"The minds of the Apostles seem full of this subject. Every thing put them in mind of it; they did not allow themselves to have it long out of their view, nor did any other branch of spiritual instruction make them lose sight of it." Consider next that part of the Epistle to the Romans, wherein St. Paul speaks of some who went about to establish their own righteousness, and had not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. May not this charge be in some degree urged, and even more strongly than in the case of the Jews, against those who satisfy themselves with vague, general, occasional thoughts of our Saviour's mediation; and the source of whose habitual complacency, as we explained above, is rather their being tolerably well satisfied with their own characters and conduct? Yet St. Paul declares concerning those of whom he speaks, as concerning persons whose sad situation could not be too much lamented, that he had great heaviness and continual sorrow in his heart, adding still more emphatical expressions of deep and bitter regret. Let the Epistle to the Galatians be also carefully examined and considered; and let it be fairly asked, what was the particular in which the Judaizing Christians were defective, and the want of which is spoken of in such strong terms as these; that it frustrates the grace of God, and must debar from all the benefits of the death of Jesus? The Judaizing converts were not immoral. They seem to have admitted the chief tenets concerning our Saviour. But they appear to have been disposed to trust (_not wholly, be it observed also, but only in part_) for their acceptance with God, to the Mosaic institutions, instead of reposing wholly on the merits of Christ. Here let it be remembered, that when a compliance with these institutions was not regarded as conveying this inference, the Apostle shewed by his own conduct, that he did not deem it criminal; whence, no less than from the words of the Epistle, it is clear that the offence of the Judaizing Christians whom he condemned, was what we have stated; not their obstinately continuing to adhere to a dispensation the ceremonial of which Christianity had abrogated, or their trusting to the sacrifices of the Levitical Law, which were in their own nature inefficacious for the blotting out of sin.-- Vide Heb. vii. viii. ix. x.] [Footnote 66: Rev. v. 12.] [Footnote 67: ib. 13.] [Footnote 68: 2 Cor. xiii. 14.] [Footnote 69: 1 John, iii. 17.--Rom. xvi. 18.--Compared with Philippians, iii. 19.] [Footnote 70: 2 Tim. iii. 4.] [Footnote 71: Matt. x. 37.] [Footnote 72: Jerem. ix. 23.] [Footnote 73: It will be remembered by the reader, that it is not the object of this work to animadvert on the vices, defects, and erroneous opinions of the times, except so far as they are received into the prevailing religious system, or are tolerated by it, and are not thought sufficient to prevent a man from being esteemed on the whole a very tolerable Christian.]