words that burn, and we light in the bosom a fire that can be quenched only by gross ingratitude, heedlessness, contempt, or violent resistance, in the person addressed.

If we can put forth our own agency, and exercise our own influences, in a manner which we do not understand, how possible, and how probable, and how real is it that "the way of the Spirit" may be far beyond the reach of our penetration. The manner in which the words of life convey the "kindling powers" of the Spirit is, to us, incomprehensible. In nature we have the same difficulty. Rays of light are perfectly distinct from the heat which they convey: how they convey and bear along with them the heat-and how they can be continued or refracted, and their heat stopped and quenched, is an everyday circumstance that utterly baffles our speculations. And if we could ascertain this, the problem what heat itself is, would still remain. As we cannot distinguish the heat from the physical operations of the rays, so we cannot separate between the influences of the Spirit, and the ordinary exercise of our own faculties, and of the powers of natural conscience. We only know that if there were no Holy Spirit, our own energies would neither conceive nor accomplish such effects. We only know of heat in the ray, by the effects which nothing but heat could produce; and we are sure of the presence of Divine influence by the results, which nothing but the Holy Spirit could accomplish. It is not the emotion in the mind, but the effects and results of the emotion on the soul, that prove it to be the operation of the Holy Spirit. The cautions and warnings, therefore, against quenching the Spirit teach us, neither to quell these emotions in our minds, nor to suppress their results on our temper and character.

The powerful influences which produce these emotions are always supposed to be under the control of man. Like the hallowed flame on the altar, this fire is first enkindled from heaven, but it is fed, perpetuated, stirred up, and increased, or quenched, by the agency of man.

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I. The emotions produced by the influences of the Holy Spirit are quenched, by slighting or neglecting the means calculated to cherish and foster them.

The influences of the Spirit are in the word and in the means of grace. When we neglect attendance on the word; when we do not read it in the spirit in which it is written; when we do not study it for the ends which it was given to accomplish, we suppress the development of Divine influences, as we would extinguish a lamp by withholding the supply of oil, or quench a fire by not furnishing the necessary fuel. When we separate prayer from the use of means, or sever docility from prayer; when we withdraw our profound regard and veneration from the truths and ordinances of the gospel; and when we shrink from

the suspicion of our being affected by impressions from God, we as effectually stifle the emotions of the Spirit, as we put out a fire by scattering asunder burning coals, or withdrawing the aliments already heaped on it for its continuance. An enga gedness of heart in worldly pursuits, and a devotedness of mind to temporal speculation, and a bustling activity in harassing anxieties, dispose the soul to an utter neglect of the warm and glowing emotions of religious fervour; just as the busy individual allows his fire to become extinct, because he has something else to do than attending to cherish it. In men of worldly minds this is to be expected, but in christians it is a sacrilegious outrage. Christians are the priests of the Most High God, and to feed and preserve the hallowed fire of his Spirit, is their fixed, and determinate-it is their unique business, to which every other employ should be subordinate, and with which no other work should interferc. The mental temper which has with fatal certainty extinguished holy emotions in thousands and millions, is a morbid and fanatic expectation of finding in the real influences of the Holy Spirit, some more rushing energy, more penetrating force, more overpowering seizure, and more vehement glowings than they have yet discovered. They know that the influences of the Spirit are a kindling light, but they are waiting for a glaring blaze; instead of fire, they are looking for a conflagration; and instead of a gentle glow of a permeating heat, they expect the Spirit to affect them with the thundering shocks of a volcano, or the irresistible percussion of lightning. In the frenzied and groundless hope of meeting with these overwhelming energies, they give no heed to the genial strivings of Divine influences with their hearts; and the small but bright scintillations produced by the collision of truth upon their consciences, they neglect, and allow through their habitual delays and procrastinations, to expire and vanish. The man who neglects the seed, is not likely to have a harvest suddenly lavished on him. The man who treats with contempt a small favour from his prince, cannot calculate on a more splendid largess. Oh! when will sinners feel, and when will the church teach the world to think, that to trifle with the incipient and tender influences of the IIoly Spirit, is not the way to bring down the burning flame that shall at once consume "the living sacrifices" of God?

II. The tendencies and operations of Divine influences on the mind are suppressed, by employing means which are not ad-apted for their development, and which are unlikely to sustain and continue them.

Fire will develope its energies only according to settled laws, and fixed combinations. If from ignorance, or fancy, or caprice, we attempt to maintain and perpetuate it by improper means, we shall inevitably quench it. We may as well expect emo

tions of fervid piety to be maintained by unsuitable and incongruous means, as that we should preserve a fire by heaping on it blocks of ice, or sustain the flame of a lamp by a supply of water. Those who neglect, or make a wrong use of gracious influences, choke and suppress their holy operations. They may come to the means too late, they may wish to direct Divine influences in inconsistent relations, or they themselves may be in a condition unsuited to their manifestations. It is thus a remedy loses its influence, or exerts no influence, on a disorder in a given state of virulency. It is not meant that the influence of the medicine has been really exhausted, or extracted out of it; but the discase has reached such a state as to reject its operations. Thus also a reason, an argument, a motive that was wont to have a powerful influence on the mind, has, by love of sin, dislike of restraint, and frequent trifling, lost all power on the hardened and obdurate. The argument or motive itself has all the virtue and force which it used to have, but is now of no avail to a mind in such a state, and should the man, in such a state of remorse, recur again to this motive, it would probably exert no influence on him. In a northern latitude a

palace of ice was once erected. It was perfectly comfortless, without heat. When fire so evidently louged for was introduced, it was extinguished, because it was foolishly wished that the fire would radiate its influence without destroying the ice. The inmates wished to be warm, and yet retain their palace. The sinner wishes in the same manner to find genial influences, that will save him without dissolving his heart, or melting away his beloved sins; he wishes divine influences to save him from drunkenness, without removing the cup of intoxication; and from covetousness, without diminishing his dishonest gains. wants these influences to operate in such a way, as must counteract the established relations and tendencies of the very influences themselves. It is no wonder, then, that he does not discover such influences as he fondly expected. The influences to save him were really present; but if they developed and radiated themselves, they must destroy his sin; and because they tend to do this, he becomes maddened, stifles their operations, and does despite to the Spirit of grace.

He

III. Men quench the influences of the Spirit, by voluntarily and designedly opposing their operations, and checking

their tendencies.

The man who stifles his religious convictions, and suppresses his holy emotions, quenches the influences of the Spirit, as a man quenches fire by not allowing it vent, free access of air, and range of play, or by choking it with a damper. The man who covers his religion with indolence, formality, fashion, and state, quenches it as effectually as another extinguishes fire by keeping on it earth and ashes. There are many painful instan

ces, in which heavenly affections have been allowed to expire, by the influence of dazzling prosperity, pomp, and power, as the domestic fire dies in the overpowering glare and lustre of the sun's rays. Others quench the Spirit, by presenting against his influences elements directly opposite to their tendencies, and surely destructive to their operations; such in a church, are the waters of strife, envy, contention, pride, levity, doctrinal error, and superstitious ceremony.

The complete control which man can exercise over divine influences, may be instanced in the fall of Adam, and in the abuse of miraculous gifts. Divine influences were in their fullest and freest energy in Adam; but that they were under his control and susceptible of resistance, is evident from a fact that has stunned our whole nature-miraculous influences are the energies of the infinite and omnipotent God; but even these were under the control of man.

The influences of an infinite Being are not necessarily infinite in their exercise, for, evidently, the energies of an omnipotent Being are not in their phenomena necessarily omnipotent. God himself is omnipotent, but his influence and energies in their exercise and operation are not omnipotent. They are not omnipotent for this immoveable reason, that God himself has set a LIMIT to their exercise. Is his influence in the bud of a rose, in the growth of an oak, or the movement of an insect, omnipotent? Even the mighty influences which he issues from his throne to renew the face of the earth, are controlled by man, and are constantly neglected and avoided, or perverted and abused. In resisting gracious influences, man opposes the measure that is in a given truth, or a given number of truths. The influences of God in the truth, are like his influences in the Universe-infinite and omnipotent in some respects, but limited and gentle and pliant in all the relations in which we can discover and use them; and certainly gentle and mild where they appear necessary for the use and the improvement of man. Man cannot annihilate one of them, but he can resist each and all of them, though, in some instances, at his immense and stupendous peril.

Experience teaches us that, with some influences, it is infinitely more dangerous to trifle than with others; and the Scripture revelation informs us, that most of all it is perilous to trifle and dally with saving influences. Picture to yourself on the strand of a river, where there is a crowd of benevolent men employing all their skill in attempts to restore the suspended animation in a man just discovered drowned. The current of breathing life is just returning, and the bosom begins to heave with its animating swell, and as the resuscitated man is in the act of respiration, one of the bystanders rushes forward and with rude hands covers the face of the patient, stops his breath,

and extinguishes the restored impulse of life. A shock of extreme horror convulses the whole multitude, and fearful shrieks of terrible dismay express their abhorrence and indignation. Is it possible to conceive a spectacle more appalling than this? Yes, there is another. Suppose, that while the benevolent individuals employed in the measures of resuscitation were, with intense anxiety, watching for the signs of life, and when their generous hearts beat high with the appearances of reanimation, and when the patient himself was fast awaking to a consciousness of the glowing powers of life, he, himself, in a moment, madly stifled the commencing inspiration, and quenched the kindling spark. All stand aghast, all are stunned,and all become petrified by a deed of such frantic atrocity. But imagine the compassionate men again to repeat their measures, and again to succeed; and again the stirrings of life to be strangled by the patient himself. Yet, in the moral world, such appalling atrocities repeated over and over again, are but faint illustrations of the part which the obdurate sinner is acting, every time he feels the force of truth; the same is the part which every church is acting, when its inconsistencies damp the convictions of a young convert, and when its formality suppresses the operations of religious revivals.

In the process of resuscitation, we think any signs of life better than death; and even the most convulsive and irregular movements of the limbs are deemed far better than the most decent and garnished 'laying out' of a corpse. We seem to think otherwise in religion. We seem afraid of life, lest there should be an irregular and disorderly action. Hence the alarm at the stirrings of a revival. Revivals will indeed disturb, but they will disturb nothing except the studied and factitious regularity of what is dead. Jesus Christ never intended that his church should attract the attention of the world by a pomp of lying-instate. Should revivals in the church disturb some orderly ceremonials which have been decreed by worldly fashion, throw into confusion the flowers aud herbs that bedeck the shroud, and chasten the odours of death, and even burst her perfumed cerements, and shatter the wood and the lead which confine her for burial, it were ño sad event: the world would not be worse. The wilderness and the solitary place would be glad for it, and the desert would rejoice and blossom as the rose. Oh glorious hour! thrice hail the welcome day! "Awake, awake, put on thy strength O Zion! put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city! For henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself from the dust: arise and sit down, O Jerusalem! loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion."