not follow. And the result which does follow, so long as we are left to ourselves, is absolutely incomprehensible, except as we acknowledge that the carnal mind is enmity to God, not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.' Wherefore, there can be no remedy but that proclaimed from heaven, namely, that we put off the old man, which is corrupt; and be renewed in the spirit of our mind; and put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness."

1 Rom., viii. 7.

2

2 Eph., iv. 22-24.

CHAPTER V.

THE ECONOMY OF THE COVENANT OF REDEMPTION.

I. 1. Transition from the Objective to the Subjective Consideration of the Knowledge of God.-2. General appreciation of the Economy of Grace.-3. Method proposed here.-II.-1. The Four Estates of Man, and the Relations of the two Covenants thereto.-2. The absolute Unity of the Way and Method of Salvation, under all Dispensations.-3. Divine Grace, through the Mediator.-4. Perpetual Development thereof.-5. Perpetual Sufficiency thereof.-III.—1. The Essence of the Covenant of Grace.-2. Fundamental points of Agreement between the Covenants of Works, and Grace.-3. Fundamental points of Difference between them.-4. What is involved in this comparison, and what results from it.— IV.—1. Gradual disclosure of the Covenant of Redemption.-2. Universal principle and result of this progress.-3. Unity of the Counsel of God and of the Essence of the Covenant of Grace; variety of Dispensation.-V.-1. Dispensations of the Economy of Redemption.-2. Our own posture in this vast administration, perfectly distinct.-3. The Adamic Dispensation.-4. The Noacic Dispensation.-5. The Old World and the New-Adam and Abraham, connected by Noah.-6. The Abrahamic Dispensation, and Covenant.-7. The Institutions of Moses.-8. Their career and their catastrophe.-9. Christ: the Gospel Church.10. The future Dispensations of the Covenant of Redemption.-11. The nature and the power of the Knowledge thus attainable.

I.-1. THE aim of this first Book of this Treatise of the Knowledge of God Subjectively Considered, is to point out the method by which, in its widest sense, the objective Knowledge of God becomes subjective; the relation between the mere outward knowledge of divine things, and the method and power and effects of that divine knowledge in the soul and upon the life of man. The preceding chapters might perhaps be considered as having sufficiently accomplished that purpose. For the Covenant of Grace and Redemption, which is the expression of the whole purpose and power of God manifested in our salvation, has been carefully considered in its nature, its relations, and its force, up to the point of the effectual, internal application of its benefits unto and within the soul of man: to which we might now proceed. That is, I have endeavoured to exhibit the first utterance by God of the existence and nature of this covenant, and to point out

the influence thereof upon the catastrophe produced by the Fall of Man, and the entrance of sin; then to state as clearly as I could, the origin, the object, and the great principles and truths of this covenant; then to disclose the intimate relevancy of it to our own intimate nature, and to our fundamental religious ideas and convictions; and then to exhibit and to illustrate the unalterable conditions on which its benefits can be applied to fallen men, and the corresponding special obligations resting on them. What would immediately follow would be the exhibition of salvation in the human soul, in the actual present posture of grace on one side, and man on the other.

2. It occurs, however, that the actual present posture both of divine grace and of sinful men, with respect to salvation through the Covenant of Redemption, is related in a manner so intimate, to all that has gone before, and to all that is to follow, touching both the development of grace and the career of man; that a right understanding of the actual and present, is greatly promoted by a clear perception of the relation of that present to the past even to the beginning, and to the future even to the end. The administration of the Covenant of Redemption has been an immense and continual development of the grace of God in the salvation of fallen men; and the point at which our race now stands is one of rest, so to speak, in that grand progress, and we have reached it only after incurring the whole force of divine providence up to this point. And before us, both in grace and in providence, both in time and in eternity, are other immense developments, other immense cycles. It is nothing that these rests are long or short, compared with each other, whether in the past or in the future; they all influence each other-they are all parts of one whole; and some insight into all of them, into their relations to each other, and into the grand whole they all make up, is necessary to the clear knowledge of any part; as, for example, the part now appertaining to us, and in connection with which we must be saved, or must perish. It is this total administration of divine grace in its whole progress, and in its whole connection, which I call the Economy of the Covenant of Redemption, and whose general appreciation seems to be the necessary conclusion of the foregoing chapters of this Book, and to be necessarily preliminary to the exhibition, in the next Book, of the work of salvation within us.

3. In attempting to sketch in a very narrow compass, an outline so vast, in which questions so immense occupy an area extending from the beginning to the end of time-and stretching both ways into eternity; it behooves, not only, that we walk very carefully in the light of God, but that every step be taken very humbly before him. Recognizing the whole as a manifestation of God, I have exhibited aspects of it, more or less extensive, in various parts of the Treatise of The Knowledge of God Objectively Considered; and especially in the Fourth Book of that Treatise, which is devoted expressly to the consideration of those manifestations of God whereby all our knowledge of him is obtained. I have occupied a considerable portion of the chapters which treat of Divine Providence, of the New Creation, and of the Sacred Scriptures, with various illustrations of this great topic. What I shall further say will be in the way of completing and generalizing the subject, with special reference to its use in this place; praying the reader who will honour me so far, to examine what I have advanced in the chapters just alluded to.

II-1. The condition of man is represented to us in the Scriptures in a fourfold aspect. His original condition was perfect, but fallible; in which our first parents alone existed-and from which they fell by transgression. By that fall the whole race came into its second condition, which is one of weakness and depravity; in which it underlies the sentence of God pronounced at the fall, and awaits the final sentence of the great day. The third condition of man is one of begun recovery; regenerated and partially sanctified by the Holy Ghost, and enjoying union and communion with the Saviour Christ Jesus; which condition is not universal of all men-but only of all penitent and believing sinners. The fourth condition of man is one of perfect restoration and eternal glory and blessedness; which is the final estate, not of all men, but only of just men made perfect, through the complete fruition of God in Christ. The impenitent and the unbelieving perish in their sin-endless perdition being the final condition of ungodly men. The original condition of fallible perfection, was the one to which the Covenant of Works applied; and the object of that covenant was to relieve man from the peril arising from the fallibility of his nature, to invest the human race with the absolute possession of a life at once perfect and immortal, and to secure to it the perpetual augmentation of glory and blessedness

therein. The Covenant of Grace applies to the second condition of man, namely, to his fallen, weak, and depraved condition; and its object is to restore man, through a Saviour, and by means of a new creation, to the image, the service, and the enjoyment of God in this life, and to the complete and endless fruition of him in a better life to come. It has therefore no relation to man except as he is considered, first, in his sins, then as penitent and believing, then as carried forward through his new life to his immortal inheritance. Grace and glory for fallen men, are the sum of its proposals.

2. However various the aspects of God's merciful dealings with sinful men may seem, there never was but one divine way of salvation revealed; and there never was but one divine method of making that way of salvation effectual. That method always was and needs must be, as it regarded man, by divine assistance through divine love; granting to us pardon for our sins on account of the satisfaction of Christ, and renewing our nature by the Holy Ghost, so that we might, by Faith, accept the righteousness of Christ imparted us, and by Repentance turn from Satan unto God. Any thing short of this would leave salvation wholly out of our reach; while any thing essentially different from it would be wholly inapplicable to our condition. The divine way of salvation to which this divine method appertains, the fruit of infinite beneficence, wisdom, and power always was and needs must be, by the incarnation, the obedience and sacrifice, and the glorious resurrection and ascension of the Son of God; and by the application to us by the Holy Ghost of all the benefits of the work of Christ, secured to us in the Covenant of Redemption; and as a consequence, our deliverance, restoration, and endless perfection and blessedness. Therefore the whole administration of the Covenant of Redemption necessarily embraces all that God has yet done, and all that he will ever do, in the way of grace and glory for fallen men. There never was any way of salvation for sinners, but through a Mediator; there never was, nor will be, but one Mediator between God and men ; and the man Christ Jesus, is that Mediator.1

3. Whatever is unto salvation, under whatever aspect, at whatever period, and by whatever means, is therefore of mere grace: yea, free, sovereign, efficacious, special, eternal grace.