able to obey them all more perfectly. The very tendency of every law is to make those happy who obey it : and were any man to obey the laws of Christ as perfectly as they do in heaven, he would already in his own soul possess a heaven upon earth. Let any one who is disposed to complain of the strictness of the Gospel, examine its laws with candour, and see which of them he can reduce: Would he love God with less than all his heart; or his neighbour less than himself? Were he to reduce any one law below its present standard, he would so far give a licence for rebellion throughout all the kingdoms of the earth, and reason for murmuring throughout all the regions of hell, since a lower standard was appointed for others than was ever allowed to them.
But this righteousness is no less visible in the administration of the King, than in the laws by which he governs : for in no one instance is his favour or his frown accorded to any one, but in a strict consistency with equity. On whom did the King ever frown but on account of his transgressions, or more than in proportion to their enormity ? or on whom did he ever deign to smile, but on those who humbled themselves before him as guilty, and pleaded his perfect righteousness as the ground of all their hopes ? Nay, where did he ever pardon one rebel, till that rebel had cast himself entirely on the merit of his sacrifice, whereby Divine justice had been satisfied, and the law of God magnified? In earth, in hell, in heaven, the righteousness of his sceptre is alike displayed, and to all eter- nity shall it be acknowledged throughout the whole extent of his dominions.]
Keeping in view the general scope of the passage, as well as our own individual benefit, we would observe by way of improvement,
1. How clearly are the great truths of the Gospel founded on the Old Testament !
[We find nothing in the New Testament which was not predicted in the Old. Hence our blessed Lord and his Apostles continually refer to the Jewish Scriptures in confirmation of their own word. And it is worthy of particular remark, that we never so much as once hear of their enemies controverting or objecting to the construction which they put upon the Scriptures. The true import of the prophecies was, in many respects, better understood then than now; because the Jews, in order to justify their rejection of Jesus as their Messiah, have laboured to find out other interpretations of the Scrip- tures, different from those which their own forefathers ac- knowledged and approved. And I cannot but regard the very circumstance of the Apostles citing the different prophecies in