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cannot retain sinners in the bands of sleep, he artfully hurries them into delusion and enthusiasm. The supernatural impressions, or new revelations which such persons pretend to, Satan makes such a handle of, as to incline them to regard them as a whisper from God concerning his secret love, choice and purpose to save them. Even persons who evidently continued the slaves of sin, have talked of their experiences of this kind; and Satan, transformed into an angel of light, has done prodigious mischief this way. Such strange commotions then, are neither conversion itself, nor any fruit or evidence of it: but even when they do accompany a saving change, which may sometimes happen, are disgraceful and injurious appendages of it, arising from human infirmity and the devices of Satan.

In regard to anguish, remorse and terror of mind, these generally precede real conversion; and it is desirable to see those who were fast asleep in sin, awakened from their spiritual lethargy and enquiring the way to be saved; yet it is a fact, meriting our serious recollection, that conviction or terror, is not conversion, nor even every change from these to a state of peace and hope; yea, no persons are more hopeless in their impenitency than those who think themselves converted because they have been troubled and afraid. What can mere distress, alarm or conviction do for you? What did they for Cain, Saul, or Judas? "So that," as one has well observed, "the workings of legal terror, unaccompanied with believing views of Christ, in person's under a gospel dispensation, are rather the workings of inexcusable enmity, ignorance and unbelief, than hopeful signs of conversion." But let not cold, empty professors plume themselves on a bare profession, because they are free from these painful and tumultuous agitations of body or mind. If they who undergo such painful alarms nevertheless come short, what shall be thought of you who are settled upon your lees, and never lay to heart your guilt and danger. If you have so little concern for your souls as to feel no interest in the truth of the gospel; yea, if you regard it not as that on which you must venture your souls for eternity, your case is dreadfully secure and dangerous. “Peace in sin, is a most infallible mark that God is no longer with you; for if the Spirit of God had not ceased striving with you, you would feel in your criminal souls, always some trouble and anxiety, dread and distrust. Thus, by securely trusting to your state of peace in sin, you comfort yourselves on that which ought to excite your justest fears. The most deplorable signs of your being condemned already, form in your mind the most solid foundation of your hope! Trust in sin is the most terrible chastisement with which God can

punish a sinner. Tremble, if not yet quite past feeling, for this calm is the forerunner of a shipwreck. You are stamped with the mark of a reprobate. Thus I would wish to guard you both against security in sin and against trusting to convictions of sin. Woe to sinners that are at ease in Zion, for when you say, peace, peace, then sudden destruction as a whirlwind cometh upon you. 2d. Conversion does not consist in changing one vicious mode of living for another, nor in any outward relinquishment of obvious vices, and a strict attention to morals. Some persons have all along maintained such visible purity of morals that they do not need an outward reformation from notorious vices, and yet these very persons must undergo the change meant by conversion, or else they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven. Besides, would our Lord in the text, have used such a solemnity of introduction, such emphasis of expression, such a strong symbolical action as the setting of a child in the midst of the disciples, if he only meant to tell them, that a wicked man could not be an heir of heaven unless he amended his life? Who ever supposed it, except avowed infidels and libertines. Conversion is not a partial but total, not and outward but an inward forsaking of sin also; but it is only as a man forsakes all sin and turns to the way of all God's commandments, that he deserves the name of a real convert. A man may reform in many respects without undergoing any change of heart. The pressure of some circumstances may compel a man to alter his mode of life, and turn from one virtuous mode of living, into one more congenial to his new circumstances. A profligate having spent his fortune, from being a spendthrift may become a miser. A drunkard may become sober, because his constitution is destroyed, or he cannot procure the intoxicating draught. A lewd person may become chaste, because he is debilitated by age, or worn out with disease. And because it is not in his power to act otherwise. Time may abate the ardour of mad passions-when the bloom of youth is effaced he may become a little more sedate—may leave off certain loose practices, but he will not hereby be converted, hisheart will not be changed. He will still be worldly, ambitious, sensual, and voluptuous. He may still have the vicious dispositions without indulging in them to excess. View all the souls who through age alone have withdrawn from the pleasures of sin, and who have changed, only from a regard to external decency, and under a different exteriors you see the same relish for iniquity, the same inclinations, the same ardour for pleasure,- -a youthful heart in a changed and worn out body. Imagination dwells upon and delights in reviewing all the sinful pleasures which time and age

have wrested from us. Blooming youth and all its attendant amusements are regarded with envy, all which things are entered into, so far as they can be thought in any degree compatible with that sedateness proper to advanced age; pretexts are formed for still mingling in certain pleasures with decency and without being exposed to public ridicule. Thus it appears that persons may reform in various respects, may cease from vice and practice several virtues, and thus acquire a fair exterior, whilst corruptions remain in their hearts unsubdued. Now you must observe here that I am so far from condemning this outward reformation that I think the smallest reformation is desirable and beneficial to society, yea, and every converted person does reform outwardly. But what I observe is, that persons may thus reform, and be outwardly moral and decent, whilst they have never yet entered into the kingdom of God by regeneration. Paul, whose conversion and apostleship, whose whole life makes such a remarkable figure in the pages of the New Testament, is an instance full in point to prove what I now say. Before his conversion he was distinguished by zeal for the traditions of his fathers, by the strictness of his profession as a Pharisee, by his punctual observance of the ceremonial institutions, and his sincere obedience to the moral law; all these he once counted his gain, in them he boasted and confided. Yet this strict moral man, who touching the law was blameless, was at this time, as every body knows, in an unconverted state, which surely he would not have been, had outward decency of moral conduct and conversion to God been synonymous and convertible terms. Men of corrupt principles, often perform actions ostensibly good with a sinister design, therefore they remain still base and their conduct detestable, because it is the motives from which a man acts which determines the merit or demerit of his actions. Whence it appears that conversion cannot be the same thing as the performance of materially virtuous actions, otherwise conyersion would be the performance of an action though good in itself, yet a bad action in truth, because proceeding from a bad motive. Herod heard John the Baptist preach, feared that holy man, and did many things gladly, was, it is probable, considerably reformed, yet he was not a converted man; for Herod and his men of war set the Saviour at nought. Let persons therefore beware of building on their own righteousness, which are all as filthy rags, which are a foundation totally insufficient.

3d. A change from a heretical, erroneous church or creed, to an orthodox one, is not conversion. A change from atheism, Judaism, infidelity or idolatry, to Christianity, is indeed, in popu

lar language, called conversion. It is all that is meant by the term, when it is used by the philosophical unbeliever. There are instances of persons who at first have held, and maintained the fundamental doctrines of the gospel, but have receded from them, and have not stopped in their retrogade course,till they have travelled through innumerable clouds of heresy and error, and have at last settled, if not in atheism, at least in what they call the religion of nature, of reason and philosophy. But let us suppose a person making a contrary progress, still it will hold true, that a man may pass through changes of this kind, till he has tried all the modes of religion that have been known on earth, and yet at last be excluded as unconverted and unclean, from the kingdom of heaven. It is an affecting truth, that there are many who know and profess the truth, can talk familiarly about its leading doctrines, whilst the truth is with them never more than a cold and barren speculation; and whilst they themselves are, for all their knowledge and logical acumen, egregious fools in the sight of God. A man may have accurate notions of the system of revealed truth, may know it in all its bearings and dependencies, may be captivated by the beauty and order of the whole system; yea, he may have it as his fixed judgment, that the Christian religion is most excellent and worthy of God, that the spiritual things revealed to us are incomparably the most worthy of our esteem, without feeling the force of truth, and giving to spiritual things a preference in his affections. The former is a degree of illumination, the latter only is conversion: for there is a vast difference between knowing and feeling sin and spiritual things. We may know of ourselves, may be well principled and abound in correct notions, but it is the spirit only that maketh us feel. "The scripture is unto us what the star was to the wise men, given to conduct us to the Saviour; but if we spend all our time in gazing upon it, observing its motions and admiring its splendor, without being led to Christ by it, the use of it will be lost to us." And his is the case of many who know the doctrine of the Bible, and that very accurately too, though the gospel still continues hid to them. What Job says of the vulture, chapter xxviii. 7, will apply to such, "there is a path which the vulture's eye hath not seen."The sight of the vulture is proverbial for its acuteness and strength; but it was an unclean bird. The words of Job may be accommodated to the case before us, and afford us this useful hint; "although men of critical discernment, may attain to great advances by mere dint of study,in the developement of the doctrines of grace; yet so long as they continue in their natural state, there will ever be a certain essential something not known or expe

rienced-or, such cannot by the utmost exertion of natural abilities apprehend, not being themselves apprehended, as the apostle says, of God. Let none of us imagine then that because we may have embraced sound sentiments, and have consistent views of divine truth, that this is a certain proof of the safety of our state; for we may be wise in theory, and right in doctrinal principles, while the state of our hearts is fatally wrong, and the tenour of our conduct a scandal to the great Redeemer's cause. You may attend on an evangelical ministry, be a member of the purest visible church, and have a seat at the Lord's table, and after all die unconverted and be eternally lost. Think then, O carnal professor, what a shocking figure you must make if at last you should perish. Heartily might we prefer to stand in the list of heathens at the day of judgment, rather than in that of many nominal Christians. "This is the condemnation, that light hath come into the world and men loved darkness rather than the light, because their deeds were evil." With what ardour should this consideration teach us to pray, "that as the sun in the firmament conveys light and heat in his beams, so may Christ shine upon us and be savingly revealed in us, to enlighten, warm, transform and spiritualize our souls, and that by this new light and saving view of the Redeemer, new qualities and dispositions may be wrought in us. And here again I would repeat the observation already made, that sound knowledge is necessary and valuable; but, that such knowledge is not conversion, because many persons understand the truth who are never converted. Having made these remarks to prevent mistakes on this very important subject, we are now to state positively in what true conversion consists. [To be continued.]

For the Religious Monitor.

REDEEMING THE TIME.

EPHESIANS v. 16-COLLOSSIANS. iv. 4.

"The word "redeeming" is derived from a word which signifies a forum, where the public assemblies of the people were held; but the chief design of which was for the meeting of people to buy and sell. The literal meaning of the Greek word is, to buy out of or from, to gain. The word rendered "time," denotes due, proper season and opportunity. The language is borrowed from merchants who anxiously inspect the wares exposed to sale at the time of full market, and who occupy, or fill up every opportunity in buying out of or from it, in making advantageous purchases during the hours of business. Transferring this lan

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