which proposes to all the same conditions of acceptance, and which opens equally to all the same boundless and unsearchable blessings, vs. 11—13.
2. It must be very offensive to God, who looks on all men with equal favour (except as moral conduct makes a difference), to observe how one class of mortals looks down upon another, on account of some merely adventitious difference of rank, colour, external circumstances, or social or ecclesiastical connexions, v. 12.
3. How will the remembrance of the simplicity and reasonableness of the plan of salvation, and the readiness of God to accept of all who call upon him, overwhelm those who perish from beneath the sound of the gospel ! V. 13.
4. It is the first and most pressing duty of the church to cause all men to hear the gospel. The solemn question, implied in the language of the apostle. How can they believe without a preacher 1 should sound day and night in the ears of the churches, vs. 14, 15.
5. " How can they preach except they be sent ]" The failure of the whole must result from the failure of any one of the parts of the system of means. How long, alas ! has the failure been in the very first step. Preachers have not been sent, and if not sent, how could men hear, believe, or call upon Godl vs. 14, 15.
6. If " faith comes by hearing," how great is the value of a stated ministry ! How obvious the duty to establish, sustain, and attend upon it! V. 17.
7. The gospel's want of success, or the fact that few believe our leport, is only a reason for its wider extension. The more who hear, the more will be saved, although it be but a small proportion of the whole, V. 16.
8. How delightful will be the time when literally the sound of the gos- pel shall be as extensively diffused as the declaration which the heavens, in their circuit, make of the glory of God ! v. 18.
9. The blessings of a covenant relation to God is the unalienable right of no people and of no church, but can be preserved only by fidelity on the part of men to the covenant itself, v. 19.
10. God is often found by those who apparently are the farthest from him, while he remains undiscovered by those who think themselves always in his presence, v. 20.
11. God's dealings, even with reprobate sinners, are full of tenderness and compassion. All the day long he extends the arms of his mercy even to the disobedient and the gainsaying. This will be felt and acknowledged at last by all who perish, to the glory of God's forbear- ance, and to their own confusion and self-condemnation, v. 21.
12. Communities and individuals should beware how they slight the mercies of God, and especially how they turn a deaf ear to the invitations of the gospel. For when the blessings of a church relation have once