I have before shewn; they are their chief companions, they have a hearty welcome to the Prince of Peace who always resides in the city, and they love to sit at his dear feet, listen to his blessed voice, and with delight extol his holy Majesty for what he hath done for their poor souls. We find in days of old, when their hearts were set in tune, they addressed his Sacred Self thus,-"Thou (said they to their Lord) hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible one is as a storm against the wall," Isa. xxv. 4.

The text which I have chosen to make a few remarks upon, is applicable to none but those that I described above; it may indeed be said of them who are thus blessedly taught, that they are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens of the saints, and of the household of God." Thus, my beloved friends, you can see from what I have written, that

My motive in writing you this letter is not to insult you, although your old man may suggest this. I have sent you two numbers of the • Spiritual Magazine,' which I think is conducted consistently with scripture, both in declaring truth and exposing error. I have sent them that you may see the names of those mi nisters whom the Editors call Gospel Ministers.' You may not feel such love to those ministers as you do to those with whom you associate, because they are decided for God's discriminating grace, mercy, and love. But, however, these ministers agree with that text which you preached

"

"So that

from a few weeks back, neither is he that planteth anything, nor he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase." They believe that ministers neither in planting nor watering are anything, but as instruments employed of God, in the displays of his gifts and calling; mercy and grace, according to his own sovereign will: for as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneththem, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will." Now if you were a husbandman, and kept a farm, and either of your labourers dictated to you what fields you should break up and cultivate, contrary to your own designs; or, should another sow seed upon the surface of the earth; would you not think such labourers arbitrary and foolish servants? Just so it is with free-will ministers: they are telling God-the great Husbandman of his vineyard-what he can do, what he may do, and what he ought to do! for this is the substance of their prayers and sermons. The Holy Ghost brings the soul to see himself in the glass of the law a condemned sinner, in every precept of it, both in word and deed; and ministers, who are under his influences, expose ain by the law-not merely expose two or three external sins, such as drunkenness, as Tee-totalers do but the Holy Ghost convinces, by his ministers, of the spirituality of the law. It is astonishing how some ministers direct their hearers to the two great commandments, because Christ told the Sadducees, &c. to keep them: they felt not their need of the person and work of the Son of God, therefore they sat in Moses' seat. (Matt. xxii, xxiii.) There is not a person converted nor unconverted that can keep the whole law; if we could we should not stand in need of that redemption whereby Christ hath delivered us from the curse of the law. Therefore I delight in God the Father's electing love, and the Son's redeeming love; and I love the brotherhood,

for such are my nearest neighbours under the gospel. I cannot believe (as many spiritual ministers likewise say) that a true conversion work is going on by human persuasion and enticing words of man's wisdom; endeavouring to bring the whole world within the pale of the church; making proselytes of them, compassing sea and land, as their fathers did before them. Hence we read in God's word that church-members, when mere professors, are the greatest enemies to the grand and leading truths of the gospel: they corrupt the word of God, and promise their hearers salvation; they pervert the gospel, and preach a yea and nay gospel, which is no gospel at all-it is neither milk nor meat. Jus

Instead of an universal conversion, the scripture speaks of an universal persecution. We need not look to the church of Rome for popery: there is much of that among dissenters now-a-day, both among independents and baptists; the parsons make popes of themselves, and they make dupes of the people, and the people are such dupes that they make popes of their parsons: they worship the creature more than the Creator. Those universal men draw false inferences from the Old Testament prophecies, not knowing their spiritual sense; and they preach contrary to the prophecies of the New Testament, yea, they are led by their own imaginations. Concerning the second coming of Christ, those who deny it will be overtaken as a thief in the night, because they look not for him. I learn from the scriptures that about the end of 6000 years the Lord will come in a cloud, as he went up. And he will call together his elect from the four winds of the earth, and under the earth, and from heaven, and they shall meet the Lord in the air then will he set the world in a blaze, and the rest of mankind that will be in it. The apostle leads us to self-examination, (2 Peter iii. 3. Are we leaning wholly upon

the covenant engagement of the Son of God, who giveth eternal life to as many as the Father hath given him? not one more nor one less. This is acknowledging his omniscience. Ma-, ny people confess his divinity and honour him by their mouths: but their arminian scheme Christ living and dying peradventure is a flat denial of the work of the Spirit, for neither forms nor duties, prayer-sayings (nor chapel goings, are the cause of our justification, but Christ hath secured it; He is our Surety, Substitute, and Friend.

If any of your children or my children are saved, it is not because they are our children by nature, but because they are his children by elec, ting love not of works, but of his grace he will save them, for he hath said, "all his children shall know him," in the covenant of grace, from the least to the greatest. Therefore salvation is not a mere offer in the covenant of grace, as it was in the covenant of works; and the Son of God is glorified in the salvation of those whom the Father hath given him (John xvii. 10). I cannot learn from scripture that he will be glorified in any whom he never knew (Matt. vii. 22, 23). There are many wonderful workers in the religious world, who are striving to convert as many as they can by their human efforts and long prayers; but their preaching hath no tendency to convince them of their condemnation by the spirituality of the law, nor their justification by the Law-Fulfiller. They try to convert the infidel, when they are yet unconverted themselves. They contend for the works of the creature, but not for the work of the Creator. The Arminian ministers say that the Calvinists are not fit to convert all the world; and the Calvinists say the Arminians are not fit to convert any, only to religionize some. Many shall deceive many. We read there shall be many false preachers and false teachers, who cannot submit to the

decretive will of God; therefore they cannot say Thy will be done in earth as it is done in heaven," but they pray that the Lord may submit to their mind and will. God worketh all things after the counsel of his own will. I desire to lay passive in His hands who guides me with his counsel, and will afterwards receive me to glory, which is his glory.

But perhaps you may think, Sir, that I am not as I ought to be; for you do not seem to have any love for those who are decided for Christ and the truth. But I am the same as Christ and his apostles; I am the same as those ministers mentioned in the Casket; I am the same as the Baptist churches in London and throughout the nation in the year 1659; the same also as the Independents and Baptists were in the year 1741, for I have got their articles, But these two sects have sunk partly into the state of free-willers, which they did then protest. There are two leading points which free-willers are blind to; the covenant of works and the covenant of grace: or, the everlasting electing love of God, and the total depravity of fallen man. According to their scheme, Christ redeemed those who are eternally lost. Those who are like Baxter may as well be like Armi, nius altogether. I have read Baxter's Call to the Unconverted, and find it to be a mass of Arminian rubbish: in many things he contradicteth himself, in many things he contradicteth the preaching of the Lord Jesus: many scriptures he quotes which contradict his own sentiments. He applies his text to that which it was never intended: it was spoken to God's chosen Israel, who are ready to pine away and die on account of their convictions. There is a vast differ ence betwixt legal convictions and spiritual convictions. Legal preaching will get legal hearers and make legal converts, but the work of the Holy Ghost is quite different.

I trust you know these things.

I

once thought you did, and considered you as able a preacher as I should ever wish to hear; but you have been led away by those men with whom you have joined yourself. You would have found greater comfort if you had conscientiously associated with the other party, whose hearts are consecrated with the divine will of God and of Christ.

4

Among those ministers mentioned in the Casket I see one Francis, but I do not see your name; I find there one Chapel in Waterloo Road, but I do not find the Baptist Chapel, Waterloo Road. I am sorry that your name was not reckoned worthy of being inserted there: I suppose they rank you among the Arminian tribe. But Christ and his apostles declared justification to be not of works, but of grace alone, The doctrines of grace is the foundation of our hope and faith, which we love: the promises are for, our consolation here, and the precepts for our walk and conduct; if we enjoy the promise, let us attend to the precept. Now those ministers who place effects for causes, and causes for effects, are in a bad state, they are in a state of unregeneracy. But we must expect the non-elect to make a great stir about works, as they always did before in ages past. May we enjoy the Lord's prayer in being kept from all evil of the world,

But I do not like to hear dry doctrines, as they are called-although I do not find they are called so in God's word; God hath said, "My doctrine shall drop as the rain, and my word shall distil as the dew:"the doctrines delivered in the mere theory, but I love to hear them set forth experimentally, savourily: the beauty and excellency of the person of Jesus Christ, and the certainty of salvation by the perfection of his work of redemption; and the reality of the work of the Spirit. The elect of God the Father's love, when brought into the bond of the covenant of grace, are

kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation; so that they do not stand upon the same footing as the fallen Israelites, but the Lord maketh a way for our escape, the Lord preserves by his Spirit.

I have one word more to say, as if I was talking to you. There is a great deal of that spirit abroad in the present day, which was with the Corinthian church, some are for this preacher and some are for that. The question is, who are you for, and who am I for. Let us apply it to ourselves. Am I, or you, for those who preach a free and finished salvation, yea a certain salvation, to be enjoyed in the present life, for Christ says, "He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, (spiritually,) hath eternal life?" or are we for those who preach a possible salvation, a may-be one, upon the condition of our works. Those ministers mentioned in the Casket' are reckoned Gospel ministers, because they preach as Christ preached (see Matt. v. Luke iv), which I conceive to be God's elect in a state of conviction: these feel themselves poor, having nothing; they mourn under the burden of sin and depravity; and this breaks their hearts, so that they cannot boast of keeping the law of God with all their hearts, nor yet of loving their neighbour as themselves. But they love Christ, for he has delivered them from under the curse which the law denounces. A spiritual and scriptural knowledge of the person and work of Christ, of the electting love of the Father, and of the teachings of the Spirit; which grand truths the worlde cannot receive; are called by some people stumbling-blocks in the way of babes. But instead of that it is the very milk and meat provided for both babes and fathers. The apostle Peter says, "They stumble at the word who are disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed." And our Lord said, "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from

the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes."

When our Lord Jesus Christ said to his disciples "Ye are not of the world," he referred to the world of religion which was in that day; and in the present day there is the religion of the world-the arminian principles. And although they are divided into different sects, and differ in some minor points, yet the world of religion are of the free-will or self-will principle: every idolater is a free-willer, and they worship their own imaginations. They tempt Christ to make his atonement sufficient for all the human race. They have an eye to all. But God and Christ have an eye to the elect. (John xvii; x.) Well, the redeemed of the Lord are brought into that state recorded Matt. v. and Luke iv.: nothing is there said about being willing. The convinced sinner wants to have Christ preached to him, for He is the true bread which feeds the soul, and he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever. And this is the Father's will, that the Son should save all whom the Father hath given him.

Now dear Sir, and brother in the Lord, farewell. I have written much more than I at first intended. If you wish to reply to anything write me a letter. And may God the Holy Ghost fill you with all wisdom, and bless you with all spiritual blessings, according as he hath chosen you to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. Christ is the Way-yea, all the way, the straight way, the narrow way: the Truththe whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Therefore we are charged not to be carried about and tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine, by the inventions of men who deny the triune work of a triune God, and the sovereignty and omniscience of Father, Son, and Spirit: such men will only acknowledge the Holy Spirit as a mere emanation. May you be brought to see an inseparable connection in the

B.

SERMONS ON THE EPISTLES TO THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA.

BY THE LATE REV. SAMUEL EYLES PIERCE.

(Never Before Published.)

SERMON IV.

"And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations: (and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers) even as I received of my Father. And I will give him the morning star. He that hath on ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches."-Rev. ii. 26-29.

THOUGH it is not our professed design to consider these epistles in a prophetical point of view, and as representing the state of the church of Christ throughout all future ages down to the coming of the Son of God; yet as something was proposed in our first sermon to this purpose, that it would be taken notice of so far as it might serve to open and explain some of the passages contained in these letters, and to shew the connection of them, I would here give a brief account of the state of Christ's church, which the former and which this epistle is acknowledged by our greatest divines to represent.

The church of Ephesus represents the state of Christ's church in the apostolic age, and as immediately following. it. The church of Smyrna represents the state of Christ's church immediately following that, and as under the Roman emperors, or during the ten persecutions which befell the church, which was, as to suffering, a most grievous time; for in the time of Dioclesian, which was of all the ten persecutions foregoing it the greatest, and which lasted ten years, there suffered one hundred and forty-four thousand in one province of the empire, how many therefore in the rest? The church of Pergamos represents

ged out of these grievous afflictions, and her case is set forth from the time of Constantine and onwards, rising up to, and enjoying great power, and riches, and honour: and as riches and honour are seldom of a any real good to the people of the Most High, so neither were they found to be so at this time; for through the riches and honours which Constantine bestowed upon the christians, they became vain, ambitious, proud, and careless: false doctrine and superstition obtained a footing, and the antichristian apostacy came on apace, prevailed, and increased; and the church of Pergamos is reproved for conniving at those who taught false and corrupt doctrine, for it was during this church state that antichrist began visibly to exalt himself: he began doctrinally and practically to work in the time of the apostles, though he lay greatly hid for a season, and was let and hindered from a more open appearance by the Roman emperors (2 Thess. ii. 7), but after Constantine was seated upon the imperial throne, he removing his place from Rome to Constantinople, way was hereby made for the man of sin -the son of perdition-the pope of Rome, to take upon himself the stile and title of Universal Bishop; and he corrupted the doctrine and worship of God, and set up a god which his fathers knew not (Dan. xi. 38). brought on the Thyatiran churchstate, which represents the church of Christ in the darkest and most superstitious times of popery, until the

reformation.

This

In our attempt to open this epistle, we are first to consider the titles and characters which Christ here takes to himself. And, secondly, what he has to say unto the church, and unto the angel of the church of Thyatira :"Write these things, saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet like fine brass."

This letter being, as were all the