ul can cordially come (or be brought) to Christ, without a
due sense of its infinite distance from God by nature? of the
impossibility of making any suitable approaches to him? and of the utter
disability to do any thing that may answer the law, holiness and
righteousness of God therein, _etc._? _For they that be whole_ (at least
think themselves so) _need not a physician_, saith Christ; _and I came,
not to call the righteous_ (or such as think themselves so) _but sinners
to repentance_, Mark ix. 12.

From hence observe, that whosoever intends to forsake his sin, in order
to come to Christ, or effectually to correct vice, before he believes on
him, must needs meet with a miserable disappointment, for _without faith
it is impossible to please God_, Heb. xi. 6. and in the end sink himself
into an immense and bottomless chaos of uncertainties, like one lopping
the branches off a tree to kill the root; _no man cometh to the Father
but by me, and without me ye can do nothing_, says Christ himself, John
xiv. 6. xv. 5. The love of God being the _prima causa_, the obedience
and meritorious righteousness of Christ the foundation, source and
spring of man's salvation and all true happiness, _for by grace ye are
saved_, Eph. 2. 8. And whosoever has been made rightly to know any thing
of the depravity of his nature in a lapsed state, or experienced any
thing of the free grace of a God in Christ, will be made to acknowledge
this, _That it is God that worketh in us both to will and to do of his
good pleasure_, Phil. ii. 13. And yet I know it is objected, That it is
highly dishonouring to the Author of nature, to argue man to be such a
mean and insufficient creature, and that it can never be supposed, that
a gracious and merciful God would make such a number of intelligent
beings to damn them, or command a sinner to repent and come to Christ,
and condemn him for not doing it, if it were not in his own power upon
moral suasion to obey, &c. It is true indeed, that in comparison of the
irrational insect and inanimate creation, man is a noble creature, both
as to his formation, _I am wonderfully made_, Psal cxxxix. 14. and also
in his intellectual parts, but much more in his primeval state and
dignity, when all the faculties of the mind and powers of the soul stood
entire, being endued not only with animal and intelligent, but also
heavenly life, _Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels_,
Psal. viii. 5. But then in what follows,