MEN DISBELIEVE GOD'S FORGIVENESS. 231 envious, wrathful, backbiters, malicious praters, slan- derers, and the like and shall we think that such as these believe forgiveness of sin 'I God forbid. Again, some are ignorant, blind, utterly unacquainted with the mystery of the Gospel,: nor doat all make it their busi- ness to inquire into it. Either they hear it not at all, or negligently, slothfully,from mere custom, and tonopurl pose. Let not such persons deceive their own souls to live in sin, and yet believe the forgiveness of sin, is ut- terly impossible. Christ will not be a minister of sin, nor ,give his Gospel to be a doctrine of licentiousness; nor shall you be forgiven, that you may be delivered to do more abominations. God forbid.. If any shall say that they thank God they are no such publicans as those mentioned ; they are no drunkards, no swearers, no unclean persons, or . the like ; so that they are not concerned in this consideration; their lives and their duties give another account of them. Then yet consider further, that the Pharisees were all that you say of yourselves; and yet the greatest despisers of forgiveness that ever were in the world; they hated the light, because their deeds were evil. As for the du- ties you mention, what, I pray, is the root and spring of them l Do they spring from this faith of forgiveness you boast of 2 May it not be feared that it is utterly otherwise l You do not perform them because you love the Gospel, but because you fear the law. If the truth were known, I fear it would appear that you get no- thing by your believing of pardon but an encourage- ment to sin. Your goodness, such as it is, springs from another root. It may be also that you ward yourselves by itagainst 'thestrokes of conscience or the guilt ofpar- ticular sins; this is as bad as the other. You may as well be encouraged to`sin, ..as so tobe encouraged under sin, as to be kept from humiliation for it. None under hea- ven are more remote from the belief of grace and par
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