right ones, will not control the movements of his heart. With such objects before him, and such a state of mind, he will have such emotions. "To the pure all things are pure; but to them that are defiled nothing is pure." Thus we see how it happens that a man is so often disappointed in regard to his own feelings. He voluntarily turns his attention to particular objects, or puts himself in particular circumstances, because, for some reason, he wishes to have certain emotions. But instead of the emotions desired, others of a different kind arise, and he thus finds that an act of his will can have no influence to elicit affections which are contrary to the state of his heart. It may sometimes be the case, that a man of a covetous disposition, may wish and labor to acquire riches, for the purpose, among other things, of curing his covetousness, and making his feelings kind and generous. But he is disappointed. His riches, when acquired, have no effect but to increase his covetous desires. Why is this? Because his external circumstances and his own thoughts and wishes, have an influence upon him according to the character or state of his mind. This well known principle, this law of our intellectual and moral nature, is taught in the Scriptures. When Christ says, "a good tree will bear good fruit, and a corrupt tree corrupt fruit," and that it cannot be otherwise, he says it to illustrate the principle that a man's feelings and actions will be according to his mental state or character. We can, indeed, excite a great variety of affections in ourselves by the exercise of our voluntary agency in the manner above described; but they will all be consonant to our predominant disposition. Take the case of confirmed hostility to the Christian religion, such as appeared in the leading infidels of the last century. Was it in the power of the most convincing arguments or the most persuasive eloquence to produce in their hearts, while unchanged by the Holy Spirit, the affection of true love to Christ and his religion? Take the case of an inveterate miser. Can you present any motives before him which will produce in his heart a sincere affection for the word of God, and a readiness to give away his treasures to the destitute? Take the case of the wicked at the last day. Their attention will be power

fully arrested by the most excellent, glorious, and moving objects. But they will have no right feeling. Amid all the light and glory of that day, they will have no emotions but those which correspond with their sinful disposition. Satan is a moral agent of high intellectual powers. Now suppose he could be admitted into the heavenly world, and see all that the angels see and enjoy. What would be his feelings? They would be feelings of hatred, envy, and remorse. Whence this difference between the feelings of Satan and the feelings of Gabriel, in view of the same objects? Whence, but from their different states of mind?

"He

The principle which I have endeavored to illustrate, is often exemplified in the experience of sinners under awakenings of conscience. They are conscious that their affections towards divine things are sinful; and from their natural dread of misery and love of happiness, they in a sense desire such affections as God will approve, and, for the purpose of producing them, they apply themselves to a diligent and serious consideration of the character of God, the merciful interposition of the Redeemer, the holy law, and the precious blessings of salvation. But if the renewing of the Holy Spirit is withheld, they will have no right affections. Those divine objects which they contemplate, will, through their perverseness, be the occasion of exciting dislike and opposition in their hearts, and so prove 66 a savor of death unto death." that loveth is born of God," and this implies, that he only who is born of God, loveth. No considerations however mighty, no motives however powerful and touching, if unaccompanied by the renewing influence of the Spirit, will ever have power to produce any right affections in unregenerate men. Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." And it is equally true, that except a man be born again, he cannot have holy affections; for the want of this is all that prevents his seeing the kingdom of God. If now we say or do anything to lead sinners to think, that any voluntary agency of theirs, or any power of excitement or persuasion which they can use with themselves, or which others can use with them, will ever bring them truly to love God, or believe in Christ, without the new creating agency

66

of the Spirit; we practise a dangerous delusion upon them; and in this way, we show too, that we ourselves labor under a great mistake, and that we forget the desperate wickedness of the heart. Such is the state of the posterity of Adam, that if they become holy, their holiness will not be "from the will of the flesh, or the will of man," not from any disposition or voluntary agency of theirs, but from the Spirit of God; and the whole of their salvation will result, not from any works of righteousness which they have done, but from the purpose and grace of God. Christian ministers should remember this, and should learn to rely wholly upon divine power and mercy for the conversion and salvation of sinners.

I cannot close this number without remarking distinctly on the mistake of those writers on mental philosophy, who make up their systems without recognizing the peculiar facts which are disclosed in the Scriptures, and in the history of the church. No system of mental philosophy can be considered as complete, which overlooks any of the principal phenomena which the human mind has exhibited. But the time would fail me to speak of all those writers on intellectual and moral philosophy, who entirely neglect the peculiar mental operations and states so fully disclosed in the Scriptures, and whose systems are just what they would be, if man had no natural alienation from God, and just what they would be, if there were no such thing as conviction of sin, and regeneration by the Holy Spirit, and a warfare, throughout the life of Christians, between the law of their sanctified mind and the law of sin in their members. I shall give a single example of the fault referred to. Writers very properly notice it as a law of the mind, that the affections are elicited by a view of proper objects; and then, without considering that man is morally depraved, they represent the clear exhibition of divine truth to the understanding, and the serious consideration of it, as all that is necessary to call forth right affections, overlooking that special divine influence, which is the only efficient cause of holiness in the heart of man. Now this is as palpable a mistake as it would be in writers on health, to represent that wholesome food is all that

is necessary to promote vigor and activity in those who are sick. If there are any facts which ought to be made prominent in a system of mental philosophy, surely they are those which are made prominent in the infallible word of God. For does not he who made and redeemed the soul, know what are its powers and capacities, its dispositions and states, and the laws which govern its operations? And can any one who believes the Scriptures, especially any minister of the gospel, deem it proper to disregard those preeminently important facts which result from man's apostasy, and from the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit in man's salvation? These facts, and the laws of the mind respecting them, which are all involved in sound Christian experience, are as certain and as worthy of consideration in a system of mental philosophy, as the laws of the understanding, of the memory, of conscience, or of the natural affections. And a system which overlooks the former is as defective and as much at variance with the truth, as one would be which should overlook the latter. There is no right mental philosophy, but that which has its chief foundation in the facts revealed in the word of God. The sacred writers, taught by their own experience, and by the Divine Spirit, understood the true philosophy of the human mind, and spoke and acted according to it. And if we would understand it, and apply it to its proper uses, we must learn to think and reason, to speak and act, as they did.

NUMBER IV.

In the last Article on the Philosophy of the Mind, I inquired what influence the acts of the will have over the affections. If the distinction which I have made between the acts of the will and the affections, is kept in mind, this inquiry will be intelligible and important. If not, what does it amount to? If the affections are considered as acts of the will, then the influence which the acts of

the will have over the affections, is the influence which some acts of the will have over other acts of the will; and the influence which the will itself has over the affections, is the influence which a faculty has over its own acts. And what is the influence which a faculty has over its own acts, but simply its putting forth acts? And what is putting forth acts, but acting? To say then, that the will exerts an influence over its own acts, is the same as to say, that the will acts. If it is anything more, what is it?

This way of considering the affections as acts of the will, is, as we have seen, attended with a manifest inconvenience. For if you call the affections, as well as volitions, acts of the will, then you include under the same head two classes of mental acts which are essentially different, one class being in themselves morally good or evil, and the other not. And you yourself recognize the distinction, when you speak of the affections being influenced by the acts of the will. For surely you do not mean to speak of the influence of one thing over another, when both of them are of the same kind. And if they are not of the same kind, how can we discourse about them without confusion, if we include them both under the same name? Those who call the affections acts of the will are obliged to divide the acts of the will into two classes, and to mark these classes by distinct epithets, the constant use of which would be cumbersome. But if you omit them, and call both classes acts of the will merely, how can you discourse about them with clearness? I speak particularly of philosophical discourse, in which precision and exactness are necessary. The same as to the word voluntary. If you make it include not only those bodily and mental acts which follow a volition, but the volitions themselves; you must say in each case in what sense you use it, or you will expose others to mistake by using it ambiguously. You say the moral affections are voluntary. But do you mean, that the moral affections are consequent upon a volition? You reply, no. Why, then, do you use an expression, which, according to its ordinary meaning, would convey that sense? If you mean merely, that the affections belong to the