SERMON XV.

MERE REPENTANCE NO GROUND OF PARDON.*

ACTS 3: 19.-Repent therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out.

WHETHER God will pardon our sins, is a most important question. And if he will pardon at all, the next question is, in what way and on what conditions will he do it? The scriptures assure us that on our repentance and faith he will pardon us for Christ's sake. But what is the doctrine of reason, or of the light of nature? If we may believe infidels, it is that we shall be pardoned on our bare repentance, without a mediator and without any atonement. This is a main principle of infidelity, on which the whole system, so far as it is allowed that we are sinners, depends. Therefore let us consider it attentively, and inquire whether it be indeed the voice of reason that we shall be pardoned on our repentance barely.

Several eminent infidels, as Hume and Bolingbroke, deny that there is any evidence of the moral perfections of God, or that he is a good being. On this principle there cannot possibly be evidence that he will pardon at all, either in consequence of repentance, or without it. For unless we have evidence of his goodness, it is impossible that we should know but that he will take pleasure in torturing his creatures, whether it answer any good purpose or not, or whether they deserve it or not. When infidels say that God will pardon on bare repentance, they must believe either that justice requires such pardon, or that mere goodness and grace require it; either that pardon is no more than strict justice requires, or that though it is indeed beyond the requirement of strict justice, it is required by divine goodness and grace. Let us consider the proposition on both these grounds.

I. That the pardon of the penitent is a mere act of JUSTICE, and that if he be not pardoned, he suffers injustice. Concerning this I observe,

1. If this be the case, it is no pardon at all, and it is absurd

* No date.

to call it by that name.

To release a man on the footing of justice, is manifestly no pardon, but a mere act of justice which he deserves, and which cannot be denied him without injury and oppression. But pardon, in its very nature, is an act of grace, which may be denied without injustice. On this hypothesis, then, the law of nature must be, that we shall perform certain actions; and that if we do not, we shall repent, and thenceforth perform them. Now if this be the law of nature, then it is plain, that if we either perform the actions required, or having neglected them if we afterward repent and thenceforward perform them, we fulfil the law of nature, and stand right with respect to it, and therefore are to be justified by it. Our conduct, in either case, equally answers the law. Where then is the foundation or possibility of pardon in consequence of repentance? There is no possibility of it, as there is nothing to be pardoned.

2. On this supposition, repentance is either the complete and perfect obedience of the law, or it is its complete penalty. Otherwise it does not, and cannot answer the law or satisfy it, so but that the sinner is still, both by law and justice, liable to its penalty. Surely he is liable to the penalty of the law, who has indeed broken it, and who has not suffered the penalty. For as to a gracious pardon, whether with or without an atonement, it is in the present case, entirely out of the question; because the very principle on which we proceed, at present is, that the penitent is to be released from punishment on the footing of justice and not of grace. But repentance is neither the perfect obedience of the law, nor the complete penalty. It is not the perfect obedience of the law, as it is supposed that the subject has transgressed the law; and indeed, otherwise there would be no foundation or possibility of repentance. Nor is repentance the complete penalty of the law. That is a curse; but repentance is a blessing. The penalty of any law is an evil; but repentance is a good, and a most important and invaluable good. And to imagine that this is the curse or penalty of the law, is to confound good and evil, curses and blessings. If a man in consequence of transgressing the law of nature, be justly liable to repentance only, he is rather entitled to a reward than exposed to penalty, and so transgression will appear to be a moral good, rather than a moral evil.

3. This supposition implies that the end of all punishment is the good of the transgressor, and that he, in any case, deserves no more punishment than is subservient to his repentance and reformation. But this is by no means true in human governments; and whence does it become true in the divine? We never execute a murderer for his good, or to lead him to repentance and VOL. II.

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to reform his morals. He is executed to restrain and deter others, to support the authority of the law, and to establish government. Yet the case may be so clear that no man shall question the justice of the execution. A child may deserve to be disinherited, and to be banished from his father's house, though there be no prospect, and therefore no intention of reforming him by the measure. The sole end may be, to deter the other children from the like vicious courses, and to cut off the abandoned child from the opportunity to corrupt them. In like manner, if a man have transgressed the law of God, and thereby have trampled on that law, and done what in him lies to bring it into general neglect and contempt, it is just that he should be exemplarily punished, to restrain and deter others. The public good requires it. It is due to the public, and therefore is just. But if his punishment be just, it cannot at the same time be unjust; as it would be, if agreeably to the principle now under consideration, he be entitled to impunity on the footing of justice.

4. This principle implies that there is in transgression no evil in any other respect than as by it the transgressor has injured himself. The principle is that the penitent cannot be punished consistently with justice, and that the only just end of punishment is the repentance and good of the transgressor. But if the only just end of punishment be the good of the transgressor, then the only just end of punishment is to remove or prevent evil to the transgressor. Therefore the whole and only evil of transgression, or that on the account of which it deserves punishment, is some ill consequence to the transgressor personally, and there is no evil in it in any other respect. Therefore there is no moral evil in any dishonor done to God, or in any abuse of any creature, unless therein the agent do an injury to himself; and no further, and on no other account than as he does an injury to himself. But who does not see the falsity of this doctrine? Who does not see that murder and theft are moral evils, whether by them the murderer and the thief injure or benefit themselves? Who does not see that another man's life and happiness, other things being equal, are at least of the same importance and worth as the life and happiness of a murderer, and that if it be a crime for a man to destroy his own happiness and life, it is also a crime to destroy those of another person?

5. On this principle, the punishment deserved for transgressing the law of nature is no evil at all, but a very valuable good. It is either repentance itself, or that wholesome discipline which is necessary to lead the subject to repentance. But neither of these is any evil, but a good, an advantage, a privilege. So that

on this principle, sin deserves no evil, but good; not a punishment, but a reward; for surely even that wholesome discipline which is absolutely necessary to a man's repentance and highest happiness, is as real a good, and may be as properly given in the way of reward, as an effectual medicine to a sick man. Such a medicine is no token of the displeasure of the physician towards his patient, but of his benevolence. So the necessary and wholesome discipline in question is no token of the displeasure of the Deity, but of his benevolence to the individual. It would be as absurd to punish vice with this, as it would be to punish murder by the administration of some dose, of disagreeable taste indeed, but which should certainly make the man who takes it, immortal and entirely prosperous and happy forever.

6. It cannot be the law of nature that sin deserves to be punished with repentance only, or with only that discipline which is necessary to the repentance and happiness of the subject. The law of nature is the law of reason, and the law of God. It is the effect of infinite reason and wisdom; and whatever is dictated by the law of nature, is the dictate of infinite reason and wisdom. Now it is not the dictate of reason that sin deserves nothing but repentance, or beneficial discipline; but it is the dictate of reason that it deserves some real and proper token of displeasuresomething that on the whole shall be a real evil and disadvantage to the sinner.

7. There can be no law without a sanction, a punishment threatened. But neither repentance, nor wholesome discipline is a proper punishment, as it is on the whole no evil to the subject. Therefore on the principle we are now considering, there is no law of nature, and of course there is, without revelation, no moral government of God over intelligent creatures; which is contrary to the avowed doctrine of many deists, and to all which they say concerning the law of nature.

8. If the law of nature require, on the footing of justice, that every penitent be pardoned, then it is a dispensation of grace, and it ought to be called the gospel of nature instead of the law of nature. But what evidence have we that there is such a gospel of nature, and that God has given up, or will give up the law of nature to make way for this gospel? Besides, there is a direct contradiction in the supposition that a man is entitled to pardon, which is an act of grace, on the footing of strict justice.

9. On this hypothesis, sin, or transgression of the moral law of nature is no moral evil. Moral evil deserves natural evil-that natural evil which is an evil on the whole, and which is a token of the divine displeasure. But if transgression of the law of na

ture deserve nothing but repentance, it deserves nothing which, on the whole, is any evil to the subject, and therefore is not a moral evil. Moral evil deserves to be disapproved and abhorred. This abhorrence is just; and therefore it is just in God, the supreme magistrate of the universe, to show this abhorrence in a corresponding treatment of the subject, and that, whether such manifestation tend to the repentance and good of the subject or And if this be just, it is deserved, and moral evil deserves something more than repentance. But sin or transgression, by the present supposition, deserves nothing more than repentance. Therefore, according to this supposition, it is not a moral evil.

not.

If sin deserve hatred, and the proper fruits of hatred in no case but when such hatred and fruits are beneficial to the sinner, then sin is not in itself, and on account of its own nature and tendency hateful, but on account of this circumstance, that the hatred of it, and the proper fruits of that hatred are beneficial to the sinner, and in this circumstance alone the evil of sin consists, which is absurd. And if it be evil in no other respect, if it be not hateful on account of its own nature and tendency, it is no moral evil at all.

Moral evil is a damage to the intellectual system, as it violates the law, and weakens the government of the system; and unless restrained and counteracted, it would issue in the ruin of the system. Therefore the good of the system requires that it be restrained and counteracted by the great moral governor, to whom it belongs to defend the rights and secure the interests of the system. But what restraint of a moral kind, and in the way of moral government, can be laid upon moral evil, otherwise than by law, threatening, and punishment? And if the good of the intellectual system require such restraint to be laid on sin, then the punishment of the sinner, which must be more than repentance, is just and sin is a moral evil.

Moral evil is a damage to the universe, as it is a violation of the law, an opposition to the authority and government of the God of nature, and as it dissolves and weakens that government. Therefore satisfaction is due to that authority and government, and the good of the system requires that by something done to support the government, to restore its tone, and to deter others from future transgressions, reparation be made of the injury done by moral evil. But bare repentance is no satisfaction to the insulted and weakened law, authority, and government of the universe is no reparation of the damage done to the public, which consists in weakening the government; and the threatening of repentance is no proper terror or restraint to others. What ter