3,9 INWARD WITNESS TO CHRISTIANITY. bolder They take greater delight in God, and more gustful satisfaction in his worship, and in his company : Their zeal for his honour is warmer and stronger ; they are perpetually employ- ing themselves in contrivances for the glory of God among men. Thus in every part of this spiritual life the testimony increases, the evidence grows brighter; as eternal life advances : in them. In the last place : As it is a growing witness, so it is such an one as never can be utterly lost; and that character of it is deri- ved from the very name, for it is eternal life. Where it is once wrought in the soul, it shall be everlasting, it shall never die. The seed of God abides in those that are bornof God; 1.tohn iii, 9.fOr they are born not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible,: even the word of God, which lives and abides forever; 1 Pet. i. 23. His gospel, which is an everlasting gospel, continues that heaven- ly work in the soul, which that gospel did first begin. It may be darkened indeed, it may be hidden for a season ; sometimes the violent temptations of the evil one, may, as it were stop the mouth of this divinewitness ; and sometimes, defiling lusts rising upon the face of the soul, may darken these evidences, but can never entirely blot them out. Eternal life must abide for ever, . according to the name and natureof it. Though the evidence for a season may be Obscure, and may seem to be silent through, the power of iniquity, and the strength of temptation ; yet this, life will resunìe its activity; and discover itself, becauseits nature, is eternal. It is Christ Jesus living in the soul by the power of his own Spirit ; Christ Jesus; who isthe eternalprinciple of life, . and his Spirit, which is the eternal Spirit : and where he bath begun td dwell, he shall forever inhabit. This evidence shall continue to all eternity, and shall give manya sweet reflection to the saints in heaven. "" I feel now (says every saint there) that this was a true gospel I trusted in, in the days of my flesh ; and this religion was divine, for it bath raised me to these mansions' of blessedness. I feel now it was a doctrine came down front heaven, and that Christ Jesus was not an imposter, but the Son' of God indeed, for he has brought me to his Father's house by this doctrine ; he has seatedme open his own throne, even as ho is seated upon the throne of his Father : he hath made me an overcomer by believing this doctrine, even as he himself has over-' come.." Eternal life itself, in the perfection of it in the future world, shall be a standing and everlasting evidence of the truth of the gospel. I will now endeavour to draw some few inferences or remarks fromthe discourse' and then conclude. 1. The first remark is very obvious, howglorious is the gos- pel of our Lord ! How preferable to all other religions! Those
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