and pervading faculty which belongs | it also. The truth is, that a want of ba to God, as the judge of all and the lief in God as a Judge, is nearly as preva、 lawgiver of all. Be assured that there is a presiding justice in His administration; that there is a moral government founded on a righteousness, the lessons of which are more or less known by all, and the sanctions of which will be accordingly fulfilled upon all. Your very power of judging others, proves that its lessons are in some degree known to you. And think not, O man which judgest those who do such and such things, and doest the same, that thou wilt escape the judgment of God.

lent as the want of belief in Christ as a Saviour. Could the one be established within you, it would create an inquiry and a restlessness and an alarm, which might soon issue in the attainment of the other. But the general habit of the world proves, that, in reference to God as a God of judgment, there is a profound and a prevailing sleep among its generations. The children of alienated and degenerate Nature, are no more awake to the law in all the unchangeableness of its present authority, and in all the certainty of its coming terrors-than they are awake to the gospel in the freedom of its offers, and in the sureness of its redemption, and in the exceeding greatness and preciousness of all its promises. There is just as little sense of the disease as there is little of esteem for the remedy. Theologians accordingly tell us of the faith of the law, and of the faith of the gospel. By the one we believe what the law reveals, in regard to its own requirements and its own sanctions. By the other we believe what the gospel reveals, in regard to its own proposals and its own invitations and its own privileges. Faith attaches itself to the law as well as to the gospel; and obedience to the gospel as well as to the law. The apostle here speaks of our not obeying the truth-and the psalmist says→ "Lord, I have believed thy command

God, in the day of final account, will find out in the case of every human Being whom He does condemn, the materials of his valid condemnation. These materials may in a great measure be hidden from us now; and yet the palpable fact of each being able morally to judge another, and to pass his moral opinion upon another, however little he may be disposed to scrutinize himself, forms a very palpable disclosure of the fact, that there is in our hearts the sense of a moral law-a monitor who, if we do not follow him as our guide here, will be our accusing witness hereafter. And from every feeling of reprobation, if not from every feeling of resentment towards others of which we are capable, we may gather assurance of the fact, that there does exist within us such a sense of the distinction between right and wrong, as, if not acted on in our own con-ments." The truth is, that, among the duct, will be enough to convict us of a latent iniquity, and to call down upon us a rightful sentence of condemnation.

men of our listless and secure species, there is no realizing sense of their being under the law-or of their being under the So long as self is the subject of its over- haunting control and inspection of a seership, the moral sense may be partial Lawgiver. Their habit is that of walking or reluctant or altogether negligent of its in the counsel of their own hearts and in testimonies. But if it can give those tes-the sight of their own eyes-nor do they timonies clearly enough and feelingly enough, when it casts a superintending eye over the conduct of others, this proves that an inward witness could speak also to us, but does not, because we have bribed him into silence. In other words, it will be found on the last day, that we had light enough to conduct us if we would have followed, and to condemn us if we have either refused or wilfully darkened its intimations. So that God will be clear when He speaketh and justified when He judgeth. He will wipe His hands of every outcast on that great and solemn occasion; and make it evident that the guilt of all the iniquities for which he is punished is at his own door-that there is no unrighteousness of severity with God, but that His judgment is indeed according to truth when it is against them who commit such things.'

The apostle affirms his own sureness of this, and with a view to make us sure of

feel, in the waywardness of their self-originating movements, that they are the servants of another and amenable to the judgment of another. Let a man just attend to the current of his thoughts and purposes and desires, throughout the course of a whole day's business; and he will find how lamentably the impression of a divine superintendence, and the sense of a heavenly and unseen witness, are away from his heart. This will not excuse his habitual ungodliness-due, as we have often affirmed it to be, to the wilful smothering of convictions, which, but for wilful depravity, he might have had. But such being the real insensibility of man to his own condition as a responsible and an amenable creature, it is well that by such strenuous affirmations as those of the apostle, he should be reminded of the sureness wherewith God will appoint a day in righteousness; and institute a judgment over the quick and the dead.

shaking of the ground from under usbut, instead of these, why it is that all is going on in its wonted order, and the sun moves as steadily, and the seasons roll as surely, and all the successions of nature follow each other with as undisturbed

so to persevere even unto eternity.

Unbelief is not so much a dissent of the mind from any one particular truth or doctrine of revelation, as a darkness of the mind which intercepts a realizing view of all the truths and all the objects that lie spread over the region of spirituality. The clearing away of this dark-regularity, as if destined so to abide, and ness renders these objects visible; and it We know not the theory of ungodly is a variation in the order of their disclosure which forms one chief cause of the men upon this subject, but their practice varieties of religious experience. Some speaks most intelligibly what they feel catch in the first instance a view of the about it. They tread upon this world's law, scattering, as if from the mouth of a surface as firmly, as if the world stood on volcano, its menaces and its terrors on all a secure and everlasting foundation. They the children of disobedience; and it is not prosecute this world's objects as strenutill after a dreary interval of discompo- ously, as if in the gaining their little porsure and distress, that they behold the tion of it, they gained a value which in mantle lifted away from that stronghold exchange would be greater than the value into which all of them flee as an escape of men's soul's. They toil and calculate and a resting place. Others again catch and devise for this world's interests, with at the outset a milder and a quieter ray as intense and undivided earnestness, as from the light of the Sun of Righteous- if they and the world were never to be ness; and it is not till they have been separated. In the face of evidence-in conducted within the fold of a most sure the face of experience-in the face of all and ample mediatorship, and from whence they know about death, and of all that they may look tranquilly and at a safe has been revealed to them about judgment and protected distance on all around them and retribution and the final wreck of the —it is not till then, that they are made to present system of things, do they assign see the hatefulness of sin, and all the a character of perpetuity to what is seen dread and all the dignity of God's fiery and sensible around them; nor could they denunciations against it. These things possibly labour more devotedly in the follow each other by a different succes-pursuits of time, though they themselves sion with different individuals; but certain it is that the most partial glimpse of the smallest portion of the whole territory of faith, is greatly more to be desired, than the deep and sunken and unallevia- | ted carnality of him, who is wholly given unto things present and things sensible; and even he, to whom the guilt and danger alone have been unfolded, is far more hopefully conditioned, than he, who, alike insensible to the wrath of God the Judge, and to the beseeching voice of God the Saviour, has taken up with time as his portion and his all; and, living as he lists, lives in the enjoyment of a peace, which, if not broken up`ere he dies, a few years will demonstrate to have been indeed a fatal and then irrecoverable delusion.

The 4th verse of this chapter has been referred to by Peter in his second epistle wherein he also explains why it is that God does not cut short the present stage of His administration-why it is, that He tolerates so long the succession of one sinful generation after another-why it is, that He sweeps not away such a moral nuisance as our rebellious world, and so have done with it-why it is, for example, that at this very hour we see not the symptoms of dissolving nature, and hear not the trumpet of preparation for the solemnities of the last day, and feel not the heat of melting elements, or the

were to continue here for ever, and all things to continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.

Such is the practical impression of a natural man about the life that he lives in the world; and all his habits of life and business are founded upon it. But how different from the revelation of its design and purpose as given by the apostles. It is a suspension of the wrath of God against sinners, that space may be allowed for repentance. It is that He, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return, forbears the infliction of His final vengeance till they have got their opportunity. The perverse interpretation which a worldly man puts upon the continuance of the world, is, that the world is worthy of all his affections; and that it is his wisdom to rear upon its basis the fabric of his hopes. He misses the altogether different conclusion which should be drawn from it-that this continuance is due to the goodness of God, lengthening out to him and to us all the season of an offered indemnity, and of a proclaimed pardon, and of an inviting gospel with the whole of its privileges and blessings-and so, not knowing that this goodness, instead of rivetting him more to the world should lead him to forsake the love of it for the love of its Maker, does he misunderstand and misapply the bearing of time upon eternity.

What we have already noticed, about | goodness, that we have been spared to the alternative character of that dispen- this present moment of our history; and sation under which we sit, is strikingly now hear Him in the very language of brought out in the verses before us. Good- His own revelation bid you turn and turn, ness to the innocent, or goodness to the for why will you die. But if you will not deserving, merely displays this attribute draw from the treasures of His forbearin a state of simplicity; but the goodness ance, there is treasure of another kind which remains unquelled and unexhausted that is heaping by every day of your neafter it has been sinned against-theglected salvation, in a storehouse of vengoodness which persists in multiplying geance; and which, on the great day wher upon the transgressor the chances of his God shall ease Him of all His adversaries, recovery, and that in the midst of affront will all be poured forth upon you. And and opposition-the goodness which, loth | thus it is, that if you despise the riches of to inflict the retaliating blow, still holds His goodness and forbearance and longout a little longer and a little longer; and, suffering, and suffer not them to lead you with all the means in its power of aveng- to repentance, you will by your hardness ing the insults of disobedience, still ekes and impenitency, treasure up unto yourout the season for its return, and plies it selves wrath against the day of wrath, with all the encouragements of a free and revelation of the righteous judgments pardon and an offered reconciliation of God. this is the exuberance of goodness, this is Let us therefore, in plain urgency, bid the richness of forbearance and long- you repent; and, untramelled by system, suffering; and it is the very display which set before you, as the apostle does, both God is now making in reference to our the coming wrath and the coming glory; world. And by every year which rolls and tell you that the one is to him who over our heads-by every morning in doeth evil, and that the other is to him who which we find that we have awoke to the doeth well; and we may be sure that light of a new day instead of awakening there is nothing in faith, or in any of its in torment-by every hour and every mysteries, which will supersede the day minute through which the stroke of death of judgment as it is recorded in the pasis suspended, and you still continue a sage here before us. The apostle is not breathing man in the land of gospel calls only describing what would have happenand gospel invitations-is God now justi-ed under the first covenant, but what will fying His goodness towards you. And And happen under the second. For though earnest as He is for your return, and heed- justified by faith, we shall be judged by less as you are of all this earnestness, works; and let not the one of these artidoes it call as time moves onward for a cles be so contrasted with the other, as to higher and a higher exertion of forbear- throw a shade either of neglect or insigance on the part of the Divinity, to re-nificance over it. When rightly understrain His past and accumulating wrath, stood, they reflect upon each other a mufrom being discharged on the head of tual lustre, and lend to each other a muthose among whom though God entreats tual confirmation. Faith is the high road yet no man will turn, and though He to repentance. Our acceptance of the stretch out His hand yet no man regardeth. righteousness of Christ as our title for an Now if such be the character of God entrance into heaven, is an essential stepin His relation to man, mark what charac-ping-stone to our own personal righteouster it stamps upon man should he remain ness as our preparation for the joys and unsoftened and unimpressed by it. It the exercises of heaven; and if there be were offence enough to sin against the a stirring of conscience and an agitation authority of a superior; but to sin against of alarm in any of your hearts, under the his forbearance forms a sore and a fatal sense of your not being what you ought aggravation. Thus to turn upon the long- to be-we can do nothing more effectual, suffering of God and to trample it-thus than to propose the blood of Christ to to pervert the season which He has allot- your faith, in order that under the transted for repentance, into a scason of more forming and sanctifying influence of such secure and presumptuous transgression- a belief, you both be what you ought and thus, upon every delay of vengeance with do what you ought. which He favours us, the more to strengthen ourselves in hard and haughty defiance against Him-this indeed is a highway of guilt, which, if you be not arrested therein, will lead to a sorer judgment and a deadlier consummation. Turn then all of you at the call of repentance, or it is the very highway on which you are treading. It is because He is rich in

The great object of the apostle's demonstration is, that men should make their escape from the penalties of the law, to the hiding-place provided for them in the gospel. And though he here intimates the rewards which it holds out to obedience, and the fearful vengeance which it holds out against transgression-yet he does not intimate that any individual ever earned

the one, or ever secured by his own right- | Jesus Christ to whom this judgment will eousness an exemption from the other. be committed; and the judgment will be His object is to make known to us the according to 'my gospel,' or the gospel constitution or the economy of God's gov- which the apostle proclaims to his hearers. ernment, that, should any of its subjects | The judgment of condemnation will be fulfil all its requisitions, they should be upon those who have withstood its overrewarded; but without saying that they tures; or who, if these overtures had actually did so-or, that, should any of never reached them, have withstood the its subjects fail in those requisitions they instigations of their own conscience, would be punished; but without telling us which ought to have been a law unto whether any or some or all come under them. And the judgment of acquittal will this condemnation. How it was that they be upon those who have obeyed the truth, actually did conduct themselves under or who have rendered obedience unto the this administration, he tells us afterwards faith-those whose persons and whose -when he says of all, both Jews and works are accepted for the sake of a better Gentiles, that they were under sin; and righteousness than their own-those who, that by the deeds of the law no flesh can after they believed, were sealed with the be justified, for that all had sinned and Holy Spirit of promise, and were made come short of the glory of God. the workmanship of God in Christ Jesus, and were created anew unto good works. So that, after the first covenant has been superseded by the second-after man has become dead unto the law and made alive unto Christ-after all its demands have been satisfied, and it has no more power to challenge or to condemn him who truly believes in Jesus, Jesus himself takes up the judgment of him, and tries him on the question whether he is actually a believer'; and the deeds done in the body are the evidences of this question, and make it manifest on that day that the faith which he professed was no counterfeit, being fruitful in all those works of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the praise and glory of God.

And yet after all there will be a judgment; and this judgment will proceed upon each individual according to the deeds done in his body; and it is upon those who bring forth fruit with patience, or who maintain a patient continuance in well-doing, that these accents of invitation will descend—“ Well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord;" and it is also upon those who are contentious and obey not the truth but obey unrighteousness, that the awful bidding away to the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels will be pronounced, by Him who conducts the solemnities of that great occasion. But then, as we read afterwards, it will be

LECTURE VII.

ROMANS ii, 12—29.

For as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law, (for not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be jus tified. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another,) in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel. Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest his will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou therefore that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? for the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written. For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep the law; but if thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made uncircumsion. Therefore, if the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision? and shall not uncircumcision, which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge thee, who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law? For he is not a Jew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew which is one inwardly: and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.'

V. 12. WITHOUT a written law as the Jews had-they shall perish without being judged by that law. There will be another law to judge them—and, whosoever perishes, it will not be the consequence

of a condemnation brought to bear upon him by a law which he did not know of. They who have sinned in the law, that is in the written law, are they who have sinned under that law-the Jews who will

This is all that needs to be advanced in the way of exposition-and the following is a paraphrase of this passage,

be judged by it. V. 13. There is a term which we may often have to recur toand which we therefore shall explain at present. Some would have it that justifi- For as many as have sinned without cation in the New Testament means the law, shall also perish, not by the conmaking of a man personally just. Con- demnation of that law, but of another ceive a thief, for example, to undergo which they had; and as many as have such a transformation of character as sinned who were under the dispensation that he henceforward is honest in all his of the written law, shall by that law be transactions—this would be making him judged. For, as to the Jews, they are not a just person in the sense which some the hearers of the law who are reckoned choose to assign to the word-it would be just before God; but they are the doers justifying him. We believe it may be of the law only who shall be justified. made out, in almost every place where it And, as to the Gentiles, they having not occurs, that this is not the real meaning the law of Mount Sinai, yet, when by naof the term-that it should be taken, not ture they do the things contained in that in a personal, but in what may be called law, these, though without a written code, a forensic signification-or, that to justify, have a something in its place which to instead of meaning to make just by a them has all the authority of a law. For process of operation upon the character, they show that the matter of the law is means to pronounce or to declare just by written in their hearts-both from their the sentence of a judicial court. This is conscience testifying what is right and called the forensic sense of the term, wrong in their own conduct, and from because a court of justice was anciently their reasonings in which they either accalled a forum; and it is evident that, cuse or vindicate one another. No man here at least, the word must be understood | shall be judged by a law known only to forensically for the doers of the law do others and unknown to himself; but all not need to be made just personally. shall be judged by the light which beThey are already so; and therefore for longed to them, in that day when God them to be justified, is to be declared just shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus by the sentence of him who administers Christ, and agreeably to the gospel which the law. V. 15. There seem here to be I now declare unto you. Behold, thou art two distinct proofs of the Gentiles being called a Jew, and hast a confidence in thy a law unto themselves. The first is from law, and makest a boast of thy peculiar the fact of there being a conscience indi- relationship with God, and thou knowest vidually at work in each bosom, and His will, and canst both distinguish and deponing either to the merit or the de-approve the things which are more excelmerit of actions. The second from the fact of their accusing or excusing one another, in the reasonings or disputes which took place between man and man. For what is translated thoughts,' may be rendered into dialectic reasonings, or disputes which one man has with another, when a question of right or justice is started between them. It proves them to be in possession of a common rule, or standard of judging, or, in other words, that a law is actually among them. So true is it, even in its application to the Gentiles, that there is a light which lighteth every man who cometh into the world. V. 22. To commit sacrilege, or to take to our private use, that which is consecrated to God. This is what might very readily be brought home to a Jewish conscience-it being matter of frequent complaint against the Jews, that they offered what was lame and defective in sacrifice. V. 24. This is written for example, in Ezekiel xxxvi. 20, where it is said that the Heathen in mockery said unto the people of Israel when they were carried away captive-"These are the people of the Lord and are gone forth out| of His land."

lent-being instructed out of thy law. And, with all this superior advantage, thou lookest upon thyself as a guide of the blind, and as a light of them who are in darkness, and as an instructor of the ignorant, and as a teacher of babes-seeing that thou hast the whole summary of knowledge and truth which is in the law. But it is not he who heareth, or he who knoweth, but he who doeth that shall be justified; and dost thou who teachest another, teach effectually thyself?-thou who proclaimest that a man should not steal, dost thou steal?-thou who sayest that a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery?-thou who abhorrest idols, dost thou rob God of His temple offerings ?-thou who makest thy boast of the law, through the breaking of the law dost thou dishonour God? For we have it upon record, that through you the name of God has been blasphemed. For your circumcision, and other outward observances which form the great visible distinction between you and the Gentiles

these are profitable if you keep the whole law; but if you break the law, the keeping of its external ordinances will not raise you above the level of those who