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we make him a liar, and his truth is not in us: which words are spoken fo indefinitely, as to fhew, that they extend to mankind in general, teaching that there are none that live free from all manner of fin. And yet, as if this were not enough, the apostle St. James affirms it to be univerfally true, that there is none, no one of all mankind, who has not his defects and flips. (t) In many things, fays he, we offend all; "ATATES Taloμer, we all, the best and holieft not excepted, have our falls, and leffer and more pardonable miscarriages; fuch as, in the Old Teftament, are called the Spots of God's children. For thus we read, Deut. xxxii. 5. They have corrupted themselves, their Spot is not the Spot of his children; That is, fays Ainsworth on the place, not fuch a spot or blemish, as is in the fons of God through infirmity, whereto all are fubject; but such as is in a perverfe and crooked generation, that will not be reclaimed from their vices.' So that it seems even the children of God, fuch as he owns for his fons and daughters, are not without their fpots, their flips and failures; but all men are finners in some respect, and even fuch, who in our Saviour's phrase, (u) need no repentance. Sins of infirmity none can efcape, not even those who are moft circumfpect in all refpects, and the most careful that can be to abstain from all others. It was the peculiar privilege of our bleffed Lord, when he affumed our nature, that he was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without fin, But no mere fon of Adam may pretend to the fame exemption, this being a pure effect of the conjunction of the divine with the human nature. But then, for our encouragement, tho' we cannot live without thefe frailties, our comfort is, that there is a remedy offered for them, through the mediation of our Saviour and Redeemer. (x) If any man fin, we have an Advoçate with the Father, Jefus Chrift the Righteous: and be is a propitiation for our fins; and not for ours only, but (5) James iii. 2. (#) Luke xv. 7. (x) 1 John ii, 2.

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for the fins of the whole world. And if for all our fins, then more efpecially for fuch as are committed through inadvertence, and weakness, and because we cannot help it as is also implied in the fore-cited words, They are not the fpots of God's children. For if fuch remain God's children, notwithstanding these spots, then muft it follow, that their spots are forgiven them, and fo do not at all endanger their everlafting welfare. In a word, our God is, as I faid, a gracious God, and merciful; and will favourably accept of fuch an obedience, as he knows us able to perform. Nor ought any to distrust his kindness, only because they have not done that, which was impoffible for them to do, and will be fo, whilft they are men, and not angels, and are militant here on earth, and not triumphant in Heaven. The natural confequence of which doctrine is, that our fins of infirmity fhall moft certainly be forgiven upon a general repentance; and fo the good Chriftian has no reason to doubt of his falvation upon their account,

Eufeb. Thus you have fully proved the little reafon there is, for any of us to be in fears upon the account of our fins of infirmity. But you have not yet told us, how to diftinguish thefe fins from fuch as are wilful and damnable; which is a point of great confequence, and the clearing whereof will tend very much to the fatisfaction of the mind; and without fome knowledge whereof, the good man will not be able to pass a true judgment upon himself,

Theod. This is a queftion too nice to be eafily refolved; and a thorough difcuffion whereof would take up more time, than can be allowed for it at prefent, Wherefore I fhall not pretend to give you fo full an answer to it, as you may expect; but only to present you with fome few obfervations, which I hope will, give fome light into it, and in fome measure fatisfy your defire. And here I must plainly own, that it is abfolutely

abfolutely impoffible to furnish you with a complete catalogue of fins of infirmity, whereby for each one to diftinguish which fins are fuch, and which not; and for a very good reafon, because the fame acts which in fome men are the effects of weakness, and are pure involuntary miscarriages, may be wilful in others; and even in the fame perfons too, at other times, and in other circumstances. At one time, and under one fort of temptation, they may be lefs able to withftand them, than at another. And fometimes, again, they may be less watchful against them, or at least, against the temptations that lead to them; and fo they may become in fome degree wilful, though not deliberately and refolutely defigned. And if what is a fin of furreption and furprize at one time, may become a wilful tranfgreffion at another, in the fame person, it is easy to fuppofe, that it may be much more fo in different perfons. One man is not fo cholerick naturally as another; and fo that may be an inexcufeable excess of paffion in him, which yet is pardonable in another, who cannot thoroughly mafter these unruly motions in himself, tho' he ever fo heartily defire and endeavour it. Another is of a timorous conftitution, easily affrighted by any fudden furprize; and fo is fometimes put upon doing inconfiderately, what he ought not, and what he would have been fure not to have done, if he had been mafter of his own thoughts and defigns, and had time to weigh what he was venturing upon, Which makes his cafe very different from theirs, who have more power over themfelves, and a more undaunted fpirit, and greater prefence of mind, and fo have their thoughts at command, and can fuddenly recollect with themselves, what is to be done in fuch an exigence, and how apparently they must offend God, and take the ready way to ruin themselves, if they act otherwife.

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(y) The foldiers in Julian's army, who were induc'd to offer facrifice, under the mistaken notion of paying an ufual reverence to their fovereign, before whom they did it, foon declared fuch an abhorrence of all idolatry, and of themselves, because of it, that every one might fee this was an involuntary crime in them; which yet had it been done confiderately, and upon due information, would have entered them in the number of apoftates from Christianity, as themselves openly acknowledged, as foon as they were made fenfible of what they had been doing. And their guilt was nothing like that of their companions, who did the fame thing knowingly, and for (z) the fake of what they were like to get by it. And divers other like cafes there are, where the fame action is fometimes an involuntary, and at other times a voluntary fin, and whofe guilt therefore varies accordingly.

Anchith. Here you leave a man at great uncertainty; and take a ready way, inftead of fatisfying, to increase bis doubts and fears.

Theod. I think I cannot be faid to leave the man at great uncertainty; but at fome I do, and inevitably muft leave him. Because, as I faid, there is no certain distinction betwixt these fins, that will hold in all cafes, fo as that it can be faid, Such and fuch fins are, and will. be, fins of weakness, and all other chofen and wilful fins. However, to make the difference between them as evident as I can, I think, firft, That wandering thoughts, and heaviness in our devotions, tho', when indulg'd, they are certainly wilful fins, yet when we ftrive against them all we can, arming ourselves against them by fuch meditations beforehand as may feem most likely to prevent them, and in the act of

(3) Προσχήματι νόμε καὶ ἀρχαιότητος, ἐδ ̓ εἰς νῦν ἔλαβον ὃ ἡμάρτανον. Sozom. Hift. Eccl. 1. 5. c. 17.

Μικρῷ κυρὶ καὶ χρυσίῳ, καὶ διὰ κνίσσης ὀλίδης ἔπιπῖον, ἐδὲ τῆς ἑαυτῶν σφαγὴν εἰδότες οι πλείες. Greg. Νaz. Στήλι. α.

(≈) Tự Panouerów xéções deλeabérles. Sozom. ubi fupra.

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worship applying ourfelves to get our minds into the moft pious and ferious pofture we are able, ftudying to confine our thoughts purely to the bufinefs we are about, and to exert our utmost fervour and devotion; I think, I say, in this cafe, our coldness and wandrings cannot poffibly be reckoned more, than the natural effects of weakness and infirmity. Secondly, The fame I fay of carnal and atheiftical, or any fort of vicious fancies or defires injected into the mind, and which could not be foreseen or prevented. If these be cherifhed and meet with encouragement there, they thereby become our own, and must be looked upon as wilful fins: but, had they been immediately rejected, with deteftation and abhorrence, they had been either fins of weakness, or poffibly no fins at all, because not properly our own, but fuch temptations rather as our adverfary had contrived to affault us with. Thirdly, To these alfo may be added fins of pure and unaffected ignorance, when we have used the best means we could for our information, but do not yet fee the evil and mifchief of them, nor know them to have been forbidden us. Fourthly, And fuch likewife I take strong and almost invincible prejudices to be, when a man unfeignedly fets himfelf to make an impartial judgment of any matter in debate; but, after all his heartieft endeavours to fatisfy himself, has not yet been able to conquer the erroneous notion he had before conceived of it, and which perhaps he fucked in with his mother's milk; fo that it has ever fince grown up with him, and by this means has got fuch a powerful ascendant over him, that it occafions wrong conceptions in him, and fo leads him into unfeen errors of practice, as well as of judgment. Fifthly, Of this fort alfo I take all fins of mere furprize and inadvertency to be, when a man, beyond the intent of his heart, is overtaken by a temptation before he is aware of it; and fo, not having time to çonfider, can hardly be faid in any fenfe to have confented to what he did; when the fuddennefs of the affault allows him not

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