those conscious of sickness seek the physician, their earnestness in applying to him and their recognition of cure being in proportion to their sense of pain or peril. When sin is regarded as a trifle, the atoning sacrifice is undervalued or altogether denied. A light estimate of past sin will render us less watchful in the future. If the debt already incurred can be easily set aside, no great harm need be feared from fresh trespasses. If our violation of God's law were excusable error and not a debt recorded, indelible, augmenting, beyond all power of ours to discharge, and which will be brought against us in judgment, such repentance as the Word of God describes would be excessive, and such a provision as the gospel announces for its rémission would be unnecessary.

II.—THE DEBTS OF GOD'S PARDONED CHILDREN.

Can they who have repented and are forgiven appropriately present this prayer? All who truly call God "Father," who desire that His name may be hallowed, that His kingdom may come and His holy Will be done, must have been welcomed home as His adopted children. He gave them the kiss of forgiveness, and put on them "the best robe." What need to come day by day for the pardon received once for all? And why ever again confess themselves "miserable sinners," instead of exulting as God's happy children?

When a sinner unfeignedly repents, he is forgiven

Unless

and reconciled; but as long as he is liable to transgress, it is suitable and necessary to ask for pardon. he has attained a state of absolute perfection, he needs still to pray, "Forgive us our debts." Our Lord said to Peter, "He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit" (John xiii. 10, R. V.). By repentance and faith the converted sinner is bathed in "the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness." But as in walking from the bath the feet are soiled and need cleansing, so a pardoned sinner, though justified as regards his former ungodly life, is liable to contract fresh stains which make the prayer for pardon as appropriate each day as that for daily bread.

To avoid this inference, some interpreters maintain that this prayer is not evangelical, because given to those still under the Law, and prior to the crucifixion. But it was twice recorded long after that event for those who were under the New Covenant. It is true that when a sinner repents he is pardoned and becomes " a new creature," is "turned from darkness to light," and "walks not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." St. John says, "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin;" but this same beloved disciple teaches in the same epistle, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us," which Dean Alford thus interprets: "St. John is writing to persons whose sins have been forgiven them (ii. 2), and therefore necessarily the present tense exoμev refers not to any previous state of sinful life before conversion, but to their now existing state, and

the sins to which they are liable in that state.

This state of needing cleansing from all present sin is veritably that of all of us; and our recognition and confession of it is the very first essential of walking in light." The preceding verse teaches us that "if we walk in the light, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin;" the cleansing here spoken of being the pardon of the faults of the children of light who have already, in repentance and faith, been cleansed from their old sins. Again, St. John connects a state of sanctification with the continued need of pardon when he says, "These things write I unto you that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." "They cannot sin" if truly "born of God," as they once did when wandering in rebellion; they cannot sin habitually, encouraging it, persevering in it; they hate it, resist it, mourn over it; yet are they liable to be overcome by occasional temptation; but they are not on this account to despair as though no fresh pardon were possible, since they who believe have One who ever pleads their cause with God. (1 John ii. 1, 2.) St. Paul teaches the same truth by warnings to believers in every epistle. Exhortations to holiness show that perfection was far from having been reached. He says of himself, "Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect. Brethren, I count not myself yet to have apprehended, but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on

toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

The two classes of statement are in beautiful harmony. When a sinner repents, his sins are pardoned and the Holy Spirit is given, but he is still liable to the influence of the flesh, he is still in a world full of snares, and exposed to the crafts and assaults of the devil. Sin is now alien to his nature, and when he falls into it he has no peace till he repents of it. But he has often occasion to lament such failures. He still with the publican prays, 'God be merciful to me a sinner." The larger knowledge which, by the Spirit, he now enjoys of God, shows the vast interval between himself and Divine perfection. An increasing sense of obligation with growing love to God makes him more sensitive to his failures. The more he advances in holiness, the more he perceives his imperfections. The stronger the light, the more obvious the stains; the brighter the sunbeam, the plainer the motes. The summit of the mountain piercing the skies with its glittering pinnacles and spotless dome is not seen from the low-lying valley, and he who wishes to climb has a very imperfect notion of the task before him. The precipice concealing the distance must first be surmounted, requiring his utmost efforts. But when, after much toil and peril, this has been conquered, instead of thinking he has gained the goal, he is filled with admiring awe as he beholds the mountain rising far, far beyond and above him. The sinner

first seeking pardon has no such conception of his need of it while climbing the craggy cliffs of penitence, as when from the tableland of forgiveness he gazes upwards at the mountain-heights of God's holiness.

"Christian perfection" is obedience to God by men on earth similar to that of angels in heaven. This all should hold as the true ideal; but when the term is used as actually characterizing individuals, the real meaning intended is generally that of maturity of character, habitual faith in God, a steady purpose of obedience, and progress heavenward. To profess to have reached the goal indicates a low ideal; to be unconscious of defect betrays a dulness of the spiritual sense; to be satisfied with the service rendered reveals rather the weakness than the strength of love. The Rev. C. H. Spurgeon remarked to the writer respecting one who held the opinion here questioned, "I always thought him perfect till he told me he was.'

Some speak of Sanctification as attainable instantaneously by a simple act of faith. As a sinner believing is at once released from debt, so, they say, if we believe in Christ as the Sanctifier, we are at once freed from the liability to sin again. But the two great blessings of salvation, while inseparable in fact, are essentially distinct in development. In Justification, Divine Grace annuls the sentence of condemnation; in Sanctification, the Divine Spirit produces holiness of thought, motive, habit, conduct, character. In the nature of things this must be gradual and continuous. The seed is sown as soon