neighbour; therefore, Love is the fulfilling of the Law. He that truly loves his neighbour as himself, will be as loath to wrong him as to wrong himself, either in that honour and respect that is due to him, or in his life, or chastity, or goods, or good name, or to lodge so much as an unjust desire or thought, because that is the beginning and conception of real injury. In a word, the great disorder and crookedness of the corrupt heart of man, consists in self-love: it is the very root of all sin both against God and man, for no man commits any offence, but it is in some way to profit or please himself. It was a high enormity of self-love, that brought forth the very first sin of mankind. That was the bait which took more than either the colour or the taste of the apple, that it was desirable for knowledge: it was in that, that the main strength of the temptation lay, Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. And was it not deep self-love to affect that? And it is still thus though we feel the miserable fruits of that tree, the same self-love possesses us still; so that, to please our own humours and lusts, our pride, or covetousness, or voluptuousness, we break the law of God, the law of piety, and of equity and charity to men. Therefore the Apostle, foretelling the iniquities and impieties of the last times, that men shall be covetous, boasters, &c., and lovers of pleasures, more than lovers of God,―sets that on the front, as the chief, leading evil, and the source of all the rest-lovers of their ownselves: Men shall be lovers of themselves, therefore, covetous; and lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, because lovers of their ownselves. 2 Tim. iii. 2. Therefore, this is the sum of that which God requires in His holy Law, the reforming of our love, which is the commanding passion of the soul, and wheels all the rest about with it in good or evil.

And its reformation consists in this, in recalling it from ourselves unto God, and reflecting it from God to our brethren. Loving ourselves sovereignly by corrupt nature, we are enemies to God, and haters of Him, and cannot love our neighbours but only in reference to ourselves, and so far as it pro

fits or pleaseth us to do so, and not in order and respect unto God. The highest and the true redress of this disorder, is that which we have here in these two precepts as the substance of all; first, that all our love ascend to God, and then, that what is due to men descend from thence, and so, passing that way, it is purified and refined, and is subordinated and conformed to our love of Him above all, which is the first and great commandment.

Here we have the supreme Object of love, to whom it is due-The Lord thy God, and the measure of it, which is indeed to know no measure*-With all thy heart, all thy soul, and all thy mind. For which, in Deut. vi. 5, we have all thy strength. Luke hath both. The difference is none, for all mean that the soul, and all the powers of it, should unite and combine themselves in their most intense and highest strength, to the love of God, and that all the workings of the soul and actions of the whole man, be no other than the acting and exercise of this love.

He accounts not nor accepts of any thing we can offer Him, if we give not the heart with it; and He will have none of that neither, unless He have it all. And it is a poor all, when we have given it, for the great God to accept of. If one of us had the affection of a hundred, yea, of all the men in the world, yet could he not love God in a measure answerable to His full worth and goodness. All the glorified spirits, angels, and men, that are or shall be, in their perfections, loving Him with the utmost extent of their souls, do not altogether make up so much love as He deserves. Yet He is pleased to require our heart, and the love we have to bestow on Him; and though it is infinitely due of debt, yet He will take it as a gift: My son, give me thy heart. Prov. xxiii. 26.

Therefore, the soul that begins to offer itself to Him, although overwhelmed with the sense of its own unworthiness

Modus est nescire modum, subtiliùs ista distinguere facile est magis quàm solidum.

and the meanness of its love, yet may say, Lord, I am ashamed of this gift I bring Thee, yet, because Thou callest for it, such as it is, here it is; the heart and all the love I have, I offer unto Thee, and had I ten thousand times more, it should all be Thine. As much as I can, I love Thee, and I desire to be able to love Thee more. Although I am unworthy to be admitted to love, yet, Thou art most worthy to be loved by me, and besides, Thou dost allow, yea, commandest me to love Thee. My loving of Thee, adds nothing to Thee, but it makes me happy; and though it be true, the love and the heart I offer Thee, is infinitely too little for Thee, yet, there is nothing besides Thee enough for it.

The Lord, or Jehovah, thy God.] There lie the two great reasons of love, τὸ ἁγαπητον and τὸ ἰδιν—Jehovah, the Spring of being and goodness, infinitely lovely; all the beauty and excellencies of the creatures, are but a drop of that ocean; -and, Thy God, to all of us the Author of our life, and of all that we enjoy; who spread forth those heavens that roll about us and comfort us with their light, and motions, and influences, and established this earth that sustains us; who furnisheth us, with food and raiment, and in a word, (and it is the Apostle's, Acts xvii. 25.) who gives us (wy nai avoǹv xai rà avra, life, and breath, and all things; and, to the believer, his God in a nearer propriety, by redemption and peculiar covenant. But our misery is, the most of us do not study and consider Him, what He is in Himself and what to us; and therefore we do not love Him, because we know Him

not.

And thy neighbour as thyself.] If we will not confess nor suspect ourselves, how much we are wanting in the former, yet, our manifest defect in this latter will discover it. Therefore, the Apostle, Rom. xiii. 10, speaks of this as all, because, though inferior to the other, yet connected with it, and the surest sign of it. For these live and die together. The Apostle St, John is express in it, and gives those hypocrites the lie plainly: If any man say, I love God, and hateth his brother,

he is a liar. 1 John iv. 20. We have no real way of expressing our love to God, but in our converse with men and in the works of love towards them.

Certainly, that sweet affection of love to God, cannot consist with malice and bitterness of spirit against our brethren. No, it sweetens and calms the soul, and makes it all love every way.

As thyself] As truly both wishing and, to thy power, procuring his good, as thy own. Consider how much unwilling thou art to be injured or defamed, and have the same thoughts for thy brother; be as tender for him. But how few of us aspire to this degree of charity!

Thy very enemies are not here excluded. If self-love be still predominant in thee, instead of the love of God, then thou wilt make thine own interest the rule of thy love; so, when thou art, or conceivest thou art wronged by any one, the reason of thy love ceaseth. But if thou love for God, that reason abides still*. God hath commanded me to love my enemies, and He gives me His example; He does good to the wicked who offend Him.

And this is indeed a trial of our love to God. One hath marred thee; that gives thee to think that thou hast no cause to love him for thyself; be it so, self-love forbids thee, but the love of God commands thee to love him. God says, If thou lovest Me, love him for My sake. And if thy love to God be sincere, thou wilt be glad of the occasion to give so good a testimony of it, and find a pleasure in that which others account so difficult and painful.

* Amicus diligendus in Deo, et inimicus propter Deum. [AUGUS◄ TINE.]

SERMON XXX.

HEBREWS viii. 10.

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord: I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people.

THE two great evils that perplex sensible minds, are, the guiltiness of sin, and the power of it. Therefore, this new covenant hath in it two promises opposite to these two evils; free pardon to remove the guilt of sin, and the subduing of its power by the law of God written in the heart. Of this latter only, for the present. Having spoken somewhat of the sense of the Law in the Ten Commandments, and of the sum of it in Two, this remains to be considered as altogether necessary for obedience, and without which, all hearing and speaking, and all the knowledge of it, will be fruitless. Though it be made very clear and legible without, we shall only read it, and not at all keep it, unless it be likewise written within.

Observe, in the first place, the agreement of the Law with the Gospel. The Gospel bears the complete fulfilling of the Law, and the satisfying of its highest exactness, in our surety Jesus Christ, so that, in that way, nothing is abated; but besides, in reference to ourselves, though it take off the rigour of it from us, because answered by another for us, yet, it doth not abolish the rule of the Law, but establisheth it, Rom. iii. 31. It is so far from tearing or blotting out the outward copies of it, that it writes it anew, where it was not before, even within, sets it upon the heart in sure and deep characWe see this kind of writing of the Law, is a promise for the days of the Gospel, cited out of the prophet Jeremiah, Ch. xxxi. ver. 33.

ters.