attempt of any of his servants to make a statement of what he teaches us, and to eviscerate untruth. The Lord has always set himself forth as a covenant-keeping God. In this his honor is concerned. Untruth, instead of being content with deluding souls, must also cast indignity upon him, by showing him false to his own engagements, or denying that he has so bound himself, in the face of his own repeated asseverations to the contrary. Every untruth strikes at some covenant or other; as Pelagianism at the covenant of works, Arminianism at the covenant of redemption, Antipædobaptism at the Abrahamic, and Rationalism at the Gospel covenant. The influence of these errors does not end with the obliteration of the single covenant to which each one is immediately opposed, but by necessary consequence invalidates the others also.

The truth of God unto salvation is a perfect and wellcompacted scheme, made up of parts, every one of which is absolutely essential to the whole. It is impossible either to modify or take away one of these parts, or introduce a foreign one, without vitiating the whole. As in chemistry, as change in the proportions of the same elements, much less the taking away of some or the introduction of others, makes an entirely different compound, so in the truth of God, the slightest error vitiates the whole, providing it be logically followed out to its legitimate result. And the only reason why the souls of all persons who hold to any error are not lost, is that they are bad reasoners, and their hearts are stronger than their heads. We do not hesitate in the face of all mankind to declare, that any departure, however slight from God's truth, or any perversion or dilution of it, or any introduction of anything foreign into it, will, if followed out, and the process be carried far enough, end at the last in the total rejection of everything that he has revealed to us; in the denial of his being; of our own existence, and of all things whatsoever. Of course, it is only with the fewest and most radical errors that the human mind is able unerringly to follow this process. But who will deny that

to the infinite intuition of God, or even to the reasonings of higher intelligences, this is not true of every error, however slight? We have sometimes thought that a very profitable book might be written, by taking up the five points of Calvinism, and showing that this is true concerning every one of them. There is certainly no better way to test the truth of any doctrine than to run it out in all its bearings, in all possible aspects, upon every shade and phase, of other truth that is certainly known. The human mind has a wonderful penchant for what does not immediately concern it, or what concerns it as little as possible; perhaps it might gratify its taste for speculations and refinings, so as to render its work not altogether useless, by indulging in the manner just indicated.

The fact that all error modifies or denies some one or more of the covenants, renders a distinct statement of them necessary. The fact that all God's dealings with men is through covenants, is a fact which must strike every attentive reader of the Scriptures. When this is examined into, it is discovered that every succeeding one is an advance upon what precedes; that each advance is so distinctly marked from both what precedes and follows, as to possess a kind. of unity and be unique, or, in other words, to be a separate dispensation. These dispensations, we all know, are successive manifestations of the plan of redemption. Having observed all this, reason itself would lead us, even if the Scriptures were silent upon the subject, to infer that the whole plan is itself a covenant. There is always some reason revealed or unrevealed, existing either in our own condition or the nature of God, to account for all of his acts concerning us. If we inquire why he should save us by a system of covenants, obvious reasons appear. These are, unbelief in us, and faithfulness in God. Unbelief is the great sin of the unregenerate heart, just as faith is the great grace of the renewed heart; and faithfulness is the great characteristic of the true God, just as faithlessness and deception is of all false gods. That the Lord is a covenant-keeping God is a

truth most precious to the Christian heart, and a fact in which he especially glories. As unbelief and distrust of him are chief obstacles to be overcome in our salvation, the Lord adopts the means best adapted to have this result, and that is by solemn covenant. To all of these he has shown himself faithful, and he fearlessly challenges all nations and tribes of men, in every age, to produce a single instance of a soul that hath trusted him and been put to confusion. The great and mighty God hath most graciously condescended to obligate himself to man, and he appeals to our unbelief, and asks us to trust him far enough to test him. The soul that puts his trust in Christ leans upon the mediator of the eternal covenant. His death is not only sacrificial but covenantal, the slain lamb betwixt whose dissevered portions the parties to the covenant walk. His people perform this action when they are baptized into his death. The covenant secures everything to us; there is not a promise that we can plead, or a spiritual gift that we can ask, but lo! his sacred honor is pledged to grant it infinitely beyond our most consuming longings. Why is it that, after so many ages of faithfulness and high and noble dealing, we still distrust him? And is it not a matter of profound thanksgiving, that he has not long since cast us off, and refused to plead with a faithless, a perverse and a gainsaying generation? And should we not hasten to abase ourselves in the dust before him, and offer him the ready homage of our spirits, and the sacrifice of our lives?

The reasons already given are perhaps enough to satisfy us why God, in dealing with sinners, should always do it by covenant. If, however, we advance a step further, and seek to know why, in dealing with sinless man, he adopted the same plan, we find ourselves on the confines of a great mystery, and should tread reverently and cautiously, and seek not with unholy vision to penetrate the vail which the wand of Omnipotence hath not raised. The covenant of works is of this description. Unfallen man could not distrust his Maker, and he in turn need not resort to this to persuade

man of his faithfulness. But we must here pause, for whatever there might be in the very nature of things to account for it, and however forward a fruitful conjecture might be in assigning reasons, we must be content with two statements: firstly, so far as we can see, it would have been impossible to convey the benefit proposed in another way. It was necessary for Adam to be the federal as well as the natural head of the race, in order for them to be benefited by his obedience, or to inherit by a natural descent the estate, whatever it might be, into which he himself might be brought by his covenant relation with God, or to go back of this, that he should himself enter into that estate on a given condition; and secondly, the eminent wise God always does the best thing, in the best possible way, and though he may not reveal his reasons, yet they are good and sufficient; that they are not revealed argues that they would be inscrutable to us, or that to know them would not benefit us.

God entered into a covenant of life with sinless man, on condition of perfect obedience. We can not suppose that by this covenant a merciful and wise God would have increased the hazard of man's condition. By this covenant he was placed on a probation; but a probation is hazardous; he was, therefore, on a probation before. We can not conceive of a holy and merciful God entering into a new dispensation with an innocent and perfect being, that would not be to better his condition. If now man was on a probation, both before and after the covenant of works, the bettering of his condition must consist in the latter probation being a more merciful one than the former. It is more merciful in this, that it limits the probation as to time, places it within a specified period; and that instead of standing for himself only, he stands for himself and all his natural descendants. It may be replied that this would have been true if he had not fallen; but inasmuch as he fell, it was a calamity instead of a blessing that the race was represented in him. To this the reply is obvious, that if as far as the terms of the covenant itself are concerned the objection lies, God had it in mind

by another covenant, upon the failure of this one, to redeem unto himself a people. There are, in all probability, more redeemed by the covenant of grace than would have kept the first covenant, if they had all stood for themselves. For the truth of this, what we know concerning the angels, fallen and unfallen, affords a strong presumption. There is this advantage also, those who are redeemed attain an infinitely higher happiness than they would if they had kept the first covenant and stood by their own righteousness, to say nothing of the revelation of the Trinity, and many of God's most adorable attributes, of which we could then have known nothing. We have just said, that probably more are saved by the covenant of redemption than would have stood by the covenant of works; but it is an exceedingly charitable supposition to grant that any would have stood at all; for if the representative man of the race failed with a limited probation, under probably the first temptation, how is it possible for any considerable number, or any at all of his descendants, the vast majority of whom must be inferior to himself, to stand in an unlimited probation, and under innumerable temptations. This argument is very ably put in the writings of an eminent, living theologian, whom every one at all conversant with the subject will immediately recognize.

If the covenant of works had attained its end, none other had been necessary; but inasmuch as it was broken, the end must be abandoned or sought by another covenant. This and infinitely more is accomplished through the covenant of redemption. This last embraces all that God has done, or will do, for man's salvation; it is the complete plan, from its inception in the eternity past, to its consummation in the eternity to come. It is called a covenant because it was entered into between the three persons of the Trinity, each taking upon himself his peculiar office-work. Inasmuch as it contemplates nothing less than the entire completion of the whole work, it of course embraces whatever subsidiary agencies may be employed to bring about that end. Inasmuch, therefore, as God made many covenants with men in