becomes in some degree holy, proportionably loves holy persons, and holy things: we are spiritually-minded, and habitually seek our pleasure in spiri tual pursuits and employments.-This capacity of spiritual perception is not a new faculty added to the soul, but the ability of exercising every faculty which God hath given us, in a suitable manner, about the grand concerns of religion; for which our apostacy from our Creator, and idolatrous attachment to the creatures, had wholly disqualified us. It is therefore, represented in Scripture by images taken from our bodily senses: the regenerate soul sees heavenly beauty, hears divine harmony, smells fragrancy as of "ointment poured forth," and tastes sweetness as of "honey and the honey-comb." Yet these perceptions in the new convert are feeble and indistinct; and often almost overborne and swallowed up in the tumult of natural passions, and the conflict with carnal propensities; they, however, uniformly influence him as "a new born babe to desire the sincere milk of the word, that he may grow thereby, seeing that he has tasted that the Lord is gracious." 1 Pet. ii. 2, 3. And they constitute that leaven, which will gradually diffuse its influence, till the whole be leavened, and all the faculties, affections, and operations of the soul be made to partake of the same holy nature and tendency. When we are thus made capable of perceiving, in some degree, the beauty and glory of the Divine perfections, and of forming some proper estimate of our obligations and relations to our Creator and Benefactor; we are brought to consent to his holy law, that it is good, and that its commands, though very strict and spiritual, are reasonable, equitable, and beneficial: and the view of the evil of sin, which is thus obtained, though it be imperfect, produces a submission to the justice of God in the condemnation of transgressors. Other discoveries of our guilt and danger, and of the wrath to which we are exposed, may alarm us; but nothing short of this can produce genuine humiliation and self-abasement; which will be matured and increased by fuller views of the glory of God in the person and salvation of Christ..

For did we only contemplate the perfections of God, as displayed in the works of creation and providence, or illustrated by the justice of his law and government, our consciousness of guilt and pollution would so discourage us, and even lead us to the borders of despair, that we should be induced to struggle with all our might against conviction, and to oppose the humiliating effect of every discovery of God to our souls, which we were unable to exclude. But when we are led to perceive, along with our views of the odiousness and desert of our sins, the glory of God in the harmonious display of all his attributes, through the person and redemption of his Son: this allays our terrors, inspires our hope, and fixes our attention; while it exceedingly increases humiliation, and self-abasement.-The dignity of the Divine Redeemer, the nature of his undertaking, the immensity of his compassionate and condescending love, the perfection and value of his righteousness, the depth, intenseness, and variety of his sufferings; the honour thus given to the law and justice of God; the sufficiency of his atonement; his subsequent resurrection, triumphant ascension, and glorious exaltation; his power, faithfulness, and love; his gracious invitations, and precious promises; with the manifold blessings which he freely bestows on the vilest of sinners, who come to God by him ;-these are all distinct subjects for our meditation, peculiarly suited to interest, instruct, and affect our minds, and to give us entirely new thoughts of God and of ourselves, of sin and holiness, of our immortal souls, our eternal concerns, our past lives, our present conduct and situation, and of all those things which concur to produce deep humility, lively hope, admiring love and gratitude, and every holy affection. Here without dismay we may contemplate the divine character with fixed attention; whilst we view it through a medium that softens its splendours, and endears its beauty and glory to our hearts. Here we view infinite justice, holiness, mercy, faithfulness, and wisdom, in perfect harmony, whilst each attribute reflects glory on all the rest. At the same time, our interest in these grand concerns render them far more affecting to our

minds and we are enabled, in revering and adoring the holy majesty of God, and admiring his transcendent excellency, to give up our hearts to the pleasing desire and hope of having him, sinful as we are, to be our Father, Friend, and everlasting Portion. When we have been encouraged to make this choice and indulge this hope, we begin to fear above all things, lest we should come short of it: we learn to take pleasure in such devout exercises, as strengthen our confidence, or give us some anticipation of our desired felicity: we feel lively emotions of gratitude for the condescending and merciful dealings of so glorious a Lord with such vile sinners; we long for others also to know and love him, to enjoy his favour, and to render him praise: we become zealous for his honour, grieved when we offend him, ashamed and humbled at the recollection of past transgressions, watchful against temptation and every occasion of sin, and troubled at hearing others express contempt or enmity against so gracious and merciful a God and Saviour.-All these varied exercises of holy love have' respect to the incomprehensible mysteries of the Divine nature, displayed in the grand scheme of our salvation; as originating from the most free love of the Father, purchased for us by the atonement of the incarnate Son, and applied to our hearts by the regenerating and sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit ;but it will especially centre, as it were, in the person of Emmanuel, God manifested in the flesh; as the glorious excellency and loveliness of the Deity is there more immediately revealed to us; and as he that loves, honours, believes, and obeys the Son, loves, honours, believes, and obeys the Father that sent him; for "he that hath the Son, hath the Father also;" and Christ is the appointed medium by which we approach, know, and glorify the invisible God.

The same capacity of perceiving and loving spiritual excellency, which is essential to every exercise of holy love towards our God and Saviour, disposes us also to "delight in his law after the inward man ;" to "count all his commandments in all things to be right; and to hate every false way;" to choose the precepts of the Lord;" and to "long to have our ways directed to keep them." Whilst these therefore are our desires and prayers, we must be proportionably grieved and disquieted with the opposition made to all our endeavours, by the sin that dwelleth in us:" and the want of more entire conformity to that holy, just and good law, which we now most cordially approve, will be a constant source of sorrow and cause of humiliation; and at some times will prove the burden or even the terror of our hearts; and thus the believer's tears, groans, and complaints, because "he cannot do the things which he would," being connected with evident conscientiousness and diligence in performing the will of God, may be considered as a proof that he has the holy law of God written in his heart by regenerating grace.

The same holy judgment and taste of the renewed soul enables the believer to relish every part of the sacred Scriptures; and, in proportion to the degree of his spirituality, he loves to read and meditate upon the word of God: he not only uses it as "the lantern of his paths," or the ground of his hope; but he makes it his "delight and his counsellor;" he esteems it "more than his necessary food ;" and feels an appetite for its salutary instruction like that of the new-born babe for the milk of the breast.-The same principle causes him to love the house of God, and to "count one day in his courts better than a thousand." He is no longer glad of an excuse for staying from the public ordinances of God, exact in determining how often he is bound in duty to attend on them, or disposed to yield to every petty obstacle that renders such attendance inconvenient or difficult; for "he is glad when it is said to him, let us go unto the house of the Lord:" he longeth, when detained from it, for the renewal of that satisfaction he has there experienced in communion with God and his saints; and he finds it no easy matter to be resigned to the will of God, when under a necessity to absent himself. Thus the Lord's day, which was formerly a weariness, unless profaned by worldly

business, pleasure, or company, becomes his delight: and, though too often he has reason to lament that his Sabbaths are passed without the expected satisfaction and advantage, yet he still meets their return with pleasure, and deems them the happiest days of his life. As he grows in holy love he is enabled to adopt the Psalmist's words, in respect of the worship he renders to the Lord, and to say, "My soul is satisfied as with marrow and fatness, whilst I praise thee with joyful lips:" and every thing that relates to the service of God is endeared to his heart, and held in reverence and honour.

In like manner, he perceives the "beauty of the Lord" in the character and conduct of his people, whom before he neglected, despised, or disliked: and thus he learns to love and respect them as the excellent of the earth. He chooses them for his most valued companions: he sympathizes with their joys and sorrows; he seeks their welfare, and according to his ability endeavours to promote it; he bears with their failings and prejudices, casting the mantle of love over their infirmities: he prays for their prosperity and happiness and if he can but see, or think he sees, the image of his beloved Lord upon them, he counts them his brethren, though they belong not to his subdivision of the church, subscribe not exactly his creed, and fill up a very different station in the family of God.

The admiring contemplation of the glory of the Lord, in the person and salvation of Christ, is always productive of a gradual transformation of the soul into his holy image: 2 Cor. iii. 17, 18. and the Saviour's condescending and compassionate love, to the very persons whose crimes he most deeply abhorred, appears peculiarly beautiful and endearing to the redeemed sinner. Thus benevolent love to mankind in general is produced and increased; selfish and contracted prejudices are removed; and proud contempt of the mean, the vile, and the ignorant, bitter resentments borne to the injurious, and envy of rivals and competitors, are changed into pity and good-will. While conformity to Christ, love to his most beautiful and glorious character, gratitude for redeeming love, and willing obedience to his commandments, combine their energy in disposing his true disciples to love strangers and persecutors, the most abandoned transgressors, and the most provoking enemies; and to copy his example of long-suffering, meekness, forgiveness, compassion, fervent prayers and tears for them, and persevering endeavours to overcome evil with good.

When love, the ruling principle of activity in the mind of man, is thus fixed on its proper objects, and regulated, proportioned, and exercised according to the Divine law of God; it is evident that all spiritual worship, humble submission, and devoted obedience to God, with all righteousness, goodness, and truth, in our conduct towards men must result from it, and grow in proportion as it is increased. We' may, therefore, easily perceive the propriety of the apostle's prayer for the Philippians, "that their love might abound yet more and more."-This accords with many other prayers and exhortations in his epistles. "The Lord grant-that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,-may know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge.' Eph. iii. 16.-19. "The Lord made you to abound in love, one towards another, and towards all men, even as we do towards you ;-to the end he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness." "Ye are taught of God to love one another; and indeed ye it: but we beseech you to increase more and more." 1 Thess. iii. 12, 13. iv. 9, 10. "Your Faith groweth exceedingly, and the love of every one of you all towards each other aboundeth.' 2 Thess. i. 3. Indeed the love of believers towards each other is principally meant in these texts: but then we know that this love is the result, the evidence, and the measure of our love to God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ. We are required to consider every true Christian as the brother and representative of our unseen Redeemer; and all the love we bear to them, and the good we do them, for his sake, will be acknowledged and graciously recompensed at the last day, as the indubitable proof of the reality and strength of our love to him.

do

GROWTH IN GRACE.

But let us more particularly consider the words before us." That your love may abound: may abound more, may abound yet more; may abound yet more and more!" Press forward, is the Christian's motto, and the minister's watchword. "We beseech you, brethren, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God; so ye would abound more and more." 1 Thess. iv. 1. The lively believer is never in this world satisfied with his degree of sanctification; but still hungers and thirsts for more entire conformity to the image and law of GOD: and the zealous minister never thinks his beloved people arrived at the summit of improvement; but, while he says, "I bless God ye abound in love;" he also adds, "I pray God you may abound yet more and more:" and, "Seeing ye have purified your souls, in obeying the truth, through the Spirit, unto unfeigned love of the brethren, -see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently." 1 Pet. i. 22.

Comparing these Scriptures with our Lord's declaration, "Every branch in me, that beareth fruit, my Father purgeth, that it may bring forth more fruit," John xv. 1-5. we may properly advert to a notion very prevalent in some places, among professors of the gospel. It is considered by them as a thing of course for true Christians to leave their first love;" young converts are supposed to abound most in love; and it is expected that they will de cline in that respect, as the advance to maturity in judgment and experi ence. The expression used in conveying these ideas, is found but once in Scripture. "Nevertheless," says Christ to the Ephesian church," I have somewhat against thee; because thou hast left thy first love; remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do thy first works; else I will come unto thee quickly, and I will remove thy candlestick out of his Rev. ii. 4, 5. The severe rebuke, the earnest place, except thou repent." exhortation, and the solemn warning of this passage, as connected with the commendation bestowed on the Ephesians, in other respects, do not seem calculated to encourage men in reducing the before mentioned opinion to practice. And it should also be observed, that the stony-ground hearers lost their lively affections, and their religion along with them, "because they had no root in themselves."

Surely nothing can be more absurd, than to suppose that a Christian, when growing in grace, can decline in that very thing, in which grace principally consists! and love is evidently the greatest of all Christian graces. 1 Cor. xiii. 13. Such a sentiment is most pernicious in its tendency and effects: it gives encouragement to hypocrites, who disgrace the profession of the gospel; assists many in deceiving themselves; and induces unstable and inju→ dicious believers indolently to yield to lukewarmness as a matter of course, and even an evidence of spiritual proficiency; when they ought to be watching and praying against it, and greatly alarmed and humbled on the least consciousness of its growing upon them, from a conviction of its being one of the most detestable and aggravated proofs of human depravity-By this stratagem, Satan hath succeeded, during a lukewarm age, in establishing a false text and standard of maturity in experience and the life of faith; and hath managed in consequence to render it true in fact: that is, professors of the gospel do generally thus decline. Thus the sentiment becomes specious, by an appeal to observation and experience for the truth of it; and he, who ventures to say, "My brethren, these things ought not so to be," is thought to condemn the generation of God's children.

"Because thou art lukewarm, But what saith Christ to the Laodiceans? and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." Rev. iii. 16. This strange opinion stands, not only unsupported by Scripture, but in direct opposition to it: the question is not how things are? but how they ought to be? The comparative coldness and negligence, for which he is very deeply humbled: but upon the whole the vigour of his love is continually increasing, and he manifests this to be the case in his whole conduct. To pray" that our love may abound yet more and more;" or, "that we may grow in grace," and make progress in experimental religion, amounts

nearly to the same thing; at least there is an inseparable connection between the two petitions, and they reciprocally imply each other.-We shall, however, in some measure discover by what means the preceding most detestable sentiment has insinuated itself among pious, humble Christians, whilst we proceed to consider the next clause of the apostle's prayer.

II. Not satisfied with desiring that their love might abound yet more and more," he subjoined these words, "in knowledge and in all judgment;' and they suggest to us a second particular, in which growth of grace very greatly consists. There may be very high affections about religion, without the communication of holy principles: surprise at extraordinary and unexpected events; sanguine hopes of advantages, which appear very great and glorious; sudden transitions from adversity to prosperity, from sorrow to joy, or from pain to pleasure; and every circumstance which excites self-complacency or strong confidence, will involve or occasion a great flow of vehement affections, in the concerns of religion as well as in those of this life. Thus the Israelites on the banks of the Red Sea, beholding their formidable enemies dead on the shore, and amazed at their own most extraordinary deliverance, "believed the word of the Lord and sang his praise:" but this apparently good frame in a vast majority of them continued no longer than till their inclinations were thwarted; and "they soon forgat the works of God, and would not abide in his counsel." These affections are not of a permanent nature: and, if a man possess nothing better," he has no root in himself, and in time of temptation will fall away."

The new convert indeed experiences and manifests a similar flow of affections. The Lord, in making a Christian, does not destroy the original constitution of the human soul; and the natural passions are useful in the infancy of the Divine life to produce a proper degree of earnestness and diligence. But with them there exists a spark of heavenly love, which gathers strength whilst they are weakened, and glows more vigorously under their almost expiring ashes. As this principle acquires energy and ascendency, it suffices to produce activity, and thus to subordinate and regulate all inferior affections: then every kind of earnestness, which did not spring from knowledge, and was not exercised in judgment and discretion, becomes unnecessary, and may abate without any detriment.

All holy affections spring from Divine illumination, and increase with the advancement of spiritual knowledge and genuine experience. In proportion as the Christian is enabled to discern more clearly and distinctly the nature and excellency of heavenly things; and as he experiences more fully the pleasure they are capable of affording; the more will he love and delight in them. The reasons which induce him to love the Lord, and his truths, precepts, and people, are perceived with increasing evidence; his thirst after happiness in the favour of God, his supreme valuation of redemption and salvation in Christ, his gratitude to Him, and zeal for his glory, with attachment to his cause, and devotedness to his service, appear more and more reasonable, in proportion as his mind is truly enlightened by his influences of the Holy Spirit. He also better understands, why " he who loves God should love his brother also;" and why he ought to copy the forbearance, compassion, and mercy, of which his redeeming Lord hath given him an example.As his views enlarge, he learns to pay less regard to the strong emotions of the animal spirits, which produce very pleasing but transient sensations, than to that steady and powerful affection, which influences a man to habitual self-denying obedience; and which connects with disinterested endeavours to "do good to all men, especially to them who are of the household of faith" and he accustoms himself to judge of the sincerity and degree of his love, not by certain fluctuations in his feelings, but by its energy, in prevailing on him to renounce, venture and endure every thing, in promoting the glory of God and the good of his redeemed people. "For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous."-Thus the Christian may actually abound more and more in love,