Gentile vessel unto dishonour; and thus they considered themselves as already meet for the Master's use, without passing through death, not knowing the real predestination of God, which is, that no vessel of the whole clay, can, since the fall, become a vessel unto honour, except by passing through the dishonour, and that all who will submit themselves to the righteousness of God, whether they be Jews or Gentiles, shall become vessels unto honour; for the true honour is a participation in the Messiah's kingdom, which shall and can only be enjoyed by those, who dying to their own spirit, live in that spirit which suffered in Him, and thus become one with Him. For all the promises of God are made to him, they are not made to the seeds as of many, but to the one seed which is Christ, (Gal. iii. 16, 29,) and therefore they only who are partakers with him partake in the promises, and they who refuse to be partakers with Him shall experience what to the flesh appears a breach of promise. Heb. iii. 6, 14. Num. xiv. 34. And this is man's controversy with God, that whereas God has passed by the first vessel on account of sin, and sentenced it to be broken, that He may make it into another vessel, and has made

all His promises of happiness to that second vessel;-yet man will insist on having his glory and happiness in the first vessel, and refuses to be broken down, as a preparation for being new made, and would seek to reverse the decree that flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom. But he prevails nothing by this controversy; God's election stands firm; He hath passed by the first vessel,-He hath chosen the second vessel. This is the election, not that God hath appointed one man to be holy, and another man to be unholy,-one man to be saved, and another man to be lost; but that He hath declared that flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God; but that if any man will die with Christ he shall live with Him, if any man will suffer with Him he shall reign with Him; he shall be a vessel unto honour, meet for the Master's use.

The Jews would have welcomed Jesus, if he had come as a deliverer of the first vessel, as Joshua, and Gideon, and David; but their carnal minds would not receive a Captain of salvation made perfect through sufferings, whose deliverance and whose glory belonged not to this state of things, but lay beyond death, and could only be partaken in by those

who would consent to partake in his death, and to yield up their first vessel to be broken, that they might be made into the new vessel which God delighted to honour. Thus they rejected that on which God's election lay, and chose that on which His reprobation lay. And such is the course of the world. Man in the first vessel, is under the sentence of sorrow and death, and feeling the pressure of this sentence, he seeks deliverance from it. This is the salvation which he is truly seeking; and thus he comes into controversy with God, for he is seeking a salvation from the cross, whilst God's salvation is a salvation through the cross-a salvation by death, a redemption through blood.

The two thieves crucified with Jesus, represent mankind, as divided into two great classes, according to their choice in this thing. They were both on the cross, suffering under the same righteous sentence of sorrow and death. But they received their punishment differently. The one said to Jesus, "If thou be the Christ, save thyself and us," meaning thereby, "Take us down from the cross." The other answered him, "We indeed justly, for we receive the due

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reward of our deeds;" and unto Jesus he said, "Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom." The one desired a salvation for the first vessel, the other waited for the salvation of God, the redemption through blood. The one disallowed the potter's right over the clay, to punish with rejection the first vessel, because it was marred, and to make it up into a new vessel, meet for the Master's use; the other acknowledged the righteousness of God, and accepted His punishment, in the hope of the glory to be revealed in the second vessel.

I cannot but feel that this is the true explanation of the history of the two thieves; and therefore I cannot but feel how far from the truth that explanation is, which would represent it as a mere exemplification of the sovereign and distinguishing grace of God, taking one and leaving another. If such were the true explanation of it; if the difference between these two men were truly expounded, by saying that God visited the one with a peculiar operation of his Spirit, and withheld it from the other, then, all that we could say of them would be, that the one was fortunate in being the object of God's favour, and that the other was unfortunate in

not being so; we could not say that the one was worthy of approbation, and the other of disapprobation; we could not take any lesson from them to ourselves, by learning how the one came to have God's favour, and how the other missed it.—It is an explanation which, when fairly followed out, makes God darkness and not light, destroys all moral distinctions in the character of man, and makes his hope of eternal life a chance. Is it not much more agreeable both to the Bible and to conscience to say, that the one thief was an example of the grace of God yielded to, and that the other was an example of the grace of God resisted? Is not this an explanation more in harmony with that word of Stephen, "Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost, as your fathers did," (Acts vii. 41;) and with that word in Rom. ii. 3, "Despisest thou the riches of God's goodness, and forbearance, and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?" And does not the conclusion, according to this view, commend itself to every conscience? Jesus answered the willing sufferer, "To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise." We are all on the cross; let us remember that it is the appointed way to