while they recapitulate the conversation, confirm the doctrine. This will make you some amends for my late tedious harangue. This will tip the lead with gold.

"So law appears imperfect; and but given
With purpose to resign them, in full time,
Up to a better covenant; disciplined

From shadowy types to truth; from flesh to spirit ;
From imposition of strict laws, to free

Acceptance of large grace; from servile fear

To filial; works of law to works of faith."-B. xii 1. 300.

DIALOGUE X.

Asp. AGAIN, Theron! Must we never lay aside the weapons of controversy?—You put me in mind of the resolute Athenian, who, having fought with distinguished bravery on the field of Marathon, pursued the vanquished Persians to their fleet. At that very instant a galley full of the enemy's troops was putting off to sea. Determined, if possible, to prevent their escape, he laid hold of the vessel with his right hand, which was no sooner fixed, than chopped off by the sailors. The warrior, not at all discouraged, seized it with his left. When that also was cut away, he fastened his teeth

in its side; and never quitted his gripe till he resigned his breath*.

Ther. I have been reconsidering the case of imputed righteousness, and am by no means satisfied as to the propriety of the phrase, or the truth of the doctrine, especially in the sense which you espouse. Objections arise, more substantial and weighty than any that have hitherto been urged; and which, if I mistake not, you will find it a more difficult task to answer.

Asp. I must do my best. And if my best attempts prove unsuccessful, I shall say, with the gallant Iphicrates, when overpowered by the eloquence of his antagonist, "My adversary is the better actor, but mine is the better play."

I say better; for to you, Theron, I will freely own, what to another person I should not be so willing to disclose,-That I receive no comfort, but from the habitual belief, and daily application, of this precious doctrine. Whenever I read the most correct and beautiful writings that proceed in the contrary strain, I feel my spirits heavy, I find my prospects gloomy, and not one ray of consolation gleams upon my mind. Whereas, much meaner compositions, which breathe the savour of this evangelical unction, seldom fail to quicken my hopes, to brighten my views, and put into my mouth that piously alert profession of the Psalmist, "I will run the way of thy commandments, now thou hast set my heart at liberty," Psalm cxix. 32. Though I am far from laying any considerable stress upon this observation, farther still from advancing it into the place of an argument, yet I may be permitted to mention it in the confidence and familiarity of friendship.

Ther. An opinion proposed with so much modesty, and so nearly connected with my Aspasio's comfort, has doubtless a claim to my serious atten

• The Athenian's name was Cynægyrus. The author who relates this extraordinary story is Justin. If the reader should think it a rhodomontade, I believe he will not judge amiss. And I promise myself, the same good sense will enable him to distinguish between what is hinted by way of pleasantry, and what is urged by way of argument.

tion. Otherwise it might possibly provoke my raillery. For you must know I am no great admirer of inward feelings. I cannot think them a very solid method of demonstrating your point. It must be enforced by better reasons, if you would gain it access to my heart.

We must place, you say, a dependence upon the Lord Jesus Christ, in all that he has done and suffered. What he has done and suffered, you add, is our only justifying righteousness; and to place our dependence on it, is the only method to obtain pardon of our sins, and life eternal.

Asp. I have said it, Theron, and I abide by it. This being the righteousness of God, is————

Ther. Give me leave, before you proceed farther, to propose a query. Does the righteousnesss of God signify the active and passive obedience of Christ?

Asp. Righteousness is a conformity to the law in heart and in life. As the Son of God voluntarily made himself subject to the law, perfectly fulfilled its precepts, and suffered to the utmost its penalty; this, I should imagine, furnishes us with the truest and noblest signification of the phrase. Ther. What if I or others should imagine quite the reverse?

Asp. I thank my friend for his admonition. It is indeed unreasonable that my bare imagination should pass for orthodoxy and truth. Let us then inquire after better proof.

When the divine name, in the sacred phraseology, is added to a substantive, it expresses some very extraordinary property. "The trees of the Lord," Psal. civ. 16, denote those stately and magnificent forests which the hand of the Most High planted. "The mountains of God," are those prodigiously large elevations of the earth, which none but an almighty arm could establish. The righteousness of God likewise means a righteousness of the most supereminent dignity; such as is worthy to be called by his name, and may justly challenge his acceptance. And where shall we find this, but in the conduct and person of his blessed Son? This has a most unexceptionable claim to the exalted title; being, as a masterly critic explains the phrase, "a righteousness devised by God the Father, from all eternity; wrought out by God the Son, in the person of Jesus Christ; applied by God the Holy Ghost to the sinner's soul."

Ther. This doctrine of yours, if I rightly understand it, would make remission of sins but one half of our justification, and something else necessary in order to obtain eternal life; which is just as rational as to suppose, that though one cause may expel darkness, another must supervene in order to introduce light.

Asp. The nature of justification, and the nature of condemnation, are two opposites, which will mutually illustrate each other. What is implied in the condemnation of a sinner? He forfeits eternal life, and is doomed to eternal death. What is included in the justification of a sinner? It supersedes his obligation to punishment, and invests him with a title to happiness. In order to the first, there must be a remission of sins; in order to the second, an imputation of righteousness. Both which are derived from Christ's mediation in our behalf; and both take place when we are united

• This is the import of the original 78 77, Psalm xxxvi. verse 7, Hebrew; verse 6, English.

to that divine head; so that we do not derive them from two different sources, but ascribe them to one and the same great all-sufficient Cause. Your comparison, though intended to overthrow, I think, fully establishes the sentiment. When yonder bright orb makes his first appearance in the east, what effects are produced? The shades of night are dispersed, and the light of day is diffused. To what are they owing-each to a separate, or both to the same origin? Every one's experience will answer the question. Thus, when the "Sun of righteousness" arises in the soul, he brings at once pardon and acceptance. Remission and salvation are under his wings. Both which constitute the "healing of the nations," Mal. iv. 2; and both owe their being to Christ's obedience, embraced as active, and not rejected as passive.

Ther. This, I know, is the fine-spun theory of your systematic divines. But where is their warrant from Scripture? By what authority do they introduce such subtle distinctions?

Asp. I cannot think the distinction so subtle, or the theory so finely spun. To be released from the damnatory sentence is one thing; to be treated as a righteous person, is evidently another. Absalom was pardoned when he received a permission to remove from Geshur and dwell at Jerusalem; but this was very different from the recommencement of filial duty and parental endearment, 2 Sam. xiv. 24. A rebel may be exempted from the capital punishment which his traitorous practices deserve, without being restored to the dignity of his former state, or the rights of a loyal subject. In Christianity likewise, to be freed from the charge of guilt, and to be regarded as a righteous person, are two several blessings, really distinct in themselves, and often distinguished in Scripture.

Ther. Where are they distinguished? in what texts of Scripture? This is what I called for-your scriptural warrant.

Asp. What think you of Job's reply to his censorious friends? "God forbid that I should justify you!" Job xxvii. 5. That he forgave them, there is no doubt. Yet he could not justify them; could not allow their reflections to be equitable, or their behaviour charitable.

What think you of Solomon's supplication? "Then hear thou in heaven, and do, and judge thy servants; condemning the wicked, to bring his way upon his head; and justifying the righteous, to give him according to his righteousness," 1 Kings, viii. 32. To condemn, in this passage, evidently signifies to pronounce guilty, and obnoxious to punishment. By parity of reason, to justify, must denote, to pronounce righteous, and entitle to happiness.

What says Solomon's father? "Enter not into judgment with thy servant, O Lord! for, in thy sight, shall no man living be justified!" Psalm cxliii. 2. A man might be pardoned, if judged according to the tenor of his own obedience. But no man could be declared righteous, in consequence of such a trial: this were absolutely and universally impossible.

From all which passages I conclude, that to be justified is different from, is superior to, the bare remission of sin.

Ther. All these instances are derived from the Old Testament; the New, if I mistake not, speaks another language. Consider the case of the penitent publican. What does he request? "God be merciful to me a sinner!" What does he obtain ? "He went down to his house justified,” Luke xviii.

13, 14. If, then, the petition and the grant may be deemed correspondent pardon and justification must be reckoned equivalent.

Asp. The Old and New Testament are, in their style and contents, exactl correspondent. Echo, in yonder cloisters, does not more punctually rever berate the speaker's voice, than those divine books harmonize with each other Yet it will not follow, from the publican's request and the publican's bless ing, that pardon and justification are the same: only that God's bounty fre quently exceeds our prayers, and is larger than our expectations; or that the blessing which was implored, and the blessing which was vouchsafed, ar inseparably connected, and always accompany each other.

St. Paul mentions "a justification of life;" not barely an exemption from the sentence of death, but such a justification as gives a title (Rom. v. 18) t the reward of life. The words are very emphatical. We shall injure the dignity of their meaning, if we understand them in a more contracted sense Towards the close of the same chapter, we have another passage rich with consolation, and full to our purpose: "Grace reigneth through righteousness unto eternal life," Rom. v. 21. Here is pointed out the prime source of all our blessings-infinitely free and triumphant grace: the meritorious causenot any works of man, not any qualifications of our own, but the perfect righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ: the effect or end of all-which is not barely an absolution from guilt, but an instatement in life; a life of holy communion with God in this world, to be crowned with an eternal fruition of him in another.

Let me produce one text more, which just at this instant occurs to my memory. You will find it in the apostle's defence of himself before Festus and Agrippa. He opens, as it were, his apostolical commission, and repeats the words of his royal Master: "I send thee" to ignorant and enslaved, guilty and ruined creatures, "to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God; that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among all them which are sanctified by faith that is in me," Acts xxvi. 18. The great preacher of the Gentiles, or rather the supreme Lord of all preachers, has distinguished between remission of sins and the inheritance of saints; between the pardon that delivers from hell, and the justification that entitles to heaven. So that the former does by no means constitute the latter; but is connected with it, as a link in the same sacred chain; or included in it, as part of the same glorious whole.

Ther. Admitting your distinction to be proper, is not the satisfaction made by the death of Christ sufficient of itself to obtain both our full pardon and our final happiness?

Asp. Since my friend has started the question, I may venture, with all reverence to the divine counsels, to answer in the negative; it being necessary that the Redeemer of men should obey, as well as suffer in their stead. For this we have the testimony of our Lord himself: "This commandment," says he, “have I received of my Father, that I should lay down my life," John x. 18. "Thus it becometh us," adds he in another place, "to fulfil all righteousness," Matth. iii. 15. To which his apostle subjoins, that if we "reign in life," it must be not only through those sufferings which expiate, but also through that righteousness which merits, Rom. v. 17.

Ther. Our Lord's testimony relates only to a positive institution, and is quite foreign to our purpose. I have often been disgusted at such strained

applications of Scripture. The partisans of a system wrest the sacred book. They deal with divine truth as the tyrant Procrustes served those unhappy creatures who fell into his merciless hands. Is a text too short to suit their design? Our Procrustean expositors can stretch it on the rack, and lengthen its sense. Is it too full to consist with their scheme? They can lop off a limb, secrete a sentence, or contract the meaning. Is this to reverence the great God? Is this to treat respectfully his holy word?

Asp. I have been grieved, I assure you, and disgusted at this practice, as well as yourself; a practice not only very irreverent, but very injudicious also. It really prejudices the cause it would unfairly recommend. Such a support is like "a broken tooth, or a foot out of joint," Prov. xxv. 19; not only unserviceable, but hurtful; an obstruction rather than a furtherance. However, I am not conscious of committing any violence on this passage, or of forcing it into my service. The circumstance you object, rather strengthens than invalidates the conclusion. If it was so requisite for our blessed Mediator to observe a positive institution, how much more necessary to fulfil those moral precepts whose obligation is unalterable and everlasting?

Besides, it should be considered whether Christ's sufferings were a complete satisfaction to the law. Complete they were with regard to the penalty, not with regard to the precept: a distinction obvious and important. From whence arises the following argument, which, for once, you will allow me to propose in the logical form.

By what alone the law was not satisfied, by that alone sinners could not be justified:

By Christ's sufferings alone, the law was not satisfied :

Therefore, by Christ's sufferings alone, sinners could not be justified.

But when we join the active with the passive obedience of our Lord, the efficacy of the one with the perfection of the other, how does our justification stand firm, in the fullest sense of the word? We have all that the law demands, both for our exemption from the curse, and as a title to the blessing.

Ther. Does not the Scripture ascribe the whole of our salvation to the death of Christ? delivering it as a never-to-be-forgotten maxim in Christianity, that "we have redemption through his blood," Eph. i. 7; "are brought near through the blood of Christ," Eph. ii. 13; nay, "that we are justified" (the very point under debate) "through his blood," Rom. v. 9. Would the inspired writer have assigned these various blessings to this one cause, if it had been a price inadequate to the purchase, or a means insufficient to accomplish the end?

Asp. This part of our Lord's meritorious humiliation is, by a very usual figure, put for the whole.

The death of Christ includes, not only his sufferings, but his obedience. The shedding of his precious blood was at once the grand instance of his suffering, and the finishing act of his obedience. In this view it is considered, and thus it is interpreted, by his own ambassador, who, speaking of his divine Master, says, "He was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross," Phil. ii. 8.

By the same figure, faith is someimes said to be a lively influential persuasion "that Christ died for our sins," 1 Cor. xv. 3. At other times it is represented as a firm practical belief, that "God hath raised him from the dead,” Rom. x. 9. Neither of which can, without the utmost contrariety to the

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