but the same spirit. Were the Gentiles now introduced into gracious privileges and blessings of the covenant of grace in a church state? Well. It was the same blessing and the same covenant state which Abraham before enjoyed, and into which his posterity were through him introduced. Thus the Apostle reasons. Gal. iii. 14. That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith, v. 15. Brethren, I speak after the manner of men ; Though it be but a man's covenant; (does not this most clearly shew that the covenant he speaks of is-God's covenant, or the covenant of grace, for he reasons from the less to the greater) yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or addeth thereto. v. 16. Now to Abraham and his sead were the promises made.. All this is so corgenial not only with the tenor and scope of scripture, but even with the honest and fair negociations of men in a social state, according to the representa tive system, that it may indeed seem strange that any should either deny or misunderstand it. Sure every one knows that so long as the charter of any society continues, or the constitution of any community, that it is still the same society, and the same community, although it may change a thousand times its members; be increased or diminished, or altered in its by laws to any degree you can imagine. Suppose a civil society to be formed by settling at first all of one nation, it is afterwards mixed, and finally the descendants of

the original stock become extinct-it is still the same political body. All the treaties or contracts made by the aborigines would stand in the court of nations, and the original constitution would just as much belong to the last members as to the first. This principle of the identity of organic bodies, seems to be understood in physics and ethics, and jurisprudence-in every thing but where it is most true and of most importance that is in regard of the Church.

What privileges do we Gentiles now enjoy? Is it not that though once aliens, we are now fellow citizens, and of the household of faith? We are come, not to the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire and to blackness and darkness, or we are not introduced into the dark, typical, and terrific legal part of ancient dispensations. But we are come to mount Sion and unto the city of the living God, to the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels. To the general assembly and Church of the first born which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect.

Were Gud's people as a nation called out of and separated from an unbelieving idolatrous world? So are we-called out of every people and tongue and nation, to be to him a peculiar people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood. But are we by this made a new society or different community from that which God of old redeemed? He has but one body, for he is one head;

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he has one sheep-fold, for he is one shepherd; one kingdom; for he is one king. By the blood of the covenant he has made of twain one new man, so making peace. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile, bond nor free: all are one, He has united all things in heaven or in earth. Is this done by altering the constitution and arrangement of things respecting those already in glory, or is it not rather by altering and conforming things on earth to the pattern of things in heaven? Either then the ancient saints were trained up for that place, by a dispensation of grace, or we are not, or they and we cannot be united. If they were not, and we are, then our education and theirs are essentially different. They and we are not, cannot, be socially and beatifically united. One will speak the language of Canaan, and the other the language of Ashdod. They will be barbarians to us, and we to them. We cannot be united as one nation, our language, our : sentiments, our spirit have been so different. Who but sees the absurdity of this? They without us could not be perfect, nor we without them. The reason is obvious. The body is one. are all members one of another. All must be unitedly exhibited as the reward of his suffering, when he shall see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied; when he shall surrender the kingdom unto his father; saying here am I and the children whom thou hast given me. Though gathered from different ages and places, they shall then be ONE GREAT NATION. The charter has

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always been the same.

The one charter of all

their rights has been the covenant of grace, and when all the diversities of opinions shall be dispelled, by the vision of glory, the differences of times, in which they have lived, shall be all lost in the duration of eternity. Then shall Abel, the Protomartyr, whose spirit first of human souls, enjoyed celestial bliss, and the last believing spirit, who shall close up, the rear of the great ransomed multitude, unite in sweetest symphony, in shouting, "Grace, Grace, unto it.""

But are we still told that this all might be the case, and yet the Abrahamic covenant not be a dispensation of the covenant of grace, because he lived in a typical period?? What !! might grace be exhibited, and grace applied for salvation, and: yet the dispensation not be gracious? It must be remembered that typical and gracious are not op-posites, capable of being contrasted, or contradic-tory, incapable of reconciliation. Of what were the ordinances of that period typical? Do you: say, of the external ordinances of the gospel dis pensation? Then there must be some antitype in these of the rite of initiation. What is that, if not baptism?? Again do you say, they were typi-eal of spiritual things? If so, then what is the essential difference between them and the ordi-nances of grace now? In this sense the ordi-. nances may still be called typical, for they still address men's reason through the organs of sense: and perception. They yet regard man as consist ing of soul and body; a candidate in time for rnity.

Is it farther objected, that our system makes Abraham a Mediator? We answer, by no means. On the contrary, we establish from scripture that he had the same One Mediator that all believers have. The covenant we have seen was not originally made with him. It was the eternal covemant which only received a formal and eminent ratification with this illustrious patriarch. Finally. Is it objected that nothing but a natural birth was required in the Abrahamic covenant, but that a spiritual birth is necessary in order to partake of the privileges of the covenant of grace?

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To this we answer, by asking; Were there any saved under that dispensation? Were the believers of that day, and under that dispensation regenerated or unregenerated? Did they believe without the operation of the Spirit, or with it? If with it, then they were regenerated, as well as If they were not, how did they enter into heaven? Except a man be born again he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven. Is it said the kingdom in John iii. means the visible Church? Grant it, and are the terms of admittance into the latter stricter than into the former? Can they be admitted into the heavenly society without regeneration, and not into the earthly-into the triumphant, and not into the militant Church!!!

Again, can none be members of the church now unless they be regenerate? Was Judas regenėrated? No; he was the son of perdition. Was Simon the sorcerer regenerated? No; he was in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniqui