alvin said,
pregnant with good works, justifies before they are brought forth.
This distinction between faith and works underlies St. Paul's teaching
in parts, but is never very prominent. {20} It accounts, however, for
St. Paul's shrinking from any insistence upon outward observances in
the Church, such as do not necessarily convey any spiritual meaning or
power. 'Why,' he cries to the Colossians, 'do ye subject yourselves to
ordinances; handle not, nor taste, nor touch (all which things are to
perish with the using), after the precepts and doctrines of men?[22]'

2. Inasmuch as 'the law' was a national thing, so 'works of the law'
were a supposed means of justification confined to Israel, and an
occasion of contempt for other nations. Faith, on the other hand, the
mere capacity to feel our own wants and to take God at His word, is a
universal quality and belongs, or may belong, to all men. Thus
justification by faith is opposed to justification by works of the law,
as the universal or catholic to the merely Jewish or national, and in
this aspect the contrast occupies a great place in St. Paul's thought
and teaching.

3. But it is not in the things it is occupied about, or in the range
of its activity, that faith is most centrally contrasted with works.
It is in the attitude of man towards God which it represents. The
'worker' for justification always {21} retains his own independence
towards God. He works upon the basis of a definite covenant by which
God is bound as well as himself. He has the right to resent additional
claims. Faith, on the other hand, means an entire abandonment of
independence. It is self-committal, self-surrender. 'I know him whom
I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to guard that which
I have committed unto him against that day[23].' The man of faith
throws all the responsibility for life on God, and says simply and
continually, 'Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth.'

It is of the utmost importance to notice that this is the only attitude
of man towards God which corresponds with the ultimate facts of human
nature, as science and philosophy are bound to represent them. Man is,
in fact, an absolutely dependent being, physically and spiritually.
His virtue must lie, not in originativeness, but in correspondence.
Supposing him a free agent in God's universe, his freedom can only
consist in a power to correspond with divine forces and laws
intelligently and voluntari