SERMON XLIX. The perpetual Obligation of the Moral Law; the Evil of Sin, and its Desert of Punishment. 1 Jolla iii. 4. Sin is the transgression of the Law. AndRon. vi. 23.-- - The wages of sin is death. THE blessed God has an undoubted right to command and governhis creatures, and when he makes known his will or lays the knowledge of it within their reach, this becomes a law to them, this determines what is their duty; and a transgression of this law, or disobedience to it, is sin; and sin carries in it thenotion of moral evil, which deserves some penalty to be in- flicted on the sinner. Now that the moral law is such a law as I have described, and has such consequences attending the trans- gression of it ; I shall endeavour to shew in the following method : I. I shall consider what we mean by the moral law, and where this law is to be found. II. I shall prove that it reaches to all mankind, and is of perpetual obligation. III. That sin or the transgression of it, is a very great and heinous evil. IV.. That it justly deserves punishment from the hands of God. shall pursue each of these in their order. The first enquiry is, What we mean by the moral law ? To which.I answer, The moral law signifies that rule which is dgiven to all mankind to direct their manners or behaviour consi- eredmerely as they are intelligentand social creatures, as crea- tures who have an understanding to know God and themselves, a capacity to judge what is right and wrong, and a will to chuse and refuse good and evil. This law, I think, does not arise merely from the abstracted nature of things, but also includes in it the existence of God, and his will manifested some way or other, or at least put within the reach of our knowledge ; it in- eludes also his authority, which obliges us to walk by the rule he givesus. The commands or requirements of the moral lawmay be represented indifferent views, but all agree inthe same design and substance. Sometimes the moral law is represented as re- quiring us to seek after the knowledge of that Godwho made us, as obliging us to believe whatsoever God discovers to us, and as
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