ercy and pity of God. Yet persons of this description by no means
disclaim a Saviour, or avowedly relinquish their title to a share in the
benefits of his death. They close their petitions with the name of
Christ; but if not chiefly from the effect of habit, or out of decent
conformity to the established faith, yet surely with something of the
same ambiguity of principle which influenced the expiring philosopher,
when he ordered the customary mark of homage to be paid to the god of
medicine.

Others go farther than this; for there are many shades of difference
between those who flatly renounce, and those who cordially embrace the
doctrine of Redemption by Christ. This class has a sort of general,
indeterminate, and ill understood dependence on our blessed Saviour. But
their hopes, so far as they can be distinctly made out (for their views
also are very obscure) appear ultimately to bottom on the persuasion
that they are now, through Christ, become members of a new dispensation,
wherein they will be tried by a more lenient rule than that to which
they must have been otherwise subject. "God will not now be extreme to
mark what is done amiss; but will dispense with the rigorous exactions
of his law, too strict indeed for such frail creatures as we are to hope
that we can fulfil it. Christianity has moderated the requisitions of
Divine Justice; and all which is now required of us, is thankfully to
trust to the merits of Christ for the pardon of our sins, and the
acceptance of our sincere though imperfect obedience. The frailties and
infirmities to which our nature is liable, or to which our situation in
life exposes us, will not be severely judged: and as it is practice that
really determines the character, we may rest satisfied, that if on the
whole our lives be tolerably good, we shall escape with little or no
punishment, and through Jesus Christ our Lord, shall be finally
partakers of heavenly felicity."

We cannot dive into the human heart, and therefore should always speak
with caution and diffidence, when from external appearances or
declarations we are affirming the existence of any internal principles
and feelings; especially as we are liable to be misled by the
ambiguities of language, or by the inaccuracy with which others may
express themselves. But it is sometimes not difficult to any one who is
accustomed, if the phrase may be allowed, to the anatomy of the human
mind, to discern, that generally speaking, the