felf-conceit makes them value themselves, to the undervaluing and contemning of others: though yet, while they fuppofe themselves to be pure, their impurity re

mains.

We may obferve two forts of perfons in the vifible church.

1. Some truly exercifed perfons, who, looking more to their spots and weakneffes, than to their graces and privileges, are ready to conclude themselves to be hypocrites and diffemblers with God. There are a few of these.

2. There are those who have nothing but a profeffion of religion, being ftrangers to the power of it; yet entertain an high opinion of themselves: who, looking more to their feeming righteoufnefs, than to their real cafes; more to their gifts than to their fpots, conceive themfelves to be, what they really are not. They have an high conceit, a towering imagination, and raised opinion of themselves; and there is a multitude of fuch: There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet are not washed from their filthiness.

This chapter contains, 1. Agur's confeffion of faith. 2. His prayer, and the parts of it. and the parts of it. 3. His fixfold quaternary; that is, his coupling of four things together, and making a comparison among them; as you may fee them divided in the contents of the chapter, upon fome of your Bibles.-The first four is a fourfold generation of finners that are most detestable to God: though this be not expreffed, yet it is clearly implied; and you will find a parallel where it is expreffed, Prov. vi. 16. Now, of the four generations he here fpeaks of, the fecond is in our text: A generation that are pure in their own eyes, yet are not washed from their filthiness. The fcope whereof is to fhew, That it is a fault incident to vaft multitudes, to have an high opinion of themselves, while yet they are naught; to think themselves pure, while yet they are impure: they take external reformation for true converfion; outfide holiness, for inward fanctification; and common grace for faving.

In the text thefe perfons are defcribed two ways; both negatively and pofitively. 1. Nega

1. Negatively, from what they are not in reality; they are not washed from their filthiness: where, as the defilement of fin is expreffed by the word filthiness, fignifying excrement, and denoting the pollution and defilement of fin; fo the neceflity of purity is fuppofed; they are not washed: they were never cleanfed in the fountain opened for fin and for uncleanness; they never wafhed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb; their hearts and natures remain polluted, and under the power of corruption.

2. They are defcribed pofitively, from what they are in their own opinion: they are pure in their own eyes: they have a fpititual pride. For it is of this, I think, the text chiefly means: because carnal pride is spoken of, ver. 13. They have an high opinion of themselves. And they are set forth by their number: There is a generation of fuch. This word is fometimes taken for the fucceffion of one age to another. Sometimes it imports a multitude; and in this fenfe I chiefly take it: There is a multitude of people that are pure in their own eyes, yet are not washed from their filthiness.

The farther explication I refer to the profecution of these three doctrines. 1. That fin is an impure thing, of a polluting and defiling nature. 2. That purity is an excellent thing, and of abfolute neceffity to denominate a true faint. Whatever we think of ourselves, if we be not washen from this defilement, we are naught. 3. That felf-conceit is incident to a multitude of professors. Many who are moft impure, do yet look on themselves as pure, and labour under a fad and woful delufion; a grofs and damnable miftake, about the ftate of their immortal fouls: they have a good heart, they think; and yet, alas! it is the worst part about them. There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet are not washed from their filthinefs. The two former doctrines are clearly implied, the last is plainly expreffed, and is what I mainly designed in fixing on the text: but I fhall touch at the two other alfo. I begin with the first of thefe, and would speak a little to it at the time.

VOL. I.

S s

DOCT. I.

DOCT. I. That fin is a pollution and defilement.

The method we propofe for handling this fubject, through divine aid, shall be the following,

I. We would confider what the fcripture faith about the pollution of fin.

II. We would compare the pollution of fin with the guilt of fin, for clearing the difference between the one and the other; and for evidencing the greatnefs of this defilement.

III. Speak of the nature and qualities of this pollu

tion.

IV. We would fhew whence this pollution comes, and how it is derived into the world.

V. Make application of the whole fubject.

1. The first thing propofed was, To confider what the fcripture faith about the pollution of fin. Indeed the scripture compares it to all the greatest deformities imaginable. Sometimes it is compared to the blood and pollution of a new born infant, Ezek. xvi. 4, 5, 6. Sometimes to a dead body, or a rotten carcafe, hanging upon a man, Rom. vii. 24. O wretched man that I am! who fhall deliver me from this body of fin and death? Sometimes to a stinking exhalation of a green open grave, and the rottennefs of the land of darknefs, Rom. iii. 13. Sometimes to the poifon of afps, or ferpents, Rom. iii. 13. Sometimes to the vomit of a dog, and the puddle of fwine, 2 Pet. ii. 22. Sometimes to a canker, or gangren, 2 Tim. ii. 17. Sometimes to the dung of filthy creatures, Phil. iii. 8.; or human dung: we read of the dung of mens facrifices caft in their faces. Sometimes to the plague and peftilence, to a putrifying fore, Ifa. i. 6.

-But, not to name any more; furely if fin had not been fuch a pollution and abomination, the Spirit of God would not have made ufe of fo many terms, to lay before us the odious nature of it: yet none of these things, to speak properly, are pollutions in themfelves, being part of the ornament of the creation, though they be poison to man, or disagreeable to our fenfes :

but

but fin is ugly in itself, and in the eye of God and holy angels.

II. The fecond thing was, To compare the pollution of fin and the guilt of fin together.

1. The pollution of fin hath a reference to the command and precept: the guilt of fin hath a reference to the threatening and execution. God injoins us to do fo and fo; we do it not: or he forbids us to do, and we do it here is the ftain, blot, and pollution of fin; being a deformity of foul, and contrariety to the law of God. The pollution of fin hath a relation to the command; the guilt of fin looks to the fanction: whoever fins fhall die, fhall be punished; guilt looks to that.

2. The pollution of fin looks more directly to the bolinefs of God; the guilt of fin hath a relation to the juftice of God. The pollution of fin is the direct oppofite to that purity that is in him; it is a direct contrariety to his holinefs: but guilt looks to the justice of God, which chains the moral evil and the penal evil together.

3. Though guilt of itself, properly speaking, cannot be faid to be a good thing, it being evil to the rebel and criminal; yet it is a good thing that fin fhould be punifhed with fuffering, and mifery, and hell: it is the emanation of God's justice and fanction of his law, and obligation upon the rebel, to give God as much glory by his fuffering, as he robbed him of by his fin. This guilt in a manner brings all into order again. The polution of fin breaks the order of the univerfe: that moral dependence, that the intellectual reasonable world had upon their Maker, is broken by the pollution of fin: but guilt, by punishment, brings all into order again; while either the guilty man fuffers in his own perfon, which, alas! he can never fully do; or his guilt is transferred upon a Surety.

4. The pollution of fin is infeperable from it. Though fin be pardoned, it is ftill pollution: but guilt may be Separate from fin. There may be fin without guilt in two refpects. (1.) When God gives a law, and adds no fanction with it: as the greatest of our divines affert,

S s 2

That

That a law may be without a fanction. (2.) When pardon comes and takes away the guilt. I fay, fin may be where there is not guilt: as in the case of the pardoned finner, who is no more liable to the punishment due to fin. And guilt may be where there is no fin, as in the cafe of Chrift, who had no fin of his own, yet as Surety was liable to the punishment of all the fins of an elect world. But though, I fay, guilt is feparable from fin, yet the pollution of fin is infeperable from fin; the very nature of fin must be destroyed, ere it can cease to be a pollution.

III. The third thing was, To speak of the nature and qualities of this pollution. As to the nature of this pollution, there are two words I would say concerning it. There is in it a privation, or want of that beauty, which the foul had, when the image of God was upon it: it is a want of conformity to the holiness and beauty of God's nature and law. There is alfo in it a pofitive foulness and defilednefs of mind and confcience: an introducing of the image of the devil; yea, a deformity of foul, body, and converfation. But this will further appear from the properties of this pollution: and therefore, as to the qualities of it,

1. It is a natural pollution; Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean! no, not one. Whatfoever is born of the flesh is flesh. Adam, after his apoftacy, begat a child after his own likeness: had he stood, he would have had children after God's image; but having fallen, he begat a fon after his own image. This is natural : In fin was I conceived, fays David; and in iniquity did my mother bring me forth, Pfalm li. 5.

2. It is a deep and indelible pollution: it is of a crimfon hue, Ifa. i. 18. It is like the blakness of the Etheopian, and the Spots of the leopard; much nitre and foap cannot purge it away, Jer. ii. 22. The deluge of water did not wash it away from the earth: the fire that came down upon Sodom did not burn it out. The fire of hell to eternity will not take away the stain of fin out of the fouls that fhall be there. It is deep; nothing but the blood of God can wash it away.