subject : but all the different classes may be safely reduced to these two.
Let us pause a moment, to consider whether we ourselves do not belong to the one or other of them.
There are many who, as we have said, seek salvation by their works for Christ's sake. They will not go so far as to say, that Christ has done nothing for man's salvation : on the con- trary, they think that they are much indebted to him; for that to him they owe it, that their imperfect obedience shall be accepted for their justification before God. They do indeed suppose that their repentance, their reformation of life, their alms-deeds, and their attendance on divine ordinances, will procure to them the favour of God : but then it is not because these things are absolutely meritorious, so as to deserve and purchase heaven ; but because the Lord Jesus Christ has pro- cured a relaxation of the perfect law of God, and obtained for them that their sincere obedience shall be accepted instead of perfect obedience. And, if their obedience should not be altogether sufficient for the desired end, they expect he will add a portion of his merits to theirs, so that there shall be no deficiency upon the whole.
But a very little knowledge of God's perfect law is sufficient to dispel this fatal delusion. The law neither is mitigated, nor can be mitigated : it never can require less than it did. It required of man to love God with all his heart, and mind, and soul, and strength, and to love his neighbour as himself. But from which of these has God released us? or from which, consistently with his own honour, can he release us ? The law remains the same as ever it was, both in its requirements and its penalties : and, as our works never did, nor ever can, come up to its demands, it can never do any thing but denounce a curse against us, as long as we continue under it : as the Apostle says, " As many as are of the works of the law are under the curse ;" for it is written, " Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them'." Whilst therefore it curses us, it of course can never justify : nor can our defective obedience to it form any part of our justifying righteousness before God.
When men are driven from this refuge, they then flee to the other, of which we have spoken, and look for justification by Christ for their works sake. They see that in Christ alone can be found such a righteousness as the law requires ; and they now look to him as their righteousness. But yet they dare not go to him, as it were, with all their sins upon them ; they think they must wash themselves first with the tears of peni- tence, and make some compensation for their past iniquities
* Gal. iii. 10.