A supplement to the several discourses upon various divine subjects

That I may not be mistaken, observe, when I use the word May sin, I understand it of a May of possibility, not a May of lawfulness: And when I say a regenerate man cannot sin so or so, understand it of a settled habitual frame; distinguish between passion, and surprise, a sudden effort of nature, and an habitual and deliberate determination. The sense of this cannot I shall lay down in several Propositions.

1. It is not meant exclusively of lesser sins, or sins of infirmity. There are sins of daily incursion and lighter skirmishes; there are some open, some secret assaults, a multitude of secret faults, Psal. 19.12. undiscernible and unknown. Every good man is like Jacob, though he hath one thigh sound, he hath another halting. I do not find that ever God intended to free any in this life from the remainders of sin: What he hath not evidenced to have done in any, we may suppose he intended not to do. 'Tis a total Apostasy, not a partial Fall, that the Covenant provides against. Christ in his last prayer, prays for Believers preservation, and gradual sanctification, not for their present perfection. The very Office of Advocacy erected in Heaven, supposeth sins after regeneration, and during our continuance in the world, 1 John 2.1. My little Children, I write unto you that you sin not; and if any man sin; we have an Advocate with the Father. In many things we offend all, James 3.2. Not only you that are the inferior sort of Christians, but we Apostles. We is extensive; All offend in many things. 'Tis implied in the Lord's Prayer, the daily standing Pattern. As we are to pray for our daily bread, so for a daily pardon, and against daily temptations, which supposeth our being subject to the one, and our commission of the other. The brightest Sun hath its spots; the clearest Moon her dark parts. The Church in her highest comeliness in this world hath her blackness of sin, as well as of affliction; because, though sin be dismounted from its Throne by grace, it is not expelled out of its residence: It dwells in us, though it doth not rule over us,