from its servitude; not a carnal liberty, which would seduce us from obedience to the law, invite to all kinds of licentiousness, break down the barriers of inordinate desire, and give the reins to every lawless passion; but a spiritual liberty, which will console and elevate a distressed and dejected conscience, showing it to be delivered from the curse and condemnation under which it was held by the law. This liberation from subjection to the law, and manumission, (if I may use the term,) we attain, when we apprehend by faith the mercy of God in Christ, by which we are assured of the remission of sins, by the sense of which the law penetrated us with compunction and remorse. II. For this reason all the promises of the law would be ineffectual and vain, unless we were assisted by the goodness of God in the gospel. For the condition of a perfect obedience to the law, on which they depend, and in consequence of which alone they are to be fulfilled, will never be performed. Now, the Lord affords this assistance, not by leaving a part of righteousness in our works, and supplying part from his mercy, but by appointing Christ alone for the completion of righteousness. For the apostle, having said that he and other Jews, “knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, believed in Christ,” adds as a reason, not that they might be assisted to obtain a complete righteousness by faith in Christ, but “that they might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law.”[128] If the faithful pass from the law to faith, to find righteousness in the latter, which they perceive to be wanting in the former, they certainly renounce the righteousness of the law. Therefore let whosoever will now amplify the rewards which are said to await the observer of the law; only let him remark, that our depravity prevents us from receiving any benefit from them, till we have obtained by faith another righteousness. Thus David, after having mentioned the reward which the Lord has prepared for his servants, immediately proceeds to the acknowledgment of sins, by which it is annulled. In the nineteenth psalm, likewise, he magnificently celebrates the benefits of the law; but immediately exclaims, “Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults.”[129] This passage perfectly accords with that before referred to, where, after having said, “All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies,” he adds, “For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity; for it is great.”[130] So we ought also to acknowledge, that the Divine favour is offered to us in the law, if we could purchase it by our works; but that no merit of ours can ever obtain it.