who has excited our diligence, intends to crown it with success.

You see, Sir, I have obeyed your commands; and have addressed you with as much plainness and familiarity as the cause requires, and you yourself have demanded.

That God may effectually bring you to submit to the terms of his grace, and enable you so to run, as that you may obtain, is the prayer of

Yours, &c.

LETTER VIII.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A TRUE SAVING FAITH, AND A DEAD TEMPORARY FAITH, DISTINCTLY CONSIDERED.

SIR-Your complaints do exactly answer my expectations. It is not your case alone, to have "unworthy apprehensions of God, vain trifling imaginations, and strange confusion of mind, accompanying the exercises of religion." It is no new thing for those who are setting out in earnest in a religious course, to find by experience, that their "progress in religion bears no proportion to their purposes:" And that their "good designs and resolutions, come to but little more than outside appearances, and no way answer their hopes." It is matter of thankfulness, that you have a feeling sense of this. I hope, if no other arguments will convince you of the truth of what was insisted on in my last, you will at least be convinced by your own experience, that you depend on mere mercy.

You" thank me for my plainness and faithfulness to a poor wretched infidel, who yet breathes, out of hell, by the mere patience of an affronted Saviour." I had not only the warrant of your commands, but the vast importance of the concern before us, to

embolden me to lay by all reserves; and even to transgress the common rules of decorum and respect, in my former letters. And you need not "conjure me to retain the same freedom." I am no courtier: nor am I at all acquainted with the fashionable methods of the beau monde. I shall therefore apply myself according to my capacity, in my accustomed methods of address, to answer your desires.

You observe," that I insinuate as if men may believe the truth of the gospel, without a saving faith in Christ, without an interest in him, or a claim to the benefits of his redemption. You "therefore desire I would give you the distinguishing characters of a saving faith, and show you wherein the difference lies, between a true faith and that which is common to hypocrites, as well as to Christians indeed."

I do indeed insist upon it, that men may notionally and doctrinally believe the truth of the gospel, without a saving faith in Christ, and without an interest in him, or a claim to the benefits of his redemption. This is a truth clearly taught in the Scriptures, and abundantly evident from the reason and nature of things. If any therefore should expect salvation, from a mere doctrinal and historical faith in Christ, they will in the conclusion find themselves disappointed and ashamed of their hope.

We read, John xii. 42, 43, of many of the chief rulers who believed in Christ, but dared not confess him; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. And will any man imagine, that such believers who dare not confess Christ before men, shall be confessed by him before his heavenly Father and his holy angels in the great day of retribution? Will any man imagine that our blessed Lord will own such of his sincere disciples and followers, who love the praise of men more than the praise of God? Here then is a clear instance of a doctrinal and historical faith, which was not saving; and could give no claim to the promise made to true believers. We have this matter further illustrated and confirmed by the apostle James, in the second chapter of his epis

tle; where we are shown, that such a faith is dead, being alone; that it is but a carcase without breath. As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also. Of such a faith we may therefore say with the same apostle, What doth it profit, though a man say that he has faith? Can faith save him?

But I need not multiply Scripture quotations in this

case.

It is what is continually confirmed to us by our own observation. How many do we see every day, who acknowledge the truth of the gospel, and yet live worldly, sensual, and vicious lives; who profess they know Christ, but in works deny him; who call themselves by his name, and yet value their lusts and idols above all the hopes of his salvation; and even run the venture of eternal perdition, rather than deny themselves, take up their cross and follow him? Now there can be nothing more certain, than that these men are utterly unqualified for the kingdom of God; and that they can have no special interest in him who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.

As, on the one hand, there is a gracious promise of final salvation, to all who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ: He that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved: He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life: So, on the other hand, there is a sort of believers, who can have no claim to this promise, nor any interest in the salvation by Christ. It must therefore be of infinite consequence, that we have indeed the faith of God's elect that we may become the children of God by faith in Jesus Christ; and therefore that our faith be distinct, in its nature and operations, from such an empty, lifeless, and fruitless belief, with which the formal, wordly, and sensual professor may deceive and destroy his own soul. From whence it appears, that your question is most important; and deserves a most careful and distinct answer; which I shall endeavour in the following particulars:

1. A true and saving faith, is a realizing and sensible impression of the truth of the gospel: whereas a dead faith is but a mere notional and speculative belief of it. Faith is by the apostle described, the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen: That which brings eternal things into a near view, and represents them unto the soul as undoubted realities. Whence it is, that the true believer, when he has experienced the defect of his own purposes and endeavours, when he is wearied out of all his false refuges, emptied of all hope in himself, and is brought to see and feel the danger and misery of his state by nature, he is then brought in earnest to look to Jesus, as the only refuge and safety of his soul. He then sees the incomparable excellency of a precious Saviour, breathes with ardent desire after him, repairs to him as the only fountain of his hope; and proportionably to the evidence of his interest in him, rejoices in Christ Jesus, having no confidence in the flesh. Now, the blessed Saviour and his glorious salvation is the subject of his serious, frequent, and delightful contemplation. Now, an interest in Christ is valued by him above all the world; and he is in earnest to obtain and maintain good evidence, that his hope in Christ is well founded. Now, the favour of God, and the concerns of the unseen and eternal world, appear of greater importance than every thing else. He now mourns under a sense of his former sins, he groans under the burden of his remaining corruptions and imperfections; and with earnest diligence follows after holiness, endeavouring to work out his own salvation with fear and trembling. And in a word, he has such an impression of these invisible realities, that whatever temptations, desertions, or prevailing corruptions he may conflict with, nothing can so banish the great concern from his breast, make him habitually slothful and indifferent about it. Nothing can quiet him, short of having his heart and affections engaged in the things of God and godliness; and his appetites and passions under the restraint and governing influence of the law of the Spirit of life.

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But now, on the other hand, if we take a view of the influence which a dead faith has upon the soul, it is evident, that this usually leaves the subjects of it secure and careless, trifling and indifferent, in the concerns of the eternal world. These appear to such a person but distant futurities, which do not engage his solemn attention, and make him in earnest solicitous about the event; nor give any effectual check to his inordinate appetites and passions. Or if (as it sometimes happens) any awakening dispensation alarms the conscience of such a person, to a distressing apprehension of his guilt and danger, drives him to duties and external reformations, and makes him more careful and watchful in his conduct, he has yet no sensible impressive view of the way of salvation by Jesus Christ. He either endeavours to pacify the justice of God, and his own conscience, by his duties and religious performances; and so lulls himself asleep again in his former security or else continues to agonize under most dark, dreadful and unworthy apprehensions of the glorious God, as if he were implacable and irreconcilable to such sinners as he. Such a person would readily acknowledge, but he cannot feel this blessed truth, that Christ Jesus is a sufficient Saviour. He allows it to be truth; but it is to him such a truth, as has no effectual influence upon his heart and life. Though he owns this to be true: Yet he can never comfortably venture his soul and his eternal interest upon it, unless a ray of divine light shine into his soul, and give him a lively and sensible view of what he could before have but a slight and superficial apprehension of.

Here, then, you see an apparent difference between a true and a false faith. The one realizes the great truths of the gospel, by a lively and feeling discovery of them; giving the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The other gives but a lifeless and inactive assent to these important truths; the one influences the heart and affections, and by beholding with open face, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, changes the soul into the same