attempting to be wise above what is written, that we involve ourselves in all these difficulties. If we would be content to take the Scriptures as they are, and to leave the reconciling of them unto God, by whose inspiration they were written, we should find them all admirably calculated to produce the ends for which they were designed. How delightful is the truth here intimated ! and how strange is it, that, instead of enjoying it, and adoring God for it, men will make it only a ground of acrimonious conten- tion ! I thank God, that all the Scriptures, whatever be their bearing, are alike acceptable to me ; and that, whether they mark the sovereignty or the mercy of God, I am alike ready to prosecute them, in accordance with their plain and obvious meaning. By attending to the original, we shall often find our way clear, when, from a diversity of idiom, a trans- lation scarcely conveys the precise idea. The pas- sage before us, for instance, does not convey in the original any thing like a secret determination in God, but only a willingness, that all should be saved : it is precisely parallel with what is spoken by St. Peter, when he says, " God is long-suffering to us-ward ; not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance3." And this is assigned as a rea- son why God would have us pray for all men. Our intercessions for them are pleasing and acceptable to him, because " he is willing to save all," without exception and without reserve.
In the words before us, then, we see, I. The disposition of God towards our fallen race —
We are not to understand the text as expressing any decree, either in reference to some favoured in- dividuals, or in reference to all mankind. We have said, that it imports only a willingness to save ; and that in that sense it has no limit whatever; the whole human race being objects of his tender com- passion, and equally accepted of him, when they seek him in his appointed wayb.
a 2 Pet. iii. 9. & Acts x. 34, 35.