34I E7iTÉ.doençNlnt wirttrS$ or Tuff st'ntrt without some peculiar and more uncommon influences orate. Rely Spirit, they could hardly be said to arise to suchjoy as was unspeakableand full of glary, or glorifedjoy, as the greek text expresses it, xapm S=Soça ,.nvr a-km to that which the saints pos- sess inthe glorified state. 2. There is yet another sort of extraordinary witness of the spirit ; and that is, when in an immediate and powerful manner, the 1-loly Spirit impresses the soul with an assurance of divine love, and gives'the heart of a saint such a full discovery of his; adoption or interestin-the favour of God, without the more slow and argumentative method ofcomparing the dispositions Of their souls with some special characters of the children of God in scripture. The Spirit of God may witness in an exfraerdinary manner' toour adoption, by an inward experimental sense of the love ofGod shed abroad in the heart, assuring someof his favou- rites that they ara the sons or daughters of God, without any particular examination of the heart at that time, or any present reflections on the characters of adoption described in thebible. Y confessthe several acts ofthe mindof man, even the reason- ing and argumentativeacts of the soul, are se quick and sudden, and the sensible joy that may arise from them, follows in so swift and close a succession, that it is sometimes very hard to dis- tinguish and define the bounds and limits of the several actions, perceptions, and impressionson the mind. On this account I shall not be solicitous to keep up the distinction between these two kinds of the extraordinary witness of the Spirit, but shall only speakof them in general, as distinguished from the ordinary witness of the Spirit, by; the more immediate sensations of di- vine love, that are impressed through the peculiar favour of God on the souls ofsome ofhis children. I am very sensible that, in our present age, the Spirit of God is somuch withdrawn from the christian church in all his operati- ons, that a man exposes himself to the censureof wild enthusi- asm, and a heated fancy, if he ventures to discourse at all on such a theme as this: But as I am persuaded these things were fre- quent matter of christian experience in the primitive days of the gospel, and in scenes ofsharp persecution, so I am satisfied that God lias not utterly withheld his divine favours of this kind from . his churches and his-children, for sixteen hundred years toge- ther ; and I hope I shall make it appear, that a supposition of this extraordinary witness of the spirit may be maintained, with out givinga loose to all the roving dreams ofa distemperedbrain, or to the bold presumptions of weak and conceited men or false and deceitful impòstors. The method ofmy discourse is this, I. I will offer some very probable proofs that there has been and is, such a thing as the extraordinary witness of the Spirit of God, II. I shall mention a few of Qhe special seasons or oeca-
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