truth and grace;" these he is said to receive; not as if he had them not before, but because they are peculiarly the things of Christ; and it is added, "He shall shew them to you." He shewed the apostles his truth, by immediate revelation; enabling them infallibly to understand and declare the whole counsel of God; and he still continues to shew to all believers the truth of Christ by the word, as written and preached; instructing us in it, and enlightening our minds spiritually to understand the mind of God in it; and his grace he shewed, by pouring out his sanctifying graces and extraordinary gifts upon the first disciples; and he still continues to shew his grace to believers, as he imparts it to them in sanctification, consolation, and spiritual gifts. The reason of this assertion is then given us : "All things that the Father hath are mine; therefore, said I, that he shall take of mine, and shew it unto you. The things to be declared to us and bestowed on us, are originally the Father's things: he is the peculiar Fountain of them all; his love, wisdom, goodness, counsel, and will, is their supreme cause and spring. They are made the things of the Son, on account of his mediation; for thereby they were to be prepared for us, and given out to us; and then they are actually communicated to us by the Holy Ghost:"He shall take of mine, and shew it unto you." He does not communicate them to us immediately from the Father. We do not so receive any grace from him, nor make any return of praise to him. We have nothing to do with the Father immediately. By the Son alone we have access to him; and by the Son alone he gives out his grace to us. With him, as the great Treasurer of heavenly things, are all grace and mercy intrusted. The Holy Spirit, therefore, bestows them on us, as they are the fruits of the mediation of Christ, and not merely as the effects of the divine bounty of the Father. Thus he supplies the bodily absence of Jesus Christ, and effects what he has to accomplish in the world; so that whatever is done by him, it is the same as if it were wrought immediately H

by Christ himself in his own Person; and thus are his promises accomplished to believers.

And this teaches us the way and manner of our communion with God by the Gospel. The Person of the Father is the origin of all grace and glory; but it is not immediately from him that they are communicated to us. It is the Son whom he loves, and hath given all things into his hand. He has made a way for their communication to us; and he does it immediately by the Spirit. As the descending of God towards us, in love and grace, issues in the work of the Spirit on us, so all our ascending towards him begins therein; and we must attend explicitly to these things, if we wish our faith, love, and obedience should be evangelical. Woe to professors of the Gospel who are seduced to believe that all they have to do with God consists in their attention to moral virtue! It is sottish ignorance and infidelity to suppose that, under the Gospel, there is no communication between God and us but by laws, commands, and promises on his part; and by obedience performed in our own strength on our part. Let them judge thus who, being weary of Christianity, have a mind to turn Pagans; but our "fellowship is with the Father, and his Son Jesus Christ," by the Spirit. It is therefore of the first importance to us to enquire into, and secure to ourselves, the promised influences of the Holy Ghost.

5. As the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of grace, and the immediate efficient cause of all gracious effects in men, wherever there is mention made of any one of them, it is to be looked on as a part of his work, though he be not expressly named. I do not understand what some begin to talk about moral virtue; they seem to aim at something that is in their own power, at least with a blessing on their endeavours; but as to grace, I think all men will grant that it is of the Holy Ghost alone. Whether we understand by grace, the free favour of God towards us, or his free effectual operations in us, the Holy Spirit is its Author, in the first sense, as to its application; in the latter, as to the operation itself. This, therefore, must be taken for granted, That wher

ever any gracious actings of God towards men are mentioned, the Holy Spirit is principally intended.

6. It must be duly considered, that whatever the Holy Spirit does, he does it according to his own will: and several things of great moment depend on this. (1.) The will and pleasure of the Holy Spirit is in all the grace that he communicates to us. He is not a mere instrument or servant, disposing of what he has no concern in nor power over; but in all things he works according to his own will. We ought therefore to acknowledge his love and kindness in what we receive from him, no less than those of the Father and of the Son. (2.) He does not work as a natural agent to the utmost of his power, or as though in all his operations he did what he could; for he manages all his works by his will and wisdom; and therefore when some are said to "resist the Holy Spirit," it is not to be understood that they can do so absolutely, but only as to some way, kind, or degree of his operations. Men may resist the means he employs, but they cannot resist him as to the end he designs; for he is God, and "who hath resisted his will?" We must therefore consider what the means he employs tend to in their own nature, and what he intends by the use of them. The first may be resisted and frustrated; the latter cannot. Sometimes, by that word which in its own nature tends to the conversion of sinners, he intends only their hardening (Isa. vi. 9, 10); and he can, when he pleases, exert such power and efficacy as shall take away all resistance. As to the dispensation of the word, men may resist him, and reject his counsel against themselves; but when he exerts his power in and by the word, to the creation of a new heart and the opening of blind eyes, he so removes the principle of resistance, that he cannot be resisted. (3.) Hence also it follows, that his works may be of various kinds, and in various degrees. Some of the works of the Spirit are perfect in their kind, and men may be made partakers of the whole intention of them, and yet no saving grace be wrought in them. Such are his works of illumination, conviction, &c. Persons may have a work of the Spirit

on their minds, and yet not be sanctified and converted to God; and thus also, where he works the same effect in the souls of men, as in their regeneration, he does it by various means, and carries it on in various degrees, as to the strengthening its principle and the increase of its fruits of holiness; and hence is that great difference as to light, holiness, and fruitfulness, which we find among believers. The Holy Spirit works in all these according to his own will; by no other rule than his own infinite wisdom.

But it may be said, If all graces in us are ascribed to the Holy Spirit, then there is no need to use our own endeavours, or take any pains about the growth of holiness, or the duties of obedience. To what purpose then are all the commands, threatenings, and exhortations of the Scripture? I answer,

1. Let men imagine what consequences they please, yet that the Spirit of God is the Author of all that is spiritually good in us, is a truth that we must not forego, unless we intend to part with our Bibles also; for in them we are taught, "that in us (that is, in our flesh) there dwelleth no good thing;" that we are not sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; “but our sufficiency is of God," "who is able to make all grace to abound towards us." To grant that there is any spiritual good in us which is not wrought in us by the Spirit of God, is to overthrow the grace of the Gospel. It is therefore certain, that nothing can be inferred from hence but what is good and useful to the souls of men; for from truth nothing else can follow.

2. It is brutish ignorance in any to argue, from the effectual operations of the Spirit, that we may be slothful in our own duty. He who knows not that God has promised to work in us, in a way of grace, what he requires from us in a way of duty, has either never read his Bible, or does not believe it; or never prayed, or never took notice of what he prayed for. He is a heathen, not a Christian, who does not pray that God would work in him what he requires of him. This we know, that what God prescribes, we ought with all

diligence and earnestness to comply with; and we know too, that whatever God has promised, that he himself will perform in us: it is our duty to believe that he will do so; and to fancy an inconsistence between these things, is to charge God foolishly.

3. If there be an opposition between these things, it is either because the nature of man is not meet to be commanded, or because it need not be assisted; both which suppositions are vain and false. The Holy Spirit so worketh in us, as that he worketh by us; and what he does in us, is done by us:-our duty is to apply ourselves to his commands; and it is his work to enable us to perform them.

4. He who can indulge negligence on account of the promised assistance of the Spirit, may look upon it as a certain evidence that he has no interest in it; for where he affords his aids, he, in general, prepares the soul by diligence in duty: and as he works only in and by the faculties of our own minds, it is ridiculous, and implies a contradiction, for a man to say he will do nothing because the Spirit does all; for where he does nothing, the Spirit does nothing, except by the infusion of the first habit or principle of grace; of which we shall treat hereafter.

5. As to degrees of grace, they are peculiar to believers; who are furnished with an ability to perform those duties on which the increase of holiness usually depends; for though there is no grace, nor degree of grace, in believers, but what is wrought in them by the Spirit, yet generally the increase and growth of grace depend on the use and improvement of grace received, in a diligent attention to all those duties of obedience which are required of us:-and methinks it is the most unreasonable thing in the world for a man to be slothful in religious duties (on which his spiritual growth depends; which the eternal welfare of his soul is concerned in) on pretence of the efficacious aids of the Spirit, without which he can do nothing, and which he neither has, nor can have, while he does nothing.

Here then is the ground of our exercising faith to