If

"And so, truly, unless we have the vanity to think ourselves on a par with Comper and Hayley, and I know not what other elegans, in the higher circles of fine writers, we are to fall out with every thing common, and shut ourselves up in Monkish seclusion! such were a fair consequence, from reading their productions, 1, for one, would vote for their suppression amongst my correspondents, though I might feel disposed to avail myself of the plea for excusing my own reluctance to expose my defects; and, at my time of life, (just on completing my 64th year,) such a plea might very plausibly, and not unreasonably, be urged. Yet, in my homely way, so long as my faculties are spared, I shall not shrink from chatting on paper with such of my friends as I cordially esteem-leaving it with their good sense and temper to overlook the inelegancies of an old man's style. And, for yourself, though I say nothing against your improving every stimulus towards the attainment of what you admire in the best models of composition, I trust that, whenever I am favoured with your epistolary communications, no restraint will be laid on the freedom and fulness of your ideas, both which properties, in your correspondence, have always been to myself truly grateful."

But what Mr. B. was in the circle of his friends is of inferior consideration, when compared with the important relations in which he stood to society, and especially to "the church of the living God." As a divine and theo

to point out, in addition to the remarks already made in noticing his different publications. We allude to his constant and strenuous endeavour to maintain, that the Sacred Scriptures are the only satisfactory basis of religious truth. Every thing besides, for which authority has been claimed in religious matters, he regarded with a laudable jealousy. It was this that made him the enemy of the excessive deference sometimes shown to metaphysical reasoning. In one of his publications, he says, in aid of Biblical and Philological inquiries, a temperate use of metaphysics, or the science of intel lectual existences, in their respective natures, principles, properties, relations, and modes of action, &c. may be highly advantageous. But, after nearly forty years experience, I am free to confess, that, with respect to a proper and useful knowledge of all revealed truths, I am now much less disposed to rely on metaphysical investigation, than I was when emerging from the cloisters of an academy. The subjects of revelation, so far as it is interesting for us to understand them, are proposed with sufficient clearness in the word of God, though not arranged in systematic order, nor expressed in technical phraseology. And certainly, whatsoever is not capable of being conveyed to our understanding through the medium of scripture language, but is obliged to be presented by means of scholastic distinctions, arbitrary terms, and intricate subtleties, appears at once under a suspicious form, and can have but a slender claim to our unreserved confidence."-Appendix, p. 11.

This reverence for divine revelation, led him also to regard with much suspicion the divines of the modern German school, and to disapprove of the almost implicit

confidence sometimes placed in their critical discussions. He was not insensible that we are indebted to them for a considerable accession of historical and biblical information to the stores of sacred literature; yet he thought, with some others, that all this would be too dearly purchased at the expence of imbibing that daring spirit which cashiers received opinions, and even portions of sacred writ, frequently on most insufficient grounds. He was truly and extensively learned, and studied divinity with most liberal views; but he was convinced that the pride of literature is not less dangerous than any other modification of that intoxicating passion. He briefly states his views of this matter in the following extract of a letter to a friend.

*

"As to Michaelis, and other critics of that class, whose deep researches and very liberal concessions towards the enemies of pure Christianity, have been so highly boasted by the latter, I cannot help thinking, with many, that they have indulged in very bold animadversions on the sacred code, and strengthened the cause of indifferency to the great peculiarities of the Gospel, by a multiplied show of exceptions against the received version of the Sacred Scriptures, which some of the learned among the orthodox have, I think, ostentatiously admitted, lest their great reading should be called in question. Yet, after all, upon summing up the amount of their critical researches, one cannot but be thankful that so very trifling a part of the sacred code is at all affected by all the various readings, or omissions, which they have been able to collect; and we may admire the wisdom of providence in having permitted their great talents to take this direction, in order to establish a result so favourable to the great principles of the gospel. I have read with close attention, Griesbach's Intro

duction to his corrected edition of the Greek Testament, and could not help feeling considerable dissatisfaction at several of his. Canons, as evidently yielding to the cause of the heterodox, and therefore am very desirous of seeing Dr. Laurence's Examination of his Classification of Manuscripts," &c.

There are several persons still living, who have a lively recollection of what Mr. B. was as a minister of the Gospel. As a preacher, he attained to a considerable share of popularity, and those who knew him, will readily believe, that he neither sought nor obtained public notice by any unhallowed means. We confess, however, our inability to do justice to this part of his character. To describe a preacher, without ever having heard him, or read his printed sermons, is as impossible as to paint the portrait of a person whom the artist has never seen. But it is material to observe, that Mr. B. did not consider preaching as his only duty. He was truly the pastor of his flock. In this view, he endeavoured to reduce to practice the directions of some of his favourite authors on the pastoral care. It appears from an incidental remark in one of his printed sermons, that he had a custom of meeting the young people of his charge in the vestry of his chapel, for the purpose of instructing them in the principles and duties of religion; a practice which it is much to be wished that ministers and parents might mutually see the importance of promoting, as it cannot be doubted that it would be attended with the happiest effects. Such were the methods. used by Mr. B. to promote the great ends of religion. No wonder that the loss of such a pastor was greatly deplored, or that his labours have been long and affec tionately remembered. J. T. Knutsford.

No. XXXIX.

THE RECEPTION OF THE GREAT GOSPEL DOCTRINE.

"We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ

the power of God, and the wisdom of

God."--1 Cor. i. 23, 24.

On a recent occasion, we endeavoured to illustrate the great scheme of man's salvation by the Cross of Christ. We contemplated that glorious plan in itself, and we offered a few brief suggestions as to the feelings which it was calculated to awaken in the heart

enlightened from above." It may not be unprofitable for us to take a farther view of the same general subject, in its operation upon human character and its collision with human prejudices, as suggested by the remainder of the passage from which we selected our former text.

It might be supposed that a doctrine SO reasonable would meet with universal assent, that an offer so advantageous as that held forth in the Gospel, must command an eager and unhesitating acceptance. If we could detach ourselves from our human partialities, and look, as from an unconcerned distance, on the great transaction referred to in the text,-if we could behold with disinterested view the state of man, the merciful disposition of God, the infinite condescension of the Saviour, and the gracious agency of the Holy Spirit, we should feel it scarcely necessary to wait the result, but deeming the work completed when the offer of salvation was once made, we might turn away to the contemplation of other manifestations of the divine wisdom and compassion. But knowledge and experience unfold

a different scene; we have only to descend into the recesses of our own hearts to ascertain the feelings with which man regards the mercies of his God. Depraved affections, obstinate alienation, deep and malignant antipathy to good, are roused and called into action by the explicit and scriptural preaching of Christ crucified. So long as we stop short of particulars, and propose nothing more than general principles, while we merely hover on the frontier and outskirts of the great question, while we state the matter so vaguely as to leave the conscience at liberty to say to itself, take thine ease, we may claim an unreluctant hearing. But when we occupy a more decided ground, speak plainly the plain verities of God's word, put forward the nature, the requisitions, the awful sanctions of the Gospel, address ourselves directly to the conscience, and menace from Ebal, as well as invite from Gerizim, then every prejudice and every passion is up in arms against us; folly and fanaticism are charged upon us, and the clamour of the multitude, loudly raised of old for the crucifixion of our Lord and Saviour, calls down anew curses and persecutions on his followers. But thanks be to God who hath shewed unto us that which is good, that while others are stumbling at that stone of offence, and shouting foolishness against it, he hath revealed unto us the wisdom and the power combined in his glorious work. In our present meditations, we shall endeavour,

I. To shew why it is that the doctrine of the Cross is to the natural man foolishness, and a stumbling block.

II. To illustrate the fact, that

to the renewed man it displays, in full glory, the wisdom and the power of God.

III. To state the reasons of the different effect which it produces.

I. We have, in our introductory remarks, adverted to the antipathy cherished against the pure doctrines of evangelic truth by the natural man. But there must be reasons for this aversion; reasons that lie deep in the very centre of man's moral constitution in its actual state. These reasons, however, though they might be profitably investigated on an extensive scale, we must, on the present occasion, state in their most simple, but, at the same time, their most important and impressive form. The doctrines of the cross of Christ are not only in direct opposition to man's moral nature, but they are designed to effect an entire and painful change in all his moral habits and attachments. No wonder then that man recoils, and turns away in hatred and contempt, from proposals so abhorrent to every element of his fallen nature, and every principle of his depraved reasonings! But it is impossible for us to follow out all the bearings of this specification of Gospel truth, and our attention must be limited, in the present instance, to three particulars, in which the Gospel of a crucified Saviour exasperates the malignity of the carnal mind.-1. It levels man's pride. It is a remarkable feature in human character, that it contrives to extract food for its depraved dispositions, from the very circumstances which betray their meanness and their infirmity. If we attempt to trace the sources of man's vanity and loftiness, we shall invariably find them terminate in weakness or in guilt. Now the Gospel directs its warnings and its threatenings against every principle, and every exhibition of human pride. It confounds the vanity of human grandeur; it

exposes the emptiness of human learning; it mocks the credulity of human superstition; it shows the rust and the canker devouring the accumulations of human wealth, and it convicts of unutterable folly those who rely on the hollow and delusive seeming of health and vigour. Bring the doctrine of a crucified Redeemer into contact with all the varieties of human elevation, and they must fall prostrate before it. Tell the Phariseeand every man is a Pharisee at heart-that all his labours, and observances, and self-congratulations, are not only worthless, but aggravations of his guilt before God, and he will put aside the hateful truth with scorn. That the whole world is guilty before God; that every approach to the assumption of personal merit is a new insult to the majesty of an offended God, and a fresh disqualification for his pardon; that we are helpless, hopeless debtors to a holy and violated law; that there is One, the gracious, glorious substitute of his followers, whose infinite merit is alone effectual to redeem, who has acquitted the debt, discharged the penalty, and secured the life and liberty of all who cast themselves exclusively and implicitly on Him; that the purchase of this great salvation was the humiliation and agony of the cross, and its seal the justification of God's elect through the perfect righteousness of Christ ;-these are truths not less conspicuously recorded in the word of God, than they are unpalatable to human vanity-than they are precious to the renewed spirit. Wherever they find a cordial reception, they must lay all the high imaginations of man's heart low before the work of grace, and the love of Christ.-2. This doctrine counteracts man's lusts. Human nature, in its fallen condition, exhibits a strange combination of pride and appetite. It

should seem, that these apparently opposite forms of depravity could not possibly co-exist; but that one must destroy the other; either pride would elevate man above the low and earthly level of the passions, or that lust would absorb and destroy even the affectation of pride. The hypocrisy of the heart finds a way to reconcile these contradictions. It can enable the most abject slave to the tyranny of sense, to raise his head without a blush; it permits the "tallest son of pride," to wallow in the mire of his abominations, and even to extract a gratification of his miserable vanity from the variety and the extent of his excesses. But where the Gospel comes, it brings with it a bright and searching light, that reveals all the shameful corruptions which lurk in the chambers of the soul; it leaves no pretext to the deceit fulness of the heart, but places man at once in the presence of his Maker, and leaves him conscious and trembling beneath the pure eye of a holy and sin-hating God. And these are feelings not to be evaded; they haunt the criminal in the busy walks of active life, and in the silent reflections of the night; they pursue him through the paths of sin; in vain does he draw the curtains of darkness round the pavilions of his lust; they overhang him there, like a dark cloud charged with the curse and the vengeance of the All-seeing and Almighty Jehovah.-3. The glorious doctrine, whose operation we are now endeavouring to illustrate, disturbs the conscience of the unsanctified man. The death of Christ displays, in the most awful light, the character of God and the nature of sin. It manifests to a guilty world, the dreadful holiness of the Divine Being, and the destructive consequences of violating his righteous law. Nor does it stop here; it individualizes, as it were, the sinner, CONG. MAG. No. 63.

separates him from the multitude with whom he would be glad to mingle and be overlooked. But the frown of God reaches and appals him there; his refuges of lies fail him when the light of divine truth flashes on his conscience. There is nothing in the doctrines of the Gospel that admits of amity or truce with the carnal mind; they are at essential and eternal variance, and he who cherishes the last, abhors the first. The death of Christ is an appalling evidence, that all were dead-the death of trespasses and sin; and this is too agitating a conviction to leave the sinner free and joyous in his career of sensuality. The agony of Gethsemane, and the sufferings of Calvary, bear too strongly the signatures of divine justice, to leave at ease the spirit of him, who feels himself obnoxious to its visitations. There is nothing in the sufferings of this world to be compared with the pangs of a guilty conscience; wealth cannot alleviate them; pleasure does but aggravate them; business cannot dissipate them, nor rest, nor sleep, lull them to repose. Let us now pause to connect these considerations with our first head; and we shall cease to wonder, that doctrines which thus crush the pride of man to the very dust, which thus rebuke his lusts, and harrass his conscience, he should reject as foolishness, and avoid as a stumbling block.

It was proposed,

II. To illustrate the fact, that the doctrine of a crucified Redeemer displays to the renewed man, in full brightness, the wisdom and the power of God. With this view, we shall briefly point out the light in which the origination and execution of the great plan of miracle and mercy present themselves to the Christian's mind. 1st. The follower of Christ beholds, in the preordination of the great scheme of sal vation, through the humiliation and

R