God against the incorrigible, and to exhibit them as examples of divine retribution. Regard to the interests of those who engaged, was not the only or the prevailing principle of this war. In all these respects it exhibits a striking figure of the warfare the church of God is called to maintain with its spiritual enemies.

Like that waged with the Canaanites, no suitable measures are to be relaxed, no idea of concession or treaty admitted, no thought indulged of future amity and reconciliation. Our eyes must not pity, nor our hands spare; no tenderness must be indulged towards our spiritual enemies, no thought admitted but of pursuing them to destruction. We are to "crucify the flesh with its affections and lusts ;"* to mortify, or, in other words, put to death our members that are in the earth, to endeavour that "the body of sin may be destroyed, that henceforth we shall not serve sin."†

As the people of Israel were forbidden to inquire in what name the Canaanites had served their gods, and were not to take their name into their lips; so christians are to have no communion with the "unfruitful works of darkness," but to "reprove them," while "fornication, uncleanness, and covetousness, which is idolatry, are not to be so much as named amongst them as becometh saints.” Every fibre of corruption is, if possible, to be extirpated, every part of the old man to be laid aside, "old things” universally renounced, and "all things * Gal. v. 24. † Rom. vi. 6. Eph. v. 3.

to become new." Hostilities are never to cease till the enemy perishes out of the land.

V. Though God could easily have destroyed the Canaanites at once, though he could have crowned [his people] with immediate and decisive victory; yet he chose rather to do it, as he informs them by Moses, " by little and little."

He adopted this method to exercise more fully their faith and patience. "I will not drive them out from before thee in one year, lest the land become desolate, and the beasts of the field multiply against thee. By little and little will I drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land."*

For wise and mysterious ends, in like manner, he permits his church to attain but a gradual victory. It is by slow degrees, and by a long succession of conflicts, that conquest is achieved; the force of the enemy is gradually weakened, and it is long ere the church is permitted completely to rest from its toils.

VI. To suffer our spiritual enemies to remain unsubdued, is uniformly productive of effects analogous to those which the Israelites were warned to expect from sparing the Canaanitish nations. "They shall be as pricks in your eyes, and goads in your sides, because you will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you. Then it shall come to pass that those which ye let remain of them shall be as pricks in your eyes,

* Exod. xxiii. 29, 30.

and thorns in your sides, and shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell. Moreover, it shall come to pass that I shall do unto you as I thought to do unto them."* It is one thing to suffer our enemies to remain unmolested, and another to commiserate their existence.

There are seasons when the christian, overdone with continual opposition, is ready to yield himself to the love of ease, and, relaxing in his opposition and vigilance, permits the enemy to gain some advantages; but if he hopes thereby to procure lasting tranquillity, he is greatly mistaken. There is that irreconcilable hatred between the principle of grace and the principle of corruption, between the new and the old man, Christ and Satan, that nothing is gained by an attempt to compromise their differences, or amicably to adjust their claims.

Our spiritual enemies are never capable of being softened by indulgence, of becoming neutral, much less of being converted into friends. They will be incessantly plotting our destruction, and watching for our unguarded moments, in order to catch every possible advantage of us; and the only safe way is [for us also] to be always on the watch, always distrustful of them, and hostile.

The people of Israel might have rid themselves much more completely of their enemies, had they availed themselves more diligently of their first advantages. Afterwards their enemies were suffered to remain for their trial.†

* Numb. xxxiii. 55, 56, &c. † Judges ii. 2, 3, 21—23.

VII. The people were dismayed at the report of the spies: a lively resemblance to the conduct of too many who set out towards the heavenly Canaan, but in the contest suffer themselves to be dismayed.

XXI.

ON THE LAW OF GOD IN THE HEART.

PSALM Xxxvii. 31.—The law of God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide.

THE temporary prosperity of the wicked, has in every age afforded a trial to the faith and patience of the righteous. Often are they doomed to behold the contemner of God "flourishing like a green bay tree," abounding in sensual pleasures and luxurious enjoyments, and elated with pride, as though the world were made only for them; while such as fear his name are crushed under the rod of power, and subjected to the greatest privations and sufferings. Such is the scene of providence, a scene which appears to have given birth to the composition of this psalm, in which the impatience and discontent which such a spectacle is apt to occasion is corrected, the brevity of the worldly prosperity of the wicked is foretold, and the final happiness and triumph of the righteous is asserted. The [righteous] are assured

of the powerful protection of the Supreme Being, whose favour they at present enjoy; whose wisdom is continually, though invisibly, operating in securing their future good. "The Lord loveth judgement, and forsaketh not his saints; they are preserved for ever: but the seed of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land, and dwell therein for ever."*

In opposition to the transient prosperity and the fugitive pleasures enjoyed by the wicked, the righteous are distinguished by the possession of permanent principles and unfading prospects. He is upheld by an invisible, but abiding power, and his character and conduct partake of the unchangeableness which belongs to his interior principles : "The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide."

By "the law," in this passage, it is probable we are to understand the word of God in general, with a particular reference to the preceptive part, in the same sense as it must undoubtedly be taken throughout the 119th Psalm. The preceptive part forms so essential a branch of every system of revelation, that it may with great propriety impart its peculiar name to the whole, agreeably to which even the gospel is denominated "the law of faith."+

These words present us, first, with a view of the internal principle which actuates a good man-" the law of God is in his heart;" next, with its effects + Rom. iii. 27.

* Psalm xxxvii. 28, 29. VOL. V.

P