues, and against persons endued with such virtues, there is no law. And that for two causes : one, there is no law to condemn such; secondly, there is no law to compel them to obey, because they freely obey God, as if there were no law.

Mark, then, the condition of spiritual men. They are a voluntary and free people, serving God freely without constraint. So as if Christ would not give unto them life everlasting, yet would they love him, and desire the advancement of his kingdom.* On the contrary, if there were no hell, and God would not punish adultery, drunkenness, blasphemy, &c. with eternal death, yet would a Christian man abstain from these things; because he knows that they displease Christ, and he is governed with another spirit, to which they are contrary.

Also these words are a reason of verse 16: There is no law against them that do these things; therefore walk in the Spirit. †

J. M.

*This sentiment, although it has been maintained by some mystical writers, is clearly overstrained. How can those who are reprobate (i. e. rejected) love Christ? Some persons, indeed, under severe spiritual trials, who could not find hope, have still retained their integrity, like Job; but in their case there is grace in power, only not in joy. See also the words of Jonah, ii. 4.

+ If the petition in the Litany, to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, were felt in its vast importance, the results would be to the greater glory of God. May every reader take heed!

IN a former part of this volume (p.185.) we exhibited the views of the writers of these Tracts on the subject of Justification, as standing in contrast to the evangelical statements of the Church of England on that important doctrine. It had been pretty generally rumoured all over the land, that the mere moral disquisitions of fifty years ago had given place to a certain degree of doctrinal preaching in the pulpits of the Church of England. Especially it was with some confidence asserted, that, however low might be the standard according to which clergymen might speak concerning the work of the Spirit, yet that Justification was a doctrine more and more fully recognized in our pulpits. We have often heard it said, in so many express words, 'You will find few clergymen of any note, whether in the universities or in the more influential towns of the country at large, keeping out of view the doctrine of Justification: they feel, in fact, that it is expected of them that they should preach it.' Very good, so far as professions and mere words go. But, alas for mere words! It now appears that there are, and probably all the time were, two ways of holding this doctrine of Justification: the one, a scriptural, Church of England, rational and spiritual way; the other, an unscriptural and really irrational mode:-the one, in short, being Justification by Faith; the other, Justification at and through Baptism. The Tractwriters take the latter course; and, in doing so, they support a system fraught with incalculable evils to the souls of men.

SEPTEMBER 1838.

Yet neither is this term, Justification at and through Baptism, fully explanatory of their system. For though the words Justification, Regeneration, Sanctification, occur in their pages, yet it is clear that they confound the proper, distinctive sense of Justification, and make it comprehend Regeneration, and, by immediate consequence, Sanctification also. They entirely fall into the error which marks the opening paragraph of the seventh chapter of the Sixth Session of the Council of Trent :- Hanc dispositionem, seu preparationem justificatio ipsa consequitur, quæ non est sola peccatorum remissio, sed et sanctificatio, et renovatio interioris hominis per voluntariam susceptionem gratiæ et donorum.' ".... Justification, which is not solely the remission of sins, but also Sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man, through the voluntary acceptance of grace and of gifts. In fact, they make Justification to comprise within its ample sense every thing that is incident to a person in a justified state. With much elaborateness and copiousness of language-their style being cumbersome beyond almost all example, and to a degree which theology by no means requires - they bring the mind of the unwary to this point,

that an infant, rightly baptized, receives a grace, in virtue of which not only are his sins washed away, but his very nature is renewedyea, regenerated.' And this is, with them, the only regeneration of which a human being is capable.

In simpler terms, they would lead their followers to the conclu2 Y

sion direct, that baptism is regeneration. To detect, by a brief analysis, their modes of enforcing this opinion, is the design of the following remarks. The Tract of Professor Pusey on Baptism will, of course, principally engage our

attention.

1. The first preliminary mode, which the writers have thought it very convenient in this controversy to adopt, is,-to have a fund of epithets (though sometimes a single one will work better) ready at hand to cast in the face of opponents. The epithet will be the more effective for its purpose, if it should be somewhat sonorous. Such a term is Rationalistic,' which the writers often condescend to employ. We will frankly own that we think this method of warfare may legitimately be met, by attaching to the tract writers the imputation of being mystic: and that, in the severest sense of the word. If rationalistic be something like a perversion of reason; mystic we hold to be also a perverted form of mystery. There is a legitimate use of reason in things sacred: and there is a sound sense, in which mystery envelopes certain revealed truths, which have nevertheless a claim upon our faith. But as reason may wax wanton, so also may the love of mystery run to unwarrantable lengths; and this we apprehend to be the special and leading fault of these tracts. On the subject of baptism-and on other subjects also-they are mys

tics.

ture of things, immediately ministers to slavish fear. A purely sentimental mind may indeed fancy

that there is a certain charm in obscurity: but practical mystics, like the Romanists, know very well how to convert the system of mysticism into an engine for enthralling the human mind.

2. Having introduced and adopted the use of some such catchword as this, Rationalistic, it may be well in the next place, for the better promotion of a particular view, to assume a meaning of a given word, without defining it. The word we specially refer to, is grace. Now on this article, some may be ready to say, 'How can this word admit of a definition? Is it not obvious that even in scripture it has several senses?' This may seem not only a good escape, but a sufficient ground therefore for indiscriminately adopting the term grace, for something which shall essentially belong to every holy ordinance; let there be the baptismal grace, the eucharistical grace, episcopal grace, the grace of the apostolic succession, &c. It will be with the multitude a convenient and a convincing method; but why so? Because it confuses a subject, and gives scope for any notion to pass current without a distinct challenge and inquiry.

But if, as philosophers say, nature abhors a vacuum; is it true also, that theology abhors a definition? If so, we should allow the tract writers to assume and assert as much as they please, without venturing to expect such a thing as distinctness. We believe, however, that the controversy concerning regeneration turns so materially on a clear view of this matter, that we shall endeavour with as much conciseness as practicable, to explain this part of the subject.

In considering the infinitely important subject of grace, it is requisite to direct our attention to