DEPTHS OF SIN. ái here lies the exercise of renewed free-will. This is the field of free, voluntary obedience, under the adminis- tration of gospel grace. There are extremes which, in respect to the event, it is not concerned in. To be wholly perfect, to be free from every sin, all failings, all infirmities, is not provided for, nor promised in this covenant. It is a covenant of mercy and pardon, which supposes a continuance of sin. To fall utterly and finally from God is provided against. Between these two extremes of absolute perfection and total apostacy lies the large field of believers' obedience and walking with God. Many a sweet heavenly passage there is, and many a dangerous depth, in this field. Some walk near to the one side, some to the other; yea, the same per- son may sometimes press hard after perfection, some- times be cast to the very border of destruction. Now, between these two lie many a soul-plunging sin, against which no absolute provision is made, and into which, for want of giving all diligence, believers often fall. 4. There is not, in the covenant of grace, provision made of ordinary and abiding consolation, for any under the guilt of sins greatly aggravated, which theyfall into by neglecting the condition ofaboundinggracejust named. Sins there are, which, either because in their own na- ture they wound and waste conscience, or in their ef- fects break forth into scandal, causing the name of God and the Gospel to be evil spoken of, or in some of their circumstances are full of unkindness against God, do deprive the soul of its wonted consolation. How, by what means, on what account such sins came to terrify conscience, to break the bones, to darken the soul, and to cast it into inextricable depths, notwithstand- ing the relief that is provided of pardon in the blood of Christ, I shall not now declare. That they will do so, and that consolation is not of equal extent with safety, we know. Hence God assumes it to himself, as an act
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