never before, that he must be delivered from this carnal bondage. He feels that the atonement can save to the uttermost. He says, I believe Christ can take away from me not only my actual transgressions but also my misfortune and my evil propensities. He believes that such is God's will. He has faith that the forces represented in the atonement and involved in the Spirit Infinite can redeem completely. He places everything upon the altar; he is thereby consecrated. He is then led to say, I now believe that God does this work. And he rests there; and in some instances the cleansing is wrought with no other step taken; and that struggler becomes as joyous as he can be and live. His bondage is gone, his evil inclinations are gone, and his impulses flow out naturally and beautifully towards God and holiness.

In the language of theology, that man is sanctified. He has complied with the only known condition, that of complete consecration, and there results, by the would I do not; but what I hate that I do. To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not.' He was fighting with sin continually, but not always conquering. Before, he had willingly served sin; now it was unwillingly; but still he served it. He fell, and rose, and fell again. Sometimes he was overcome, and in heaviness; sometimes he overcame, and was in joy. Once he had foretastes of the terrors of the law; but now he had foretastes of the comforts of the gospel. For above ten years there was in him this struggle between nature and grace; and yet he was still only striving with, not freed from sin; neither had he the witness of the Spirit with his spirit that he was a child of God; nor, indeed, could he, for he sought it not by faith, but, as it were, by the works of the law.'" (Tyer man's "Life and Times of John Wesley.")

pleasure of Heaven, this new spiritual translation. The command is obeyed as our Lord meant it; and according to human ability, and by the grace of God, that man, in his sphere, is morally perfect like his Father in heaven.* In the words of Jonathan Edwards, he now can say, "This holiness is sweet, pleasant, charming, serene; bringing an inexpressible purity, brightness, peacefulness, and ravishment of soul." Or he can enjoy the experience of the ven*Matt. v. 48.

† Nothing can surpass. President Edwards' expression respecting this sanctified condition of the soul. He says: "Holiness, as I then wrote down some of my contemplations on it, appeared to me to be of a sweet, pleasant, charming, serene, calm nature, which brought an inexpressible purity, brightness, peacefulness, and ravishment to the soul. In other words, it made the soul like a field or garden of God, with all manner of pleasant flowers; enjoying a sweet calm, and the gentle, vivifying beams of the sun. The soul of a true Christian, as I then wrote my meditations, appeared like such a little white flower as we see in the spring of the year, low and humble on the ground, opening its bosom to receive the pleasant beams of the sun's glory; rejoicing as it were in a calm rapture; diffusing around a sweet fragrancy; standing peacefully and lovingly in the midst of other flowers round about, all in like manner opening their bosoms to drink in the light of the sun."

In harmony with this is the statement of Mr. Wesley's experience: "O, with what joy unspeakable, even joy that was full of glory, was my soul filled, when the weight of sin went off, and an abiding sense of the love of God, and a full assurance of faith, broke in upon my disconsolate heart! Surely it was the day of my espousals, a day to be had in everlasting remembrance."

Arvid Gradin, ore of the Moravians of whom Wesley learned respecting the sanctified life, says that it is "repose

erable Dr. Kirk, who during the last year of his life was wont to say, "I am no longer living the life of a man, but that of an angel."

But this confession must be added, that there will not be found a sanctified person on earth, but who is conscious that this sublime achievement has been wrought for him by the Spirit Omnipotent. The holiest men are the humblest.* Sanctified men are permitted to stand upon this glorious summit of Christian attainment, not by the power and might of human conquest, but because the Spirit of Infinite Mercy and Majesty, in every step of the ascent, comes to the

rescue.

Such, then, are some of the experiences of individual minds, and such the office of the Holy Spirit in relation to them. If, now, we group a community of individual minds thus affected, we are in the midst of what is technically termed a revival of religion; that is, men are in the process of awakening, conviction, regeneration, and sanctification.†

in the blood of Christ, a firm confidence in God, and persuasion of his power; serene peace and steadfast tranquillity of mind, with a deliverance from every fleshly desire and from every outward and inward sin."

*Thomas Rutherford, in 1787, wrote thus to a friend in London: "I am sure you agree with me in believing that the late Mr. Fletcher was the holiest person you ever saw; the person who, above all others, excelled most in every grace; and yet he made no account of himself in anything. He was indeed 'clothed with humility.'" Thus Dr. Kirk to the last shrank from applying to himself the word "perfection."

See Appendix, IV.

† "Let

many sinners," says Dr. Barnes, "simultaneously turn to God; let conversions to Christ, instead of being few

But, as we have seen, there is called into exercise in each individual instance, and in the varied experiences of each person religiously affected, something

and far between, become numerous, rapidly occurring, and decided in their character, and you have all that is usually meant when we speak of revivals, so far as conversions are concerned. Still these are all individual conversions, accomplished in each case by the Holy Spirit, and in exact accordance with the design of the gospel. Each one is converted in the same way, by the same truth, by the same great agent, the Holy Spirit, as though he were alone, and not another mind been awakened or converted. It is the conversion of a number of individuals from sin to holiness and from Satan unto God. Look at the heavens in a clear night, and you will have an illustration of what we mean. The stars that are set in that broad zone of light which stretches over the firmament - the milky way—

are single stars, each subject to its own laws, moving in its own sphere, glorious, probably, in its own array of satellites; but their rays meet and mingle, not less beautiful because the light of millions is blended together. So in conversion from sin to God. Take the case of a single true conversion to God, and extend it to a community, to many individuals passing through that change, and you have all the theory of a revival of religion. It is bringing together many conversions; arresting simultaneously many minds; perhaps condensing into a single place, and into a few weeks, the ordinary work of many distant places and many years. The essential part is, that a sinner may be converted by the agency of the Spirit of God from his sins. The same power which changes him, may change others also. Let substantially the same views, and feelings, and changes which exist in the case of the individual exist in the case of others; let a deep seriousness pervade a community, and a spirit of prayer be diffused there; let the ordinary haunts of pleasure and vice be forsaken for the places of devotion, and you have the theory, so far as I know, of a revival of religion."

which is above and beyond the natural. Indeed, we thus are forced, independently and conjointly, to the same conclusion as that reached from the survey of religious revivals. The still broader generalization cannot well be denied that there will be found beneath every right spiritual renewal and improvement, whatever may be the involved conditions, the majestic presence and power of an Infinite Reformer.

The conclusions which modern science now compels the world to adopt are, that the apparent multiplicity of forces in the universe does not really exist, but that all forces, of whatever kind, are modifications of some one force which is the origin of all others; also that all these modifications of natural or physical force have their origin in the unknown. The Christian hypothesis is, that this unknown primal force is God; and that this Force, as discovered in the realm of spiritual experience, general or individual, is none other than the Third Personation of the adorable Trinity, which is called the Holy Ghost; is any other hypothesis as defencible?