eth; There is none that seeketh after God: There is none that doeth good: The way of peace have they not known." And in general by denying all true piety or religion in men in their first state, ver. 18. "There is no fear of God before their eyes."-The expressions also are evidently chosen to denote a most extreme and desperate wickedness of heart. An exceeding depravity is ascribed to every part: To the throat, the scent of an open sepulchre; to the tongue and lips, deceit, and the poison of asps; to the mouth, cursing and bitterness; of their feet it is said, they are swift to shed blood: And with regard to the whole man it is said, destruction and misery are in their ways. The representation is very strong of each of these things, viz. That all mankind are corrupt; that every one is wholly and altogether corrupt; and also extremely and desperately corrupt. And it is plain, it is not accidental that we have here such a collection of such strong expressions, so emphatically signifying these things; but that they are chosen of the apostle on design, as being directly and fully to his purpose; which purpose appears in all his discourse in the whole of this chapter, and indeed from the beginning of the epistle.

SECT. III.

Observations on Rom. v. 6—10. and Eph. ii. 3. with the Context, and Rom, vii.

Much

Another passage of this apostle, which shews that all who are made partakers of the benefits of Christ's redemption are in their first state wicked, desperately wicked, is Rom. v. 6-10. "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man, some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son; much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life."-Here all for whom Christ died, and who are saved by him, are spoken of as being in their first state sinners, ungodly, enemies to God, exposed to divine wrath, and without strength, without ability to help themselves, or deliver their souls from this miserable

state.

Dr. T. says, the apostle here speaks of the Gentiles only in their heathen state, in contradistinction to the Jews; and that not of particular persons among the heathen Gentiles, or

as to the state they were in personally; but only of the Gentiles collectively taken, or of the miserable state of that great collective body, the heathen world: And that these appellations, sinners, ungodly, enemies, &c. were names by which the apostles in their writings were wont to signify and distinguish the heathen world in opposition to the Jews; and that in this sense these appellations are to be taken in their epistles, and in this place in particular.* And it is observable, that this way of interpreting these phrases in the apostolic writings is become fashionable with many late writers; whereby they not only evade several clear testimonies of the doctrine of original sin, but make void great part of the New Testament; on which account it deserves the more particular consideration.

It is allowed to have been long common and customary among the Jews, especially the sect of the Pharisees, in their pride and confidence in their privileges as the peculiar people of God, to exalt themselves exceedingly above other nations, and greatly to despise the Gentiles, calling them by such names as sinners, enemies, dogs, &c. Themselves they accounted, in general (excepting the publicans, and the notoriously profligate) as the friends, the special favourites and children of God; because they were the children of Abraham, were circumcised, and had the law of Moses as their peculiar privilege, and as a wall of partition between them and the Gentiles.

But it is very remarkable, that a christian divine, who has studied the New Testament, and the epistle to the Romans in particular, so diligently as Dr. T. has done, should so strongly imagine that the apostles of Jesus Christ countenance and cherish these self-exalting, uncharitable dispositions and no, tions of the Jews which gave rise to such a custom, so far as to fall in with that custom, and adopt that language of their pride and contempt; and especially that the apostle Paul should do it. It is a most unreasonable imagination on many accounts.

1. The whole gospel dispensation is calculated entirely to overthrow and abolish every thing to which this self-distinguishing, self-exalting language of the Jews was owing.It was calculated wholly to exclude such boasting, and to destroy the pride and self-righteousness which were the causes of it. It was calculated to abolish the enmity, and break down the partition wall between Jews and Gentiles, and of twain to make one new man, so making peace: to destroy all dispositions in nations and particular persons to despise one another, or to say one to another, "stand by thyself, come not near to me; for I am holier than thou ;" and to establish the

*Page 114-120. See also Dr. T.'s Paraph. and notes on the place. VOL. II,

59

contrary principles of humility, mutual esteem, honour and love, and universal union, in the most firm and perfect man

ner.

2. Christ, when on earth, set himself, through the whole course of his ministry, to militate against this pharasaical spirit, practice, and language of the Jews, by which they showed so much contempt of the Gentiles, Publicans, and such as were openly lewd and vicious, and thus exalted themselves above them; calling them sinners and enemies, and themselves holy, and God's children: not allowing the Gentile to be their neighbour, &c. He condemned the Pharisees for not esteeming themselves sinners as well as the Publicans; trusting in themselves that they were righteous, and despising others. militated against these things in his own treatment of some Gentiles, Publicans, and others, whom they called sinners, and in what he said on those occasions.*

He

He opposed these notions and manners of the Jews in his parables, and in his instructions to his disciples how to treat the unbelieving Jews; and in what he says to Nicodemus about the necessity of a new birth, even for the Jews, as well as the unclean Gentiles with regard to their proselyteism, which some of the Jews looked upon as a new birth. And in opposi tion to their notions of their being the children of God, because the children of Abraham, but the Gentiles by nature sinners and children of wrath, he tells them that even they were children of the devil §.

3. Though we should suppose the apostles not to have been thoroughly brought off from such notions, manners, and language of the Jews, till after Christ's ascension; yet after the pouring out of the spirit on the day of Pentecost, or at least after the calling of the Gentiles, begun in the conversion of Cornelius, they were fully instructed in this matter, and effectually taught no longer to call the Gentiles unclean, as a note of distinction from the Jews, Acts x. 28. which was before any of the apostolic epistles were written.

Matth. viii. 5-13. Chap. ix. 9-13. Chap xi. 19-24. Chap. xv. 2128. Luke vii. 37. to the end. Chap. xvii. 12-19. Chap. xix. 1-10. John iv. 9. &c. ver. 39, &c. Compare Luke x. 29, &c. Matth. xxi. 28-32.

Luke xiii. 28, 29, 30.

Chap. xxii. 1-10. Luke xiv. 16-24. Compare

Matt. x 14, 15.

§ John viii. 33,-44.

It may also be observed, that John the Baptist greatly contradicted the Jews' opinion of themselves, as being a holy people and accepted of God, because they were the children of Abraham-and on that account better than the Heathen whom they called sinners, enemies, unclean, &c.-in baptizing the Jews as a polluted people, and sinners, as the Jews used to baptize proselytes from among the Heathen; calling them to repentance as sinners, saying, "Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father; for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham;" and teaching the Pharisees, that instead of their being a holy generation, and children of God, as they called themselves, they were a generation of vipers.

4. Of all the apostles, none were more perfectly instructed in this matter than Paul, and none so abundant in instructing others in it, as this great apostle of the Gentiles. None of the apostles had so much occasion to exert themselves against the forementioned notions and language of the Jews, in opposition to Jewish teachers and judaizing Christians who strove to keep up the separation wall between Jews and Gentiles, and to exalt the former and set at nought the latter.

5. This apostle, in his epistle to the Romans, above all his other writings, exerts himself in a most elaborate manner, and with his utmost skill and power, to bring the Jewish Christians off from every thing of this kind. He endeavours by all means that there might no longer be in them any remains of these old notions in which they had been educated, of such a great distinction between Jews and Gentiles as were expressed in the names they used to distinguish them by; the Jews, holy children of Abraham, friends and children of God; but the Gentiles, sinners, unclean, enemies, and the like. He makes it almost his whole business, from the beginning of the epistle, Rom. v. 6, &c. to convince them that there was no ground for any such distinction, and to prove that in common, both Jews and Gentiles, all were desperately wicked, and none righteous, no not one. He tells them, chap. iii. 9. that the Jews were by no means better than the Gentiles; and (in what follows in that chapter) that there was no difference between Jews and Gentiles; and represents all as without strength, or any suffi ciency of their own in the affair of justification and redemption. And in the continuation of the same discourse, in the 4th chapter, he teaches that all who were justified by Christ were in themselves ungodly; and that being the children of Abraham was not peculiar to the Jews. In this 5th chap. still in continuation of the same discourse-on the same subject and argument of justification through Christ, and by faith in himhe speaks of Christ dying for the ungodly and sinners; and those who were without strength or sufficiency for their own salvation, as he had done all along before. But now, it seems, the apostle by sinners and ungodly, must not be understood according as he used these words before; but must be supposed to mean only the Gentiles as distinguished from the Jews; adopting the language of those self-righteous, self-exalting, disdainful Judaizing teachers, whom he was with all his might opposing: countenancing the very same thing in them, which he had been from the beginning of the epistle discountenancing, and endeavouring to discourage, and utterly to abolish, with all his art and strength.

One reason why the Jews looked on themselves better than the Gentiles, and called themselves holy, and the Gentiles sinners, was, that they had the law of Moses. They made

C

their boast of the law. But the apostle shews them, that this was so far from making them better, that it condemned them, and was an occasion of their being sinners in a higher degree, and more aggravated manner, and more effectually and dreadfully dead in sin*.

It cannot be justly objected here, that this apostle did in fact use this language, and call the Gentiles sinners in con tradistinction to the Jews, in what he said to Peter, Gal. ii. 15, 16. "We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ." It is true that the apostle here refers to this distinction, as what was usually made by the self-righteous Jews, between themselves and the Gentiles; but not in such a manner as to adopt or favour it; but on the contrary, so as plainly to shew his disapprobation of it; q. d. Though we were born Jews, and by nature are of that people which are wont to make their boast of the law, expecting to be justified by it, and trust in themselves that they are righteous, despising others, calling the Gentiles sinners, in distinction from themselves; yet we being now instructed in the gospel of Christ, know better; we now know that a man is not justified by the works of the law; that we are all justified only by faith in Christ, in whom there is no difference, no distinction of Greek or Gentile, and Jew, but all are one in Christ Jesus.' And this is the very thing he there speaks of, which he blamed Peter for; that by his withdrawing and separating himself from the Gentiles, refusing to eat with them; &c. he had countenanced this self-exalting, self-distinguishing, separating spirit and custom of the Jews, whereby they treated the Gentiles as in a distinguishing manner sinners and unclean, and not fit to come near them who were a holy people.

6. The very words of the apostle in this place shew plain ly, that he uses the term sinners, not as signifying Gentiles, in opposition to Jews, but as denoting the morally evil, in opposition to such as are righteous or good. This latter distinction between sinners and righteous is here expressed in plain terms. "Scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die; but God commended his love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." By righteous men are doubtless meant the same that are meant by such a phrase throughout this apostle's writings, throughout the New Testament, and throughout the Bible. Will any one pretend, that by the righteous man, for whom men would scarcely die, and by the good man, for whom perhaps some might even dare to die, is

*See Chap. vii. 4-13. agreeably to those words of Christ, John v. 45.