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exceedingly to quench the Spirit of God, if not to provoke Him finally
to forsake them. And when such a spirit has much prevailed, and persons
have not so earnestly strove against it as they ought to have done, it
has seemed to be exceedingly to the hindrance of the good of their
souls. But in some other instances, where persons have been much
terrified at the sight of such wickedness in their hearts, God has
brought good to them out of evil; and made it a means of convincing them
of their own desperate sinfulness, and bringing them off from all
self-confidence.
The drift of the Spirit of God in His legal strivings with persons, has
seemed most evidently to be, to bring to a conviction of their absolute
dependence on His sovereign power and grace, and an universal necessity
of a mediator. This has been effected by leading them more and more to a
sense of their exceeding wickedness and guiltiness in His sight; their
pollution, and the insufficiency of their own righteousness; that they
can in no wise help themselves, and that God would be wholly just and
righteous in rejecting them and all that they do, and in casting them
off for ever. There is however a vast variety as to the manner and
distinctness of such convictions.
As they are gradually more and more convinced of the corruption and
wickedness of their hearts, they seem to themselves to grow worse and
worse, harder and blinder, and more desperately wicked, instead of
growing better. They are ready to be discouraged by it, and oftentimes
never think themselves so far off from good as when they are nearest.
Under the sense which the Spirit of God gives them of their sinfulness,
they often think that they differ from all others; their hearts are
ready to sink with the thought that they are the worst of all, and that
none ever obtained mercy who were so wicked as they.
When awakenings first begin, their consciences are co
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They have a secret instinct which impels them to seek amusement and
occupation abroad, and which arises from the sense of their constant
unhappiness. They have another secret instinct, a remnant of the greatness
of our original nature, which teaches them that happiness in reality
consists only in rest and not in stir. And of these two contrary instincts
they form within themselves a confused idea, which hides itself from their
view in the depths of their soul, inciting them to aim at rest through
excitement, and always to fancy that the satisfaction which they have not
will come to them, if, by surmounting whatever difficulties confront them,
they can thereby open the door to rest.
Thus passes away all man's life. Men seek rest in a struggle against
difficulties; and when they have conquered these, rest becomes insufferable.
For we think either of the misfortunes we have or of those which threaten
us. And even if we should see ourselves sufficiently sheltered on all sides,
weariness of its own accord would not fail to arise from the depths of the
heart wherein it has its natural roots and to fill the mind with its poison.
Thus so wretched is man that he would weary even without any cause for
weariness from the peculiar state of his disposition; and so frivolous is he
that, though full of a thousand reasons for weariness, the least thing, such
as playing billiards or hitting a ball, is sufficient to amuse him.
But will you say what object has he in all this? The pleasure of bragging
tomorrow among his friends that he has played better than another. So others
sweat in their own rooms to show to the learned that they have solved a
problem in algebra, which no one had hitherto been able to solve. Many more
expose themselves to extreme perils, in my opinion as foolishly, in order to
boast afterwards that they have captured a town. Lastly, others wear
themselves out in studying all these things, not in order to beco