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so must be the kind of poetry to which I allude, when thus accompanied with music, and every other circumstance that can give it access to the youthful heart! The more I reflect upon the subject, the more deeply I become convinced that the whole system of reading, now under discussion, is

indefensible on any manly or Christian grounds; and that, if persisted in for many years longer, it will tend, more than any thing else, to break down that barrier which ought to separate the recreations of a religious family from those of the unthinking world.

(To be concluded in our next.)

REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS.

Sermons on various Subjects and
Occasions. By GEORGE STAN-
LEY FABER, B. D. Rector of
Long-Newton. Vol. I. London:
Rivingtons. pp. xvi. and 484.

1816.

and of taste, that few persons, we presume, who are competent to follow the reasoning, will take up the work without giving it an entire perusal. These sermons are not, in the usual sense of the words, either practical or popular: we are inclined to place them in the same class with Bishop Horsley's. They are addressed to men of thought and reflection and we have seldom met with discourses better suited to convince the rea> soning gainsayer, and to confirm the intelligent believer in his most holy faith. In the following pages we shall confine ourselves chiefly to the humble but useful task of affording a brief view of Mr. Faber's manner and line of argument in the prosecution of his several subjects.

THE name of Mr. Faber is well known to the public, as that of a distinguished scholar and an eminent divine. Whether his researches have always been of a kind best calculated to enlighten the world, and to do justice to himself, may perhaps admit of a question and for ourselves we confess, that we are never so happy to meet him as in the walks of Christian theology. The ability and learning which he has displayed in elucidating many dark and intricate subjects, cannot, at any rate, be misemployed in the illustration and enforcement of those The first sermon is on the ́ ́unigreat truths which are more im- versal Profitableness of Scripture : mediately connected with his pro- and its object is to show in what fession and although we had not way the Scripture is profitable for been favoured with his Treatise on doctrine, for reproof, for correcthe Holy Spirit, we should still tion, for instruction in righteoushave anticipated much both of in- ness. This discourse is, perhaps, struction and improvement from better adapted than any other in such a dedication of his time and the volume to an ordinary congrelabours. The volume of sermons, gation: it was delivered as a collaof which we propose now to give tion sermon at Stockton upon Tees: some account, is evidently the pro- and the preacher very properly duction of no common mind. It takes occasion in it to state both the comprises many subjects of high doctrines and the practice which he importance; and they are handled, should feel himself bound in conin general, with such a Christian science to inculcate. In disspirit, with such force of argument, cussing the subject of doctrine, Mr. and such correctness of language Faber shows briefly from the Arti

cles, which he had that day read before the congregation, the truths which are taught in Scripture, and which are peculiarly profitable for man in his present state: such as original sin; salvation by faith; the necessity of Divine grace, that we may have a good will, and working with us when we have it; justification through the merits of Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings; boliness of life; adoption into the family of God; and the readiness of the Father of Mercies to give his Spirit to them that ask him.

After explaining,in the next place, how the Scripture is profitable for reproof by its warnings and denunciations, and showing how incumbent it is upon the minister of Christ not to handle the word of God deceitfully, or to cry Peace, when there is no peace, he proceeds to illustrate the term correction. By this word, in conformity with the Greek, he understands the setting us right in our opinions, whether those opinions respect principles or practice.

"Without the Bible, all our senti

ments of God and religion are radically false it is the office of Scripture to correct those sentiments. And, even with the Bible in our hands, it is astonishing what erroneous opinions are frequently entertained with regard both to doctrine and practice: it is the office of Scripture to correct all such mistakes." p. 13.

He takes, as instances, the following particulars. Some have maintained that because we are dead in trespasses and sins, and have no power to help ourselves, it is vain for us to attempt to repent and turn to God. Others have gone into the opposite error, and have argued, that because Scripture commands us to perform such and such duties, we are of course able to perform them in Our own strength. Others have become Antinomians, and have madly decried all good works as mere servile legality, because the Bible teaches us, that we are justified

solely by grace through faith, and not for our own works and deservings. In all these respects, Mr. Faber shows the excellence of the Scriptures as profitable for correction; and proves that such errors could not prevail if men willing to take the word of God in plainness and simplicity.

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The manner in which the Scripture instructs us in righteousness requires, as our author justly observes, many sermons for a full discussion. He is contented, in this discourse, with a general view of it; and refers his hearers to the opening of our Lord's Sermon on the Mount, and to St. Paul's account, in the fifth chapter to the Galatians, of the works of the flesh, and the fruits of the Spirit ;-the first delineating the character of the true Israelite; the second proving further what manner of persons we ought to be in all holy conversation and godliness. The sermon cludes with a brief but impressive address to the congregation to pray for themselves, and for those also who watch for their souls; that hereafter they may be their pastor's joy and crown of rejoicing in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, at his coming.

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The title of the second sermon is, "God's Justice exemplified in Rom. iii. 23-26. the Atonement of Christ;" the text

The perfect justice of God is here stated to be the very basis of Christianity: and upon the existence of this attribute is built the whole of St. Paul's argument in his Epistle to the Romans. Mr. Faber reasons upon the subject in the following manner:

Any exertion of justice presupposes the existence of some known law or standard of right or wrong, to which actions may be referred. If the actions come not within the cognizance of the law, the man is innocent; if they be of a contrary description, he is guilty, and punishment must follow. He may not have broken every enactment: but

his partial innocence will not excuse his partial transgression. If he be suffered to escape after breaking the law in one point, that permission is an act of injustice. In the exercise of human laws, it is necessary to vest somewhere the power of granting an absolute pardon. But, however necessary, the use of this power is a departure from strict justice. In human institutions, perfect justice and perfect mercy cannot subsist together. Mercy, as exercised by men, is only an inferior sort of injustice. In some such way as this, St. Paul appears to have reasoned. He assumes as the ground-work of his argument, that God must, from the very perfection of his nature, be absolutely and immutably just. He next shows, that all men have violated a known law; and thence concludes that by the law none can be justified.

The first of these positions needs no discussion.

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To prove the second, the general violation of the law, the Apostle refers both to the Gentile and the Jew. The Gentiles probably retaining some recollection of primitive patriarchal revelation, were liable, even in a state of nature, as contra-distinguished from a state of subjection to a written law, to account for their transgression of that will of God with which they were quainted. He shows, that although their knowledge of God's will was very imperfect, if compared with that of the Jews, still they never acted conformably to that degree of light which they really possessed. They were guilty of actions which they knew at the time to be offensive to their Creator. "Knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them." They were therefore guilty on their own principles.

Few arguments are necessary to prove the violation of the written CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 186.

moral law on the part of the Jews: even if no instance of external positive transgression could be adduced, yet when we reflect upon the purity of the Divine law, and consider that it reaches the very thoughts and intents of the heart, that it takes cognizance of every rebellious speculation and every unhallowed wish, the conclusion must be, that both Jews and Gentiles are all under sin.

Hence the third position is evident, that by the law none can be justified: if it were otherwise, God would cease to be perfectly just. The strange notion that in the day of judgment a sort of balance will be struck between a man's good deeds and his bad ones, is as contrary to the usage of human tribunals as to the holy Scriptures. The justice of God is as much concerned to inflict punishment on all mankind, as the justice of our courts of law is concerned to in flict punishment on a convicted offender. "Cursed is every one that continueth not in ALL things, which are written in the book of the law to do them."

How then are we to be delivered from this curse? The plan of the Deist, who rejects Divine Revelation, and of the Socinian, who receives it so far only as it suits his inclination, is partly to extenuate the guilt of man, and partly to call in the unqualified mercy of God. But this plan does not solve the difficulty. The question is not, to what extent we have offended, but whether we have been disobedient at all. The sentence of God is against every man who has violated the law in any one particular; and with respect to the alleged unqualified mercy of God, it is in this view utterly indefensible; since it takes away the attribute of perfect justice. The Deity of the Socinian is necessarily an unjust, and therefore an imperfect being.

Very different is the doctrine of Scripture.

"The remarkable passage before us 3 D

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contains the sum and substance of the whole matter. As a point already proved by him in the preceding part of his Epistle, St Paul first sets forth, as an undeniable principle, that all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. He next declares that, notwithstanding our violation of the Divine law, we are yet 'justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.' He then proceeds to describe how we are redeemed by Christ: God hath set him forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood.' And he lastly intimates, that this was done in order that the justice of God might be preserved absolutely perfect and entire, even at the very time when he was extending pardon to those whose condemnation that justice loudly demanded : 'to declare his righteousness (or, for the public demonstration of his justice) in the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; I say, for the public demonstration of his justice at this time: that so he might be just, and yet the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus."

"It must, I think, strike every one, however singular it may appear at the first view, that God's remission of sins is not here described as an act of mercy, but as an act of strict and unbending justice. His remission of them, contradictory as such a thing might seem, is yet a public demonstration of his justice. The Apostle, in order, as it were, that his meaning might be incapable of misapprehension, emphatically repeats his words: and, instead of disguising the point, or refusing to meet the difficulty, he sums up the whole in what may well be termed the great legal paradox of Christianity, by declaring, that God accepted the atonement made by the blood of Christ, in order that he might at once be just himself,and yet the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus: nay, that by virtue of this powerful atonement, the remission of sins should absolutely be a demonstration of his justice; --not of his mercy, (as the Socinian would teach us,) but of his justice." pp. 41 -43.

An objection is frequently made, that the substitution of the innocent for the guilty is itself an act of injustice. To this it is satisfactorily replied, that such a substitution would doubtless be unjust, if constrained: but not so, when it is

voluntary on the part of the substitute. Something more, however, is necessary to constitute an adequate substitute. There must not only be the will, but the right and the power: and it is not easy to conceive how these three requisites can meet in any created being.

This subject is discussed by Mr. Faber with his usual acuteness; and his reasoning leads to the conclusion that the person whose atonement is of such efficacy as to exhibit God perfectly just, even in the very act of justifying sinners, must himself be God; since it does not appear that inferior being can any possess the qualifications of the will, the right, and the power.

Accordingly, both the inherent right and the full power, which last completes the character of a sufficient substitute, are expressly claimed for our Lord. 'Therefore doth my Father love me,' saith he, 'because I lay down my life that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.' So likewise He is able,' saith his Apostle, 'to save them to the uttermost that come

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unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. such an High-priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; who needeth not daily, as those high-priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.”

"In this manner, and in this only, can the problem be solved, that sinful man should escape the penalty due to his sins, and that God should still retain inviolate his attribute of perfect justice.

"In Christ Jesus alone, very God and very man, are the apparently jarring attributes of justice and mercy reconciled together. Through the atonement made by his precious blood-shedding, we may now with a firm though humble confidence look up to God as being at once just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." pp. 49, 50.

The text of the third sermon is Rom. viii. 33, 34. Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth;

who is he that condemneth?" The of the doctrine of justification.

subject is the doctrine of justification by faith.

This doctrine, Mr. Faber observes, may claim to itself a sort of precedency over all other doctrines. Luther pronounced it to be the criterion of a standing or falling church, accordingly as it was held, soundly or unsoundly and respecting those who departed from the scriptural view of this great doctrine, it was declared by St. Paul that Christ should profit them nothing, and that to them the Gospel was become of no effect.

The theological sense of the words justify and justification, or the sense in which St. Paul uses them to describe the mode and ground of our acceptance with God, may be gathered very definitely from the text. The phraseology of the passage is forensic. The elect of God are put upon their trial charges of various sorts are pleaded against them: yet, however aggravated, and however true the charges, who shall presume to condemn, since it is God that justifieth? Here justification is opposed to condemnation; and therefore its theological sense must be acquittal. But since the charges are true, the persons accused cannot be acquitted as innocent; justification, therefore, is a complex idea: it involves the notion of pardon as well as of acquittal. In this sense we accordingly find it used, Rom. iii. 23-25. "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God: being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God bath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God.'

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But how can it be reconciled with the Divine attribute of justice, that the allowedly guilty shall not only be pardoned, but acquitted? This apparent contradiction can be solved only by a right view

The Apostle was aware of the question, and therefore immediately subjoins, " To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness, that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus."

Now we can be justified before a just God only by righteousness of some sort: by our own righteousness, or the righteousness of some other person. By our own righteousness, as we have already seen, we cannot be justified: we must therefore be justified by some external righteousness; and that righteousness is the righteousness of our Saviour Christ, apprehended by faith, and imputed to us by the grace of God; so that at the bar of heaven it is reckoned as our own, and pleaded by our great Advocate, to use Mr. Faber's expression, "in arrest of judgment." Hence Christ is said to be made righteousness unto us: hence also this righteousness is said to be by the faith of Jesus Christ unto all, and upon all them that believe. Faith is the instrument by which we apprehend the righteousness of Christ; and we are therefore said to be justified by faith, which is the same thing as our being justified by grace through faith.

"On these authorities, our church rightly determines, that we are accounted righteous before God (accounted only, not actually made righteous) only for the merit of our Lord not for our own works or deservings. and Saviour Jesus Christ by faith, and Wherefore, that we are justified by faith only is a most wholesome doctrine, and very full of comfort.' And, on the same authorities, she further decides respecting works done before justification, that works done before justification be not they are not pleasing to God. But, if pleasing unto God; then no works of ours can, in any shape, be the procuring cause of justification: for, if we can do no good works until we be first justified, and if even the good works done after our justification, and in consequence of it, cannot put away our sins and endure the severity of God's judgment, then

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