entitled to the privileges of the gospel, or that the followers of Jesus began to be distinguished from other Jews by the name, by which they are now every where known. Down to this period, therefore, the believers, or the saints, as they were generally called, cannot be regarded in any other light than as a sect of reformed Jews.

Hence it is obvious, that the conversion of the five thousand, of which I am now speaking, bore, but little resemblance to conversions which take place at the present day, when the vicious or worldly, or indifferent are awakened and reclaimed. Most of the converts were probably made from among the honest and devout Jews, who did not consider themselves as called upon to renounce the faith of their fathers, but only to embrace the new and more spiritual views, which Christ, as a divinely inspired Teacher and Reformer had found in that faith, and inculcated as a part of it, or at least as new developments of it. They were not converted for the first time to religion in general, nor yet to a new religion; but only to new views of the religion in which they had been educated, and which they conceived fidelity to that religion required them to embrace, and to eadeavor to propagate. At the time of which I am now speaking not one among the five thousand had any notion, we may presume, of Christianity considered as a distinct religion from Judaism, nor of Christianity considered as the universal religion which it afterwards became, when more fully developed and understood. To confirm the position here taken I may observe, that after the lines between Judaism and Christianity had become more distinctly drawn, the

conversions effected by the preaching and miracles of the same apostles, as might have been expected, were incomparably less frequent.

3. We have now seen that the five thousand were converted from a state of mind, in which they were already disposed to favor the rising sect; and again, that they were converted to a state of mind, in which they had as yet but very partial and inadequate conceptions of the opening and expanding genius of Christianity. It is plain, therefore, that the change was neither so sudden, nor so great as is sometimes supposed by the careless or superficial reader. It only remains for us to inquire by what means this change was effected. What, under God, was its efficient and proximate cause?

If any one should say, that the five thousand were converted by an effusion of the holy spirit, he cannot, it would seem, have read his Bible with much care. Our Lord, after speaking of his approaching death, to sustain the drooping courage of his followers, had assured them that, after he should be taken away, God would give them another Comforter, the Spirit of Truth; meaning thereby the extraordinary and supernatural endowments with which the first Christians began to be clothed at the Feast of Pentecost. Accordingly we find, in the Acts of the Apostles, that the spirit in all cases was poured out on those who were already converted, and never on the unconverted. Not a single instance can be adduced of an effusion of the spirit on the unconverted as a means of converting them. It was every where regarded as the privilege of those who had been converted, or sometimes perhaps as the

test or seal of conversion; but never as its means, as its efficient proximate cause. Those who will make this plain and obvious distinction, must perceive how little authority can be derived from the conversion of the five thousand for believing, that a general awakening at the present day is produced by a special outpouring of the holy spirit. This may be the language of modern books, and modern sermons, and modern prayers; but it is not the language of the New Tes

tament.

The conversion of the five thousand, according to the Scriptures, was effected, under God, by the discourses and miracles of the Apostles. When we speak of the discourses of the Apostles, however, we should remember that they did not owe their wonderful effect, like modern preaching, to a display of learning, or argument, or rhetoric. They consisted, for the most part, in a simple and plain statement of facts; that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah; that he had come to set up a spiritual throne in the hearts of men, that he had risen from the dead, and passed into the holy heavens, to be our advocate with the Father. The serious and careful reader of the book of the Acts. can hardly help noticing, that in most cases the Apostles do not appear to stand up as the advocates, but only as the witnesses of the Christian revelation. This testimony, however, would have availed them but little, comparatively, if it had not been accompanied, as it was, by a divine attestation in the miracles, which they wrought in the presence of the multitude. When the conscientious and devout Jew heard their solemn asseverations, and saw also in their mighty works that God

was with them, he could not but believe. This single circumstance shows how little resemblance there is, or can be between the means, by which the five thousand were converted, and those by which conversions are to be effected at the present day. Who, at the present day, will pretend, that he can bear testimony, as the Apostles did, as an eyewitness to the facts of the gospel, or that he is clothed like them, with supernatural powers?

After what has been said, we must not think to reason from the conversion of the five thousand to the religious excitements, awakenings, or revivals of modern times. As we have seen, the change produced at the present day, when the vicious, the worldly, or the indifferent are converted to truth and holiness, is an essentially different change from that which took place in the mind of the conscientious and devout Jew, when he joined himself to the company of believers. The means too, employed in producing the change, in the two cases here supposed must be regarded, as we have also seen, as essentially different. Whoever therefore appeals to the conduct and success of the Apostles, as recorded in the Acts, as authority for attempting to get up, at the present day, a general and passionate excitement on the subject of religion, exposes himself to the imputation of handling the word of God deceitfully.

At the same time, there is a true and important inference to be drawn from the conversion of the five thousand, materially affecting the credit and authority of the gospel. There was nothing, as we have seen, in the discourses of the Apostles to give them the effect

UNITARIANISM ADAPTED TO PRODUCE ZEAL. 71

which we know they had, except on the supposition that they were really accompanied, as we are told, by a display of divine power. We find, therefore, in the simple narration of the wonderful success which attended the Apostles' preaching, the strongest possible circumstantial evidence for the truth of the miracles said to have been wrought by their hands. And, admitting the truth of these miracles, we can no longer doubt that these holy men spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. J. W.

UNITARIANISM ADAPTED TO PRODUCE ZEAL.

It is sometimes urged ihat the doctrines held by liberal Christians cannot be true, since they awaken so little zeal. Are then all systems and all doctrines which either do or have awakened zeal, to be therefore esteemed sound? Assume this principle, and there is no limit to the follies and the iniquities to which you give countenance. The mere love of distinction, power, praise, who can tell the ardent and desperate efforts it may occasion? Not unfrequently too, the more men suspect the soundness of an opinion, held perhaps for its antiquity alone, or for the interest they have in its support, so much the more earnest do they become in defence of it. Conscious truth is usually of a calm and noiseless habit. Conscious truth is unpretending and quiet. It prefers a steady, although a silent motion, to the starts and excesses which attend