Saviour within you, mortifying all your corrupt affections, and sinful actions, that ye may truly say with St. Paul, "I am crucified with Christ." Six several times do we find that Christ shed blood: in His circumcision-in His agony-in His crowning-in His scourging-in His affixion-in His transfixion. The instrument of the first was the knife; of the second, vehemence of passion; of the third, the thorns; of the fourth, the whips; of the fifth, the nails; of the last, the spear. In all these we are, we must be, partners with our Saviour. In His circumcision, when we draw blood of ourselves by cutting off the foreskin of our filthy (if pleasing) corruptions. In His agony, when we are deeply affected with the sense of God's displeasure for sin, and terrified with the frowns of an angry Father. In His crowning with thorns, when we smart and bleed with reproaches for the name of Christ; when that which the world counts honor is pain to us, for His sake; when our guilty thoughts punish us, and wound our restless heads, with the sad remembrance of our sins. In His scourging, when we tame our wanton and rebellious flesh, with wise rigor and holy severity. In His affixion, when all the powers of our souls and parts of our body are strictly hampered, and unremovably fastened upon the royal commandments of our Maker and Redeemer. In His transfixion, when our hearts are wounded with Divine love (with the spouse in the Canticles) or our consciences with deep sorrow. In all these we bleed with Christ, and all these (save the first only) belong to His crucifying. Surely, as it was in the old law, without blood shed there was no remission, so it is still, and ever, in the new. If Christ had not thus bled for us, there had been no remission; if we do not thus bleed with Christ, there is for us no remission. There is no benefit where is no partnership. If Christ therefore bled with His agony, with His thorns, with His whips, with His nails, with His spear, in so many thousand passages, as tradition is bold to define; and we never bleed, either with the agony of our sorrow for sin, or the thorns of our holy cares for displeasure, or the scourges of severe Christian rigor, or the nails of holy constraint, or the spear of deep remorse, how do we, how can we for shame, say, we are "crucified with Christ?" St. Austin, in his epistle, or book rather, to Honoratus, gives us all the dimensions of the cross of Christ. The latitude he makes in the transverse; this (saith he) pertains to good works, because on this His hands were stretched. The length was from the ground to the transverse, this is attributed to His longanimity and persistence; for on that His body was stayed and fixed. The height was in the head of the cross, above the transverse, signifying the expectation of supernal things. The depth of it was in that part which was pitched below within the earth, importing the profoundness of His free grace, which is the ground of all His beneficence. In all these must we have our part with Christ; in the transverse of His cross, by the ready extension of our hands to all good works of piety, justice, charity. In the arrectary or beam of His cross, by continuance and uninterrupted perseverance in good. In the head of His cross, by a high elevated hope, and looking for of glory. In the foot of His cross, by a lively and firm faith, fastening our souls upon the affiance of His free grace and mercy. And thus shall we be crucified with Christ, upon His own cross. Yet, lastly, we must go further than this, from His cross to His person. So did St. Paul, and every believer, die with Christ, that he died in Christ; for, as in the first Adam we all lived and sinned; so, in the second, all believers died, that they might live. The first Adam brought in death to all mankind; but, at last, actually died for none but himself. The second Adam died for mankind, and brought life to all believers. Seest thou thy Saviour, therefore, hanging upon the cross? all mankind hangs there with Him, as a knight or burgess of parliament voices his whole borough or county. What speak I of this? The members take the same lot with the Head. Every believer is a limb of that Body; how can he, therefore, but die with Him, and in Him? That real union, then, which is betwixt Christ and us, makes the cross and passion of Christ ours; so as the thorns pierced our heads, the scourges blooded our backs, the nails wounded our hands and feet, and the spear gored our sides and hearts; by virtue whereof we receive justification from our sins, and true mortification of our corruptions. Every believer, therefore, is dead already for his sins, in his Saviour; he needs not fear that he shall die again. God is too just to punish twice for one fault; to recover the sum both of the surety and principal. All the score of our arrearages is fully struck off, by the infinite satisfaction of our blessed Redeemer. Comfort thyself, therefore, thou penitent and faithful soul, in the confidence of thy safety. Thou shalt not die, but live, since thou art already crucified with thy Saviour. He died for thee, thou diedst in Him. "Who shall lay any thing tc the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies! Who shall condemn? It is Christ that died; yea, rather, that is risen again, and lives gloriously at the right hand of God; making intercession for us." To Thee, O blessed Jesu, together with thy co-eternal Father, and Holy Spirit, three persons in one infinite and incomprehensible Deity, be all praise, honor, and glory, now and forever. Amen. DISCOURSE FOURTEENTH. THOMAS ADAMS. It is impossible to determine, with precision, the time and place of Thomas Adams's birth, whose discourse next follows. He is not to be confounded with either of two other somewhat distinguished divines of the same name; one of whom is mentioned in Wood's Athena Oxonienses, as removed from his fellowship for non-conformity in 1652, and preaching in the Conventicles of London; and the other of whom died in 1784, well known as the Rector of Wirthingham, and author of "Private Thoughts," and a volume of sermons. The Thomas Adams here represented, was minister at Willington, and a preacher at Paul's Cross in 1612; which must have been several years before the birth of the Nonconformist minister above mentioned. But where he was born, or when, and how he died, we know not. He has left no diary, and found no biographer; nor are there any traces of him in the record of his times. His works constitute his only monument. These were published by the author in 1630, in one folio volume of 1240 pages, and some of them, at an early date, passed through several editions.* From dates and references in his writings, we learn that he was a public preacher in the early part of the reign of James the First, and that he must have been cotemporary with Bishop Hall (whose writings he often quotes), though probably his junior by a few years. As a proximate date of his birth, we have fixed upon the year 1578. He was a man of deep and varied learning, and his discourses abound in passages of great brightness. His style is much like that of Joseph Hall, and Jeremy Taylor; plentiful in ornament, rich, quaint, terse, vigorous, and sparkling with brilliant. imagery. We are not disposed to detract aught from the meed of praise awarded by his recent English editor: "With the eye of a poet, the heart of a saint, and the tongue of an orator, he gives substance to abstractions, personifies the virtues, paints the beauties of holiness, and brings to the ear the voices of the distant and the dead." A part of his Discourses have recently been edited by Rev. W. H. Stowell of Independent College, Rotherham, and republished in this country by the Carters of New York. THE THREE DIVINE SISTERS-FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY. "Now abideth faith hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity."— 1 COR. xiii. 13. When those three goddesses, say the poets, strove for the golden ball, Paris adjudged it to the Queen of Love. Here are three celes tial graces, in a holy emulation, if I may so speak, striving for the chiefdom; and our apostle gives it to Love. The greatest of these is Charity. Not that other daughters are black, but that Charity excels in beauty. We may say of this sister, as it was said of the good woman, "Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all." Paul doth not disparage any when he saith, "Charity is the greatest." All stars are bright, though one star may differ from another in glory. We may say of graces, as of the captains of the sons of Gad: "The least a hundred, the greatest a thousand.” Or as the song was of Saul and David: "Saul hath slain his thousands, David his ten thousands." Faith is excellent, so is Hope; but "the greatest of these is Charity." These are three strings often touched; Faith, whereby we believe all God's promises to be true, and ours; Hope, whereby we wait for them with patience; Charity, whereby we testify what we believe and hope. He that hath Faith can not distrust; he that hath Hope can not be put from anchor; he that hath Charity will not lead a licentious life, for love keeps the commandments. For method's sake we might first confer them all, then prefer one. But I will speak of these according to the three degrees of comparison. 1. Positively. 2. Comparatively. 3. Superlatively. "The greatest of them is Charity." Under which method we have involved: 1. Their order, how they are ranked. 2. Their nature, how they are defined. 3. Their distinction, how they are differenced. 4. Their number, how many are specified. 5. Their conference, how they are compared. 6. Lastly, their dignity, and therein how far one is preferred. Faith is that grace which makes Christ ours, and all His bene. fits. God gives it. "Faith is given by the Spirit." By the word preached. "Faith cometh by hearing." For Christ's sake. "To you it is given for Christ's sake, to believe in His name." This vir |