asters, laws, and statutes, to the end, if they cannot
do more, yet at least that they may bind the claws of the Devil, and
to hinder him from raging and swelling so powerfully (in those which
are his) according to his will and pleasure.

And (said Luther), although thou hadst not committed this or that sin,
yet nevertheless, thou art an ungodly creature, &c. but what is done
cannot he undone, he that hath stolen, let him henceforward steal no
more.

Secondly, we use the law spiritually, which is done in this manner;
that it maketh the transgressions greater, as Saint Paul saith; that
is, that it may reveal and discover to people their sins, blindness,
misery, and ungodly doings wherein they were conceived and born;
namely, that they are ignorant of God, and are his enemies, and
therefore have justly deserved death, hell, God's judgments, his
everlasting wrath and indignation. Saint Paul, (said Luther),
expoundeth such spiritual offices and works of the law with many words.

Rom. vii.

Nothing can be more sound or more philosophic than the contents of these
two paragraphs. They afford a sufficient answer to the pretence of the
Romanists and Arminians, that by the law St. Paul meant only the
ceremonial law.

Ib. p. 189.

And if Moses had not cashiered and put himself out of his office, and
had not taken it away with these words, (where he saith, 'The Lord thy
God will raise up unto thee another prophet out of thy brethren; Him
shall thou hear'. (Deut. xviii.)) who then at any time would or could
have believed the Gospel, and forsaken Moses?

If I could be persuaded that this passage (Deut. xviii. 15-19.)
primarily referred to Christ, and that Christ, not Joshua and his
successors, was the prophet here promised; I must either become a
Unitarian psilanthrophist, and join Priestley and Belsham,--or abandon
to the Jews their own Messiah as yet to come, and cling to the religion
of John and Paul, without further reference to Moses than to Lycurgus,
Solon and Numa; all of whom in their different spheres no less prepared
the way for the coming of the Lord, 'the desire of the nations'.

Ib. p. 190.

It is therefore most evident (said Luther), that the law can but only
help us to know our sins, and to make us afraid of death. Now sins and
death are such things as belong to the world, and which are therein.

Both in Paul and Luther, (names which I can never separate),