truths which had a Avowing belief in glorying in that as

cross for sinners. This was a part of the system of doctrine which they professed to have embrac ed for themselves, and pressed upon those whom they got to listen to them. And such was their perversity, their want of sincerity, their contempt of principle, that they trampled upon the gravest and most important of the place in their ministrations. the atoning death of Christ the foundation of their hopes and labouring to inculcate it upon the faith of others--they did, at the same time, so mix it up with gross and damning errors, and were so disobedient to the will of Christ, whom all the while they affected to follow as teachers of his religion, that they are strongly said to have denied to have dishonoured to have rebelled against him whom they proclaimed as the Lord that had bought them with his blood. All this resembles a method not uncommon with our Saviour himself and his prophets and apostles, who argued with opposers on their own principles, and on their professed tenets, as if their principles had been just, and their professions sincere. And it is a mode of reasoning, and judging, and censuring, which men have recourse to continually, and in adopting which they are neither considered as offending against propriety and truth, nor incur any risk of being misunderstood by the intelligent, or misrepresented by the candid.

Your time is too far spent to allow me to proceed with our expositions, till another opportunity occurs. In the meanwhile, I trust that this plan of replying to the abettors of universal pardon, will not only enable us to put down their most pernicious heresy, if it has got any footing in your minds, and to guard such of you as are in danger of being imposed upon by its palatableness and its plausibilities, but will profit us by fixing more clearly, and more effectually in our minds, both the real meaning of the passages commented upon, and the correct mode of discovering and ascertaining it. I shall direct your attention, in our next discourse, to various other passages, and hope to convince you that holy writ must be altogether dreadfully perverted before it can be made to give a statement, or to utter a word in support of the dogma of universal forgiveness. And let us all pray for the effectual teaching of the Holy Spirit; and according to the light, which through the medium of the word he sheds upon our minds, let us work out our own salvation, guide our brethren in the path of truth, and labour for the glory of Him who came into the world to call sinners to repentance, and to give himself an offering and a sacrifice unto God, that whosoever believeth may not perish, but have everlasting life!

SERMON VII.

SAME SUBJECT.

WE are contending against the doctrine of universal pardon. And after showing its direct and palpable contradiction to the plainest declarations of the word of God, and its necessary result in the final and complete redemption of every man, a result which our opponents themselves hold to be most unscriptural-we proceeded to the consideration of those passages of the Bible which they quote in support of their opinion. Three of these we explained-pointing out at the same time how much they had been misunderstood and perverted, and what inconsistencies arose from the interpretation put upon them, in order to maintain the opposite side of the question. We now go forward in the work of exposition.

4. And the next passage to which we would call your attention is in 1 John v. 8—13.

"And there are three that bear witness in earth, the spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in

one.

"If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.

"He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar because he believeth not the record that God gave of his

Son.

“ And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life; and this life is in his Son.

"He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.

"These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God."

We are told that the doctrine of universal pardon is proved by the record which God is said to have given of his Son, since our disbelieving that record could not be to make God a liar, unless he had really conveyed the gift of life to us, and since every man who believes this record must of course be held to believe a divinely attested truth.

But it must be very evident to you all that this interpretation of the words goes much farther than they who adopt it can possibly approve—that it makes the Apostle assert what they cannot admit, because it is contrary to Scripture-that, in short, by proving a great deal too much, it really proves nothing at all, and must be rejected by themselves

as well as by us. For observe what the blessing is which it is alleged God has bestowed upon every one of us, and to the bestowal of which he is affirmed to have given such a decisive testimony? It is not pardon merely, but "eternal life.” "This is the record, that God hath given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son."

We cannot allow that this phrase means nothing more than a removal of the curse, so that the sinner has his existence prolonged, and is freed from the positive punishment to which the law had doomed him for his transgression. This is not the meaning of "eternal life" in the New Testament. There it invariably means the felicity of heaven, embracing, of course, all the privileges and blessings which constitute that felicity, or which contribute to it. It is described as the grand and ultimate object of Christ's mission. "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting (eternal) life. God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved."* Thus Christ makes salvation and eternal life equivalent, as the intended issue of his redeeming work. And is every man saved? Or has every man eternal life actually conferred up

* John iii. 16, 17.

For