thing in which we fail. Now, it being confessed, that we cannot ordinarily distinguish at the time the suggestions of the Spirit from the operations of our minds, it may be asked, how are we to listen to them? The answer is, by attending universally to the admonitions within us. Men do not listen to their consciences. It is through the whisperings of conscience that the Spirit speaks. If men then are wilfully deaf to their consciences, they cannot hear the Spirit. If hearing, if being compelled to hear, the remonstrances of conscience, they nevertheless decide, and resolve, and determine to go against them; then they grieve, then they defy, then they do despite to the Spirit of God: In both cases, that is, both of neglecting to consult, and of defying, when they cannot help feeling, the admonitions which rise up within them, they have this judgment hanging over their heads: "He that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath." He that misuses or abuses the portion and measure of spiritual assistance, which is afforded him, shall lose even that.

The efficacy of the Spirit is to be judged of by its fruits. Its immediate effects are upon the disposition. A visible outward conduct will ensue; but the true seat of grace and of spiritual energy is in the heart and inward disposition. Whenever, therefore, we find religious carelessness succeeded within us by religious seriousness; conscience, which was silent or unheard, now powerfully speaking and obeyed; sensuality and selfishness, the two grand enemies of salvation, the

two great powers of darkness, which rule the natural man; when we find even these giving way to the inward accusing voice of conscience: when we find the thoughts of the mind drawing or drawn more and more towards heavenly things; the value and interest of these expectations plainer to our view, a great deal more frequent than heretofore in our meditations, and more fully discerned; the care and safety of our souls rising gradually above concerns and anxieties about worldly affairs; when we find the force of temptation and of evil propensities, not extinct, but retreating before a sense of duty; self-government maintained; the interruptions of it immediately perceived, bitterly deplored, and soon recovered; sin rejected and repelled; and this not so much with an increase of confidence in our strength, as of reliance upon the assisting grace of God; when we find ourselves touched with the love of our Maker, taking satisfaction in his worship and service; when we feel a growing taste and relish for religious subjects, and religious exercises: above all, when we begin to rejoice in the comfort of the Holy Ghost; in the prospect of reaching heaven; in the powerful aids and helps, which are given us in accomplishing this great end, and the strength, and firmness, and resolution, which, so helped and aided, we experience in our progress: when we feel these things, then may we, without either enthusiasm or superstition, humbly believe, that the Spirit of God hath been at work within us. External virtues, good actions will follow, as occasions may draw them forth; but it is within that we must look for

the change, which the inspiration of God's Spirit produces.

With respect to positive external good actions, we have said, that they must depend in some measure upon occasions and abilities and opportunities, and that they must wait for opportunities; but, observe, it is not so with the breaking off of our sins, be they what they will. That work must wait for nothing. Until that be effected, no change is made. No man, going on in a known sin, has any right to say, that the Spirit of God has done its office within him. Either it has not been given to him, or, being given, it has been resisted, despised, or, at least, neglected. Such a person has either yet to obtain it by prayer, or when obtained, to avail himself duly of its assistance. Let him understand this to be his condition.

The next duty, or rather disposition, which flows from the doctrine of spiritual influence, is humility. There never was a truer saying, than that pride is the adversary of religion; lowliness and humility the tempers for it. Now religious humility consists in the habit of referring every thing to God. From one end of the New Testament to the other, God is set forth and magnified in his agency and his operations.

In the greatest of all businesses, the business of salvation, He is operating, and we cooperating with him. "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling;" and why? "for it is God that worketh in us to

will and to do according to his good pleasure." He is not superseding our endeavours, (the very contrary is implied by commanding us to exert them,) but still nothing is done without him. If we have moral strength, we are strong in the inward might of the Holy Ghost: consequently all boasting, all vanity, all self-sufficiency, all despising of others, on the score of moral and religious inferiority, are excluded. Without the grace of God we might have been as the worst of them. There is, in the nature of things, one train of sentiment belonging to him, who has achieved a work by his own might, and power, and prowess; and another to him, who has been fain to beg for succour and assistance, and by that assistance alone has been carried through difficulties, which were too great for his own strength and faculties. This last is the true sentiment for us. It is not for a man, whose life has been saved in a shipwreck, by the compassionate help of others, it is not for a man, so saved, to boast of his own alertness and vigour, though it be true, that, unless he had exerted what power and strength he was possessed of, he would not have been saved at all.

Lastly, this doctrine shuts the door against a most general, a most specious, and a most deceiving excuse for our sins; which excuse is, that we have striven against them, but are overpowered by our evil nature, by that nature, which the scriptures themselves represent as evil; in a word, that we have done what we could. Now until, by supplication and prayer, we

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have called for the promised assistance of God's Spirit, and with an earnestness, devotion, perseverance, and importunity, proportioned to the magnitude of the concern: until we have rendered ourselves objects of that influence, and yielded ourselves to it, it is not true, "that we have done all that we can." We must not rely upon that excuse; for it is not true in fact. If experiencing the depravity and imbecility of our nature, we see in this corruption and weakness an excuse for our sins, and taking up with this excuse, we surrender ourselves to them: if we give up, or relax in, our opposition to them, and struggles against them, at last consenting to our sins, and falling down with the stream, which we have found so hard to resist; if things take this turn with us, then are we in a state to be utterly, finally, and fatally undone. We have it in our power to shut our eyes against the danger; we naturally shall endeavour to make ourselves as easy and contented in our situation as we can; but the truth nevertheless, is, that we are hastening to certain perdition. If, on the contrary, perceiving the feebleness of our nature, we be driven by the perception, as St. Paul was driven, to fly for deliverance from our sins, to the aid and influence and power of God's Spirit, to seek for divine help and succour, as a sinking mariner calls out for help and succour, not formally, we may be sure, or coldly, but with cries and tears and supplications, as for life itself; if we be prepared to cooperate with this help, with the holy working of God's grace within us, then may we trust, both that it will be given to us, (yet in such manner