human production, to prove that good works, proceeding from the proper motive,-obedience to God's laws, are in some degree meritorious, and will bring to us some hopes of reward. We have the Divine Word, repeated and enforced, through the whole of the New Testament, and giving us the strongest, most direct, and incontrovertible assurances of the fact. From the lips of Christ himself, to whom the Christian owes his appellation. as well as his religion, we have received these assurances, in more forcible and direct terms, if possible, than from his apostles; but from all, in number and strength enough to overwhelm any erroneous deductions, which would seek to convert the warm and cheering doctrines of Christ's religion, to the chilling temperature of desolate hopelessness and discouragement.

It is not, alas! against an imaginary error, that these reasonings are produced. The mistaken doctrine which has been hitherto stated as a matter of supposition, is in fact a reality. It is a living and a moving principle, adopted by many amongst us, and propagated with extreme zeal, and no small success. It draws within its various persuasions, minds of various orders, from the gentle pliancy of sincere piety, (often but poorly guided by knowledge,) to the false pretenders who work out their worldly advancement under the borrowed cloke of sanctity,-and the more open sinners, who find it convenient to listen to holy things, at that last extremity when unholy ones are beyond their reach. The active zeal of its teachers, often a sincere enthusiasm,-sometimes, alas! a less holy motive,-invades our places of public worship, even the churches of our national establishment, and our very domestic recesses, by public promulgation, and by the more insinuating process of domiciliary teaching, and printed instruction, gratuitously distributed.

It therefore behoves a parent responsible for the

rectitude of the religious principles instilled into a very numerous progeny of children, to look about him, to guard their young minds against the admission of any fundamental error, and to seek for, and guide them into, the way which appears least liable to error. With this view, let him "search the Scriptures"; for in them unquestionably will be found all which man does, or can know of the way to eternal life. To this source all teachers must and do appeal. To this only test must all doctrines be brought. Every man therefore can judge for himself, before he accept or reject any doctrine submitted to him. That doctrine which he finds to be warranted by what is here taught, he may accept; that which he finds to be contrary, or repugnant, to this pure fountain and stream of all holy knowledge, he must wholly reject.

Impressed with the importance of the duty, unfettered by prejudices, seeking for truth, and for truth alone, without even a leaning to any favorite side, the whole of the New Testament has been carefully and attentively perused, for the special purpose of considering every sentence and word, which bears. upon the doctrines of faith and works. The sole

object has been to learn from the Gospel itself, the only fountain of divine truth, what a Christian is really to understand and believe of his duties on these two important subjects; and what he is encouraged to hope for, as the consequence of his best efforts to discharge those duties. Instead of accepting any doctrine at second hand, and receiving the deductions or suggestions of any human authority, the Scriptures themselves have been carefully examined; the words of Christ himself, and the lessons of his inspired apostles, have been well perused; the combined system of the whole revelation has been studied, and its various parts have been separately digested. The whole doctrines on these two subjects are so simple, plain and clear, to any unclouded and

unbiassed mind, prepared to examine them on those sound principles which have been already laid down, that there is no need of the aid of laborious commentaries; which, however they may assist in the explanation of matters needing elucidation from historical research, do but too often lead the mind astray from the simplicity of the sacred volume itself, and in the end bewilder it in extraneous casuistry and refinement. Not that it is to be denied, that there are to be found, on these topics, some few dark and difficult passages. But such ambiguous passages (being in fact susceptible of various arguments, and open to many modes of interpretation, and not therefore to be conclusively fixed by any,) can never be allowed to be so understood, as to overturn the clear concurrent bearing of all the large mass of instruction which is open to us, of the most unambiguous and simple character.

From this anxious investigation, a labor apparently great, but really light and most agreeable to the mind, has proceeded that strong conviction, which has suggested the arguments and observations already submitted upon the doctrines of faith and works.

In order to make the matter as clear to others, as it ought to be to all, every part of the New Testament which appears to bear upon the subject, has been extracted, in the course in which the several books are printed. The intention has been most conscientiously to extract indiscriminately every thing applying to either view of the questions; and so far from intending to omit any thing, several passages, having some words bearing an apparent connection, have been taken, although really considered to be quite inapplicable. These extracts are classed under the two heads faith and works, and will be found in an Appendix at the end of these introductory arguments.

In considering attentively these extracts, it can not but strike the mind, to observe, that, in all

those doctrines which proceed immediately from Christ himself, that is, in every thing which we find in the four first books of the Evangelists, how very little there is, which can be fairly represented as having, even remotely, any intimation of the exclusive merit of faith, and the absolute want of merit in good works; whilst, on the other hand, our Savior's injunctions to perform good works, and his promise of reward and favor for them, are most powerful, urgent, continual, and too plain to be disputed or distorted.

A very large proportion of his sayings on the subject of faith, are limited merely to the approbation of those persons, who shewed that belief in his personal power on earth, which he required from those who asked of him some bodily advantage. Of the rest, a large portion is also obviously intended solely for those favored servants, who were to do his work after his return to heaven, and who were, for that purpose, to be enlightened with divine spirit, and endowed with preternatural powers. If these parts be detached, there remains but a small collection of sayings from Christ himself, on the subject of faith in general.

In the extracts from the Epistles of the Apostles, upon which the objectionable doctrine is made chiefly to rest, care has been taken to shew as much as possible the line of argument and design of the writers. But it is really impossible to do this effectually, by any extracts. Each Epistle is in fact but one whole continued argument. The division into chapters and verses is a mere modern invention, utterly inconsistent with a true understanding of the whole, and greatly encouraging erroneous interpretations. Hence springs the power of those who propagate mistaken constructions, to give a semblance of authority to their notions, by the selection of fragments; which their hearers take upon trust, and have not the power or the inclination to ex

amine in their proper position, and in their connection with those Scriptures from which they have been separated.

A very moderate share of attention will convince any reader of the Epistles, that the chief labor of the writers, in all those parts which can be brought to bear on the questions of faith and works, is to controvert and overcome the prejudices of the Jews, and the attempts made by them to perpetuate the ceremonies of their ancient law, and the traditionary customs engrafted on it. The Jews, it is obvious, were constantly upholding the necessity and merit of a rigid observance of all their laws and customs, in opposition to the new principles of conduct taught by the inspired writers; and were endeavouring to subdue the purer laws of Christianity, or to undermine them subtilly, by engrafting their own rights and ceremonies upon them. Against this mischief the apostles argue most strenuously; and many of the Epistles contain nothing but one continued course of vehement reasoning against it. From these Epistles is it, that portions are detached, to support the erroneous doctrines under discussion; although to every reader, who is not too indolent to use his own faculties, or disposed by a blind habit to accept the dictation of others, when it is quite plain and open to his own examination,-it must be most palpably manifest, that when the utter inutility of the observance of the law, and the deeds and works of the law is declared, the declaration is, in every instance, most clearly and pointedly applied solely and exclusively to the ceremonies and deeds required by the old Jewish law, which were abrogated by Christ. With this fact so plain and undeniable, it is marvellous how any man can presume to select separated fragments, for the sake of drawing from them doctrines contradictory to the tenor of the whole connected Gospel of Christ.

Saint James indeed seemed to foresee the pos