In executing this important duty we shall do well to observe the following rules ; namely.
To form our judgment with care —
To exercise it with candour — and
To implore of God the enlightening and sanctifying influences of his Spirit, that we may be preserved from error, and be guided into all truth.
We must, in the first place, form our judgment with care. — It is no easy matter to search out all the mysteries of our holy religion, and to attain a clear and just knowledge of the inspired volume. There are confessedly many passages which are difficult to be understood, and many passages which appear to have, what may be called, an opposite and contradic- tory aspect. To explain all these, and to reconcile them with each other, and to gather out of them one entire and consistent plan of salvation, is surely no easy work : it should be undertaken with fear and trembling ; and no pains should be spared to execute it aright. To take one set of texts, and to wrest the opposing texts to a sense which they were never de- signed to bear, will save us indeed much trouble, and gratify a proud contentious spirit ; but it will never bring us to a just view of the truth as it is in Jesus. The way to solve the difficulties of Scripture, is, to give to every declaration of God its proper force, and then to mark the subserviency of one truth to others which appear opposed to it. A person, who should in an ignorant and superficial manner observe the opposite motions that are found in a great engine, would be ready to suppose that the wheels would obstruct each other : but on a closer inspection he would find, that there is a subserviency of one part to another, and that all the motions, however opposite in appearance, tend in reality to one common end. Thus it is in the Scriptures of truth ; there is no real opposition between one part and another ; but every truth has its proper place in the system, and its proper use : if one encourages, another humbles : if one inspires confidence, another stimulates to acti- vity : and true wisdom will lead us to assign to every