ftle's argument is plainly this: That no man is juftified by the obedience required in the Sinai covenant, is evident from Habak. iii. 4. "The "just shall live by faith." Now obedience to the Sinai covenant is not of faith. It may flow from very different principles and motives; that Covenant requiring nothing more in order to the life promised in it, than our doing or omitting fuch and fuch things, and accepting in fo far outward obedience, though faith or grace in the heart fhould not be the root of it.

. Many things forbidden to Chriftians, fuch as divorce on flight occafions, polygamy, &c. (1) were in that covenant permitted to the Jews, because of the hardness of their hearts. Hardness of heart therefore, however oppofite to fpiritual devotion, was confiftent with an intereft in the Sinai covenant.

$2. No tranfgreffion deprived Ifrael of the temporal bleffings God had promised them, unlefs idolatry, finning prefumptuously and with a high hand, and fuch like breaches of the effential fundamental articles of Mofes's law. The Scripture often reprefents these as the fource of God's vengeance against them. Thus Deut. iv. 3, 4. "Your eyes have feen what the Lord did because of Baalpeor; for all the men that fol"lowed Baalpeor, the Lord thy God hath deftroyed them from among you. But ye that "did cleave to the Lord your God, are alive this day." every one of you Deut. viii. 18, "But thou fhalt remember the Lord thy God; for it is he that giveth thee power "to get wealth, that he may establish his cove

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19, 20.

(1) Deut. xxiv, 1. Matth. xix. 3.

"nant

"nant which he fwore unto thy fathers, as it is "this day. And it fhall be, if thou do at all "forget the Lord thy God, and walk after other "gods and ferve them, and worship them, I

teftify against you this day, that ye shall fure"ly perifh. As the nations which the Lord de"ftroyeth before your face, fo fhall ye perish, "because ye would not be obedient unto the "voice of the Lord your God." Jof. xxiii. 16. "When ye have tranfgreffed the covenant of "the Lord your God, which he commanded you, and have gone and ferved other gods, "and bowed yourselves to them; then shall the "anger of the Lord be kindled against you, and

ye fhall perish quickly from off the good land "which he hath given you." Jer. xi. 10, 11. "They are turned back to the iniquities of their "forefathers, which refused to hear my words; "and they went after other gods to ferve them. "The houfe of Ifrael and the houfe of Judah "have broken my covenant which I made with "their fathers. Therefore thus faith the Lord, "behold I will bring evil upon them which "they shall not be able to escape; and though "they fhall cry unto me, I will not hearken 66 unto them." Indeed the whole hiftory of the Judges is one continued proof of this. And in like manner God did not threaten to cut off a particular Jew, and deftroy him from among his people, on account of pride, covetoufnefs, impatience, and other evil difpofitions of heart; but on account of eating blood, doing work on the day of atonement, profane fwearing, turning after familiar fpirits, giving of their feed to Moloch, and other grofs outward vices. In cafe of leffer offences, even knowingly committed, there

were

were trefpafs-offerings inftituted, Lev. vi. which God promised in so far to accept, as to avert the temporal judgment threatened to difobedience, and to bestow the temporal mercy promised to obedience.

§3. Sin-offerings were defigned to restore a finner to the state he was in, before the fin was committed and therefore the offering them proves, that the fins for which they were offered, would have been a breach of the Sinai covenant, if they had not been expiated by fuch a facrifice and the not offering them in other inftances equally proves, that these fins for which no facrifices were offered, and which yet were not punished by death, are no breach of that covenant, seeing, without fhedding of blood, there is no remiffion of fins. Now ceremonial uncleanness arifing from the touch of a leper or dead body; and perjury, rafh fwearing, facrilege, lying with a bond-woman betrothed, and other outward immoralities, were expiated by facrifice (m). When the king, the high-prieft, or the whole congregation, had finned, fin-offerings in the ftricteft fenfe of the word took place: as trefpafs-offerings did in leffer fins, or when the offender confeffed his fault, without being admonished or convicted by witneffes. But for impurity of heart, not manifefted by fpeech or behaviour, neither the one, nor the other of these, were appointed to be offered.

But are we not told, that expiation was made on the folemn day of atonement, for all the fins and tranfgreffions of the Ifraelites? We are fo (n). But fin there fignifies, as it does in many paffages of

(m) Lev. iv, v, vi. chap. (n) Lev. xvi. 16, 21, 22.

the

the books of Mofes (), the doing fomething which ought not to have been done. So that the facrifices on the day of atonement, were only in-” tended to expiate outward fins, which, being unknown, had not been expiated by the ordinary facrifices. I fhall not pretend to deny, that the minds of fome might be divinely enlightened, to confider these facrifices, as fhadows and figns of the remiffion of all their fins, through the facrifice which the Meffias was to offer. I only plead, that there must be a proportion between fin and the facrifice that expiates it, fo that carnal outward facrifices were infufficient, and fpiritual facrifices neceffary, to expiate fpiritual and inward guilt. Accordingly the facred oracles inform us, that the legal facrifices only fanctified to the purifying of the flesh (p), and that it is the blood of Jefus, not thefe types of it, which purges, the confcience from dead works, and, in a proper fenfe, redeems the tranfgreffions that were under the first covenant (q). Indeed fo far were the facrifices under the law from expiating heartfins, that they did not free the conscience even from the guilt contracted by outward fins. In these refpects they were weak and unprofitable (r). They only averted temporal judgments, removed the hinderances of an outward correfpondence between God and the Jews, reftored their right to the temple worship, and preferved to them, notwithstanding their fins, the benefits of the Sinai covenant. Sacrifices therefore removing only the outward pollution, not the inward guilt, contracted by finful actions, could have no effect

(0) Lev. iv. 2. (p) Heb. ix. 13. vii, 18, 19. ix. 9, 14, 15.

(r) Heb. vii. 18.

(9) Heb.

as

as to inward vices, from which no outward pollution was contracted. This obfervation may throw fome light on Acts xiii. 39. "By him all aff "that believe are juftified, from all things from "which ye could not be juftified by the law of "Mofes." That law could not justify from heart-fins, or fins in practice committed with a high hand, or from the intrinfic guilt even of leffer outward fins. Thus, it is evident, that heart-fins were no breach of the Sinai covenant, feeing they were neither punished by death, nor expiated by facrifice.

4. He who yielded an external obedience to the law of Mofes, was termed righteous, and had a claim in virtue of this his obedience to the land of Canaan, fo that doing these things he lived by them (s). Hence, fays Mofes (t), " It "fhall be our righteoufnefs, if we obferve to do "all these commandments," i. e. it fhall be the cause and matter of our juftification, it shall found our title to covenant bleffings. But to fpiritual and heavenly bleffings, we are entitled only by the obedience of the fon of God, not by our own. The Ifraelites were put upon obedience as that which would found their claim to the bleffings of the Sinai covenant. But they were never put upon feeking eternal life by a covenant of works. It is on this account, that the Mofaic precepts are termed, Heb. ix. 10. carnal ordinances, or, as it might be rendered, righteoufneffes of the flesh, because by them men obtained a legal outward righteoufnefs; there was no objection againft them, why they might not

25.

(s) Lev. xviii. 5. Deut. v. 33.

(1) Deut. vi.

be