chansje, including a1] that takes place in the consciousness, and all that occurs in the soul itself (so to speak), below the conscious- ness, and subsequently in the state and relation of the soul to God. In this change the Word of God is eminently instrumental. It is by the Word that the sinner is convinced, aroiised, made to seek rec- onciliation witli God, and enlightened in the way of salvation. It is by the Word that the person and work of Christ are revealed, and all the objects on which the activity of the regenerated soul terminates, are presented to the mind. The Gospel is, therefore, the wisdom and power of God unto salvation. It is by the Word that all the graces of the Spirit are called into exercise, and with- out it holiness, in all its conscious manifestations, would be as im- possible as vision without light. But this does not prove that light produces the faculty of seeing ; neither does truth produce the principle of spiritual life. The Apostle Paul, who glories so much in the gospel, who declares that it is by the foolishness of preach- ing that God saves those that believe, still teaches that the inward work of the Spirit is necessary to enable men to receive the things freely given to them of God ; that the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit, that they must be spiritually discerned. (1 Cor. ii. 8-11.) As examples of the latitude with which the words beget, begotten, and new-birth are used in Scripture, refer- ence need be made only to such passages as 1 Peter i. 3, where it is said. He " hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resur- rection of Jesus Christ from the dead ; " and 1 Corinthians iv. 15. There is therefore nothing in what the Scriptures teach of the agency of the truth in conversion, or regeneration in the wide sense of the word, inconsistent with their distinct assertion that in ts narrow sense of quickening or imparting spiritual life, it is an act of the immediate omnipotence of God. This point was ad- verted to in a previous chapter.
The fact then that the Bible represents regeneration as a spirit- ual resurrection, as a new creation, and as a new birth, proves it to be the work of God's immediate agency. There is another familiar mode of speaking on this subject which leads to the same conclusion. In Deuteronomy xxx. 6, Moses says : " The Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and witli all thy soul, that thou may- est live." In Ezekiel xi. 19, it is said, " I will give them one heart, and 1 will put a new spirit within you ; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh." And in chapter xxxvi. 26, " A new heart also will I give
704 PART m. Ch. XIV. — VOC A.TION.
you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my jvidgments and do them." Jeremiah xxiv. 7, " I will give them an heart to know me." The Psalmist prayed, " Create in me a clean heart, O God ; and renew a right spirit within me." (Ps. li. 10.) It is admitted that the word heart, like all other familiar terms, is used in diff*erent senses in the Scriptures. It often means the whole soul ; as when mention is made of the eyes, the thoughts, and the intentions of the heart. It very frequently means the feelings or affections, or is used collectively for them all, or for the seat of the feelings. A cold, hard, sluggish, timid, humble, broken, heart are all common forms of expression for what exists in the conscious- ness ; for transient and changeable states of the mind, or inward man. Notwithstanding it is no less clear that the word is often used in the same sense in which we use the word nature, for a principle of action, a permanent habit or disposition. Something that exists not in the consciousness, but below it. That such is its meaning in the passages just quoted, and in all others in which God is said to change or renew the heart, is plain : (1.) Because it is something which God not only gives, but which He creates. (2.) Because it is the source of all right action. It cannot be a volition, or a generic purpose, or any state of mind which the man himself produces ; because it is said to be the source of love, of fear, and of new obedience. Our Lord's illustration, derived from trees good and bad, forbids any other interpretation. A good tree produces good fruit. The goodness of the tree precedes and deter- mines the goodness of the fruit ; and so a good heart precedes all just thoughts, all right purposes, all good feelings and all holy exer- cises of every kind. (3.) The Scriptures ex[)lain what is meant by " creating a new heart " by the exegetical expression, "I will put mv Spirit within you." This surely is not a right purpose. The in- dwelling Spirit or Christ dwelling in us, is the principle and source of that new life of which the believer is made the subject. All those passages in which God promises to give a new heart, are proofs that regeneration is a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit ; not a moral suasion, but a creating and imparting a principle of a new form of life.
Argument from related Doctrines.
6. Another decisive argument in favour of the Augustinian doc- trine of efficacious grace, is derived from its necessary connection