388 CHRISTIANITY He finds that his spiritual interests do not advance. He begins to discover that his faith is cold, even, his work is sluggish,. and its progress unsatisfactory. His ex- ertions want the inspiring principle;, they want a genuine faith. He begins to dis- cover, that even his good actions, on which he had been accustomed to rest half his salvation, are exceeded by those persons who do more, and put no trust in them. He at length, through the influence of Divine grace, begins to discover, or ra- ther to feel, that while one party is exclu- sivelyexalting faith, and the other works, both seem to have forgotten, or rather not to have known, that there is a third, a heavenly principle, a sacred cement, without which their separation might be eternal, and even their junction would be imperTect. The sacred principle is LOVE. He now knows, experimentally, that Christianity is a religion of the affections, a sentiment of the heart ; that it demands and confers that charity, 3
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