can come unto me," said Christ, "unless the Father which hath sent me draw him." Again, it was the first great lesson taught by Jesus Christ whilst on earth to the Pharisee Nicodemus, that "that which is born of the flesh is flesh; while that only which is born of the Spirit can become spirit," or spiritual. But then the instrumentality, our books assert, has been provided, through Jesus, for the obtaining of that gift of the Spirit by them that ask it. For Jesus Christ, as there set forth, is not a mere wonderful departed prophet of 1800 years ago ;but a still living, loving, all-seeing, all-hearing Saviour, ever acting as Intercessor for us in the court of heaven; and there, with the plea of his blood shed on Calvary, ready to intercede on behalf of each earnest humble supplicant. To such, we read, the promises appertain : "Ask, and ye shall have. What man among you that is a father, if his child ask bread, will give him a stone? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?" And the actual experience of Christians of every age has set its seal to the truth of the promise.

So, in the first instance, it was with Jesus Christ's earliest disciples themselves. He drew them to Himself by his Spirit. He enlightened their eyes to see in Him the light of life. "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness," says St. Paul, "hath shined into our hearts, to give us the light of the knowledge of his glory, in the face of Jesus Christ." And the same was the experience of their converts from both Jews and Gentiles afterwards. "Our Gospel came not unto you only in word," says the same apostle, but in power, and with the Holy Ghost." "You that were dead in trespasses and sins yet now hath He quickened.” -Of which quickening, enlightening, and converting influences of God's Holy Spirit evidence blessed and unmistakeable was soon plainly seen in the happily changed lives and hopes of the converts. "Such were

some of you," said St. Paul to the Corinthians ;-so dark, so corrupt, so evil :-" but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." And again: "It bringeth forth fruit in you, even as in other converts, since the day ye heard it, and knew the grace of God in truth."

And so, indeed, it continues even to the present day. The evidence of the converting, enlightening, sanctifying, comforting power of God Almighty's Spirit is seen, as the Christian Gospel's accompaniment, wheresoever that Gospel is preached faithfully, and faithfully received :-alike in England, in America, in Africa, in India, in China, everywhere. It is the standing miracle of Christianity.-Blessed be God, the youngest, poorest, most illiterate, if real Christians, though not sufficiently intelligent to enter into the other evidences can yet well appreciate this evidence, and the strength, of it. "I know this, that, whereas I was blind, now I see."

Dear young friends, this is the choicest, sweetest evidence of all. Whichever else may seem hard to any of you fully to comprehend, may you possess this evidence of the renewed heart through Jesus! Then all will be well.

And now our imaginary Court breaks up. The Judgment has been pronounced. Alike the REASON, the CONSCIENCE, and the HEART, concur in it. And the judgment is this:-"That the evidences for the truth and divine origin of Christianity are irrefragable and complete. Alike the Historical, Prophetical, Moral, Experimental Evidences unite, as with a fourfold ever intertwining chain, to enwrap and prove it."

Thus, my young friends, you see that the baptismal blessings, of which I spoke in my third Lecture, are what you may fully and unhesitatingly rely on, as offered you, albeit conditionally, by God Himself.-Moreover,

adverting to the three conditions which are required of the baptized, in order to the personal appropriation of the blessings,-conditions which we may briefly designate as those of believing, renouncing, fulfilling,—there need be no hesitation, you must now see, in accepting and subscribing to the first, viz. that of believing all the articles of the Christian faith; in so far, at least, as regards belief from conviction of their truth.—On the two other required conditions of renouncing and fulfilling, I shall hope to address you in my next Lecture.

Meanwhile, I cannot dismiss the subject of the Christian Evidences (now almost more than ever an important one) without three words of advice connected with them.

Ist, Never let anything, or any one, induce you to forget the indissoluble union together of all the four kinds of evidence:-the moral intertwining with the historical and prophetic; and the experimental (in the case of true spiritual disciples of Jesus) with each and all of the other three.

2ndly, Do not be surprised, or daunted, if here and there a difficulty occur on one or another minor point of Christian faith, which you are yourselves unable to solve. This is quite to be expected by finite creatures, like men, when dealing with questions which concern the infinite God. I shall have to say something on this point, when treating in my next Lecture of unbelief, as one of the works of the Devil.

3rdly, As you take a comprehensive view, looking back, of the subjects we have been considering, mark and admire the grandeur of that scheme of salvation of fallen man through Jesus Christ, thus unfolded, as reaching in God's counsels from eternity past to the eternity still future: and the manner in which the Divine attributes,-alike his justice, holiness, mercy, love, truth,-shine forth all-gloriously in it; just like the solar rays in the rainbow, which, with its beauteous

arch, spans from northern to southern horizon the vault of heaven. Here is in itself a fresh and crowning evidence of the truth and divine origin of Christianity. For God, from his very nature, must ever seek his own glory. And in Christianity, so as in nothing else conceivable, is all this his glory made consistently to shine forth.

LECTURE VI.

ON THE RENOUNCING AND FULFILLING CONDITIONS REQUIRED IN CHRISTIAN BAPTISM.

IN

N the two preceding Lectures it was my object to set before you a brief sketch of the several evidences, historical, prophetical, moral, and experimental, which all combine together in proof of the truth and divine origin of Christianity. We supposed those three several discriminating faculties which God has given to man, of the Reason, the Conscience, and the Heart, to have been seated as it were on the judgmentseat in a Court of Inquiry into the great question; and saw it to be the clear decided judgment of each and all, after most careful examination of the evidence in every the most characteristic point of view, that the religion of Jesus Christ, and that religion exclusively and alone, had stamped upon it indubitable marks of being indeed from God.

And hence it resulted that there need be no hesitation whatsoever on your part in subscribing to one particular condition, out of the three promised for you by sponsors at your baptism; viz., that of your believing all the articles (well summed up in the Apostles' Creed) of the Christian faith; in so far at least as regards a theoretic intellectual belief of them. "The proof," you will doubtless have thought, "is complete; and how then can we help believing them?" Moreover, if there then came up before the mind that further and very important consideration, that it is not a mere theoretic intellectual belief that is here sufficient, (so as it is in