should everlastingly lose the fruition of him, and he should likewise lose the service and voluntary subjection of his creature. And yet he will not abolish his law neither; lest thereby his justice should be more securely abused, his hatred against sin the less declared, his truth in all his threatenings questioned; and his dreadful majesty by men neglected, as the wooden king by the frogs in the fable. He will not punish those persons whom he loves, because he is pitiful to them; he will not pass over the sins which he hates, because he is jealous towards himself. Man and sin are as inseparably joined together since the fall, as fire and heat: yet God will have mercy on the man, and he will take vengeance of the sin. Some course then or other must there be found out to translate this man's sin on another's person, who may be able to bear them; and to interest this man's person in another's righteousness, which may be able to cover him. Some way must be found out, that things may be all one in regard of man, as if the law had been utterly abrogated, and that they may be all one in regard of God too, as if the creature had been utterly condemned. And all this is done in our High-priest. On him was executed the curse of the law; by him was fulfilled the righteousness of the law; for him was remitted the sin of man; and through him were all things made new again. The world was in Christ, as in its surety, making satisfaction to the justice of God; and God was in Christ, as in his ambassador, reconciling the world unto himself again. By all which we see the necessity which man, lapsed, had of a priest to restore him.

Hence then we may learn, First, How much we ought to hate sin, which arms the law, justice, and power of God against us. As hateful as it is unto God, so hateful it is in e itself. For he judgeth uprightly; he seeth things just as they are, without passion, prejudice, or partiality and as #hateful as it is in itself, so hateful should it be unto us, as the only ground of our misery, of the creature's vanity, and of God's dishonour. We see it is so hateful unto God, that he will most certainly be avenged of it. If he spare me, yet he will not spare my sin, though his own beloved Son must be punished for it. O then, why should that be light to me, which was as heavy as a millstone to the soul of Christ?

Why should that be my pleasure, which was his passion? Why that be on a throne with me, which was upon a cross with him? Why should I allow that to be really in me, which the Lord so severely punished, when the guilt thereof was but imputed to his son?-Many sins there are which others, Papists in their practice, as well as in their doctrine. and profession, esteem for light and venial sins. And venial indeed they are, 'per exoratorem Patris Christum,' as Tertullian states the question, By Christ who is a prevailing advocate with the Father. But, however, let not us dare esteem that a light thing, for which Christ died. And woe it had been for men, if Christ had not, in his body, on the tree, carried as well the guilt of our idle words, our vain thoughts, our loose and impertinent actions, as of our oaths, execrations, and blasphemies. If great sins were as the spear and nails, certainly small sins were as the thorns which pierced his head. And therefore we should learn with David to hate every evil way,' because God hates it, and suffers it not to pass unpunished; to revenge the quarrel of Christ against those lusts of ours, which nailed him to his cross, and to crucify them for him again; for, for that end was Christ crucified, that "our old man might be crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin a."

Again, We see, by this necessity of a priest, how deeply we stand engaged to our merciful God, who hath vouchsafed to help us in our greatest necessity: how we ought to love him, who hath first of all loved us: how we ought, in our bodies and in our spirits, to glorify him, who hath so dearly bought us how we should, like volunteers, fight for him who overcame for us: how thankful we should be to him, who was so compassionate unto us: how we should admire and adore the unsearchable riches of his wisdom and goodness, who, when we were desperately and incurably gone, had found out a way of escape and deliverance for us. God stood not in need of us, or any service of ours; he could have glorified himself in our just destruction. Who then can enough express either the mercy of God, or the duty of man, when he considers that God should call together

a Rom. vi. 6.

all the depths of his own wisdom and counsel, to save a company of desperate fugitives, who had joined in combination with his greatest enemies, to resist and dishonour him? It would have posed all the wisdom of the world (though misery be commonly very witty to shape and fashion to itself images of deliverance) to have found out a way to Heaven between the wrath of God and the sin of man. It would have posed all the heavenly intelligences, and the united consultations of the blessed angels, to have reconciled God's mercy in the salvation of man, and his justice in the condemnation of sin; to have poured out Hell upon the sin, and yet to have bestowed Heaven upon the sinner. If God should have instructed us thus far, "Ye are miserable creatures, but I am a merciful God: the demands of my justice I must not deny, neither will I deny the entreaties of my mercy: find me out a sacrifice answerable to my justice, and it shall be accepted for you all!"-O where could man have found a creature of capacity enough to hold, or of strength enough to bear, the sins of the world, or the wrath of God? Where could he have found out in Heaven or earth, amongst men or angels, a priest that durst accompany such a sacrifice into the presence of so consuming a fire? Or where could he have found out an altar whereon to offer, and whereby to sanctify so great a sacrifice? No, no! the misery of man was too deep and inextricable for all the created counsel in the world to invent a deliverance. Now, then, if God himself did study to save me, how great reason is there that I should study to serve him! How ought all my wisdom, and counsel, and thoughts, and desires, be directed to this one resolution, to live acceptably and thankfully unto him, who, when he might have produced glory to himself out of my confusion, chose rather to humble, and, as it were, for a while to unglorify himself for my salvation! Certainly that man did never rightly understand the horror of sin, the infinite hatred of God against it, the heaviness of his wrath, the malediction of the law, the mystery and vast dimensions of God's love in Christ, the preciousness of his sacrifice, the end, purpose, or merit of his death, any of those unsearchable riches of God, manifested in the flesh,-who will not crucify a vanity, a lust, a pleasure, an earthly member, unto him again; who finds more content and satisfaction in

his own ways of sin and death, more wisdom in the temptations and deceits of Satan, and his own fleshly mind, than in those deep mysteries of grace, and contrivances of mercy, which the angels desire to pry into.

over.

Therefore, in the last place, we should labour to feel this necessity we have of such a priest. This is the only reason why so few make use of so precious a fountain, because they trust in their own muddy and broken cisterns at home, and are never sensibly and thoroughly touched with the sense of their own wants. For it is not the saying and confessing, 'ore tenus,' that I have nothing,-nor the knowing in speculation only that I have nothing,—but the feeling and smarting, by reason of my want, which will drive me to seek for relief abroad. If a man did seriously consider and lay together such thoughts as these; "I am very busy for the affairs and passages of this present life, which will quickly vanish and pass away like a weaver's shuttle, or a tale that is told; I have another, and an abiding life to live, after this is All that I toil for here, is but for the back, the belly, the bag, and posterity. And am I not nearer to myself, than I am to my money? Am I not nearer to my soul, than I am to my carcase, or to my seed? Must I not have a being in that, when neither I nor my posterity have either back to be clothed, or belly to be fed, or name to be supported? O why am I not as sadly employed? why spend I not some, at least as serious and inquisitive, thoughts about this as about the other? Do I not know that I must one day stand before him who is a consuming fire, that I must one day be weighed in the balance, and woe be unto me if I am found too light? Appear before him I dare not of myself alone, without a priest to mediate for me, to cover and protect me from his fury, and to reconcile me unto him again. My person wants a priest; it is clogged with infinite guilt, which without him cannot be covered. My nature wants a priest; it is overspread with a deep and universal corruption, which, without him, cannot be cured. My sins want a priest; they are, in number and in quality, above measure sinful, which without him cannot be pardoned. My services want a priest; they are blemished and poisoned with many failings and corruptions, without him they cannot be accepted:"-I say, if men did seriously lay together such thoughts as these,

it could not be, that rational and sad men, men of deep thoughts in other matters, who love to bolt out things to the bran, and to be very solicitous for evidence and certainty in them, should suffer such a business as this, their interest in that priest, who must alone clothe their persons with his righteousness, and cleanse their nature with his Spirit, and wash away their sins with his blood, and sanctify their prayers and alms and all religious devotions with his incense and intercession, or else all of them must pass through the trial of such a fire as will consume them all,-to be slubbered over with loose and slender thoughts, and to be rested in, and resolved upon rather by the lying presumptions of a deceitful heart, than by the evidences and testimony of God's holy Spirit.-Consider what I say, and the Lord give you understanding in all things.

The second thing, proposed to be considered in the priesthood of Christ, was the qualification of that person, who was to be a fit High-priest for us. Legal sacrifices would not serve the turn to purge away sin, because of their baseness. They are not expiations of sin; but were only remembrances and commemorations of sin. Necessary it was, that heavenly things themselves should be purified with better sacrifices; for they, of themselves, without that typical relation which they had unto Christ, and that instrumental virtue which in that relation they had from him, were utterly weak and unprofitable: as the shadow hath neither being in itself, nor can give refreshment unto another, but dependency on the body to which it belongeth. And this appeareth, first, By their reiteration. Where the conscience is once purged, and there is remission of sin, there is no more offering: for the repeating of the sacrifice, shows that the person, for whose sake it is repeated, is ' in statu quo prius,' in the same condition now, as he was in at the time of the former oblation. Secondly, By their variety: there were both gifts and sacrifices for sini. Bulls, and goats, and calves, and lambs: and that shows that no one thing was fit to typify the full expiation wrought by

b Heb. ix. 9, 12.

f Heb. ix. 13.

Heb. ix. 9, xii. 13.

c Heb. x. 3. g Heb. vii. 18.

d Heb. ix. 23. h Heb. x. 2, 18.

• Gal. iii. 23. i Heb. v. 1. viii, 3.