and inquirers. Formerly they made hypotheses about the laws of nature; they thought they understood the essences of things. At length they acknowledge they know nothing beyond the phenomena.

Now, in Christianity, the declarations of the Bible are our phenomena, our first principles. As faith is more simple, it acknowledges it knows as little of God and his will and counsels, abstractedly and hypothetically and universally, as we profess is the case with regard to his works. Faith confines herself to the record, and stops where that stops.

Still, as in philosophy, axioms are framed, laws of philosophizing laid down, principles adopted, facts accumulated, generalized, and established as maxims of natural science; so in the Bible faith has found her axioms, her laws, her principles, her facts.

But, as in natural philosophy, these are always referable to first principles, and every thing is tried and examined by them; so is it in religion. The Bible is still our standard; and every thing there found is a part of those first principles to which all subsequent advances must be referred.

And as there are discoveries made in the natural world, by cautious observation and simple obedience to fact and experiment; so, in the Bible, faith, by the same means, makes continual discoveries; not, indeed, in the great features of truth-for these rest upon a few facts, expounded by a few main doctrines-but in the detail, the application, the effects, and use of truth.

4. And this leads the Christian to FOLLOW, AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE, THE LANGUAGE, as well as the sentiments of the holy Scriptures. The disposition to acquiesce in God's Revelation is so entire, and the fear of overstepping the limits of the record is so wakeful, that the true Christian naturally and almost necessarily adopts the expressions, delights in the phraseology, employs in preference the words, and appeals perpetually to the authority of the sacred word. The

Bible is a book by itself. Its sanctity, its new and heavenly doctrines, the inspiration under which it was written, invest it with a peculiarity which no human wisdom can imitate. It has been uniformly found, that when the faith of the church has declined, the language of Scripture has become neglected. The Bible was seldom cited during the dark ages. At the Reformation the use of its terms and expressions revived with a love for its main doctrines.

In fact, the Revelation itself provides for this. The apostles oppose the wisdom of God to the wisdom of men, and the words of the Holy Ghost, to those of human invention. "Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual." The same direction is involved in the commands to "search the Scriptures," to "hide them in our heart," to make them " our counsellors," to "meditate therein day and night," to

66

delight in them above gold and precious stones," to account them "sweeter than honey, yea than the honeycomb," to "rejoice in them as one that findeth great spoil." He that does this, insensibly adopts their manner of expression, their turn of thought, their way of stating things; his mind is cast into the mould of the Bible, and he labours to receive more and more its exact form and impress.

Such, then, being the nature, reasonableness, and extent of faith, a reflexion or two may be offered, before we proceed to our conclusion, on the tranquillity of mind which it produces; and on the necessary influence it exerts on the whole life of a Christian.

1. Observe THE TRANQUILLITY which this faith produces. There is an acquiescence of mind in divine truth, a cheerful resignation of the understanding and

VOL. II.

15 1 Cor. ii. 10.

Y

will to the testimony of God. Thus one great end of Revelation is attained.

The perturbation, the forebodings of conscience, the apprehension of futurity, the dread of the almighty Arbiter of the universe, the uncertainty of human opinion, the tossings and tempests of conjecture and prejudice, are all terminated. Faith settles every thing. The truths of Scripture are as exactly adapted to this exercise of a contrite and humble mind, as the light of heaven is to the natural eye. The same divine Spirit, which indited the Scriptures, knew what was in man, and disposes his heart to receive what is revealed. The result is a tranquillity of soul, arising from a correspondence between the faculty and the object. Reliance on the inspired Scriptures brings that calm joy, which the revelation of such important truths might be expected to produce.

The discovery of truth, of whatever kind, is delightful to man." 16 Mathematical knowledge, physical, metaphysical, create repose in a certain way, from the pleasure of discovering what is new and useful in the worlds of science. But in divine truth there is that repose which springs from the impression of the greatness of the mercy vouchsafed in Revelation, of the magnitude of the truths communicated both in themselves and to man, of the high and elevated and purifying effects produced, of the bright and cheerful hopes awakened. The soul attains its rest. Faith completes the noblest instinct of man, that natural pulse which he has after truth and happiness. It meets his inmost wants, it agrees with his accountable nature, and with all his primary duties to Almighty God." Faith rectifies, as it were, the illusions of vision; brings forward into near view those eternal things which, from their remoteness, are apt to be

16 La logique est un besoin de l'esprit, comme la réligion est un besoin de l'ame.

17 Lecture XIV.

either wholly overlooked or appear but faintly in the utmost bounds of the horizon; and removes backward and reduces to their true comparative size the objects of the present life, which are apt to fill the human eye and assume a false magnitude from their vicinity.18 And this is the source of tranquillity.

Faith especially fixes the mind on one grand object, in which all the lines of revealed truth converge, as in their centre, THE PERSON OF JESUS CHRIST; and thus brings us to the fountain of felicity. The very conviction of our own ignorance, and of the infinite wisdom and truth of God, promotes the same calmness of spirit. I am in a dark and sinful world; I am surrounded with mysteries; but my heavenly Father has revealed to me a sufficient guide; things are all, practically speaking, well; he assures me all shall be cleared up in a future world. I leave them with him; I follow by faith in the track of patriarchs and prophets, evangelists and apostles; my mind is tranquil, and resigns itself to God; I give over conjecturing, reasoning, disputing, in order to BELIEVE.

For as

2. Nor is it difficult to perceive how this faith is THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. the eye receives the light, and directs the whole body, so faith, the eye of the soul, receives the light of Revelation and directs the life. All depends upon it. Truth operates on the heart only as it is appropriated by this principle. We wonder not that it is described as the grace which apprehends the promises of Christ for justification, which works in a way of love to the things revealed, which overcomes the smiles and frowns of the world, which purifies the heart, which produces uniform and cheerful obedience. It cannot be otherwise. If it be a living and active principle, it is the reliance of an enlightened and renewed heart upon the testimony of Almighty God; and every act of it ex

18 Wilberforce.

cites the correspondent affections, and produces the becoming conduct. As it respects the testimony of God in Revelation itself, it is the first link of union between truth and the heart of man; as it respects the promises of forgiveness in a Saviour, it is the instrument of justification; 19 as it regards the entire compass of truth and duty, of which Christianity consists, it is the principle of the whole life and behaviour; as it looks forward into futurity, it is the parent of hope, and the spring of love, patience, enterprize.

Let me, then, in conclusion, press on all before me the importance of examining themselves whether they have a lively faith; of imploring the grace of the Holy Spirit to impart to them this blessing, or increase it if they already possess it; and of ever retaining that humility of mind which the highest degrees of it are best calculated to enforce.

I. EXAMINE YOURSELVES, my young friends, whether your faith be living and influential or not; a mistake here is very common and most destructive. That you assent to the truth of Christianity I doubt not. That you are in some measure impressed with the force of the evidences which we have been considering, I am ready to admit. That you have some knowledge of the main doctrines and duties of Revelation, and some persuasion of the importance of them, I allow. But, I ask, is your faith such as the Scrip

19 The act of faith as justifying, and justifying alone, and yet as standing, in other views, in connexion with the whole Christian life, has been thus illustrated. While the poor criminal, who fled to the altar for refuge, laid hold of the horns of it with his hands alone, his heart would beat, his blood circulate, and his other limbs and senses perform their proper functions. Thus the penitent sinner by faith alone lays hold of Christ; yet his soul is alive to God and all the graces of the Christian life are at the same time exercised according to their proper nature and functions.