and who were accepted through that Saviour, whose merits extended to the ages that preceded, as well as to those which followed his beneficent Advent.

Thus then the delay of the manifestation of the Son of God in the flesh, was no impeachment of the justice or the goodness of the Almighty. For he will judge those who lived under dispensations less favourable to the knowledge of his will, according to the opportunities of serving him which they have enjoyed, and thus "rewarding every man according as his work shall be "," he will vindicate his justice, and prove that he is "no respecter of persons *.

But the peculiar fitness of the time of Christ's appearance, does not rest alone on the sovereign determination of him, who giveth not to man an account of his doings. These are important reasons which mark it emphatically, as the time the most suitable for that event. For

II. It appears to have been the design of God, in spiritual matters as in temporal, in the economy of grace, as in the order of nature, to conduct men from feeble beginnings to mature vigour and knowledge,-from the glimmering notices of religious truth, to the full manifestation of his glory in the face of Jesus Christ.

The spiritual and moral world, having the same

divine Author as the natural and intellectual, the laws by which they are governed, we may presume, will in many respects be the same. In the natural world knowledge is progressive. Human sciences do not immediately arrive at perfection. From the darkness of hypotheses and contradictory theories, they gradually advancé, until at length they shed forth their full lustre. No person is guilty of the folly of impeaching the wisdom of the Author of nature, because he hath subjected the intellectual world to this law of progressive improvement. Nor ought we then to impeach the Father of our spirits, that he has seen fit to conduct the human race through increasing degrees of religious knowledge; from the faint light which dawned upon patriarchs and prophets, to that glorious splendour which burst forth when the Sun of righteousness arose. powers of the human mind advance from the imbecility of infancy and childhood, through the vigour of youth, to the full perfection of mature age. We should deem it folly to murmur against our Maker, that we do not immediately spring from the weakness of infancy, to the intellectual strength of manhood. And why should we arraign, at the bar of our imperfect reason, that infinite Wisdom which saw fit to treat us in our spiritual part as it has done in our natural and intellectual; and to require men to pass through different degrees of religious knowledge in the

The

patriachal and Jewish state of infancy and childhood, till they receive, in Christ Jesus, "the adoption of sons'? "

But further;

III. The time of Christ's appearing was the fittest season-because-the inefficacy of the Jewish dispensation and of the light of nature to reform mankind, had been fully proved.

Even with the striking evidence which the heathen world afforded, of the weakness of natural reason in teaching men religion, and training them to virtue, there have been those in every age, who have extolled its sufficiency. How much more plausible would have been their boasts, if the Gospel had been proclaimed, before the experiment had been fairly tried, whether the world by wisdom would know God. The experiment was made: and what was the result? At a period when the human mind was brightened to the highest refinement, and reason quickened to her keenest vigour; when the polish of the mind and the strength of reason were displayed in productions of art and of intellect, which stand unrivalled models of admiration-at this period, when human genius achieved her greatest triumphs, what did unassisted reason effect in the momentous concerns of religion and morals? Look at those enlightened nations who had multiplied to an incre

y Gal. iv. 5.

dible amount the number of their Gods, and who, sanctioned by the alleged example of the objects of their adoration, indulged in every vice that disgraces human nature. Enter the schools of their philosophers; and, confounded by discordant systems, you find that the primary truths of religion, the truths the most essential to the happiness of man, and which are therefore written most deeply by the finger of reason on the heart, were embraced only with dubious hope; while, with but a few exceptions, these enlightened sages practised the superstitions, and indulged in the vices, of the multitude.

Reason then had proved an incompetent instructress. She had tried in vain to recover man from the deplorable corruption and superstition in which he was plunged. "Darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people." Then was the time for the Sun of righteousness to arise, and, in this region of the shadow of death, to trace with a heavenly beam the path to life.

The Jewish law also, considered as a final and effectual reformer of mankind, had proved weak and unprofitable. This "law" indeed, was only designed as a schoolmaster to bring men to Christa." It was a dispensation preparatory to that of the Gospel. Like the pillar of fire, which was set up among his chosen people, this law had

diffused among them the light of the knowledge of God, and even scattered some faint rays of celestial truth among the benighted nations. But so grossly had the Jews abused their privileges, so deep had they plunged in superstition and vice, that this pillar of fire became a pillar of a cloud; and midnight darkness, the darkness of the soul, overspread this guilty nation. They had made their law of none effect, by teaching, for the commandments of God, the traditions of men. By their superstition, their hypocrisy, and their crimes, they had altogether corrupted their ways. This was the time for "the Lord to come to his temple"-he who was "to sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, to purify the sons of Levi, and to purge them as gold and silver, that they might offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness"."

IV. The time of our Lord's appearance was most suitable for that event-Because the state of the world at that period was peculiarly calculated to test the truth of his pretensions, and to advance the establishment of his kingdom.

If Jesus Christ had appeared in an age of ignorance and barbarism, the success of his pretensions would have been ascribed, by the enemies of his Gospel, to the incompetency of mankind to scrutinize them. But he advanced his claims at a period of distinguished cultivation and refinement;

b Matt. xv. 9.

c Mark vii. 7.

d Malachi iii. 3.