Page images
PDF
EPUB

66

any thing which held out to them the prospect of retaining their superiority over the Gentiles. Saint Paul meets, and pointedly opposes this opinion, in the early part of his epistle to the Romans. Having shewn the sinfulness of both Jew and Gentile (the Gentile violating the dictates of his natural conscience, the Jew transgressing against the precepts of a revealed law,) having proved that the outward privileges of the Jew did not absolve him from the general charge of guilt; having answered an objection which arose to this, and explained in what the advantages of the Jew really consisted, he repeats his sweeping sentence of universal condemnation, we have proved both Jews and Gentiles that they are all under sin." He then collects from the Old Testament a fearful list of passages descriptive of man's guiltinesshis throat an open sepulchre, his lips fraught with the poison of asps, his mouth full of cursing and bitterness, his feet swift to shed blood, destruction and misery in his ways, and no fear of God before his eyes—and lest the Jews might seek to evade all this, by applying such expressions exclusively to the Gentiles, he adds, in conclusion, Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law." What things soever the ancient Scriptures contain upon this subject, are to be applied to those who live under

66

the light of those Scriptures; that is, to the Jews: "that every mouth may be stopped" of privileged, self-righteous Jew, as well as of neglected, demoralized Gentile; every mouth of every human creature, without any single exception, may be stopped, and all the world be pronounced guilty before God. To the same purpose is the Apostle's language, in the second chapter of his Epistle to the Ephesians. Having reminded them of their wretched state by nature, "dead in trespasses and sins, children of disobedience," he adds, "among whom also we all had our conversation in times past, in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath even as others." We all! Not only you heathens of Ephesus, who have been blindly falling down before the statue of Diana, but we also, Jews, who have been worshipping Jehovah the God of Israel, according to his own appointment: not only you who are descended from idolaters, but we also who are descended from Father Abraham: not only you who have been living in open allowed iniquities, but we also who have been observing a strict course of outward morality: yea, even those amongst us who are most privileged, and have most to trust to in the flesh, I, even I myself, Saul of Tarsus, "I who was circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of

Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law a Pharisee; concerning zeal, persecuting the church of Christ," which seemed to be opposed to my own religion, "touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless." Notwithstanding all this, I say of myself as of you, it is true of me, as of the very worst among you; that I was born in sin, that I lived in sin, according to the course of this world, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and was most equitably to be ranked among the children of disobedience, the children of wrath, even as others. Who is the proud professor of the present day, who imagines himself in a better condition by birth, or church ordinance, or education, than Saul of Tarsus? and that the sentence of actual, wilful sin deserving the wrath of God, which was pronounced truly against the conscientious disciple of Gamaliel, is not true when pronounced against him? If he still entrench himself behind the supposed infallible efficacy of his baptism, I call upon him, as he values his eternal salvation, to reflect upon the difference between the sign, and the thing signified; to bear in mind that saying of the Apostle in one of the above-mentioned arguments, "He is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh;" and to consider its un

C

deniable application, he is not a Christian who is one outwardly; neither is that baptism which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Christian who is one inwardly; and baptism is that of the heart, in the spirit and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.

Another and perhaps even a more deceitful reason why the scriptural statements of the universal guilt of man are evaded by so many, arises from the very comprehensive language of scripture upon the subject, describing a variety of characters in a single sentence and thereby expressing more than any one individual can take to himself. Observe then the effect of this. When a man reads one of these comprehensive sentences, self-love directs his attention to those parts of it which do not apply to himself; and his conscience not condemning him therein, he passes over the whole sentence as if no part of it applied to himself. Take, for example, this sentence: "Men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of Godliness, but denying the power thereof." I am not without natural affection, whispers the

desperately deceitful heart of the reader, I am not a truce-breaker, I am not a false accuser, I am not therefore one of those persons of whom the Apostle writes. Stay! the conclusion is false: the Apostle does write of you: one clause is sufficient to convict. You are not without natural affection? Granted: but are you not unthankful? You are not truce-breakers? Well; but are you not proud, are you not boasters, are you not covetous? You are not false accusers? Be it so: but are you not lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God? and having a form of Godliness, are you not denying the power thereof? We repeat, one clause is sufficient to convict; and even if you could prove complete exemption from every clause but one; yet still, under that one, you incur complete condemnation. That sentence of death be passed upon a man, it is not necessary to prove him guilty of murder, and robbery, and forgery: one crime, one clause, is sufficient to convict.

Must it not then be fully acknowledged by us all, that the days of the years of our lives have been indeed evil? But who amongst us feels this acknowledgment, and how shall I endeavour to produce this salutary feeling? The opening of a new year is an occasion well calculated to help us to it: but the great enemy of our souls appears to be aware of this; and

« PreviousContinue »