(4.) It will make the promise to be of no effect to you. All our comfort lies in the acceptance of the gospel, we are undone by tbe old law. Now when you depend upon works, you cut off yourselves from those hopes, and are obnoxious to the rigour of the law. God puts it to your choice at what court you will stand ; will you plead at the tri- bunal of justice, or of grace? Kom. xi. 6, 'If it be of works, it is no more of grace ; and if of grace, it is no more of works.' Either it must, be wholly of grace or wholly of works. So Gal. iii. 18 ; if you build upon the law, you will evacuate and make void the promise to you. The covenant will not be mixed, no more than gold or clay, no tem- pering of these things. Gal, v. 2-4, those that would establish works, the apostle tells them they are ' fallen from grace,' are ' debtors to the whole law,' and that ' Christ profits them nothing.' God doth not love a patched righteousness. New cloth upon an old garment will make the rent worse. Your souls must be entirely carried out to the righteousness of Christ.
(5.) We shall best know the danger of self-dependence when wrath doth actually make pursuit after sinners, either in pangs of conscience, or in the hour of death, or at the day of judgment. Phil. iii. 9, ' 0 that I might be found in him ; ' the expression ' found' implies that there is a time when God will search Jerusalem with candles. When wrath makes inquisition for sinners, oh, it is an excellent thing to be sheltered under the buckler of grace ! Merit-mongers are best confuted by experience. Certainly, they that cry up works seldom look into their own conscience. However men may babble in the schools, ,yet when they come to plead with God, then they will see there is no claim will serve their turn but the righteousness of Christ. They may dis- pute with men such as themselves, but when they come to dispute with their own consciences in the agonies of death, then they will cit out it is best to lean upon the merit of Christ. Let a man plead with God, Give me not a crumb of mercy, imless I be found worthy ; do not save and justify me, unless I deserve it. Yet, when conscience arrests men, and cites them before the tribunal of God, then they tremblingly fly to the horns of God's mercy, and to his free acceptation in Jesus
Book I.] a tkeatise of self-denial. 211
Christ. Therefore this will be comfortable to you in the hour of death. You cannot have abetter winding-sheet than to be wrapt up in Christ's righteousness ; it is only that will bear you out. Therefore say, Hor- reo quicquid de meo est, ut sim mens.
[3.] To give some discoveries of the depending upon our own right- eousness. Because men are doctrinally right, and disclaim the opinion of-merit and works, they do not discern this secret vein of guilt that runs throughout the soul. There are practical papists, as well as prac- tical atheists. Thou shalt not be judged by thy naked opinion, but by the disposition of thine heart. A man may own grace in pretence, yet trust in himself all the while. Luke xviii. 9, compared with the 11th. verse. In the 9th verse it is said, 'Jesus spake this parable against those that trusted in themselves that they were righteous ; ' there he brings the instance of the Pharisee ; yet in verse 11, he saith, * God, I thank thee ; ' he talks of grace, of blessing God and owning God, but he was proud and puffed up by the conceit of his own right- eousness, his secret confidence was built upon his own works. So Deut. ix. 4, ' Say not in thine heart, this is for my righteousness.' Though we do not say it with the tongue, and plead for merit, yet there may be a saying in the heart ; there is a language which God understands, in the secret dispositions of the soul. All thoughts are not expUcite, and impressed upon the conscience ; some are implicite, thoughts by interpretation. How shall v^e find this difference out ?
(1.) When there is a secret blessing of ourselves in our performance of good duties, without humiliation for defects. The children of God, the more they do, the more they abhor themselves and hunger after Christ. It is a notable passage of Nehemiah, chap. xiii. 22, ' And I commanded the Levites that they should cleanse themselves, and that they should sanctify the sabbath-day. Remember me, 0 my God, con- cerning this also, and spare me according to the greatness of thy mercy.' It was an excellent work he had done here, to put them upon sanctify- ing the sabbath, yet ' spare me.' When the children of God do any- thing worthy and excellent, they the more hunger after grace as having sensible experience of their own defects, whenever they come into God's presence. They have more cause to be humbled than lifted up, though carried on with much activity and life in a holy service. There is much weakness, much want of zeal, and want of affection or atten- tion ; therefore they have still cause to reflect even upon their holy things. But now, when there is no actual humiliation, when men per- form duties, and grow more proud and conceited, their duties prove loss to them, not gain. This is one advantage we have by holy ordin- ances, to grow more vile in our own eyes. Nothing makes the children of God to abhor themselves so much as their duties, because there they converse with a holy God. and that puts them upon the remembrance of their defects, and there they discern the weakness of their graces. As we feel the lameness of the arm in labour and exercise, so in those spiritual exercises they discern the feebleness of their graces. Nay, there their corruptions are irritated, and make resistance, and therefore they come to see that their natures are full of sin and their services are full of weakness. And so they cry out with David, Ps. cxliii. 2, ' Enter not into judgment with thy servant, 0 Lord ! ' He doth not