SECTlON_Ii.. 31 picable country of Galilee; and when he was a man here upon -earthy how did his meek and gentle and condescending bahaviour manifest his self-abasing virtues ? He emptied himself of the splendors which he once possessed ; Phil. ii. 6, 7. He made himsefof noreputation, as the,English translators have rendered it, and being found infashion as a man, he behaved like a fellow- creature, a friend and a brother, though he was really superior to angels and one with God, thoughhis name was God with us, and his character was God manifest in theflesh. See what sort of inference the apostle makes from such a view of our blessed Lord? verses 3, 4, 5. Let nothing be done through strife or vain-glory, but in lowliness ofmind let each esteem others better than themselves. Look not every manon his own things, that is, with a self-flattering and exalted survey of them, but let every man also look on the things ofothers, paying all due regard to their real worth and dignity. Let this mind be inyou which was also in Christ Jesus. Indeed there is no possibility of lessening ourselves comparably to the self-abasement of the Son of God ; and yet the nearer we are like him the more shall we partake of the Father's love, andwe shall be in the way of divine advance- ment, in a humble imitation of the advancement of Christ him- self: Because he humbled himself to death, therefore God bath highly exalted hint and given him a name above every name; Phil. ii. 9. V. By ahumble opinion of ourselves, and by a lowly con- duct andbehaviour in life we shall bringhonour to the gospel and become the truest ornaments to the divine religion which we pro- fess. Never was any religion founded in so much humility as that of the gospel : The first principle of it requires that we be sensible of our own guilt and sinfulness, our danger and misery, and our utter insufficiency to relieve ourselves : And in the pro- gress it spews us to derive all the good we have and hope for from the free mercy of God through a Mediator. The first line of that excellent sermon which Jesus, the author of the gospel, preached to his people upon the mountain, is this, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven ; Mat. v . 3. Blessed are those who have the lowest and meanest thoughts of themselves, for the heavenly treasures of divine grace are par- ticularly offered to them, and they are most ready to receive them. It is the very design of the gospel to stain the glory of all flesh, and to hide pride from man, to teach man that he is nothing, and that he has nothing in and of himself, that he that glorieth may glory in theLord;' 1 Cor. i. 19, 31. Now the man that keeps these self-abasing virtues, and maintains a humbling sense of his own nothingness in himself, and his universal depen dente upon the grace of Christ, does acceptable honour to the gospel which heprofesses, and makes it appear in its own proper and divine light.
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