Let Christless sinners be persuaded to consider what is before them. The Judge at whose bar they are to stand is the very Saviour whom they are despising. You must appear there: you must " 'give account of yourselves" to Him. 0 how will you bear to stand before Him? How will you abide the penetrating and searching look of those "eyes that are as a flame of fire?" Those eyes were once closed in death for sinners. They are now open on all your ways;they see every hidden recess of your hearts. They now look upon you with the melting of pity, and with the imploring expression, "Ye will not come unto me, that ye might have life." Turn not-0 turn not away from this look of beseeching earnestness. You will not be able to shun His look on the throne of judgment. 'Every eye shall see him"riveted by terror or by love. And He to whom you now refuse submission will say " As for those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me."

LECTURE LXIV.

ROMANS XIV, 14-23.

"I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean. But thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil spoken of: for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men. Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another. For meat destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are pure; but it is evil for that man who eateth with offence. It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak. Hast thou faith? have it to thyself before God. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. And he that doubteth is damned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith: for whatsoever is not of faith is sin."

In the preceding verse, in the form of reproof for the past and admonition for the future, and on the ground of the account to be rendered of their principles and conduct at the judgment-seat of Christ, the Apostle had inculcated an important general duty: "Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling-block, or an occasion to fall, in his brother's way."

He proceeds here to apply this general precept to the particular case: and he speaks with no uncertainty or hesitation. He expresses his "knowledge" and full "persuasion," -as a principle on which he felt himself at perfect liberty

to act, without the slightest demurring of conscience-that there was "nothing unclean of itself."

By this phrase "unclean of itself," he cannot mean merely that the distinction did not lie in the nature of the thing. The distinction between "clean" and "unclean" animals in sacri

fice seems to have existed from the beginning.* This was a distinction made by Jehovah himself when sacrificial rites were instituted. Whether, when the grant of animal food was made to man, the distinction between "clean" and "unclean" which afterwards had place among the Jews was introduced, is a matter of uncertainty. But whether it was or not, there does not appear the smallest ground for believing that it would ever have suggested itself independently of a divine. interdict. That men would have discovered, and have acted upon the discovery, that different kinds of food were more and less agreeable and wholesome, is true. But the distinction between "clean" and "unclean" meats proceeds on considerations, whatever they might be, independent of this, or, if in some instances connected with it, not uniformly so. It is obvious that the Apostle's "knowledge" and "persuasion" that the distinction rested not in the nature of the thing would have been nothing at all to the purpose. If God had made the distinction, it was enough. If it still had the sanction of divine authority, no man could be at liberty to dispense with it. The ground or reason of the law was not the question. The sole inquiry was whether the law, of the existence of which there could be no doubt, was still in force. The distinction had originated, not in the nature of things but in the sovereign will of God. The expression "of itself," therefore, does not mean independently of God's appointment, but independently of the conscientious convictions of His people. Accordingly, he does not say, that although there is nothing "unclean of itself," the will of God has made certain kinds of food "unclean;" but that the uncleanness now depended on the state of mind of the eater-"there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him that esteemeth any thing

*Gen. viii. 20.

A Jew under the old

to be unclean, to him it is unclean." economy could not have spoken thus. The distinction did not then depend at all on any convictions of his mind, on any views of nature or of duty which he might entertain: -it was a matter of explicit divine prescription. The meaning evidently is, that now the case was different; that the difference, whence soever arising of old, no longer existed. And, accordingly, in verse twentieth there is a still more unqualified statement of the doing away of the distinction, “All things are pure❞—or "clean. The duty or the sin now arose, not from any actually existing and obligatory statute, but from the state of the individual's convictions in regard to statutes that had been formerly in force. the conviction in his conscience that the pealed, should eat of meats which by that statute had been pronounced "unclean," he sinned:-for to him they still were "unclean." No one was to act against the convictions of his own mind. For such a man to eat would obviously, in the principle of it, be a violation of the divine law, that law still maintaining its authority in his conscience. More of this on verse twentieth.

If any man with statute was not re

The Apostle's "knowledge" and "persuasion" were "by the Lord Jesus." They rested, that is, on the authority of the Lord Jesus: they were in accordance with the views which he had obtained, and that by revelation, of the nature of the work of Christ and the principles of His kingdom. It amounts to this, that under the New Testament dispensation, the dispensation introduced and established by the Lord Jesus, the distinction in question was done away. There can be no doubt, that his conviction was based on the same authority with all that he states as the mind and will of his divine Master.*

The statements of the Lord Jesus during his life, in introducing the spiritual principles of His kingdom, are in harmony with the Apostle's views: "Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man,

* Comp. 1 Cor. xi. 23; xiv. 37 &c.

it cannot defile him; because it entereth not into the heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats? And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: all these evil things come from within, and defile the man.' I do not mean that our Lord is to be understood as setting aside the Law: but he shows the folly of those who, without adverting to the design of ceremonial distinctions, trusted in their freedom from legal defilements while they were chargeable with such moral pollutions as he here enumerates. While the grand design of the vision of Peter on his being sent for by Cornelius was to do away the distinction between Jew and Gentile, which had even been carried beyond the limits of the Law's prescriptions to an unwarranted and superstitious excess, the effect of spiritual pride rather than of commendable self-jealousy, the nature of the emblem by which, in the vision, the cessation of this distinction was indicated, conveyed, at the same time, a lesson of the abolition of the difference between "clean" and "unclean" meats.t

The fifteenth verse is evidently addressed to "the strong:" -“But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ died." The word "grieved" does not signify merely his being displeased or annoyed-but his conscience. being wounded and tempted, and his mind thus shaken, perplexed and harassed. It may include also the grief arising in any case from his being led to imitate, and so to bring guilt on his spirit-sorrow for the sin, whether in act or only in wish. If "the strong" used their liberty so as to produce any such effects; if they were thus regardless of the scruples of "the weak," glorying over them, showing off their freedom and superiority to prejudice, in contempt of the scruples of their brethren;-they walked not—that is, did

Mark vii. 18-23.

+ See Acts x. 9-16.