has God been striving with some amongst us, who yet continue alienated from the life of God through the blindness and hard- ness of their hearts ! Think, in what diversified ways he has dealt with us, in order that he might fulfil in us his good pleasure, and accomplish in us the rich purposes of his grace ! From the first moment that reason began to expand and operate, he began also to work upon our consciences, and to draw us by the influences of his Spirit. Say, ye who are now in the vigour of youth, or grown to man's estate, whether ye cannot call to remembrance many interpositions of the Deity, when he sought to stop you in your career of sin, and to bring you to repentance ? And ye who are advanced in life, say, whe- ther every year that has been added to your lives has not brought with it much additional ground for God's indignation against you ! Behold then, the conduct of the Jews is realized and renewed in us : and the Lord Jesus Christ has reason to repeat over us the complaint once poured forth over the dis- obedient Jews, " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered you, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings! but ye would not." Yes, at the day of judgment shall this be our condemnation, " I would ; but ye would not."]
There is yet a further point of view in which these prophecies may be considered ; namely,
III. As truths illustrative of the whole economy of salvation —
The Gospel is altogether a dispensation of grace —
[This is its most distinguishing feature : it is a plan de- vised and ordained of God for the displaying of " the exceeding riches of his grace." Every thing that God has bestowed upon fallen man in relation to it, has been unsought, and unsolicited. We may see the whole exemplified in our first parent Adam. When he fell, did he cry to God for mercy? Did he ask for a Saviour ? Did he implore such measures of grace as might restore him to the Divine image ? No : instead of " seeking after" God, or even asking of God whether there were any possibility of ever being restored to his favour, he fled from God, and hid himself; and, when called forth from his hiding- place, he cast the blame of his transgression on God himself. This shews us what every man by nature does, and would continue to do, if God, of his own grace and mercy, did not infuse into his mind a better disposition. Man in his fallen state is dead, " dead in trespasses and sins :" he is like the dry bones in Ezekiel's vision, till God breathes upon him, and bids him live. Nay, he would revert to that state again, if God did not uphold him every moment. In vain would be all his