then understand his own way?” "He fashioneth their hearts alike." "In him we live and move and have our being." Are not some of these motions voluntary? Then, besides living in him, we voluntarily move in him. Then somehow he causes our willingness as he does our life. "Who is he that saith and it cometh to pass when the Lord commandeth it not?" "There is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the Lord." "Arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words. Then I went down to the potter's house, and behold he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand So he made it again another vessel, as of the potter. the Lord came to me saying, O house Then the word of of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter, saith the Lord? Behold as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to pull down and to destroy it; if that nation against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it; if it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them." How many volitions he must control to accomplish all this. "Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? as if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself as if it were no wood." "Thou art my battle axe and weapon of war: for with thee will I break in pieces the nations, and with thee will I destroy kingdoms."* "God A number of cases in the sacred history are referred to in the margin,† in which God controlled the hearts of men in common matters. I will only ask, how could Christians pray for relief in a thousand cases, if they could not confide in his absolute power to control the heart? How otherwise could Jacob have prayed for deliverance from the rage of Esau, or have said about the unknown lord of Egypt, Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he may send away your other brother and Benjamin"? How otherwise could Jehoshaphat have prayed for his assailants to depart from him? or Esther and the Jews for the success of her intercession with Ahasuerus? In some instances where the operation could not perhaps be called sanctification, there seemed to be a direct influence upon the heart. made them also to be pitied of all those that carried them captives." "In Judah the hand of God was to give them one heart to do the commandment of the king and of the princes by the word of the Lord." When "the fathers of "He * Ps. 33. 15. Prov. 16. 1, 9. and 19. 21. and 20. 24. and 21. 1, 30. Isai. 10. 15. Jer. 10. 23. and 18. 2-10. and 51. 20. Lam. 3. 37. Acts 17. 28. + Gen. 32. 6, 11. with ch. 33. 4. Exod. 3. 21. and 11. 3. and 12. 36. and 34. 24. Josh. 2. 24. with Exod. 15. 15. with Ps. 48. 4-6 Judg. 7. 21, 22. and 14. 4. 2 Kin. 24. 2, 3. 2 Chron. 20. 22, 23. and 21. 10. Ez. 1. 1. and 6. 22. and 7. 27. Isai. 10. 5-7. Jer. 51. 11, 12. Hag. 1. 14. John 7. 30. and 8. 20. + Gen. 32. 11. and 43. 14. 2 Chron. 18. 31. Esth. 4. 16. of Cyrus, who Judah and Benjamin" went up to Jerusalem, in the days "to build the house of the Lord," it was "God" had raised" their "spirit" to that high emprise. And it was he who, in the days of Darius, "stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel—and the spirit of all the remnant of the people" to the same work.* Even in the motions of sin, (though only permissively, I suppose,) his government is effectual. "He turned their heart to hate his people, to deal subtilly with his servants." God" moved David” to number the people; and in all cases, "whom he will he hardeneth."+. But all these operations are distinguishable from that which produces holiness. These fall within the range of nature, but sanctifying grace is supernatural. The former ist ascribed to God; the latter to the holy Spirit, and constitutes his distinctive work as one of the Persons of the Trinity. Take away that supernatural operation which sanctifies, and what is there left of the office work of the Spirit? or how is he made known as one of the Sacred Persons? The great thing which our brethren oppose is a direct operation on the mind, as working, in their view, a " physical change" inconsistent with freedom. But the causing of a moral effect is not a physical change. Were a new faculty created, it would indeed be a physical change. If that moral effect is wrought by truth, the power which brings truth into view must be applied directly to the truth or directly to the mind. It cannot be applied to the truth. That would produce a change in truth itself. But truth cannot *Ps. 106. 46. 2 Chron. 30. 12. Ez. 1. 5. Hag. 1. 14. i 2 Sam. 24. 1. Ps. 105. 25. Rom. 9. 18. change. Two and two make four. What change can that truth undergo? The sinner has rebelled against God. What change can take place in that truth? And what is that power which produces no change in the thing to which it is applied? And if the power is applied directly to the mind, to make truth seen, attended to, felt, and loved, it is all we ask. And are you sure that the application of power to the understanding and conscience, to make truth seen, attended to, and felt, is any more consistent with freedom, than the application of power to the heart to make truth loved? God can doubtless say, Let the mind see truth,—in any degree of clearness,-and it is done; just as Christ willed to appear among his disciples, the doors being shut, and he appeared. If you say, in this case no one can tell on what the power operated, and no one can tell on what the power operates in the other case; yet we can tell on what the change takes place. As there are but two subjects concerned,―mind and truth,-the change must be in one or the other or both: but as no change can possibly take place in truth, it must be in the mind alone. And the change by which truth is first seen, cannot be wrought through the truth, otherwise than as truth is the object seen. That the mind first sees it, must be owing to a clearer discernment in the mind itself, not produced by the object. This probably will not be denied. Here then is one direct act upon the mind that does not destroy freedom. In the next two acts, by which truth is attended to and felt, they will say that the influence is carried on through the instrumentality of truth; and that I am not disposed to deny. But all this influence produces nothing but awakening and conviction. This is not therefore the act about which we are inquiring. Come then right to the point. Does God, by an influence on the heart, cause it to love the truth? You say, he changes the heart through the truth; and you mean that he does not act immediately on the heart, but only presents truth to the clear view of the understanding, and there leaves it. Then it is not God, but illumined truth, seen in its own affecting aspects and relations, that works the change, so far as it is wrought by any thing but the mind itself. But as truth does not control the mind, (as is every where asserted,) it is the mind that turns itself under the inducements which truth offers. And that is exactly the self-determining power. If this is so, God cannot be said to convert men. If he only sends in illumined truth, which Peter, by the selfdetermining power, loves, he also sends in illumined truth, which Judas, by the self-determining power, hates, and hates in proportion as it is illumined and except his aiming at the effect in the former case and not in the latter, he may be said as truly to cause Judas to hate as to cause Peter to love. He merely presents the object, which in one instance is hated and in the other is loved. In this theory of the self-determining power, I find nothing but effects without a cause. Here are Peter and Judas, twin minds we will suppose, of exactly the same faculties, tempers, and habits, and urged on by the same |