Sermons preached

1. The Duty of the Law is impossible. The Apostle tells us, what the Law could not do, in that it was weak through the weakness of our flesh; It could not justify us before God, it could not furnish us with any Answer to his Demands, when he shall call us to an Account. Man is mightily addicted to the Legal Covenant, therefore it is one part of a Gospel-Minister's work to represent the Impossibility of ever obtaining Grace or Life by that Covenant. Man would stick to the Law as long as he can, and will patch up a sorry Righteousness of his own, some few superficial things. He makes a short Exposition of the Law, that he may cherish a large Opinion of his own Righteousness; and curtails the Law of God, that the Ell may be no longer than the Cloth, and brings it down to a poor contemptible thing, requiring a few external superficial Duties of Men. We read often of being dead to Sin, and to ⟨p. 9⟩the World, it is as certainly true we must be dead to the Law. Now how are we dead to the Law, the Scripture tells us in one place, that through the Law we are dead to the Law; and in another place, that we are dead to the Law through the Body of Christ: The first place is Gal. 2. 19. Through the Law I am dead to the Law. Men are apt to stand to the Legal Covenant, and have their Confidence in the Flesh, to place their Hopes of acceptance with God in some few external things, which they make their false Righteousness. For the carnal World as it cries up a false Happiness as its God, so Men have a false Righteousness which is their Christ. Now through the Law they are dead to it: How? The Law supposeth us as innocent, and requires us to continue so, Cursed is every one that continues not in every thing, &c. Suppose a Man should exactly fulfil it afterwards, yet the paying of new Debts will not quit old Scores. And then we are dead to the Law by the Body of Christ, Rom. 7. 4. By the crucified Body of Christ, by which he hath merited and purchased a better Hope and Grace for us.—Well, the Duty is impossible.

1. The Duty of the Law is impossible. The Apostle tells us, what the Law could not do, in that it was weak through the weakness of our flesh; It could not justify us before God, it could not furnish us with any Answer to his Demands, when he shall call us to an Account. Man is mightily addicted to the Legal Covenant, therefore it is one part of a Gospel-Minister's work to represent the Impossibility of ever obtaining Grace or Life by that Covenant. Man would stick to the Law as long as he can, and will patch up a sorry Righteousness of his own, some few superficial things. He makes a short Exposition of the Law, that he may cherish a large Opinion of his own Righteousness; and curtails the Law of God, that the Ell may be no longer than the Cloth, and brings it down to a poor contemptible thing, requiring a few external superficial Duties of Men. We read often of being dead to Sin, and to