latter? Are we, as it is alleged, bound down to a particular creed? If we are, it is the creed of the Scriptures. Are we afraid to think and to investigate, lest we should be led to adopt opinions differing from those which our Confession expresses? I repeat-it is not so. Suppose I were to say of Ridgley's Divinity or Dwight's Theology, that I think it expresses, substantially, the doctrines of the Bible, should I dishonor the Bible by that remark? Should I degrade it from the high place which it ought to occupy in every mind, as the only infallible rule of faith? Is this any thing more than every preacher says by implication of his own sermons? If he did not think they expressed the doctrines of the Bible, would he preach them? How then can it dishonor or degrade the Bible, if I say the same of the Thirty-nine Articles, or of the Westminster Confession?

Much of the outcry against systematic theology and confessions of faith, must be accounted for, on the supposition of special odium against those that now prevail. But be not deceived. One of the most certain indications by which truth is distinguished from falsehood, is derived from the fact, that one is systematic, while the other is not so. Truth has always its connexions and dependances. It is not a single proposition, but a chain of related propositions. Now, if truth be in itself systematic or consistent, our view of truth, if it be correct, must also be systematic. And a creed is but the confession of our views of truth.

INFIDELS.

If infidels and careless persons cannot make it absolutely certain to their minds that the gospel is untrue, (and no one was ever able to do this,) their conduct is unreasonable and inexcusable. The simple possibility of the truth of such a system as the gospel, is quite sufficient to alarm the fears, to excite the hopes, and to awaken the liveliest interest of immortal beings. The unbeliever is acting as if he were absolutely certain that the gospel is a fabrication. Whereas, he has no solid and rational and abiding persuasion that even he, himself, may not yet have to yield to such an overwhelming weight of evidence in favor of its truth, as will satisfy the most reluctant and tardy mind.

It is immoral and ungodly practice that produces erroneous opinions. It is free-living that produces freethinking. There is reciprocal action of each on the other.

In giving us a revelation, God hath accompanied it with evidence sufficient to make faith reasonable and unbelief inexcusable, and further than this he was not bound to go.

How rare it is to meet with, or even read of, a devout deist or religious infidel. There was hardly ever a speculative deist, that was not a thorough-going practical atheist. And truly, if a man gives up Christianity, there is not much in religion worth retaining— nothing, if we confine ourselves to eternity.

INFIDELITY.

It is no way wonderful that there should be infidels now, when on the awful day of the crucifixion, there were so many infidels around the cross-when though the earth trembled under their feet, and the heavens were darkened at noonday over their heads, only a single one was made to cry out, Son of God."

"Truly this was the

Infidels say, if our religion is so important, why is it not universal? Such ought to remember that there have been two periods before the birth of our Saviour, when it was universal, and that since his birth, it has demolished every system of idolatry that was in the known world. It would, however, be a sufficient reply, to such, to say, "That with the Lord, one day is as a

thousand years, and a thousand years as one day; and that God is not slack concerning his promise," but has reserved, in his infinite wisdom, the latter day, for the most glorious manifestations of his grace; so that if Christianity had always been universal, it would, at the same time, have been grossly false in its predictions.

PHILOSOPHY.

Philosophy may boast that her's is a tried foundation. And she may appeal to her disciples, as we do to Christians, if they have not been supported by it through all the adventures of life, and in the hour of death. But she has no testimony, as Christianity has, from beyond the grave. John heard many voices in heaven, saying, "Worthy is the Lamb," &c., but none ever heard the blessed above, crying, "Worthy is philosophy to receive honor and glory."

There is a philosophy that pretends to a sovereignty over the ills of life, boasting of a mithridate, or a catholicon, that will cure every pain of the heart. But ah! there is more and longer grief in the cure than in the patient sufferance of the ill. It cures by cauterizing the heart, so that it shall not feel.

REASON.

The province of reason respecting the Scriptures, is two-fold:-first, to ascertain whether they bear the marks of a divine original; and secondly, to ascertain their true meaning.

The advance of the ancients was attended with no

improvement. The much adored philosophy, which came to its maturity in Greece, whatever else it did, did nothing for correct theology. Athens had more gods than all Greece besides; and Socrates, the best and wisest of Athens, advised his pupil not to pray, and asked, as his dying request to his friend, that he would slay a cock, which he had just recollected he owed to Esculapius.

At best, reason is but a little taper, that lights us on our way to death, when it becomes a dim and diminished flame and goes out.

Reason has never fathomed the depths of the future. She can never chase away its cloud. She goes with you to the utmost verge of life, points to the darkness, and leaves you alone. If you ask of her, what you are to expect beyond it, she can only put into your hand Plato's book, or Cicero's commentary upon it; and while you doubt, she bids you die and decide the mighty question. Oh, be "led by the Spirit of God." Let him take you by the hand,-lead you to the Bible, and to the Saviour, and he will lead you, through holiness, to heaven-to God.

Some say their reason declares certain doctrines of revelation to be untrue, and that is enough. Your reason! And what, pray, is your reason? How much is its dictum worth? What weighs your reason in the great scale of minds? Who made it a judge of what its Maker ought to reveal, and ought to be and ought to do? and to affirm that this may be true, and that may not be true? Do you say that God enkindled this True; but he meant it to illuminate

light within you?