salvation. This is the generation of them that seek him g that seek thy face, O Jacob." 1 Chron. xvi. 10. "Glory ye in his holy name. Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord." See the same words in Psal. cv. 3. Psal. xxii. 26. "The meek shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise the Lord, that seek him. Your heart shall live for ever." Psal xxxiv. 10. "The young lions do lack and suffer hunger; but they that seek the Lord, shall not want any good thing."

They that seek God, are spoken of as those that love God's salvation. Psal. Ixx. 4. "Let all those that seek thee, rejoice and be glad in thee; and let such as love thy salvation, say continually, Let the Lord be magnified." We have the same words again, Psal. xl. 16. The expression seems to be in some measure parallel with trusting in God's salvation; Psal. lxxviii. 22. "Because they believed not in God, and trusted not in his salvation." And hoping in God's salvation, Psal. cxix. 166. "I have hoped for thy salvation." And waiting for God's salvation, Gen. xlix. 18. "I have waited for thy salvation, O God." Lam. iii. 25, 26. "The Lord is good unto them that wait for him; to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope, and quietly wait for, the salvation of the Lord." Mic. vii. 7. “I will wait for the God of my salvation." Agreeably to this, despising the pleasant land, is spoken of as an exercise of the spirit of unbelief; Psal. cxvi. 24. "Yea, they despised the pleasant land: They believed not his word."

§ 59. Flying, resorting or running to, as to a refuge, are terms used as being equivalent to trusting; Psal. Ixii. 7, 8. "My refuge is in God. Trust in him at all times. God

is a refuge for us." Psal. xci. 2. name of the Lord is a strong tower; into it, and is safe." Psal. lxxi. 1, 3.

I

Prov. xviii. 10. “The the righteous runneth “In thee, O Lord, do

I put my trust."...." Be thou my strong habitation, whereunto may continually resort. Thou hast given commandment to save me; for thou art my rock and my fortress." Heb. vi. 18. "Who have fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before us."

§ 60. Waiting on the Lord, waiting for his salvation, and the like, are terms used as being equivalent to trusting in God in the Scripture. Psal. xxv. 2. "O my God, I trust in thee; let me not be ashamed." Verse 5. "On thee do I wait all the day." Verse 21. "Let integrity and uprightness preserve me, for on thee do I wait." Psal.xxxvii. 3. "Trust in the Lord." Ver. 5. "Trust also in him." Verse 7. "Rest on the Lord, and wait patiently for him." Psal. xxvii. 13, 14. I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord, and be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: Wait, I say, on the Lord."

66

$61. Hoping in God, hoping in his mercy, &c. are used as terms equivalent to trusting in God. Psal. lxxviii. 7. That they might set their hope in God." Psal. cxlvi. 5. Happy is that man that hath the God of Jacob for his aid; whose hope is in the Lord his God." Jer. xiv. 8. "O the hope of Israel, and the Saviour thereof in time of trouble." Jer. xvii. 7.

"Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord; whose hope the Lord is." Verse 13. "O Lord, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee, shall be ashamed." Verse 17. "Thou art my hope in the day of evil." 1 Pet. i. 3, 4, 5, &c. "Hath begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Christ from the dead; to an inheritance incorruptible, &c. who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, wherein ye greatly rejoice; that the trial of your faith being much more precious....whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice, &c. receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls." Verse 13. "Be ye sober, and hope to the end, for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ;" verse 21, 22. "Who by him do believe in God, who raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God: Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit." Chap. iii. 15. "And be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you." Heb. xi. 1. "Faith is the substance of things

"In his name shall the Gen ıssı, hope.

hoped for." Matth. xii. 21. tiles trust." In the original,

him, should

$62. Looking to, or looking for, are used as phrases equivalent to trusting, seeking, hoping, waiting, believing on, &c. Num. xxi. 9. "And it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived; together with John iii. 14, 15. "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in not perish, but have eternal life." Isa. xlv. 22. me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth." 1, 2. "Unto thee lift I up mine eyes, O thou that dwellest in the heavens. Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the the hand of their masters, and as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress; so our eyes wait upon the Lord our God, until that he have mercy upon us."

"Look unte Psal. cxxiii.

§ 63. Rolling one's self, or burden, on the Lord, is an expression used as equivalent to trusting. Psal. xxii. 8. trusted in the Lord, that he would deliver him :" In the orig inal, "He rolled himself on the Lord." Psal. xxxvii. 5. "Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass." In the Hebrew, Roll thy way upon the Lord. Prov. xvi. 3. "Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established." In the Hebrew, Roll thy works.

$ 64. Leaning on the Lord, and staying ourselves on him, are of the same force. Micah iii. 11. "Yet will they lean on the Lord." Cant. viii. 5. "Who is this that cometh up out of the wilderness, leaning on her beloved?”

§ 65. Relying on God, 2 Chron. xiii. 18. « Thus the children of Israel were brought under at that time, and the children of Judah prevailed; because they relied upon the Lord God of their fathers;" compared with verse 14, 15, wherein it is said, " And when Judah looked back, behold the battle was before and behind; and they cried unto the Lord, and the priests sounded with the trumpets. Then the men of Judah gave a shout; and as the men of Judah shouted, it came to pass that God smote Jeroboam and all Israel, before Abi jah and Judah."

§ 66. Committing ourselves, our cause, &c. unto God, is of the same force. Job v. 8. "I would seek unto God, and unto God would I commit my cause, who doth great things, and unsearchable, marvellous things without number."

§ 67. The distinction of the several constituent parts or acts of faith, into assent, consent, and affiance, if strictly considered and examined, will appear not to be proper and just, or strictly according to the truth and nature of things; because the parts are not all entirely distinet one from another, and so are in some measure confounded one with another: For the last, viz. affiance, implies the other two, assent and consent; and is nothing else but a man's assent and consent, with particular relation or application to himself and his own case, together with the effect of all in his own quietness and comfort of mind, and boldness in venturing on this foundation, in conduct and practice.

Affiance consists in these five things: 1. Consent to something proposed, to be obtained by another person, as good, eligible or desirable, and so for him. 2. Assent of the judgment to the reality of the good, as to be obtained by him; that he is sufficient, faithful, &c. 3. The mind's applying itself to him for it, which is no other than the soul's desiring him to possess us of this good consented to, expressing these desires before him, that he may see and take notice of them, i. e. expressing these desires with an apprehension that he sees our hearts, and designedly spreading them before him, to the end that they might be observed by him and gratified. 4. Hoping that the good will be obtained in this way; which hope consists in two things, viz. expectation of the good in this. way; and in some ease, quietness, or comfort of mind arising from this expectation. 5. Adventuring some interest on this hope in practice; which consists either in doing something that implies trouble, or brings expense or suffering, or in omitting something that we should otherwise do; by which omission some good is foregone, or some evil is brought on.

If these acts cannot in strictness all take place at the same moment of time, though they follow one another in the order of nature, yet they are all implied in the act that is exercised

the first moment, so far as that act is of such a nature as im plies a necessary tendency to what follows. In these three last especially consists man's committing himself to Christ as a Saviour. In the third and fourth especially consists the soul's looking to Christ as a Saviour.

§68. In that consent to the way or method of salvation, which there is in saving faith, the heart has especially respect to two things in that method, that are the peculiar glory of it, and whereby it is peculiarly contrary to corrupt nature: 1. Its being a way wherein God is so exalted and set so high, and man so debased and set so low. God is made all in all, and man nothing. God is magnified as selfsufficient and allsufficient, and as being all in all to us; his power and his grace, and Christ's satisfaction and merits being all And man is annihilated; his power, his righteousness, his dignity, his works, are made nothing of

2. Its being so holy a way; a way of mere mercy, yet of holy mercy; mercy in saving the sinner, but shewing no favor or countenance to sin; a way of free grace, yet of holy grace; not grace exercised to the prejudice of God's holiness, but in such a way as peculiarly to manifest God's hatred of sin and opposition to it, and strict justice in punishing it, and that he will by no means clear the guilty; every way manifesting the infinite evil and odiousness of sin, much more than if there had been no salvation offered. Therefore, humiliation and holiness are the chief ingredients in the act of consent to this way of salvation.

In these things I have spoken only of a consent to the way or method of salvation. But in saving faith is included also a consent to the salvation itself, or the benefits procured. What is peculiarly contrary to this in corrupt nature, is a worldly spirit; and therefore in order to this act of consent, there must be mortification to, or weanedness from the world, and a selling of all for the pearl of great price.

Lastly, Besides all these, there is in saving faith a consent to Christ himself, or a closing of the heart or inclination with the person of Christ. This implies each of the three things forementioned, viz. humiliation, holiness, and renouncing the