FLESH AND SPIRIT, BIC: CSERM. IV. drawn- away to the còmmission of this folly; if Thad not an ear, I had not been tempted from God at such a sea- son; if I had not such appetite or senses in exercise, I had been secured from-many a snare; if I did notwear this flesh about me, which is so fond and tender of it- self, and so impetuous and active in.tlie pursuit of its ease and satisfaction, I had not shrunk away at such a time from a dangerous duty ; I had not been so fearful and cowardly at such a place in the profession of my faith, nor so often polluted my soul with sensualities, and made work for bitter repentance. ' Thus the experience of Christians, and the language of scripture concur in this point, That the occasions of sin evidently lie most. in the flesh : and a contradiction or opposition to sin, proceeds more from the spirit. It is true indeed, and must be confessed, that the soul being but in part sanctified, too often complies with these motions of sin which work in our members; and the affections, of the soul itself,' being not perfectly holy, are too easily induced to indulge the desires and pas- sions of the flesh ; and thereby sin is committed, and guilt contracted. The law, or principle of sin in the members, leads the mind, too often, captive ; Rom. vii. 23: Thus the soul is very culpable for want of perpe- tual resistance, and becomes guilty before God, byevery such inordinate passionbreaking forth, andby the satis faction of every such sinful raging appetite : yet I must believe that the soul of a Christian would not be guilty half so often, if the lusts of the body were not more ac- tive than the mere abstracted lusts of the mind are. The spirit lusteth against, the flesh, and the flesh against the spirit, Gal. v: 17. That part which is chiefly sanctified, and that which is chiefly unsanctified, strike against each other; and it is true rn a literal sense, as well as a figurativeone, that a saint with his mind serves the law of God, but too often with his flesh the law of sin. Thus I have given the chief reasonswhy the principles of sin are represented in scripture by flesh, and the springs of holiness by spirit. [This sermon may b divided here.] From this consideration of flesh 'and spirit, of holi- ness and sin, which are set forth in the word of God,.- aad thus explained in the most free and intelligible me--
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