balance all the evil he has done. By degrees his mind becomes more enlightened, and he sees that his sins have been neither so few, nor so venial, as he had imagined. And now his legal hopes vanish, and are succeeded by slavish fears. The declara- tions of God respecting the final condemnation of the wicked are credited by him ; and his claims of innocence or good desert are seen to be destitute of any solid foundation. Now the thoughts of death and judgment are terrible to him; and, as St. Paul says, He, " through fear of death, is all his life- time subject to bondage." To such an extent do " these terrors of the Lord" operate on many, that they hate their very existence, and would gladly surrender it up, if they could but perish like the beasts, and never be called to any future account. These apprehensions lead, as may be expected, to self-righteous endeavours. The person who is under their influence, sets himself to read, and pray, and attend the ordi- nances : he dispenses alms to the poor ; he renounces many practices which he once justified, and performs many duties which he once neglected ; hoping, if possible, to make up for all the time that he has lost, and to conciliate the favour of his offended God. As his light increases, and the insufficiency of human merit is discovered by him, he looks to the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, to atone for his faults, and to supply his defects. Perhaps in time the folly of depending on human righteousness is seen by him; and he is willing to seek for salvation through Christ, provided he may but recommend himself to Christ by some obedience of his own, and have in himself the warrant for embracing the Saviour, and for ex- pecting his salvation. Thus he founds his hopes, if not entirely, yet in some measure, on his own good works ; and though doing well, as far as respects the ardour of his exertions, he fatally errs in making self the ground of his dependence, and perishes for want of a better righteousness than his own. This was the progress of the Spirit's work in the unconverted Jews'; and such it is also in thousands at the present day.]
In those who are converted, he works as a Spirit of adoption —
[To these he imparts sublimer gifts, enabling them to look up with confidence to God, crying, " Abba, Father." He gives them an assured testimony of their acceptance with God as a reconciled God and Father ; setting, as it were, upon their hearts the Father's sealk, and witnessing with their spirits that they are the children of God1. Thus, drawing them by his gracious influences, he brings them into a state of holy " fel- lowship with the Father and the Son," causing them to walk
» Rom. ix. 31, 32. k 2 Cor. i. 21, 22. ; ver. 16.