40 / 514
INWARD WITNESS
TO
CHRISTIANITY.
tSEÁhÍ.
tir.
the
beginnings
of that eternal
life
wrought
in the soul;
which the
Son
of God
bestows on
all believers;
he
that
hath
the
Son
hath
life.
The spiritual life
of
a
christian
runs
into
eternity;
it
is
the
same divine
temper, the
same
peaceful and
holy
qualities
of
mind communicated
to
the
believer here
in the
days
of
grace, which shall be
fulfilled and
perfected
in
the world
of
glory;
and' this
is
a
blessed witness to
the
truth of
christianity;
it
proves
with
abundant
evidence,
that
it
is
a
religion
sufficient
to
save souls;
-for
the
salvation
is
begun
in every man
that
receivesit.
I
shall
.
repeat
no
more
of
the foregoing discourses,
but
proceed immediately
to
answer the last
question
there
proposed,
viz.
What sort
of
witness this
is,
which
true
faith
gives to
the gospel
of
Christ, and what
are the
remarkable properties
of
this testimony.
I
answer,
I.
It
is
a witness
that
dwells
more in the
heart
than
in the
head.
It
is
a
testimony
known by
being felt and practised, and
not
by
mere
reasoning;
the greatest reasoners
may
miss
of
it,
for
it
is
a
testimony
written
in
time
heart;
and upon
this
account it
has
some
prerogatives
above
all the
external arguments
for the
truth
of
christianity. This inward
argument
is
always
at
hand, when
a believer
is
in
the exercise
of
his
graces,
and acting according
to
his new
;nature
and
life
:
It
is
an
argument
that
is
not
lost
through the
weakness
of
the
brain, the defect
of
the memory, and long ábsence from
books and
study, to which
other arguments are
liable,;
it
is
an
argument
that cannot
be
forgotten,
while
true
re-
ligion remains
in
the
heart,,,
for
it
is
graven there
in
last-
ing characters.
Those
words
of
St.
Paul
to
the Corinthians,
in
his
se-
.
cond epistle, chap.
iii.
ver.
2,
3.
have
a reference to
our present
case:
Ye
are
manifestly declared
to
be
the
epistle
of
Christ
ministered
by
us,
written
not with
ink
but
with the
Spirit
of
the living God;
not
in
tables
of
stone,
but
in
fleshly
tables
of
the
heart. We
have
a
glory
in
our
religion,
that
distinguishes it
from,
and ad
vances
it above the Jewish
dispensation; their
law
Wàs
written
in
tables
of
stone, and afterwards Moses wrote
it
out
at
large
in
a
book: But
ye
have
something
(says
the
apostle) written
in
your hearts,
that
proves
the