Ess. XI.] SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE OF THE SPIRIT. 503

an advocacy not to be defeated, and of an intercession all-effectual for our help and salvation.

PART III.

ON THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE OF THE SPIRIT.

In the view which, in a former Essay, we took of mankind in their unregenerate condition, we traced the sure evidences both of their moral darkness and of their moral death. Man without grace (whether he is possessed of outward information or not) is, in the first place, devoid of any profitable, saving knowledge of God and his truth; and, in the second place, he is "alienated" by his wickedness from "the life of God;" and "dead in trespasses and sins."

Although, therefore, the Supreme Being has graciously provided for our indemnity through the sacrifice, and for our eternal happiness through the merits of his Son, it is nevertheless certain, that no man can be saved while he continues in his carnal state -in his original, fallen, condition. Those who are still sitting "in darkness and under the shadow of death," are destitute of all capacity for "the inheritance of the saints in light." Those whose spirits are defiled and polluted, and whose prevailing tendency is to wrath, malice, envy, lasciviousness, or covetousness, are even. here "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel," and unfit for all communion with their God and Father. Much less are they

504 OUR SANCTIFICATION INDISPENSABLE. [ESS. XI.

prepared to participate in the pure joys of the glorified church, in the society of just men made perfect, in the immediate presence of the Lamb, in the fulness of the love and glory of Jehovah.

These reflections may enable us to comprehend the emphatic doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christa doctrine of universal application to the fallen children of Adam-that "except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God:" that "except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Our Lord was pleased to follow up these memorable sayings with an explanatory declaration:-"That, "said he, "which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born. of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth so is every one that is born of the Spirit," John iii. 3, 5, 6-8. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh." The natural man does but produce the natural man, for no man can "bring a clean thing out of an unclean," Job xiv. 4; the son inherits the nature of his father; and from generation to generation are perpetuated (as all experience and history teach us) the infirmity and corruption of the human species. But there is provided for us, in the economy of the grace of God, an invisible, intangible, though not always imperceptible, influence-an illuminating, quickening principle, by which degenerate man is born a second time, morally changed, introduced to a new condition of life, and gradually restored to the image of his Creator.

Ess. XI.] THE GIFT OF THE SPIRIT.

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Now, respecting this enlightening and restoring principle, to the existence of which the Scriptures bear so full and frequent a testimony, it is necessary for us to lay down two primary positions; the first, that it is supernatural, and comes only from God; the second, that it is derived to us through that crucified Saviour, who is "the Way, the Truth, and the Life."

I. The Christian needs not to be reminded that all our possessions and all our powers are derived from the sole bounty of that almighty and most merciful Being who is the Author of every good and perfect gift; that it is he alone who bestows upon us those various bodily and mental endowments, by which we are qualified for occupying our own rank in the scale of creation. Nevertheless, between these endowments, such as the faculties of reason, reflection, memory, and speech; and the gift of the Holy Spirit, there is this essential distinction-that the former belong to the constitution of our nature, and, as such, are received by generation and inheritance; while the latter is a heavenly boon-freely offered indeed to all who are willing to receive it, and yet not inherent in our nature, but imparted supernaturally by the Lord of all things, when, where, and as he pleases.

Nothing is more clearly revealed in Holy Writ than that essential principle of our religion, that in us, that is to say, in our flesh (or natural man) "dwelleth no good thing;" that by grace we are saved through faith, and that not of ourselves, for it is "the gift of God;" that "it is God who worketh"

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THE GIFT OF THE SPIRIT.

[Ess. XI. in us "to will and to do of his good pleasure;" that the influence by which alone we are enabled to produce the acceptable fruits of righteousness is not of our spirit, but of the Spirit of JEHOVAH; that it is he who sheds that influence on his unworthy children, according to his sovereign will-his own free, unmerited, unrestricted mercy.

There is scarcely a passage in Scripture, relating to the Spirit, which may not be said to involve a proof of the absolute freedom and Divine origin of the gift of it. The subject is never treated of in the Bible on any other principle. Nevertheless, it may not be improper for us, in reference to the present point, to examine, first, the language of ancient Hebrew prophecy; and, secondly, some of the declarations of Jesus Christ and his apostles.

That the servants of God, before the coming of Christ, were the children of grace, and were actuated, in their life and conversation, by the Holy Spirit, is evident from the tenor of their history; and that many of them received those extraordinary spiritual endowments which fitted them for the peculiar of fice of prophets may be proved, not only by that history, but by the express doctrine of the apostle, that these "holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," 2 Pet. i. 21. But, among the prophecies which they were thus led to utter and to record, there are not a few from which we learn, that the dispensation of Christianity was to be attended by a yet more abundant and extensive effusion of the Spirit of God, both as the sanctifier of the souls of men, and as the imparter of those peculiar

Ess. XI.]

SUPERNATURAL.

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gifts which are directed to the establishment and enlargement of the church of God. And these promises were all issued in the name of our heavenly Father, who alone is described, by his inspired servants, as the author and dispenser of this sacred and powerful influence-a remark which applies, with equal exactness, to the spirit of grace and to the spirit of prophecy.

The former is promised, as the most conspicuous privilege of the Christian church, the children of Israel by faith, in the following memorable passage: "The palaces shall be forsaken: the multitude of the city shall be left," etc, etc.; (in other words, the church of God shall continue desolate) "until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest. Then judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness remain in the fruitful field. And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance for ever," Isa. xxxii. 14—17. It cannot, with any reason, be doubted that the application of this prophecy is to the times of the Messiah, which the ancient Hebrews were instructed to expect as the times of restoration; and soon afterwards, the same promise was repeated by the evangelical prophet, as follows: "Thus saith the Lord that made thee, and formed thee from the womb, which will help thee; Fear not, O Jacob my servant; and thou, Jesurun, whom I have chosen. For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my Spirit