condition stated as fallen; and God proclaimed as just and an avenger: yet at the same time man's hope of immortality confirmed; and God represented as merciful. Moreover we find provision made, both by way of expiation of past offences, and of future sanctification, for our being made meet for the eternal inheritance, which before we longed for indeed, but comparatively without hope.

Nor is there any thing in the details of the Christian scheme, which is not perfectly consistent with the truths of natural religion, and with the highest reason of man. The mystery of an incarnate God seems, indeed, to baffle all the prophetic glimpses of the most excited hope; and the same may be said of the personality, divinity, and operation of the Holy Ghost, our sanctifier: but Reason does not deny, but rather affirm, that in things above her ken, she must first be taught before she can understand. But the religion of all people is a demonstration, that the efficacy of vicarious suffering is not too recondite for the fancy of man; though, without a revelation, it is palpably absurd to suppose that man could prove its sufficiency in the eyes of God: and even the system of God's ordinary providence, presents many exemplifications of vicarious suffering purchasing happiness, or exemption from evil, for the weak and for the guilty.*

* I could have wished to have stated this most interesting argument more at length, but must refer to Bishop Butler's Analogy, &c. Part ii. chap. v. sec. 7.

The course, then, of God's ordinary providence, both paternal and judicial, and the marks of his hand in his works; the notices of his being, and attributes, and sovereignty, which we find in our own hearts; and every truth concerning him, which we can deduce from these grounds, separate, or fairly compared and combined; all, that is, which we learn of God from natural theology, and hold concerning him as a system of natural religion: all, moreover, .that we know concerning ourselves, and our condition before God, as we are moral and accountable, rational and immortal beings: all these things combine to testify, so far as such things can testify, of the truth of Christianity First, by intimating the necessity of a revelation, to reconcile such things as we know separately to be true, and recognise as necessary religious principles, but cannot ourselves combine in one harmonious whole; and, Secondly, by shewing the accordance of the Christian volume, in which all these are harmonized, and which professes to be such a revelation from God, with every acknowledged work and attribute of God with which it can be compared. I do not say that this demonstrates the truth of Christianity for this purpose we must have recourse to other evidence; but I say that it sufficiently condemns those who refuse to give at least a serious, candid and reverential attention to the Christian scheme: for it affords a reasonable presumption of its truth; and nothing but a very strong presumption of its falsehood, could excuse a cursory study, or a superci

lious rejection of that which claims to be a message from God to man.

I ask, then, on a review of the whole matter, whether we have not at least as great a support in a priori reasoning, for that vicarious scheme which the Bible tells us is the alone counsel of God, as there could be for any other religious system whatever? and whether, therefore, all nature, and all reason, and all conscience, and every voice which speaks to the heart of man, within him and from without, doth not compel us to hearken to Him, unto whom all the prophets bear witness? and whether, if we receive God Almighty, as the Creator of heaven and earth, (as we must do, or give up all claim to be accounted reasonable beings,) and if we receive the voice of conscience as a divine memorial in our hearts, both of the moral attributes of the Most High, and of our own state before him, (which we must do, or leave the phenomena of conscience altogether unaccounted for), we must not, by a just and necessary consequence, receive him as our Father, and the Father of him who hath said, "Ye believe in God, believe also in me?" and whether there is not in every principle of reason, an awful import in that warning, If the words spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward; how shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?

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SERMON III.

I BELIEVE IN GOD THE FATHER.

1 COR. viii. 6.-To us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.

IN the simple fact that God created and rules the heavens and the earth, there is sufficient foundation for his receiving the title of FATHER: but though she could not certainly intend to exclude a confession of God's paternity on this ground, yet is this by no means the whole truth, or the highest truth concerning the paternity of God the Father Almighty, which the Church proposes to our faith, in the first article of the Apostles' Creed: I BELIEVE IN GOD THE FATHER ALMIGHTY, MAKER OF HEAVEN AND

EARTH.

For in these words we confess the paternity of God in three other senses: each equally important in itself, with that which ascribes to him creation and providence; and each far more distinctive of the

Christian faith, and therefore far more important as an element of Christian confession. When we say I BELIEVE IN GOD THE FATHER, we declare first of all that he is the Father of the eternal Word: secondly, that he is the Father of the man Christ Jesus; and thirdly, that he is our adoptive Father, as we are members of Christ.

That these truths are intended to be confessed in the Apostles' Creed, yet more especially than our natural relation to God, we might collect from this fact, that that creed is the symbol of faith distinctive of a Christian; in which character it is not his part exclusively, nor yet principally, to confess the paternity of God, over the works of his hands and the objects of his care: but to express the relation which subsists between the persons of the ever blessed Trinity; the mystery of the eternal Word made man ; and the relation also which we bear to God, through the means of that great mystery of godliness. Were there no internal evidence, therefore, to determine its meaning, we might well suppose that it was the chief intention of the word "FATHER" in the first article of the Apostles' Creed, to express the doctrine of the church upon these portions of Christian theology.

But when we proceed to the next article, and after the confession, I believe in God the FATHER Almighty, find the confession immediately following, and in Jesus Christ his only SON our Lord ;where the title Son is evidently opposed to the title Father, in the preceding words: and when, remem