By what principle of interpretation, is any one authorised in affirming, contrary to the plain and unsophisticated import of the passage, that the meaning is not that the Spirit itself attests the paternal love of God to our minds, but that it enables us, by shining upon our hearts, and exciting in us holy affections to draw the conclusion for ourselves? It is an objection fatal to this sentiment, that it strips the Holy Spirit of his character of witness, and thus recognises only one attestation to the believer's adoption, that deposed by his own spirit or conscience; whereas there are two witnesses indisputably mentioned in the text. Consistency requires that we either expunge the witness of the Spirit from our creed entirely, or admit in accordance with the obvious and genuine meaning of the word of God, that it is immediate and direct.

The Spirit's witness is productive of peace and joy in believing. As nothing short of the manifestation of the paternal love of God to the heart, has power to tranquillize the agitations of the awakened conscience, and inspire filial confidence in Him, so this inestimable blessing is fully adequate to these desirable effects. Animated by this assurance, the believer's bosom thrills with sensations of conscious and ineffable pleasure, "and a stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy." Amid all the worlds tribulation, his is the peace of God that passeth all understanding, and the inspiration of that joy which is unspeakable and full of glory. Does he survey the enchanted brink that overhangs the gulph of irremediable woe, on which he once stood unconscious of his awful danger, adoring gratitude for so great a deliverance prompts the jubilant lay :—

Where shall my wond'ring soul begin?
How shall I all to heaven aspire?

A slave redeem'd from death and sin!
A brand pluck'd from eternal fire!
How shall I equal triumphs raise,

Or sing my great Deliv'rer's praise?

Now contemplating his present privileges, and then surrendering his delighted mind to the bliss-inspiring anticipations of a coming immortality, he summoneth angels and men to admire with him, the unsearchable riches of redeeming grace. "Behold!" he exclaims with the beloved disciple, "Behold! what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Such is the tranquillizing and joyous influence of the witness of the Spirit. "He who,' before his enjoyment of this great blessing, "had found no resting place in this world, and who had wandered through it in quest of

some object, however insignificant, that might interest him, and for a moment at least remove the sense of hopeless languor which lay dead upon his heart, finds now an object which his widest desires cannot grasp, even filial communion with God here, and the full enjoyment of Him, through a magnificent eternity, on the very threshold of which he already stands. He whose conscience of sin has made life a burden to him, and at the same time has taught him to look with a vague horror to futurity, applies to that fountain which was opened in the house of David for sin and for uncleanness, and he has peace with God through faith in Christ Jesus."

The Spirit's witness is abiding.

By which I mean, that, as it is coeval with justification, so while the recipient of this invaluable blessing retains the faith through which he was at first justified, and constituted a child of God, the Holy Spirit continues to attest his divine filiation. With the father of lights, (now become his father) from whom, among ten thousand other displays of munificence, this good and perfect gift cometh down, there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. "The gifts and calling of God are without repentance," Rom. xi. 29— Never will he revoke in displeasure, what in mercy he communicates, unless it is forfeited by unfaithfulness and sin. If he hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts crying Abba, Father, it is because we are sons, and therefore, while we stand by faith in this filial relation, he will not, he cannot, by suspending our knowledge of his pardoning and paternal love, destroy the very foundation of our filial privileges. We are aware that far different views of christian experience are entertained by many, who whilst they regard the enjoyments of the believer as fluctuating and intermittent, resolve his privations of comfort, for the most part, into pure acts of the divine Sovereignty. In their opinion, God may, and often does, for inscrutable reasons, withhold or withdraw from his children the light of his countenance, and permit them to walk in darkness. But whence have they learned this? From the Bible? surely not. It is not under this repellant aspect that the Scriptures present the sovereignty of God. Two or three passages have indeed been pressed into the service of this gloomy and chilling opinion; but they have been so often rescued from perversion, and placed in their proper light, that I deem it scarcely necessary to occupy your time in examining them. On the words of the evangelic prophet (1. 10.) the greatest stress seems to be laid: "Who is among you that feareth the Lord, and obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light? let him trust in the Lord, and stay himself upon his God." Were it as clearly evinced as it has been gratuitously assumed, that the darkness here mentioned is of a spiritual nature, still the

wide difference between the Mosaic and the Christian dispensations would neutralize the force of the inference deduced from it, in support of the doctrine we are now opposing. The elevated privileges of christians walking amid the splendors of the sun of righteousness, are not to be measured by the attainments of Jews, whose knowledge of divine things resembled, in comparison, the faint and feeble gleaming of the orb of night. But that the prophet, in the words cited, speaks of spiritual darkness, is assumed not only without the slightest proof, but contrary to internal evidence of the passage itself, is apparent from the injunctions it contains. The individual whose melancholy case is described, is directed to trust in the Lord, and stay himself upon his God-precepts which can never be obeyed by those who are under a complete eclipse of spiritual light. It follows then irresistibly, that the darkness mentioned by the prophet, is the gloom of severe and accumulated outward trial, unmitigated by the hope of deliverance in time, but which while the believer, in the exercise of a meek and acquiescent spirit, trusts in the Lord and stays himself upon his God, can never extinguish the spiritual glory kindled and enshrined in his consecrated breast. Be it then deeply and indelibly impressed upon our minds, as a most salutary and important truth, that if we are destitute of the tranquil and holy comfort of the Spirit's interior testimony, the cause is wholly in ourselves. It is not God that withdraws from us; but we that withdraw from God. God does not, purely to display his sovereignty, hide from us the light of his countenance, but we, by our unfaithfulness to Him, intercept the heavenly effulgence. Let us yield ourselves unto him, to be governed by his word, and led by his Spirit; then shall our path be as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day," Prov. iv. 18.

Having thus attempted to show wherein the interior testimony of the Holy Spirit consists, and to delineate its most prominent attributes favor me with your continued attention, while I endeavor, II. To evince that this witness is the common privilege of true believers in Christ.

Entering now on the argumentative part of this discourse, we cannot forbear expressing our astonishment and regret, that evidence of this position should be demanded by persons professing to have derived their religious sentiments from the oracles of God. Deeply indeed is it to be lamented, that from the views of experimental godliness entertained by not a few christians and christian teachers, there should be systematically excluded, a doctrine inwoven with the very texture of the gospel, as from the following considerations, it is hoped, the doctrine in question will satisfactorily appear to be.

Previously, however, to the exhibition of these evidences, it is deemed proper here to introduce a cautionary suggestion, that the mind of the least established believer may not be unnecessarily perturbed.

This divine testimony, though it be the privilege of all real christians, is not equally clear and efficacious in all; nor do the same persons enjoy it with equal vividness at all times. It is susceptible of material variations in its degrees of strength. Hence, an eminent divine, who has handled this subject with his accustomed perspicuity and force of reasoning, recommends the sparing and cautious use of the term assurance to designate this testimony, not indeed as objectionable in itself, but, as he justly remarks, "because it seems to imply, though not necessarily, the absence of all doubt, and shuts out all those lower degrees of persuasion which may exist in the experience of christians."* Like the light of day, which, regulated by the aspects of the heavens, is sometimes bedimmed with vapors and storms, and at others shines with unclouded splendor, the believer's consciousness of the divine favor may vary in strength, from just such a degree as is essential to the exercise of the christian graces, through all the intermediate stages of experience, to that "full assurance of faith," irradiated by which

"The christian dwells, like Uriel, in the sun:
Meridian evidence puts doubt to flight;
And ardent hope anticipates the skies."

But it must not be forgotten, that as the solar beam, however shaded, is distinguishable from the gloom of night, as also from fictitious splendor; so there are not wanting criteria, by which the genuine witness of the spirit in its very lowest degree may be discriminated, on the one hand from a total obscuration of the light of God's countenance, and on the other, from the illusions of fancy.

These observations being premised, the evidences of the doctrine stated above, may now be adduced.

That the Spirit of God is capable of conveying to the believer's mind such an attestation of his pardon and adoption, as has been exhibited in the course of the preceding observations, may be assumed without fear of contradiction. At least, no objection to this position can be anticipated from any who believe the word of God. In the light of that word, the Spirit appears before us, arrayed in the glory of the distinctive and unalienable attributes of Supreme Divinity. He pervades immensity with his presence, and, omniscient in wisdom, "searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God.” Whilst yet the earth on which we dwell was without form,

* Watson's Theological Institutes. Part IV. page 480.

and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep, the Eternal Spirit

"Was present, and with mighty wings outspread
Dove-like sat brooding on the vast abyss.'

وو

To him are attributed operations which none but the Omnipotent could achieve : he adorned the heavens with their splendid garniture, and “formed the crooked serpent." He is the source of inspiration. By Him was futurity unveiled to the admiring gaze of the prophets, and from Him emanated all the sublime and interesting discoveries contained in the sacred volume. "Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." His too is the work of transforming the soul into the image of God. The whole hallowing process by which the believer is made meet for the celestial inheritance, from the earliest dawn of incipient conviction, till he perfects holiness in the fear of the Lord, forms a part of the appropriate and peculiar work of the Holy Spirit. But why this profusion of argument to prove, what it would be blasphemy to deny :-That He who constructed the mental constitution of man, and whose inspiration giveth him understanding, can with equal facility interiorly "speak peace unto his people and his saints."

Since, then, to question the power of the Holy Spirit to operate an impression on the believer's mind of his acceptance with God, united with a luminous assurance of its celestial inspiration, precluding at once doubt and delusion, would involve the denial of his claims to Divinity; it is submitted, whether, even anterior to direct evidence of the fact, that there be any improbability in the supposition, that the benignant and condescending Deity should thus manifest his favor to those whom he justifies. True it is indeed, that the least blessing from the High and Lofty One who inhabiteth eternity, should fill us with grateful astonishment, and call forth our animated thanks. When we contemplate his peerless majesty, as displayed in the magnificence of his works, well doth it become us, with thrilling awe and adoring wonder, to exclaim-" What is man that thou art mindful of him! and the Son of man that thou visitest him!" But assuredly, it is not the will of God that our astonishment at his condescension and grace, should degenerate into unbelief-the tomb of devotion. That the sense of his approbation, which we regard as the common privilege of his people, affords a very striking proof of his limitless mercy, is readily allowed. But does it, we would ask, transcend? does it equal? falls it not infinitely below the unspeakable gift by which he has already commended his love towards us? Amid the splendid manifestations of his mercy with which the gospel surrounds us, were it not ungrateful, were it not guilty, to tolerate a single misgiving, as to his