tine saith, it is no arrogant stoutness, it is our faith: it is no pride, it is devotion: it is no presumption, it is God's promise.'

To those who scarcely think a man a Christian except he possesses this assured persuasion, it must be said, that they confound assurance and faith. Faith (I mean, of course, its justifying act) is the acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ as our Redeemer: assurance is the knowledge, that we have so accepted him. And just as in temporal things, a person may be safe who yet fancies himself in the jaws of danger, so also spiritually one may walk in darkness and have no light, while yet he stays himself upon his God. Nor does the steadiest hope rise always to the pitch of absolute assurance. Archbishop Leighton, it is said, was one day conversing on the blessedness of being fixed as a pillar in the heavenly Jerusalem, to go no more out, when he was interrupted by a relation, Ah, but you have assurance.' No, truly,' he replied, only a good hope, and a great desire to see what they are doing on the other side, for of this world, I am heartily weary.'

6

There is a false faith, and there is a true faith. The one places a man no whit above the devils who "believe and tremble:" by the other, being "justified, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." It is evidently of vital importance, that we ascertain of what kind our faith is. And to this end there are given us a multitude of injunctions in scripture,-"Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith prove your own selves." (2 Cor. xiii. 5.) Such an examination would be useless unless there were certain grounds on which assurance must necessarily rest. If a mere persuasion of the mind be, as

some persons maintain, sufficient, then every motive to self-examination is destroyed, and the reiterated injunctions of the Scriptures are made nugatory.

In such a case, assurance possesses not the essential character of knowledge. No man can properly be said to know a thing if it be not in itself true; if he have not sufficient evidence of its truth; if that evidence do not produce satisfactory conviction in his mind. For assurance to be genuine, therefore, an individual must indeed be reconciled to God; his expectation is else no more than the expectation of a hypocrite: he must be able to give a "reason of the hope" that is in him, not merely by setting forth the full salvation of Christ, but by shewing that he has accepted that salvation; else, he merely guesses at his spiritual state: he must have his soul grounded and settled in steady confidence in God's covenanted promises; else, he is disquieted by doubt and despondency. Hence, the only way in which you can confute a self-confident man--a philosophieal heathen, for example, who professes himself sure of everlasting life, is by proving to him that the fact he assumes of his being in God's favour, is not true, because there is no sufficient evidence of it. Pretended knowledge must be proved false, by exhibiting the unsoundness of the foundation on which it is said to rest.

It follows that the ground of assurance is the investigated genuineness of faith.--And "faith worketh by love." Faith is known by its necessary fruits. These fruits are to be an evidence, not only to others. but also to ourselves. The apostle, St. John, is very explicit on this point, in his first epistle. Hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his com

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mandments." "We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren." "Let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth and hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before him." "If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us: hereby know we that we dwell in him, because he hath given us of his Spirit."

The great argument insisted on, by those who stigmatize assurance as presumptuous, is, that it tends to relax the obligation to holiness of life. But it is quite otherwise with the assurance which rests (as I have endeavoured to place it,) on scriptural grounds. And, on this point, the observations of Leighton on 1 Peter, i., 14, 15, 16, are so very pertinent, that I cannot do better than transcribe them. It is a misgrounded fear, and such as argues inexperience of the nature and workings of divine grace, to imagine that the assured hope of salvation will beget unholiness and presumptuous boldness in sin; and that therefore the doctrine of that assurance is a doctrine of licentiousness. Our apostle, we see, is not so sharp-sighted as these men think themselves: he apprehends no such matter, but, indeed, supposes the contrary as unquestionable. He takes not assured hope and holiness as enemies, but joins them as nearest friends-hope perfectly and be holy. They are mutually strengthened and increased, each by the other. The more assurance of salvation, the more holiness, the more delight in it, and study of it, as the only way to that end. And as labour is most pleasant, when we are made surest it shall not be lost, nothing doth make the soul so nimble and active

in obedience as this oil of gladness, this assured hope of glory. Again, the more holiness there is in the soul, the clearer always is this assurance; as we see the face of the heavens best, when there are fewest clouds.'

CAIUS.

F

The Album.

THERE be three acts of faith; assent, acceptance, and assurance. The papists generally give the essence of saving faith to the first, viz. assent. The Lutherans, and some of our own give it to the last. viz. assurance but it can neither be so, nor so. Assent doth not agree only to true believers, or justified persons. Assurance agrees to justified persons, and them only, but not to all justified persons, and that at all times.

Assent is too low to contain the essence of saving faith: it is found in the unregenerate as well as the regenerate; yea, in devils as well as men: (James ii. 19.) It is supposed and included in justifying faith; but it is not the justifying or saving act. Assurance is as much too high, being found only in some eminent believers, and in them too but at some times: there is many a true believer, to whom the joy and comfort of assurance is denied. They may say of their

said of his vision,

union with Christ, as Paul "whether in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell:" so they, whether in Christ or out of Christ, they cannot tell.

A true believer may walk in darkness, and see no light. (Isaiah 1. 10.) Nay, a man must be a believer, before he knows himself to be so. The direct act of faith is before the reflex act: so that the justifying act of faith lies neither in assent, nor in assurance. Assent saith, I believe that Christ is, and that