is uncertain and limited, admits of the strongest proof that can be afforded by experience. Its effect on the discoverers themselves, on the very minds in which the image of virtue has been generated, is, if history speak true, highly problematical. What trust, therefore, can be placed in these means for the renewing of men's minds in general? Or is it not evident, from this consideration, that the light and heat necessary to the success of such a process must be diffused from a source sufficiently elevated to reach, in its descent and re-ascension, intellects of every class, and however numerous or widely separated? And in what can such a source of illumination exist, except in a divine religion, which having for its substance and object the attributes of God, can never fail in the necessary qualities demanded by an active faith? Christianity not only answers to this; it reaches the remotest wish of human nature, considered in its primary principles; and is, therefore, intimately connected, not only with the highest and grandest qualities of the soul, developed in the workings of pure reason, but with the simple yearnings of sympathy, and every movement of the heart. In the mythological religions, whatever was essentially human had its god; but there is nothing in human passion by which it can dignify or give beauty or interest to itself: whenever passion has a true natural charm or grace, it derives that ornament

But

from the corresponding intellectual movement, or from a principle of our being higher and nobler than itself: but where a deity is supposed to exist as the source of that passion, it is itself the thing worshipped as the highest good, and presents its claim to obedience as an isolated power of nature. In the revolution which Christianity has caused in our systems of philosophy and ethics, every passion has its proper laws, and its corresponding spiritual sentiment. Thus nature becomes dignified by a constant appeal to the fountain-head of good; and that which would be doomed to darkness and corruption, were it left to itself, is endued with a lustre pure and bright as that which shines in the innermost recesses of the soul. To every point, therefore, which respects the happiness or improvement of man, and which might be made the subject of philosophical discourse, the religion of Christianity looks with loving and grave attention: nothing is omitted; nothing forgotten which concerns us: it breathes throughout the tender, cautious, and comprehensive wisdom of perfect benevolence; and that which it offers to effect it has effected, and is still effecting for thousands in every quarter of the globe.

The evidence of the truth of Christ's resurrection, or of the divine origin of the religion itself, is in one respect peculiar. Enough is done for the conviction of the understanding when the same degree of

proof, proportionable to its importance, is brought for the truth of our faith, as is required for the establishment of any other system on which our safety or happiness depends. But it so happens, that the allowed conviction of the understanding is in this instance not sufficient to bring into willing subjection the whole spiritual being. Something is still wanting to leave the inner man without excuse for resistance; and reason having conquered the difficulties of the general inquiry, as the subject of historical evidence, or comparison of principles, demands of the soul why it does not yield at once to the palpable force of its deductions. The explanation of the mystery may perhaps be found in this, that as truth is certainly not limited by the power of the observer, so, while the understanding is satisfied as to that which comes immediately under observation, there may be a vast body of truth lying far out of the reach of simple historical evidence, and claiming the assent of the mind, not on the strength or correspondence of certain facts, but on the existence and everlasting operation of spiritual principles. When truth has especial relation to these, if the higher faculties of the soul remain unexerted or unsatisfied, truth is not apprehended, the evidence proper to it in this respect is not applied, and no conviction consequently is felt or acknowledged. Now religion, in all its forms, has a large portion of its evidence lying beyond the

province of historical, or mere argumentative, so far as it is verbal, proof: and Christianity does by its very nature declare this, and claims of believers, in plain and distinct language, a species of assent for which the understanding, satisfied of the historical verity, cannot lay foundations sufficiently deep or extensive. The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,' is the summing up of a statement which sets this matter in the clearest light. 'My speech and my preaching,' says the messenger of God, was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect; yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought; but we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: which none of the princes of this world knew, for had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory. But, as it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in

him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things which are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.'1

In this passage we find the most explicit account of the nature of Christian evidence, as soon as it has passed the limit of historical testimony, and enters upon that grand and infinitely more extensive province in which it appeals to the internal nature of man, and to the capabilities of his spirit for converse with the prime and essential Author of truth. Nor is it a portion of Scripture seized upon as a passage fortunately discovered among the mass of evangelical revelations, a passage distinguished from, or remarkable when compared with, the rest : the sentiments it imparts are a portion of the general sentiment of the religion; deprived of which its different doctrines would want harmony among each other, and applicability, because of

11 Cor. ii. 4-14.