must be born of God if you go to the kingdom of heaven.

Secondly, "Nor of the will of the flesh." What must we understand by
that?

It is taken for those vehement inclinations that are in man to all
manner of looseness, fulfilling the desires of the flesh. That must
not be understood here; men are made the children of God by fulfilling
their lustful desires; it must be understood here in the best sense.
There is not only in carnal men a will to be vile, but there is in them
a will to be saved also--a will to go to heaven also. But this it will
not do, it will not privilege a man in the things of the kingdom of
God. Natural desires after the things of another world, they are not
an argument to prove a man shall go to heaven whenever he dies. I am
not a free willer, I do abhor it; yet there is not the wickedest man
but he desires some time or other to be saved. He will read some time
or other, or, it may be, pray; but this will not do--"It is not in him
that wills, nor in him that runs, but in God that shews mercy;" there
is willing and running, and yet to no purpose; Rom. ix. 16, "Israel,
which followed after the law of righteousness, have not obtained it."
Here I do not understand as if the apostle had denied a virtuous course
of life to be the way to heaven, but that a man without grace, though
he have natural gifts, yet he shall not obtain privilege to go to
heaven, and be the son of God. Though a man without grace may have a
will to be saved, yet he cannot have that will God's way. Nature, it
cannot know anything but the things of nature; the things of God knows
no man but by the Spirit of God; unless the Spirit of God be in you, it
will leave you on this side the gates of heaven--"Not of blood, nor of
the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." It may be
some may have a will, a desire that Ishmael may be saved; know this, it