as to adminifter fuel to the flame of enthufiafm, or to afford a convenient cloke to diforder and licentioufnefs. The fchifmatic fanctifies his breach of conftituted order, his disobedience of eftablifhed laws, his licentioufnefs of principle in religious concerns, and his correfpondent licentioufnefs of practice, whereby he converts the Church of Chrift into a fcene of difcord, tumult, and confufion, by pleading that he acts under the guidance of the Holy Spirit: and becaufe we deny the fufficiency of an appeal to the inward motions of the Spirit, and refer to the revelation of his will contained in his written word; and becaufe the more fober notions of his influence, which that word appears to us to fupply, do not carry us the fame length as the unbridled conceptions of the enthufiaft; we are calumniated, as facrificing the truth of God at the idolatrous fhrine of human learning or human prefumption; as being ourfelves deftitate of the Spirit, and as renouncing the Gofpel, of Christ.

Convinced of the perpetual operation of the Holly Spirit on the hearts of believers; contemplating him, with lowly devout and grateful adoration, as the Regenerator, the Renewer, the Guide, the Enlightener, the Strengthener, the Comforter, and the Sanctifier of all the elect people of God; firmly perfuaded of thefe important truths, as moft evidently re

vealed in Scripture, and as forming an effential part of the scheme of our redemption; I can unite with the moft ardent advocate for divine grace in loudly proclaiming, that "the "Holy Ghoft, like his almighty Purchafer, is "the fame to-day as he was yesterday; that "he is now, as well as formerly, in the use of "all inftituted means, appointed to convince "the world of fin, of righteousness, and judg"ment; to lead them into all truth by fpiritu"ally opening their understandings, that they 66 may understand the Scriptures; and to renew a clean heart and right fpirit within them "here, in order that they may be thereby "prepared for the full enjoyment of a triune " and ever bleffed God hereafter d." But convinced at the fame time, with our pure and evangelical Church, that we may "abuse the

goodness of God, when he calleth us to re"pentance," and that we may "depart from

grace given, and fall into fin;" and further convinced with her, that "the inward motions "of the Holy Ghoft" in our hearts are an object lefs of fenfe than of faith, lefs of certainty than of "truft';" I fee not on what authority

• Whitefield's Works, vol. iv. p. 287.

• Commination Service.

f Article 16.

* See the Ordering of Deacons.

we are required, either to believe ourselves, or to teach others, that his ordinary operations on the minds of men have that irrefiftible, or that fenfible, influence, which are wont to be afcribed to them by thofe, who accufe us of not preaching the Gofpel.

There is much found fenfe in the obfervation of an acute Remarker on Ecclefiaftical Hiftory, and the times, wherein we live, fully prove the importance and the value of the obfervation, that "whilft we acknowledge the "gracious influences of Providence in every

thing, that tends to make us better and "wifer and happier, we must be very care "ful to keep the fober mean between the ex"tremes, the one of excluding the divine in"terpofition in the natural and moral world; "the other of deftroying human agency, or of

66

afcribing the wild fancies of our own heads "to the fuggeftions of the Holy Spirit"." Whether this fober mean is observed by thofe, who with the Calvinist attribute every thing in the work of man's falvation to the exclufive and irresistible energy of the divine grace; or by thofe, who with the Enthusiast are for refolving his influence into fenfible manifeftations, and experiences, to the neglect, if not to the exclufion, of all other rules of judging; is a

Jortin on Ecclefiaftical History, vol. ii. p. 26.

queftion which the prefent inquiry will probably tend to answer.

I. On the irrefiftibility of the divine grace our accufers fpeak in the strongest terms. The fact, I apprehend, is notorious; but it may be well to establish it by the adduction of particular proofs. They tell us then, that "divine grace proceeds efficaciously and cer"tainly to the attainment of its endi:”—that "its impulfes are strong, and can by no means "be refifted."-that " God himself had need "to draw with omnipotent efficacy, to draw 66 us off from the world and fin and self, that

we may come fincerely and eagerly to "Chrift"-that "converting grace is irrefiftible, that is, efficacious, invincible, and "certainly victorious":"-that "the finner in "vain ftrives to refift the refiftlefs grace of "God":"-that "there proceeds from God

an efficacious power, which fweetly over"rules the finner's natural will:"-that " nei"ther evidences the most confpicuous and "multiplied, nor arguments the most powerful "and convincing, nor demonftration itself,

Chriftian Obferver, Jan. 1806, p. 34. *Whitefield's Works, vol. vi. p. 280. 'Evangelical Magazine, April 180s. p. 153. Toplady; Church of England vindicated, p. 78. Rowland Hill's Sermon on Sunday Schools, p. 26,

? Whitefield's Works, vol. vi. p. 54.

66

66

can produce faith, which is a divine work,

a

creation in the heart by the Spirit of "Chrift :"-that "the elect shall come to "God, and if they themselves will not, the "Lord will make them willing in the day of "his power":"—that " believers are constrain"ed by a powerful and irresistible influence :" -and that "it is only fovereign, diftinguish

66

ing, irresistible grace, which brings men to "heaven."

To meet these and fimilar positions, which are frequent in the mouths of our accufers, we may, in the first place, proceed upon the ground of thofe general arguments, which prove the election of men to be conditional. In proof of that doctrine we maintain, that "Chrift died for all men," in the plain, and obvious, and large fignification of the phrafe; —that falvation is proffered to all men;-that "the grace of God, that bringeth falvation," the faving grace of God, ἡ χαρις του Θεου ἡ σωτη "hath appeared to all men." But, if the faving grace of God hath appeared to all men, and if all men notwithstanding are not faved, (a fuppofition, which is too well fupported by

Evangelical Magazine for 1807. p. 81.

↑ Hawker's Prop against all Despair. • Whitefield's Works, vol. i. p. 182. Tit. ii. 11.