ON THE

CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE

* OF THE

TEACHING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT,

AS HELD BY

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.

BALTIMORE:

PRINTED BY JOHN D. TOY.

08328.69

HARVARD COLLEGE LIONARY

GIFT OF

HENRY JOEL CADBURY

MAR 3 1937

Printed by direction of the Meeting for Sufferings, of Baltimore Yearly Meeting, (in unity with the ancient Yearly Meetings of Friends.)

Baltimore, 1839.

JOSEPH KING, JR. Clerk.

ON THE

TEACHING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

THE Society of Friends have always maintained, that the Holy Scriptures were given by inspiration of God; and, believing them to convey to man a declaration of the dealings of God with his people in past ages of his statutes, judgments, and mercy, and above all, as containing the message of the covenant of grace and peace through Jesus Christ; they have always taught, that these writings are to be reverently received, diligently read, and their commands faithfully obeyed.

In full accordance with these writings they have ever believed-that there is one God and Father of all, of whom are all things-that there is one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom all things were made, who was glorified with the Father before the world was, who is God over all, blessed for ever,-and that there is one Holy Spirit, the promise of the Father and the Son; the leader, sanctifier, and comforter of his

people; and that these three are one God. And, though shunning some scholastic terms, they have ever held, without any mystification, the real manhood as well as the deity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; that the word which was in the beginning with God, and was God, was made flesh and dwelt amongst us; that he was the Messiah of whom the Old Testament, from Genesis to Malachi, so largely speaks, and whose offices in the church were prefigured in various types under the Mosaic covenant.

They believe that man, as he stands in the fall, is separated, alienated in his nature, from God; that we have all sinned, and come short of the glory of God, and are therefore exposed to divine wrath; and that it is solely through the mercy of God in Jesus Christ, that we are again brought into reconciliation with Him, receiving the remission of our sins through the one propitiatory offering of the lamb of God, and sanctification of heart, through the influences of the Holy Spirit.

The early Friends frequently declared, that they believed in no natural principle or power in man to discover divine truth, so as to enable him to turn effectually to God; but they did not hesitate to declare their experimental conviction, that by the immediate power of his Spirit they were convinced of sin; led to deep repentance for sin; to trust alone to the free mercy of God in Jesus Christ for the for

giveness of their sins; and to experience the purification of their hearts by the baptism of his Spirit.

It was in reference to this great practical work that they urged so earnestly the doctrine of spiritual influence. They appealed to men, whether they did not know the convictions for sin in their own hearts, and besought them to attend to them as the monitions of the Holy Spirit calling them unto Christ, that they might become partakers of the covenant of his grace, and know through Him true union and peace with God.

They esteemed it no derogation to the character of Holy Scripture, but that it was in the strictest accordance with its scope and letter, to maintain that some measure of the light of the Spirit of God has been immediately granted to man ever since his fall, for the purpose of his restoration, and as the spring and principle of all true knowledge and holiness; and that a larger measure of this grace-a fuller communication between God and his people, was the peculiar feature and privilege of the christian covenant.

Neither did they imagine that they withdrew one iota from the character of our blessed Lord, as having been the sacrifice for our sins on the cross, and as still ever living at the right hand of the Father, as our high-priest and intercessor, when they asserted, as they believed, on the full authority of Holy Scripture, that, as the 'true light which lighteth every