3. Their grand plea is this: “That preaching the gospel (that is, according to their judgment, the speaking of nothing but the sufferings and merits of Christ) answers all the ends of the law.” But this we utterly deny. It does not answer the very first end of the law, namely, The convincing men of sin, the awakening those who are still asleep on the brink of hell. There may have been here and there an exempt case. One in a thousand may have been awakened by the gospel. But this is no general rule. The ordinary method of God, is to convict sinners by the law, and that only. The gospel is not the means which God hath ordained, or which our Lord himself used, for this end. We have no authority in scripture for applying it thus, nor any ground, to think it will prove effectual. Nor have we any more ground to expect this, from the nature of the thing. _They that be whole_, as our Lord himself observes, _need not a physician, but they that be sick_. It is absurd therefore to offer a physician to them that are whole, or that at least imagine themselves so to be. You are first, to convince them, that they are sick. Otherwise they will not thank you for your labour. It is equally absurd to offer Christ to them, whose heart is whole, having never yet been broken. It is in the proper sense, _casting pearls before swine_. Doubtless, _they will trample them under foot_. And it is no more than you have reason to expect, if they also _turn again and rent you_. 4. “But altho’ there is no command in scripture, to offer Christ to the careless sinner, yet are there not scriptural precedents for it?” I think not: I know not any. I believe you can’t produce one, either from the four Evangelists, or the _Acts of the Apostles_. Neither can you prove this to have been the practice of any of the apostles, from any passage in all their writings. 5. “Nay, does not the apostle _Paul_ say, in his former Epistle to the _Corinthians, We preach Christ crucified_? ch. i. ver. 23. And in his latter, _We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord_? ch. v. ver. 4.” We consent to rest the cause on this issue: to tread in his steps, to follow his example. Only preach you, just as _Paul_ preached, and the dispute is at an end. For altho’ we are certain he _preached Christ_, in as perfect a manner as the very chief of the apostles, yet who _preached the law_ more than St. _Paul_? Therefore he did not think the gospel answered the same end.