ing, enlightening, and bringing forth the fruits of obedience in me? It is the power of the truth in the heart alone, that will make us cleave to it indeed in an hour of temptation. Let us not then think that we are any thing the better for our conviction of the great doctrines of the gospel, unless we have a continual experience of their necessity and excellency in our standing before God, and our communion with him.'

When shall we rise to those higher regions of Christianity, that purer and better air of Christian faith, and hope, and love, in which some of God's favored servants have lived-like Enoch walking with God; or like Paul saying, I will very gladly spend and be spent for you, though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved?

The conflict with a man's own corruptions is one step towards this. When daily struggling with the power of inward sin, and humbled to the dust under the continual rebuffs of Satan, when sensible that there is an inward scene of abominations which man beholds not, but God beholds; who can be severe against his neighbor? Leighton well speaks of one useful controversy or dispute, one sort of war, most noble in its nature, and most worthy of a Christian, and this not to be carried on against enemies at a great distance, but such as are bred within our own breasts; against these it is most reasonable to wage an endless war, and them it is our duty to persecute to death.'

A view of the glory of the Saviour is another step towards that holy and heavenly spirit. The Church cannot be united till, like the inhabitants above, we behold his glory, as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth; and thence, filled with love and admiration, aim at this one object, the advancement of his honor, and the exaltation of His name.

CHAPTER VIII.

1

THE DANGERS CONNECTED WITH STUDIES.

THERE may be some ready at first to think that there is little need to dwell on this point, and that we should rather urge the indolent to active study, than warn men of the dangers of study. But the address made by the prophet Isaiah to Babylon of old, is still too applicable in our day-Thy wisdom and thy knowledge, it hath perverted thee; and thou hast said in thine heart, I am, and there is none besides me. And it must be admitted that wicked men, the more learning_they have, are the more dangerous to the truth. Their abuse of knowledge has led pious men to undervalue learning, as if it was the cause of this evil, and the acquired knowledge was to blame for the moral depravity; but it may effectually guard against such errors to look at the extensive usefulness of a Hooker, an Usher, a Hall, or a Beveridge, in the Church of England; an Owen, a Charnock, a Howe, and an Edwards, among those of another communion.

Yet are there real dangers encompassing and surrounding every human attainment, and our corruption breaks forth amidst all that which should restrain it. We see immense learning in many Romanists, such as Bellarmine and others, and all their talents and learning perverted to the maintenance of fundamental errors. We see learning without piety extensively injurious; puffing up its possessor with intolerable pride, and leading him to the haughty and disdainful contempt of all who have not similar learned acquirements.

But let us notice more distinctly some of the dangers of study.

The first that may be mentioned is FORMING OUR

RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS FROM OUR OWN REASONING

POWERS, rather than from the divine record. Truths, we are tempted to think, are to be made out by argument, by intellect, by the powers of the mind, and by human literature. Like our first parents, we are seeking divine wisdom independently of God. Let these controlling thoughts reign over and regulate our studies: God only can teach the things of God; He teaches in His word, and under the guidance of His Holy Spirit; every thing must be subject to that word, and every thought brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. Nothing whatever that is human will stand against His word; nor will our own notions in the least help us when we appear before Him, and have to give account how far we have believed and acted according to that word. The love of our own sentiments, because they are our own, seeking to display our skill rather than to exercise holy feelings, and the desire to maintain sentiments which have been once, and perhaps without due premeditation, avowed, have led to much mischief. Beware of your own particular views, and especially of an early declaration of them. There is also another view in which we may regard this danger when we receive things only as we can comprehend them by reason. We may see to what an awful extent this has been carried among the Neologians on the continent, who, aiming to subject every part of revelation to their own vain conceptions of what is right and wrong, enter into the very regions of infidelity. But there is a serious degree of the same evil among professing Christians. Every thing is with some to be so made out by reason, that no room is left for faith in the promises. They will go as far as their reason will carry them, but they hesitate where something above reason is to be received. Now though God's service is in the highest degree a reasonable service, yet the very peculiarity of Christianity is faith in the promise. This made the whole army of be

lievers (Heb. xi.) so triumphant; this carried the apostles and the Reformers through difficulties insurmountable to reason; and only as we live by faith, and above the scanty reach of this world's wisdom, are we genuine Christians, glorifying God, and advancing the gospel.

2. A similar danger to the one last mentioned is

TAKING OUR SENTIMENTS MERELY FROM HUMAN

AUTHORS: we say merely, for there is a just respect due to human authority. Parents must teach their children the first principles of religion; ministers must teach their people the gospel of Christ; and children and people should hear with meekness and submission the word of truth. But Christian parents and faithful teachers will be anxious in every truth which they teach, to bring before those whom they instruct the only sure foundation of truth, the word of God; and to tell them, "Take it not on my word, but on the word of Him who is my Teacher and my Father, as well as yours;" this will give its just strength to religious truth, and lay a foundation that will support the soul amid all the shakings and storms of this life. Too generally, however, we are leaning, not on Jehovah and His truth, but on man and his opinions; and the turning point in our minds is, not the overwhelming testimony of the sacred, word, after a due search of that word, but the weight of human testimony, and so human writings thrust out the divine record. Luther 'expressed his fear even in his day of too great a multiplication of books that as fathers, councils, and doctors had superseded the apostles, so it should be again; and he modestly said he wished his own books to last only for the age in which they were written, and which they might serve; believing that God would give to succeeding ages their own laborers, as he had always heretofore done.*

See Scott's Continuation, Vol. i, p. 242.

It marks a tendency to this danger, when Christians are too much afraid of men of this world's literature, and pay too much court to them, and speak too highly of them, as if men greatly skilled in human learning were, on that account alone, to have great deference shown to them in religion. If nationally God addressed his people, I have raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece;' the day too will come, when spiritually it will be seen, that to be a member of Zion, to receive the lively oracles, to know and love God, is infinitely superior to all the acquirements of classical literature, and all the arts and sciences of the world.

3. IMPROPER MOTIVES FOR STUDY are very common. Some will read to pass away the time; others to be able to talk of a book; others to gain admiration by criticising it; others because they shall be thought ignorant if they have not read it. There are those who will read for the very purpose of finding fault and cavilling. What spiritual profit can be expected from books which are read from these motives! How can improvement be reaped when it was not even thought of, or sought for! The mere acquisition of knowledge, for the pleasure which it gives, or for the superiority which it confers, is not that Christian motive from which we should pursue our studies. The Rev. Mr. Adam forcibly observes, Reading is for the most part only a more refined species of sensuality, and answers man's purpose of shuffling off his great work with God and himself, as well as a ball or a masquerade. Our chief motives should be of a far higher kind: to know that we may do the will of God: to be better fitted for serving him and our fellow creatures here; and better prepared for the everlasting state on which we

are so soon to enter.

4. MISDIRECTION IN STUDY is very serious danger. When first a thirst of knowledge is excited in the mind, it is immensely important to be directed aright. If misdirected, or if following only accidental