respecting our sentiments, we shall begin with stating what we do ?iot mean, when we insist upon the doc- trine of the new birth.
It is supposed by many, and indeed affirmed by some, that we require a sudden impulse of the Holy Spirit, which, without any co-operation on the part of man, is to convert the soul to God ; and that we re- quire this change to be so sensibly and perceptibly wrought, that the subject of it shall be able to specify the day and hour when it took place.
But all this we utterly disclaim. We say, indeed, that God may effect his work in any way that he pleases; and that, if he choose to convert men now, precisely as he did the three thousand on the day of Pentecost, or as he did the persecuting Saul on his way to Damascus, he is at liberty to do it ; and no man in the universe is authorised to say that he can- not, or shall not, or zoill not, do it. But we never require any thing of the kind : we require nothing sudden. It may be so gradual, as that the growth of it, like the seed in the parable, shall at no time be particularly visible, either to the observation of others, or to the person's own mind : " it shall spring and grow up, he knoweth not how^" We deny that we ever speak of it as wrought by an irresistible impulse of the Spirit, or without the co-operation of the man himself: for that man is in all cases a free agent : he is never wrought upon as a mere machine. He is drawn, indeed, but it is with the cords of a man ; that is, by considerations proper to influence a rational being, and by feelings which those considerations excite in his soul. He is influenced by hopes and fears, joys and sorrows, just as any other man is ; only the Spirit of God takes away from his heart that veil which was upon it (and thereby enables the man to see both temporal and eternal things in their true light, ac- cording to their relative importance) ; and then inclines the heart to act agreeably to the dictates of sound judgment. Hozo far the Spirit of God works, and how far the mind of man, is a point which no
b Mark iv. 27.