It may mind vital in every part with the spirit of holiness. be laid down as an axiom, that in order to the successful study of religious truths, there must be brought to the investigation, conjointly, a thinking mind, and a holy heart. To adopt a phraseology from common life, such truths will not give; they will not be milked in any other temper of mind. That which is apprehended by the intellect as a truth, must be delighted in by the heart, and lived out as a reality, before one can be said truly to possess it, or to be possessed by it. In the school of Christ, we must be fervent in love, before we can become even apt scholars to learn, much more masters of Divine truth in the place of our Great Teacher, to urge it eloquently upon others. A sanctified heart, alive to the impression, and apt for the transmission of truth, is the only medium through which the intellect can perceive moral truth clearly. They who disregard this dioptric law of moral science, and think to make inquisition into celestial regions, and disclose the mysteries of moral truth through the mere intellect, utterly fail, and grope at noonday as in the darkness. They are in much the same predicament with respect to God, the great moral Sun of the universe, and the realities of eternity, as we should be in respect to the natural sun, were it not for the translucent and reflective properties of our atmosphere, without which, so far as we are concerned, the sun might as well not shine. None of the wicked (says God), shall understand, but the wise, in the sense of antithesis to the wicked, shall understand. Without the discipline of a genuine, and deep religious experience ourselves, without the insight of human nature gained from personal travel, by the rough road of conviction and spiritual regeneration into the kingdom of God, we can wake no echoes in the souls of others. A man, according to the fine saying of Augustine, must first descend into the hell of his own heart, in order to ascend to the heaven of God; or we might add, before he can be safely set as a religious teacher. In order to move others, we must have been deeply, inly moved ourselves. In order to electrify others, we must have been self-electrified. Before we can stir up others to take hold on God and religion, we must have the depth of our own being fully stirred in the revolutionary process of a thorough work of grace. And in many cases, too, we must be often melted up and run over, in the crucible of affliction, before we can have acquired the experience and power that will enable us to startle others with the thunder of truth, or by the vivid flashes of a heaven-born eloquence, to reveal to them the true greatness of their nature, and make them solemn and thoughtful over themselves. We must be put into the alembic of trial before our native ore will run, or its impurities be sublimed. And often, such is our hardness and stubborn temper, we must be wrought in the forge of suffering, and it is God's breath must be blowing the bellows, before the process of refining will go so far as to reflect His image from our melting and obedient souls, and form us into vessels meet for His service, And then we must be moulded, and hammered on the anvil into various shapes, by God's painful discipline; and we must be deeply graved upon by His marking tools, before we can be at all fitted for His best uses here, or for glory hereafter. Hence the great truth, as well as beauty, of that familiar saying of Leighton, that God hath many sharp cutting instruments, and rough files, for the polishing of His jewels; and those He especially esteems, and means to make the most of, He hath oftenest His tools upon. God's tools must be often, indeed, upon the man, to shape him into holiness, whom He will eminently use for the elucidation of His truth, and the bringing of men to repentance; and it must be seen, and acknowledged, that it is holiness which is at the bottom of all His power. J Nor is it only in the direct efforts of the mind, to apprehend and possess itself of religious truth, or to communicate it to others, that the intellect is so peculiarly aided and disciplined by holiness. The devotional exercises of a man whose heart is glowing with love to God, are in the highest degree improving and disciplinary. It is the well-known aphorism of Coleridge, that "one hour of solitude passed in sincere and earnest prayer, or the conflict with, and conquest over, a single passion or subtle bosom-sin, will teach us more of thought, will more effectually awaken the faculty, and form the habit of reflection, than a year's study in the schools without them." Tertullian had good reason for his assertion, that "the simplest Christian, if indeed a Christian, knows, more than the most accomplished irreligous philosopher." This is true to its full extent, for in prayer, if it be sincere, and not made from memory, we soberly reflect and exercise the mind on the character and attributes of God, on our relations to Him, on the worth and destiny of the soul, and on many of the most sublime and important themes that can occupy the minds of intelligent beings. And not merely do we think to ourselves on these great subjects, but we accustom ourselves audibly to express thought in the language of reverence and feeling. Hence the philosophic truth of Luther's motto, bene orasse est bene studuisse, to have prayed well is to have studied well. Truth, which is the food of the mind, and on which alone it can be built up, is in prayer brought into direct contact with the soul, is assimilated by it, and cannot fail to invigorate and quicken it. Accustomed thus to the vision of God and eternal realities in prayer, the soul is enabled to look on Divine truth, with steadfast gaze; it will not be put from beholding its bright face, and it then feels most at home when in the midst of the loftiest spiritual conceptions. Without that unsurpassed fervor in devotion, Paul might have exercised the energies of 'his great mind on the system of Divine revelation for centuries, ere he could have given to the Church that glowing flame of truth in the three first chapters of the Epistle to the Ephesians. And this intellectual power gained at particular times of devotion, is not transient; but the Christian student goes from a season of fervent prayer to other intellectual efforts, with an acuteness, a vigor, and elasticity of mind, which in no other way can be so readily attained. Thus it is, that the sentiment of Dr. Young, "a Christian is the highest style of man," is but the happy expression of an absolute truth, often realized in the history of regenerate minds. No man, therefore, can be said to be thoroughly disciplined but the genuine experimental Christian student. It is for him especially to seem, and to be, the highest style of a man, a true saint, and a true scholar, at one and the same time; diligent in business, for his blessed business is nothing else but to grow in grace, and to discipline and furnish his mind for usefulness; fervent in spirit, because fervor is as natural a result of the close contact of truth with a man's spirit, as 'a spark is from the meeting of steel and stone, or as a glow is from friction; serving the Lord, for God's noblest and best approved service, is the free mind's enthusiastic investigation and development of truth. Hence the truly noble Christian student, who is being a true scholar by striving to be a true saint, says to himself in those words of the poet, and makes them his motto: I therefore go and join, head, heart, and hand, And other things being equal, just in proportion to the fervor of his heart's holiness, will be the disciplined efficiency of his intellect. Luther was often wont to invigorate himself, as it were, like one of the Grecian Athletæ, for his giant-like mental achievements, by three hour's daily prayer, and Payson frequently obtained angelic speed of thought, and power of expression, by. long communion with God. And it may be said in passing, that if ministers should particularly prepare themselves for every sermon, as Milton said he must be fitted for the composition of his Divine poem, "by devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit, who can enrich, with all knowledge and utterance, and sends out his seraphim with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases"—if this were the account of the origin of our sermons, glorious above what is now experienced would be the history of their results. Our great error, as ministers and theological students in our course of mental discipline, is in this, that we do not heartily surrender, if I may so speak, to the holy unitive despotism of the one master-passion of love to Christ and desire for human salvation. Here is the key to pulpit eloquence and the peculiar moral power of the ambassador of Christ-supreme devotion to our great Master's work. Paul had this ruling passion-I detertermined to know nothing among you but Christ-and he was mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, and eloquent to make kings and philosophers tremble when he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and a judgment to come. Ever keeping subject to this one over-mastering principle, he had the testimony of conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, he had his conversation in the world; and he fulfilled not the lusts of the flesh, because he walked in the spirit. The motto of Whitfield was, "None but Christ," and he went through Great Britain and America preaching his blessed Lord with a wisdom, a fascination, a moral mesmerism, which none could gainsay or resist. It was mainly the enthusiastic earnestness of the man, his logic set on fire by love, that won the sons and daughters which were everywhere the seals of his ministry. All the energies of his intellectual, moral, and physical being were cheerfully subservient to his one master passion of love to Christ and desire for His glory in the salvation of men. "Night and day (says he), Jesus fills me with his love. Every morning, I feel my fellowship with Christ, and He gives me all joy and peace in believing. The sight I have of God by faith ravishes my soul. I would leap my seventy years and fly into His presence. I want a thousand tongues to set off my Redeemer's praise.' In the mind of the lamented Spencer it was the same ruling passion, bringing every thought into captivity, and making his intellect the disciplined servitor of a sanctified heart, that was the spring of his unfailing energy, the fuel of his captivating animation, the source of his unbounded popularity and success. It was not the Maze of genius, nor the glow of imagination, but the ruddy flame of a steadfast piety, the kindling earnestness of a soul having its being only for Christ, and on fire with the intensity of its desires for men's salvation, that gave life, unction, and persuasiveness to his appeals. It was because he was, as Bunyan once said of himself, all on a flame to find and to lead the way to heaven and glory. And so it will be to the end of time. While the nature of truth and the moral constitution of man remain as they are, holiness only can be relied upon as the great disciplinarian of the successful preacher, without which, the minister must be considered as without the specific discipline of his profession. Let ministers be rationally, self-forgettingly, enthusiastic in the work of salvation, let love to it be, as with Paul and Whitefield, the domineering principle, night and day let the burden of souls rest on them while they rest calmly upon Christ and He supports them, then it is absolutely certain that their ministry would be a perpetual in-gathering of souls into the kingdom of Christ. So far as man's agency is concerned, it is this absorbing earnestness, more than any or all things else, that insures success in the ministry; for it implies, nay, it may be almost said to render certain, the co-operating energy of the Holy Ghost. This very earnestness is first the work of that Holy Spirit upon the preacher's soul, and then it becomes the telegraphic battery for generating the divine electricity that is to run along upon the wires of communication with other minds, and to be continually charging them with truth, thrilling with conviction and self-abhorrence, exciting them to repentance, faith, love, joy, and activity in doing good, and, best of all, insulating them from the world, and making them, while in it, to live above it. What we need as ministers is to become more powerful and perfect dissolving batteries; not constantly getting out of order like the telegraph, just at the time when heaven's messages are to be transmitted along, and the most powerful impressions are to be made on waiting minds. But our souls must be always immersed and evolving heaven's own galvanism; at once responsive to every breath of the Spirit, every call of providence, every intimation of duty, every exigency and voice of the times, and thus affording a fair vehicle for the messages of God to pass on to men. We want a more constant immersion of mind in heavenly pursuits and exercises. We want a more absorbing engagedness in the angelic work of winning souls to Christ, both in the pulpit and out. "Let us come out for God as flames of fire (said the celebrated Gilbert Tennant in a letter to his brother William), and say with gallant Luther, madness is better than mildness in the cause of God. Let us imitate dear and noble Zuinglius, who, when mortally wounded on the field of battle, triumphed over his bloody papal enemies, yea, and over death itself, in those ever memorable strains of heroism, Quidni hoc infortuni? It is a small expression of grateful love to our great and good Master, in return for His immense, unmerited, condescending love to us; and, therefore, if God so please, let good and bad, men and devils, rage and roar―yea, let the whole creation come against us with all its fury and force-strip us of everything naturally dear to mankind, curse us, condemn us, tear us to pieces, or grind us to powder, it is sweet, it is lovely, it is precious. The testimony of our conscience enlightened by the Holy Ghost, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God we have had our conversation in the world, is infinitely better and sweeter than the applause of the whole earth. The apostles did more good to mankind under the greatest reproach and contempt, than we do, with all our fine character. If we did what we should, and as we should, men would fall upon us and beat us for God's sake." Perhaps this is not exaggerated, for if ministers at this day should preach with the holy unction and enthusiastic |