2. It is absolutely necessary, that you see your need of Christ, in order to come to him. Coming to Christ, in its ówn nature, supposes, that we see no need of him. You cannot see what you need Christ for, unless you see your true character and state according to law. The law is the appointed school-master, to lead sinners to Christ. The law requires perfect obedience, on pain of eternal damnation. It requires us to love God with all our heart, as being infinitely lovely. The least defect merits eternal wo. If you take measure by this law, as your rule, your true character will appear dead in sin; at enmity against God, not subject to his law, neither indeed can be. And if you judge of your state according to this law, you are condemned already, and the wrath of God abideth on you, you are lost; you stand guilty before God. And if the law is holy, just, and good, your mouth is stopped. The Lord is righteous when he speaketh, and clear when he judgeth, although you should perish for ever. All this you' must see; yea, you must feel it through and through your heart, as did the Apostle Paul. The commandment came, sin revived, and I died. It is for want of thorough conviction, that so many awakened sinners take up with false comfort. Their wound was never searched to the bottom. It was skinned over too soon. And such slighty cures, though more easily performed, may prove fatal in the end. But let your legal convictions be ever so deep, you will perish, unless of his mere sovereign grace.—

3. He who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, shines in your heart, to give you the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ. You are blind, quite blind, to the divine beauty. And consequently blind to the beauty of the divine law. And so, consequently, blind too to the beauty of Christ, as dying to answer the demands of the law. And consequently under the power of unbelief. Every unregenerate man has the spirit of infidelity in his. heart. 1 John v. 1. Rom. x. 9. Psalm xiv. 1. You can never cordially believe that the Son of God became incarnate, and died to answer the demands of a law, in its own nature too severe. Such a substitution cannot appear to be of God,

glorious and divine; but rather shocking! You can never heartily approve of the law, (which requires us to love God for his own divine excellencies, with all our hearts, on pain of eternal damnation for the least defect,) as holy, just, and good, unless God appears in your eyes as ONE INFINITELY LOVELY.-So depraved are you, so entirely devoid of a relish for divine beauty, that God never will appear thus amiable in your eyes, unless you are born of the spirit, have divine life. immediately communicated to you from God, have a supernatural and divine sense, taste, relish, imparted to you from on high. Your heart is like the chaos; the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And dark, eternally dark, it would have been, had not God said, let there be light. So, unless he who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, shines in your heart, you will abide in eternal darkness, blind to divine beauty; to the glories of God and Christ, of law and Gospel. And if the Gospel continues thus hid from you, you are lost, for ever lost. 2 Cor. iv. 3. 6.

If the divine law, in itself, is not holy, just, and good, Christ's dying to answer its demands cannot make it so.—If the law was too severe, Christ's death was a most shocking affair! A dislike of the divine law, as too rigorous, is the root of all the chief errors in the Christian world; yea, it is the root of the prevailing infidelity of the present age. And it now lies at the bottom of all your hard thoughts of God, O my Theron; which the devil is not the author of, as some imagine, in such cases; and is a mighty bar to your believing in Christ. And nothing can effectually remove it, but divine light, imparted in regeneration d.

d No man can understandingly and heartily look to, trust in, or depend upon, the mediation of Christ, unless he sees his need of him as a mediator. No man can see his need of the mediation of Christ, unless he sees that which renders his mediation needful. Now, the goodness and excellency of the divine law which we have broke, is the only thing which originally rendered the mediation of Christ needful. But for this, the sinner might have been saved without a mediator, without an atonement, as well as with. Nay, better. For if the law were too severe, it had evidently been more honourable for God to have repealed or abated it, than to have appointed his Son to answer its demands in our stead.

Some seem to think, that the law, although suited to the strength of man ber

4. Bid a final adieu to vain and carnal companions, to all sinful and carnal pleasures and pastimes, and to every known. sin; all which tend to stupify the heart. And by reading, meditation, and prayer, endeavour with all your might to obtain a realizing sense of your true character and state. Cast yourself at the foot of sovereign grace, and cry with the blind man, Lord, that I might receive my sight! "That I may see fore the fall, and so a good law for an innocent, holy creature, yet is too rigorous for a fallen world. And therefore imagine, that Christ died to purchase an abatement, and to bring it down to a level with our present weakness. But if the law was too severe, the justice of the divine nature would have moved the governor of the world to have made all proper abatements; nor was the death of Christ needful in the case. Surely Christ need not die, merely to get justice done us.

:

Some seem to look upon God the Father, as all made up of wrath, the sinner's enemy and on God the Son, as all made up of love, the sinner's friend; and imagine he died to assuage his father's anger, and move his compassions towards poor sinners and so they love Christ, while they hate God and his law. But this is all a mere chimera. The Father is as full of love Son. The Son is as holy and just, as great a friend to the enemy to sin, as the Father. They are both of one heart. one God. John x. 80.

and goodness as the law, and as great an Yea, they are both

Some seem to resolve the whole of God's law and government, and the death of Christ, into the mere arbitrary will of God: as though the whole were not the result of wisdom, of infinite wisdom, but rather of mere arbitrary will. But it does not appear by Scripture, or otherwise, that the infinitely wise God ever determines any thing without reason, or does any thing but what is wise for him to do. But rather the whole of divine revelation joins to confirm the truth of St. Paul's observation, that God worketh all things after the COUNSEL of his own will. Eph. i. 11. All his perfections, if I may so speak, sit in council: and all his decrees and works are the result of infinite holiness, justice, and goodness, directed by infinite wisdom.

There is but one way to solve the difficulty; there is but one thing can ever satisfy our hearts. A sight of the glory of the God of glory, will open to view the grounds and reasons of the law, and convince us that it is holy, just, and good, glorious, and amiable, and worthy to be kept in credit, to be magnified and made honourable, by the obedience and death of the Son of God. But, then, if the law is good, we who have broke it, are not fit to live. Death is our due. The Judge of all the earth cannot but do right. His nature, law, and honour, call aloud for our destruction. He cannot be just, if he does not destroy us. It will bring everlasting reproach upon his government, to spare us, considered merely as in ourselves. When this is felt in our hearts, then, and not till then, shall we feel our need of Christ, and be prepared to look to the free grace of God through the redemption that is in Christ, and to exereise faith in his blood, who was set forth to be a propitiation, to declare God's righteousness, that he might be just, and yet the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus.

and know what I am, what I deserve, what I need; and the only way to obtain relief, by free grace through Jesus Christ." However, that you may not trust in your own doings to recommend you to the divine favour, nor be encouraged from your own goodness to hope for mercy, constantly remember,

5. That the divine law, which you are under, requires that you love GOD for himself; whereas, all you do is merely from self-love. Yea, it requires you to love God with all your heart; whereas, there is no love to God in your heart. And it requires this sinless perfection on pain of eternal damnation, for the least defect; so that by the law you are already condemned. By mere law you are therefore absolutely and for ever undone. You stand guilty before God. But mere law is the rule of right, and standard of justice. If justice should take place, you then see your doom. There is no hope from this quarter. Wherefore you lie at the mercy of God, his mere mercy, who is absolutely unobliged to grant you any relief for any thing you can do. He might justly have left all mankind in this state, without a Saviour. And he may, on the same grounds, as justly leave you in this state, without a Sanctifier. He did not give his Son to save this lost world, for our righteousness' sake: Yea, had we been righteous, we should not have needed his Son to die in our stead. Nor does God give his holy Spirit, to convert any poor perishing sinner, for his righteousness' sake: Yea, it is his being entirely destitute of all that is spiritually good, and dead in sin, that occasions his standing in perishing need of converting grace. And although all the promises of God are in Christ Jesus, Yea, and in him amen; yet, as to those who are out of Christ, they are so far from being entitled to the promises, that the wrath of God abideth on them. Therefore,

6. If ever you are renewed by the Holy Ghost, it will be, not for any goodness in you, but merely from God's self-moving mercy, and sovereign grace, through Jesus Christ. Tit. iii. 5, 6.

7. How dreadful soever this representation makes your case appear; yet, if this is your true state, you must see it, that you may know your need of Christ and free grace, and be in at capacity, understandingly, to give a proper reception to the

glad tidings of the Gospel, viz. That through Christ, God is ready to be reconciled to the returning penitent, who justifies God, approves his law, quits all claims, and looks only to free grace, through Jesus Christ, for salvation. Luk. xviii. 13. Rom. iii. 24, 25, 26.

8. Saving faith consists in looking to free grace, through Jesus Christ, for salvation; thus viewing God's law, and your own case, as they really be. And he that thus believeth, shall be saved. Therefore, repent and be converted, and your sins shall be blotted out. Behold, now is the accepted time, and now is the day of salvation! And by me, one of Christ's ministers, God does beseech you to be reconciled, and I pray you in Christ's stead, be you reconciled to God. For God hath made his only begotten Son to be a sacrifice for sin, that all who are united to him by a true and living faith, might return to God with acceptance, and be justified, and have eternal life through him.

Ther. Every word you have spoken sinks down into my ears. The Lord grant, the truth may pierce my heart through and through, The rest of my days I will devote to the business of my soul.-I thank you for your kind instructions; I beg your prayers; the anguish of my heart calls me to retire ; Adieu! dear sir, Adieu !

Paul. May the only wise God be your effectual instructor, my Theron! Adieu!

To my dear Aspasio,

These Dialogues are presented by

YOUR AFFECTIONATE

THERON.