might you talk of my permitting the cholera, because I do not kill off every body that could have it. Why dress up palpable Arminianism in such Calvinistic drapery? Why say in this very letter, "That the eternal purposes of God extend to all actual events, sin not excepted, or that God foreordains whatsoever comes to pass ;" when the meaning, as Dr Fitch fully explains it is, that God decreed all the foreseen actions of men in the very resolution to give them being under such circumstances and means? Why should one who has publicly renounced divine efficiency, the very ground work of Calvinism, stand in the midst of Calvinists and say, as in this same letter, "I could wish that" "my views and opinions" "might be satisfactory to all our orthodox brethren. I have no doubt that they will be to very many, and to some who have been alarmed by groundless rumours concerning my unsoundness in the faith"? How can he say, "With respect to what is properly considered the orthodox or Calvinistic system,-as opposed to the Pelagian and Arminian systems, I suppose there is between the orthodox ministry and myself an entire agreement"? It is impossible for Dr T to mean more by election than Dr Fitch does, (for both equally deny God's absolute dominion over the mind;) and yet he expresses it in this letter in the following high Calvinistic language: "I believe that all who are renewed by the holy Spirit, are elected or chosen of God from eternity that they should be holy; not on account of foreseen faith or good works, but according to the good pleasure of his will." "I do believe that when" "the grace of God" "becomes effectual to conversion, as it infallibly does in

the case of all the elect, it is unresisted." How " infallibly does"? Because all who yield to the motives presented do yield, and God foresaw they would. When this is all he can mean after denying both divine efficiency and the dominion of motives, why should he say, "I believe —that the renewing grace of God is special, in distinction from that which is common and is resisted by the sinful mind, inasmuch as it is that which is designed to secure, and does infallibly secure, the conversion of the sinner"? That is, in these foreseen instances in which the self-determining power yields to motives, God ensures conversion by merely presenting the motives. The doctrine of perseverance he fully sustains in this same letter. "I believe that all who are renewed by the holy Spirit, will, through his continued influence, persevere in holiness to the end."

Dr T says, "How does the Spirit secure this change? I answer, not by acting on the truth.-But how positively?— The question-sets philosophy at defiance." "That the change is through the truth and implies attention to the truth,—the sober, solemn consideration of the objects which truth discloses, prior to the requisite act of the will or heart, will not be doubted by the reader of the sacred volume."* God, in what he does to restore the sinner to holiness, obliges him to be conscious of the requisite process of thought and feeling, whether he will or not. sinner can indeed resist and arrest this progress of thought and feeling, but cannot prevent its commencement."+ "What is the tendency of divine truth to turn the sinner * Christian Spectator for 1829, p. 17. † 232.

The

to holiness, if there be nothing in the nature of his mind which renders him susceptible to the influence of truth? The question then still recurs, how has truth this tendency? We answer, by its solemn appeals of life and death to the principle of self-love, or the natural desire of men for happiness.-Man can never become insensible to happiness, nor to the truth that he sacrifices his own well being as a self-destroyer. This truth, as it is presented to the mind by the testimony of God,-embodies the sum total of all the moral influence which God uses in his revelation."* Nothing but self-interest to be considered! no disinterested regard to God or man! "Every act of sober consideration employed on the great truth that our supreme good is to be found only in the service of God, when dictated exclusively by self-love, implies, for the time being, the suspended influence of the selfish principle. [How, unless selfishness consists exclusively in the love of the world?] Such suspension however does not necessarily prevent the thoughts and desires of the mind from recurring, as it were instantly, to the objects of selfish affection, nor the affection itself from resuming instantly its accustomed activity and power. Indeed the tendency to this, from the previous habitudes of the mind, is direct and powerful. It is however to be remembered that— there are tendencies opposite to that specified; the tendency of excited self-love to sober consideration, and of this to deepen such excitement. When these tendencies are not successfully counteracted by opposing tendencies; when by the strivings of the Spirit they are perpetuated

* 226.

and increased; then it is that the selfish principle, not only suffers temporary suspension, [selfishness suspended before God is loved!] but grows weaker and weaker in each instance of its returning activity and dominion, until, at some point before the heart fixes on God, the power and influence of this principle wholly cease from the mind. [Selfishness is dead and God not yet loved!]-Connected with this suspension of the selfish principle, there is yet another state of mind involved in the process we are con sidering, which demands attention; viz. the truly sincere desires of the sinner for acceptance with God.—We do not suppose that the state of mind of which we now speak respects the inherent excellence of the objects of holy affec tion. What we intend is, that" the sinner "desires acceptance with God,-contemplated simply under one relation, viz. as the only means of deliverance from punishment. Nor is this a selfish state of mind, [though self-love is supreme!] but rather a state of mind which is necessarily involved in the mental process of turning from sin to holiness. The supreme affections of his heart being detached from the world, the grand obstacle to his preferring a deliverance from punishment to the only object that can come into competition with it, is removed.—And now, according to the laws of voluntary action, nothing is wanting to lead forth the heart in holy affection to God, but— clear, just, and vivid views of his glories." Those "glories -are yet veiled.-Still however—he is willing to fix, and does in fact fix, the eye of contemplation on the object of holy affection, and does, with such glimpses of his glories as he may obtain, feel their attractions and summon his

heart to" the love of God. "We now ask, is there no tendency in these acts and states of the sinner's mind to carry the soul forth to God in holy love?—a tendency which, if wholly uncounteracted, would flow out in holy love to God." "We do not say that the contemplation will result in holy love; but we say that in proportion to its intensity and the vividness of its perceptions, it will make known to human consciousness a tendency to produce love, direct and powerful, and not easily resisted."+ "These acts have the same tendency when the sinner is regenerated by the holy Spirit." "When self-love prompts the first act of sober consideration, there is in this act a tendency to augmented feeling, and-this feeling tends to fix contemplation, and this again to deepen feeling; andthus by mutual action and reaction of thought and feeling, the process, were there no effectual counteracting influence, would go on until it terminated in a change of heart. -Such acts and states therefore have a tendency to such a result. But if they have this tendency according to the constitution of man as a moral agent, and would, if uncounteracted, be followed by a change of heart without grace, then they must have the same tendency when man gives his heart to God through grace." "Of all specific voluntary action, the happiness of the agent in some form is the ultimate end." ||

"We now ask what acts of the sinner must be denoted by the phrase using the means of regeneration?" They are acts of sober consideration and thoughtfulness which were dictated by a regard to his own well being."¶ * 227-231.. † 233. +234. § 222, 3. || 24.

¶ 217.