you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were dear unto us. For ye remember, brethren, our labour and travel, labouring night and day.-Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily, and justly, and unblamably we behaved ourselves among you. And with such experiences as these this blessed apostle chiefly comforted himself, when he was going to martyrdom, 2 Tim. iv. 6, 7. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have keep the faith.

And not only does the most important and distinguishing part of Christian experience, lie in spiritual practice; but such is the nature of that sort of exercises of grace, wherein spiritual practice consists, that nothing is so properly called by the name of experimental religion. For that experience, which exercises of grace prove effectual at the very point of trial-wherein God proves which we will actually cleave to, Christ or our lusts-is the proper experiment of the truth and power of our godliness; wherein its victorious power and efficacy in producing its proper effect, and reaching its end, is found by experience. This is properly Christian experience, wherein the saints have opportunity to see, by actual experience and trial, whether they have a heart to do the will of God, and to forsake other things for Christ, or no. As that is called experimental philosophy, which brings opinions and notions to the test of fact; so is that properly called experimental religion, which brings religious affections and intentions to the like test.

There is a sort of external religious practice, without inward experience; which in the sight of God is esteemed good for nothing. And there is what is called experience, without practice, being neither accompanied, nor followed with a Christian behaviour; and this is worse than nothing. Many persons seem to have very wrong notions of Christian experience, and spiritual discoveries. Whenever a person finds a heart to treat God as God, at the time he has the trial, and finds his disposition effectual in the experiment, that is the most proper, and most distinguishing experience. And to have at such a time that sense of divine things, that apprehension of the truth, importance and excellency of the things of religion, which then sways and prevails, and governs his heart and hands; this is the most excellent spiritual light, and these are the most distinguishing discoveries. Religion consists much in holy affection; but those exercises of affection which are most distinguishing of true religion, are these practical exercises. Friendship between earthly friends consists much in affection; but yet those strong exercises of affection, that actually carry them through fire and water for each other, are the highest evidences of true friendship.

There is nothing in what has been said, contrary to what is asserted by some sound divines; when they say, that there are no sure evidences of grace, but the acts of grace. For that doth not hinder but that these operative, productive acts, those exercises of grace, which are effectual in practice, may be the highest evidences. Nor does it hinder but that, when there are many of these acts and exercises, following one another in a course, under various trials of every kind, the evidence is still heightened; as one act confirms another. A man by once seeing his neighbour, may have good evidence of his presence; but by seeing him from day to day, and conversing with him in a course, in various circumstances, the evidence is established. The disciples, when they first saw Christ after his resurrection, had good evidence that he was alive but by conversing with him for forty days, and his shewing himself to them alive, by many infallible proofs, they had yet higher evidence*.

The witness or seal of the Spirit consists in the effect of the Spirit of God in the heart, in the implantation and exercises of grace there, and so consists in experience. And it is beyond doubt, that this seal of the Spirit is the highest kind of evidence of the saints' adoption, that ever they obtain. But in these exercises of grace in practice, God gives witness, and sets to his seal, in the most conspicuous, eminent, and evident manner. has been abundantly found to be true in fact, by the experience of the Christian church, that Christ commonly gives by his Spirit the greatest and most joyful evidences to his saints of their sonship, in those effectual exercises of grace under trials, of which we have spoken; as is manifest in the full assurance, and unspeakable joys of many of the martyrs. Agreeable to 1 Pet. iv. 14. If ye are reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye: for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you. And Rom. v. 2, 3. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and glory in tribulations. And agreeable to what the apostle Paul often declares of what he experienced in his trials. When the apostle Peter, in my text, speaks of the joy unspeakable and full of glory,

"The more these visible exercises of grace are renewed, the more certain you will be. The more frequently these actings are renewed, the more abiding and confirmed your assurance will be. A man that has been assured of such visible exercises of grace, may quickly after be in doubt, whether he was not mistaken. But when such actings are renewed again and again, he grows more settled and established about his good estate. If a man see a thing once, that makes him sure, but if afterwards he fear he was deceived, when he comes to see it again, he is more sure he was not mistaken. If a man read such passages in a book, he is sure it is so. Some months after, some may bear him down, that he was mistaken, so as to make him question it himself; but when he looks, and reads it again, he is abundantly confirmed. The more men's grace is multiplied, the more their peace is multiplied; 2 Pet. i. 2. Grace and peace be multiplied unto you, through the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord."-Stoddard's Way to know Sincerity and Hypocrisy.

which the Christians to whom he wrote, experienced; he has respect to what they found under persecution, as appears by the context. Christ thus manifesting himself, as the friend and saviour of his saiuts cleaving to him under trials, seems to have been represented of old by his coming and manifesting himself to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in the furnace. And when the apostle speaks of the witness of the Spirit, in Rom. viii. 15-17, he has more immediate respect to what the Christians experienced in their exercises of love to God, while suffering persecution; as is plain by the context. He is, in the foregoing verses, encouraging the Christian Romans under their sufferings, that though their bodies be dead because of sin, yet they should be raised to life again. But it is more especially plain by the verse immediately following, ver. 18. For I reckon, that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. So the apostle has evidently respect to their persecutions, in all that he says to the end of the chapter. So when the apostle speaks of the earnest of the Spirit, which God had given to him, 2 Cor. v. 5, the context shews plainly that he has respect to what was given him in his great trials and sufferings. And in that promise of the white stone, and new name, to him that overcomes, Rev. ii. 17, it is evident Christ has a special respect to a benefit that Christians should obtain by overcoming, when tried, in that day of persecution. This appears by ver. 13, and many other passages in this epistle to the seven churches of Asia.

Object. 2. Some also may be ready to object against what has been said of Christian practice being the chief evidence of the truth of grace, that this is a legal doctrine; and that this making practice a thing of such great importance in religion, magnifies works, and tends to lead men to make too much of their own doings, to the diminution of the glory of free grace, and does not seem well to consist with that great gospel-doctrine of justification by faith alone. Which way

But this objection is altogether without reason. it is inconsistent with the freeness of God's grace, that holy practice should be a sign of God's grace? It is our works being the price of God's favour, and not their being the sign of it, that is the thing which is inconsistent with the freeness of that favour. Surely the beggar's looking on the money he has in his hands, as a sign of the kindness of him who gave it to him, is in no respect inconsistent with the freeness of that kindness. It is his having money in his hand as the price of a benefit, that is the thing which is inconsistent with the free kindness of the giver. The notion of the freeness of the grace of God to sinners, as that is that is revealed and taught in the gospel, is not, that no holy

and amiable qualifications or actions in us shall be a fruit, and so a sign of that grace; but that it is not the worthiness or loveliness of any qualification or action of ours which recommends us to that grace. Free grace implies, that kindness is shewn to the unworthy and unlovely; that there is great excellency in the benefit bestowed, and no excellency in the subject as the price of it; that goodness goes forth, and flows out, from the fulness of God's nature, the fulness of the fountain of good, without any amiableness in the object to draw it. And this is the notion of justification without works, (as this doctrine is taught in the scripture;) that it is not the worthiness or loveliness of our works, or any thing in us, which is in any wise accepted with God, as a balance for the guilt of sin, or a recommendation of sinners to his acceptance as heirs of life. Thus we are justified only by the righteousness of Christ, and not by our righteousness. And when works are opposed to faith in this affair, and it is said that we are justified by faith and not by works; thereby is meant, that it is not the worthiness or amiableness of our works, or any thing in us, which recommends us to an interest in Christ and his benefits; but that we have this interest only by faith, or by our souls receiving Christ, or adhering to, and closing with him. But that the worthiness or amiableness of nothing in us recommends and brings us to an interest in Christ, is no argument that nothing in us is a sign of an interest in Christ.

If the doctrines of free grace, and justification by faith alone, be inconsistent with the importance of holy practice as a sign of grace; then they are equally inconsistent with the importance of any thing whatsoever in us as a sign of grace; any holiness, or any grace in us, or any experiences: for it is as contrary to the doctrines of free grace and justification by faith alone, that any of these should be the righteousness which we are justified by, as that holy practice should be so. It is with holy works, as it is with holy qualifications: it is inconsistent with the freeness of gospel-grace, that a title to salvation should be given to men for the loveliness of any of their holy qualifications, as much as that it should be given for the holiness of their works. It is inconsistent with the gospel-doctrine of free grace, that an interest in Christ and his benefits should be given for the loveliness of a man's true holiness; the amiableness of his renewed, sanctified, heavenly heart; his love to God, his experience of joy in the Holy Ghost, self-emptiness, a spirit to exalt Christ above all, and to give all glory to him, and a heart devoted unto him. I say, it is inconsistent with the gospel-doctrine of free grace, that a title to Christ's benefits should be given out of regard to the loveliness of any of these, or that any of these should be our righteousness in the affair of justification. And yet this does not hinder the importance of

Just so it is

these things as evidences of an interest in Christ. with respect to holy actions and works. To make light of works because we are not justified by them, is the same thing in effect as to make light of all religion, all grace and holiness, yea, true evangelical holiness, and all gracious experience: for all is included, when the scripture says, we are not justified by works.By works in this case is meant all our own righteousness, religion, or holiness, and every thing that is in us; all the good we do, and are conscious of; all external acts, all internal exercises of grace, all experiences, and all those holy and heavenly things wherein the life, power, and very essence of religion consist; all those great things which Christ and his apostles mainly insisted on in their preaching, and endeavoured to promote, as of the greatest consequence in the hearts and lives of men, and all good dispositions, exercises and qualifications of every kind whatsoever; and even faith itself, considered as a part of our holiness. For we are justified by none of these things: if we were, we should, in a scripture-sense, be justified by works. And therefore if it be not legal, and contrary to the evangelical doctrine of justification without works, to insist on any of these, as of great importance in evidence of an interest in Christ; then no more is it thus, to insist on the importance of holy practice. It would be legal to suppose that holy practice justifies by entitling us to Christ's benefits; but it is not legal to suppose, that holy practice justifies the sincerity of a believer, as the proper evidence of it. The apostle James did not think it legal to say, that Abraham our father was justified by works, in this sense. The Spirit that indited the scripture, did not think the great importance and absolute necessity of holy practice, in this respect, to be inconsistent with the freeness of grace; for it commonly teaches them both together; as in Rev. xxi. 6, 7. God says, I will give unto him that is athirst, of the fountain of the water of life freely; and then adds, in the very next words, He that overcometh shall inherit all things; as though behaving well in the Christian race and warfare, were the condition of the promise. So in the next chapter, the 14th and 15th verses, Christ says, Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and enter in through the gates into the city: and then declares 15th ver. how they that are of a wicked practice shall be excluded.Yet in the two following verses, with very great solemnity, Christ invites all to come, and take of the water of life freely; I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star.And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth, say, Come. And let him that is athirst, come: and whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of life freely. chap. iii. 20, 21. Behold, I stand at the door and knock: If

So