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Theology.

THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT.

"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God."-Roм. viii. 16.

THERE is, perhaps, no point, connected with personal religion, more important, or less understood, than that which is involved in the language we have just quoted; we, therefore, purpose on the present occasion to take a somewhat comprehensive view of it, and shall in the first place,

I. GIVE A STATEMENT OF ERRORS WHICH HAVE OBTAINED UPON THE SUBJECT.

In dealing with this elementary consideration, it will be necessary to use some freedom with much-honoured names; and let us express our hope, that the disrespect which may seem to be implied by questioning their views, will not be inferred where it is earnestly protested against, for assuredly we entertain the highest opinion of the personal character and ministerial excellency of the late Rev. John Wesley-a man who has been signally honoured of God, and whom we have ever viewed as a prime ornament of his country, and an incalculable blessing to mankind. But though great and good, Mr. Wesley was neither infallible nor perfect, and on no subject do we conceive that he used language more incorrect than that which relates to the point before us. Speaking of the "Witness of the Spirit," he says:

"This testimony is an impression on the soul whereby the Spirit of God witnesses to my spirit, that I am a child of God, that Christ hath loved me, and given himself for me, that I, even I, am reconciled unto God."

It is worthy of notice that the views set forth by Mr. Wesley,-an avowed Arminian, have been also embraced by a large number of distinguished men holding Calvinistic views, and among these, as a fitting representative of that honourable brotherhood, is the celebrated Witsius, who thus expresses himself:

"There is, moreover, a certain internal impulse, which no human language can explain, immediately assuring God's beloved people of their adoption, no less than if they were carried up to the third heaven, and heard it audibly from God's own mouth, as the Apostles formerly heard in the holy mount a voice from the excellent glory.'

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Here the point is far more strongly

VOL. VIII.

put by the Calvinist, than by the Arminian writer, therefore, in combating the sentiment, let not our Arminian or Wesleyan friends be offended with us, as calling in question, and attempting to correct a tenet peculiar to them; for it is not peculiar to them, although, more especially in the early days of Methodism, they gave it extraordinary prominence, such prominence as fixed upon it a measure of attention which it had not previously commanded in other religious bodies.

is so.

We have no hesitation, then, in declaring that the view of the Gospel, with which this doctrine is associated, is erroneous. That view as laid down by Mr. Wesley is this:-The object of faith, the thing to be believed in order to salvation, is, that "Christ loved me, and gave himself for me." "By this faith the sinner is justified the moment he receives it.' This we consider as wholly incorrect, and a most perilous notion of the Gospel testimony. Again it is affirmed, "Our pardon becomes a reality when we believe it, and never will be true unless we do persuade and assure ourselves that it We have no absolute promise in Scripture that God certainly will, or doth give Christ and his salvation to any one of us in particular, nor do we know it to be true already by Scripture, sense, or reason, before we assure ourselves absolutely of it, only I shall prove, that we are bound by the command of God thus to assure ourselves." Such is the extraordinary language of a very celebrated writer of the Calvinistic school, namely, Marshall, who thus expresses himself in his well-known work on "Sanctification." If we mistake not, the intelligent reader, who has not been accustomed to keep his reason in abeyance in dealing with this question, will read with amazement the foregoing language, in a book of which the celebrated James Hervey, Author of "Theron and Aspasio," declared that were he to be shut up on a desert island, and to be limited to two books, the objects of his choice would be first, the Bible, and secondly, Marshall on "Sanctification." A representation so utterly at variance with common sense was never given by a good man to the Gospel of Mercy! It is at variance with

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reason, Scripture, fact, and experience, while it opens the flood-gates to every delusion. Indeed, if such be the faith of the Gospel, it strikes us that eminence in piety, of such an origin, is likely to be in the inverse proportion of good sense and sound reason; and it will be found in this as in other things, that extremes meet, and that it may here be said as of Popery, that "Ignorance is the mother of devotion," and that where reason ends religion begins! We shall not enlarge upon a subject which so insults the intelligence of Scripture students; but shall proceed,

II. WITH THE STATEMENT AND ELU

CIDATION OF WHAT WE CONSIDER TO BE

THE TRUTH.

The thing attested here is our Sonship -that we are children of God. The witnesses that testify this are here said to be two-the Spirit of God and our own spirit. The witness of our own spirit is in the nature of the case the first, and this has been explained already.

What is here called the witness is the same as that which is elsewhere called the seal-alluding to the seal of princes, the instrument by which the subject was advanced to favour-peculiar, inimitable, distinguishable, regal, an effectual confirmation of a special distinction. This seal is of a character which admits of no counterfeit to the eye that distinguishes all things; whatever is said of the witness must therefore admit of being affirmed of the seal. The import of the word must be explained by the indubitable characters of the thing. This witness is not by words, but by works, and the neglect of this fact is at the root of all the mischief which has mixed itself up with the subject; and hence the disposition to magnify doubtful suggestions, spiritual impulses, and mystic intimation as constituting the witness of the Spirit of God. God is said, in Heb. ii. 4, to bear witness "with signs, and wonders, and divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost." God's witness here is not vocal; it does not consist of assertions, but of evidences, of proofs which, after all, constitute the most impressive and indubitable language. In the Acts of the Apostles, xiv. 3, we are told, that "they abode long time speaking boldly in the name of the Lord, who gave testimony to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands." Here, then, a testimony is borne, a testimony of Divine origin to the truth of the communication. In this case miracles

not words were evidences, and not only evidences in themselves, they mightily served to fortify the Apostolic word. The Lord himself, in John v. 36, says, “I have greater witness than that of John; for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do bear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me." Here, again, deeds, not words, are employed to bear testimony. Again, in John x. 25, the Saviour says, "The works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me." Their silent testimony was nevertheless the testimony of irresistible power.

Now in perfect accordance with this is the witness of the Spirit. The Spirit's seal does not denote a voice, or suggestion, but a moral effect, a spiritual mark, by which the people of God are known. Its appeal is to the eye, and to the ear. The seals of princes were the marks of princes. The voice from heaven directed the angel in the Revelations thus: "Hurt not the earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads; a thing not uncustomary, and which from the place of the impress, was always most noticeable, presenting itself at once to the eye of the beholder. "Set a mark on the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry for the abominations that are done in the midst thereof."

The seal of the Spirit, then, is the stamp of holiness. This impress of God is the evidence of sonship. Their looks proclaim their lineage; his own image is his own seal. Ancient seals had both the image and superscription of him whose seal it was. Thus it is that the seal of the Spirit is the witness of the Spirit.

The seal of the Spirit is also the earnest, or foretaste, or fruit; it is grace and heaven in the heart; and, therefore, cannot be any voice, impulse, or impression. It is written that "He hath also sealed us and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts." And again, "In whom having believed ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance.' earnest is holy love, eternal life, everlasting glory, full fruition of good, something of the most exalted kind, which supplies every good and excludes every evil. Thus, then, having shown that the gracious and sanctifying influence of the Spirit of God is that which is meant by the witness, we shall now endeavour to

That

III. CONFIRM THE TRUTH BY AN AP

PEAL TO THE HIGHEST AUTHORITIES OF EVERY EVANGELICAL DENOMINATION.

Professor Brown, the Author of the Commentary, has thus delivered himself: "The Holy Ghost, by working gracious dispositions in us, and by shining upon his own work, doth, in and by his word, assist and concur with our consciences, that we are truly the adopted and rege nerated children of God."

Thomas Scott, the best of English commentators of modern times, thus, speaks: "The Holy Spirit, by producing in believers the affections, which dutiful children bear to a wise and good father, in their habitual state of heart towards God, most manifestly attests their adoption into his family. This is not done by a voice or revelation, or impression, or merely by a text brought to the mind; for all these things are equivocal and delusory; but by bearing witness with our spirits, or concurring with the testimony of our own enlightened minds and consciences, as to their uprightness in embracing the Gospel, and giving themselves up to the service of God. The Holy Spirit shines on his own work, excites their holy affections into lively exercise, and renders them very efficacious upon their conduct, and thus puts the matter beyond a doubt. So that this witness of the Spirit is borne along with that of our own consciences, not without, nor against it, but coinciding with that of the Holy Spirit in the Scriptures, and must be proved and assayed by it."

Let us hear Dr. Doddridge: "For his communication of the gifts of the Spirit, both to Jews and Gentiles, witnesses that we are, without distinction, in this respect, accepted, and owned by God and his people. So also he himself, by his wonderful and gracious operations beareth witness with our spirits, and so gives us an inward and joyful assurance that we are interested in his paternal love." Doddridge, it will be seen, is not so clear and explicit on this as he is on most subjects: but let us hear the venerable, the amiable, and heaven - taught John Newton.

John Newton says: "The witness spoken of in this passage, is very different from what some persons understand it to be. It is not an impulse, a strong persuasion impressed on us, in a way of which we can give no account, that we are children of God, and that our sins are freely forgiven; nor is the powerful application of any particular text of Scripture necessary to produce it; nor

is it always connected with the very lively or sensible comfort. These things may accompany the Witness of the Spirit that we are speaking of, in some instances, and in some persons, but they do not properly belong to it; they may be, and often have been, counterfeited; but what we have described is immutable and infallible." Let us hear the admirable Fuller, the ablest controversial writer of his time.

Andrew Fuller has thus declared himself: "There is not a passage in the Bible that says concerning any of us, 'I am thy salvation.' The Lord speaks only of characters; and if we answer these characters, we can prove that the things promised belong to us, not otherwise. I own that I consider all such suggestions as real enthusiasm, and as destitute of all foundation in the word of God. I do not deny that many godly people have been carried away by such things; but I have seen evils more than a few which have arisen from them." This language is explicit and emphatic, and leaves no ground for mistake as to the views of the Great Divine. But let us hear Melville Horne, an acurate reasoner as well as an eloquent writer. That gentleman, in his "Letters on Missions," asks,

"What is there in the Bible, or in the experience of God's children, which can so well claim to be the witness of the Spirit as all the tempers and graces of the Redeemer's mind, abundantly shaped and regulated in our hearts by the Holy Ghost given unto us? The experience ascribed to the direct witness of the Spirit, is totally unnecessary, and unable to add anything to the evidence arising from the Spirit's most excellent virtue. Nothing can add to the evidence of the indwelling glorious God! He proclaims his own names of love and father! The heart thus purified sees God; there is a new heaven and a new earth! God shines on himself and on all his works. The Christian is sealed with the image and superscription of the New Creator. Peace shades his head with the silver wings of the heavenly dove; his joys are as the extatic songs of the seraphim, and love makes the obedient wheels of his soul instinct with the fire of the cherubim ! Heaven, earth, and hell, are open to his piercing eyes, and he feels every power of the invisible world. All miracles are nothing to this great sanctifying Comforter-to his glorious light, and feeling; and while heavenly vision

continues, the necessity of reasoning is suspended, for who holds a candle to the sun? I deny that there is any direct witness. The Scriptures nowhere affirm it; and I exclude from faith every article which is not found to stand on the authority of the Apostles. He that prays and looks for a direct witness of the Spirit, asks for what is neither promised nor defined, which they who assert cannot describe, and which is utterly unnecessary to holiness or consolation. The massive living column of all aggregate grace, is the glorious Shekinah by which God the Holy Ghost dwells in the hearts of his sanctified people. Every grace calls God father, and every sacred virtue proclaims Jesus Lord! What are ten thousand voices and impressions in comparison of this indwelling God? What are they? From my soul, I believe them to be Satanic delusions to draw us away from the true witness!" Was ever truth arrayed in superior eloquence?

Perhaps the reader would be glad to hear good John Flavel, who has thus expressed himself: "He doth not make use of any audible voice, nor immediate and extraordinary revelations, but he makes use of his own graces implanted in our hearts, and his own promises, and in this method he brings the heart of the believer to rest and comfort."

But what says Dr. Williams? According to him, "To hold that assurance comes only by an inward voice of the Spirit, saying, 'Thy sins are forgiven thee, and by believing thereupon that our sins are forgiven, is an error that has very dangerous consequences. Most saints must quit their hopes of assurance, for they never had this voice; though they have greater stamps of the Spirit than any I ever knew pretend to this.

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makes all examination useless and vain ; it overturns one of the great ends God has assigned to grace in the heart; it sets the Spirit of God against itself, if any man can possess assurance by this voice, while his state may be justly challenged by the Gospel as wanting all sight of Gospel marks. The Holy Spirit enlightens the mind either to discern faith, love, and such other qualities as the Gospel declares to be invaluable signs of regeneration; and he adds such power to the testimony of conscience for the truth and inbeing of those graces as begets in the soul a joyful sense of its reconciled state, and some comfortable freedom from those fears which accompany the doubting Christian; and according to the evidence

of these graces, assurance is strong or weak."

Thus much for England. Let us now cross the Atlantic, and see what was thought of the subject there by two of the most distinguished men in the last age in that or any other country.

Bellamy has thus expressed himself: "We have no instance in Scripture, nor does the word of God even lead us to look for such a thing, as the direct witness. If we do certainly know our state from our sanctification, is not the immediate witness needless? Besides, how will you know whether your immediate revelation, or voice, comes from God or the wicked one? Will you know by the fruits of your faith? No! for this would be to try the witness of the Spirit by the sincerity of your graces. No honest man ought to believe his state to be good with more confidence than is exactly proportionate to this evidence-evidence arising from his character. Nor is there any evidence that will pass with our final Judge, or that ought to be of any weight with us, but real holiness. The communication of Divine grace, in a large and very sensible degree, is that whereby the Spirit of God makes it evident to our conscience, beyond all doubt, that we are the children of God, and not by any immediate revelation."

Let us now proceed in the last place, to the greatest of all the Americans, and, indeed, in some respects, as Robert Hall was wont to designate him-the greatest of human kind-Jonathan Edwards. If ever man was pre-eminently taught of the Spirit of God, he was. Let us hear this eminent man, then: "Many have been the mischiefs that have arisen from that false and delusive notion of the witness of the Spirit, that it is a kind of inward voice, a suggestion, or declaration from God to man, that he is beloved by him, and pardoned, elected, and the like; sometimes with, sometimes without a text of Scripture; and many have been the vain affections that have arisen from hence and it is to be feared that multitudes of souls have been eternally undone by it! The witness of the Spirit the Apostle speaks of, is far from being any whisper, or immediate suggestion, or revelation; but that gracious effect of the Spirit of God in the hearts of saints. The disposition and temper of children appearing in a sweet child-like love of God, which casts out fear, or the spirit of the slave. When Paul speaks of the Spirit of God bearing witness with ours,

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he is not to be understood as speaking of two spirits, that are two separate, collateral, and independent witnesses; but it is by one that we receive the witness of the other. The Spirit of God gives the evidence by infusing, and shedding abroad the love of God, the spirit of the child in the heart, and our spirit, or our conscience, receives and declares this evidence for our rejoicing."

Nothing can be more explicit than this language, which settles for ever, so far as this eminent man is concerned, the question respecting impulses, and impressions, voices and revelations. The celebrated Stoddart, the grandfather of Edwards, in his younger days, held the notion of a direct witness; but latterly, with more intelligence and more experience, he entirely rejected it. It only remains that we now consider the subject in its

IV. PRACTICAL DEDUCTIONS.

We are taught, then, that the evidence of our sonship is to be sought and found, only in our resemblance to God in spiritual nature, and moral character-originated, developed, matured, perfected, by the power and indwelling of the Holy Spirit. This witness of the Spirit, therefore, is not simply an inward, but an outward affair; a thing seen as well as felt, and in which our neighbours are concerned as well as ourselves.

Holiness is a primary part of this testimony. The people of God are actually predestined to be conformed to the Divine image, and in the absence of such conformity there is no proof of predestination, none of penitence, none of faith. "Put on the new man, which, after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness"- "As obedient children, as He who called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; because it is written, be ye holy, for I am holy"-" With open face, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."

This, then, we say, that holiness is the seal of the Eternal King-the mark, and witness of the Spirit. Where this is, the tendencies of nature are overthrown, and new principles brought into full play. You love the Lord and hate evil; you delight yourselves in his commandments, and pray that his tender mercies may come upon you that you may make his law your delight!

Justice is an element in this witness,

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or a material part of the foregoing attribute-that which God requires of man as the sum and substance of his righteous exactions, is, to "do justly, love mercy, and to walk humbly with his God"—" a God without iniquity, just and upright is he;" and as is the Father, so is the child, and so have the children ever been. "Noah was a just and perfect man, and walked with God"-Joseph was a "just man," Simeon was just and devout"-Joseph of Arimathea was a good man, and a just;" Cornelius the centurion was a just man. Justice is a term of very wide comprehension, having reference to the Creator, and the creature, and all the relations of life; and in the absence of justice, it is in vain that men lay claim to holiness. This justice provides for all their dues, custom to whom custom, tribute to whom tribute is due; in a word, it secures to every man his own, and thus all receive their dues each discharging what is due to each, all are satisfied and happy. But this justice is allied to other graces, in the absence of which its existence cannot be proved.

Goodness is a prime ingredient of the Divine witness. To all such the command is given, and by all such it is cheerfully received, "Love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do good to them that hate you; and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you, that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven; for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth his rain on the just and on the unjust." This witness is very much made up of benevolence, of forbearance with wrongdoers, compassion for sufferings, and the spirit of universal philanthropy.

Truth is also a prime element in the holiness which constitutes the witness of the Spirit. This is a special characteristic of the Father, and is invariably found in all his children. "The Lord is abundant in truth." "His truth endureth to all generations." "The Lord is God, who keepeth truth for ever." "God cannot

lie.

lie."

"God is not a man that he should "The strength of Israel will not lie." The truth of the Most High is everywhere set forth as the basis of the hope of his people. A God without truth would be a terrible object of contemplation! Power and knowledge infinite, without goodness, and without truth, would be dreadful! The attribute of truth is essential to the perfection of the

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