tue, is, because faith, in the Scripture sense, is not barely an act of the understanding, but a mixed act of the will also, consisting very much in that simplicity and unprejudicedness of mind, which our Saviour calls receiving the kingdom of God as a little child, in that freedom from guile and deceit, which was the character of Nathanael, an Israelite indeed; and in that teachable disposition, and desire to know the will of God, for which the Bereans were so highly commended,' who searched the Scriptures daily, whether these things were

true.'

This simple, teachable, unprejudiced state of mind is in itself amiable. It is pleasing both to God and good men. It is esteemed even by the wicked. It is precisely the state in which the Holy Spirit delights, and with which he will make his abode, bringing with him comfort and illumination. To use the poet's words;

He must delight in virtue;

And that which he delights in must be happy."

If indeed it were a moral virtue merely to believe a narrative on the credibility of the narrators, or the probability of the circumstances, then would it be a moral virtue to believe a well-authenticated newspaper. But to believe the gospel requires purity and piety of heart, those lovely qualities which the imagination conceives characteristic of the angelic nature. It implies a disposition which delights in devotion to God, and beneficence to man; a disposition cheerful, tranquil, and which enjoys every innocent satisfaction of this life, sweetened with the hope, that when the sun sets, it will rise in new and additional

splendour. Faith, accompanied with hope and charity, constitutes the true Christian; a living image of virtue, and forming that beautiful model which the philosopher wished, but despaired to see; truth embodied, virtue personified, walking forth among the sons of men, and exciting, by its conspicuous loveliness, an universal desire of imitation.

SECTION XXIX.

Of the Scriptural word, 'Unction;' its high mysterious Meaning.

THE very title of our Saviour (n' and XPIΣTOX) is the anointed; and the operation of the Holy Ghost is called in the sacred Scriptures (XPIZMA) unction. This idea of the chrisma pervades the whole doctrine of grace.

"The anointing with oil," says Hammond, denoted, among the Jews, the preferring one before another, (and the Targum generally renders it by a word which signifies preferring or advancing,) and so became the ceremony of consecrating to any special office, and was used in the installing men to places of any eminence."

The word chrisma, or unction, was hence assumed to signify the act of the Holy Ghost, in consecrating those who are favoured by divine

וי

grace. The consequence of this unction is illumination; for St. John says, 'Ye have an unction from the Holy One, (the Holy Ghost,) and ye (in consequence) know all things; that is, all things that concern the nature and evidence of Christ's religion. Again he says, 'The anointing which ye have received of him (the Holy Ghost) abideth in you; and ye need not that any man teach you; but as the same anointing teacheth you all things, and is truth, and is no lie; even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him."

The idea of the chrisma, I repeat, or unction,3 pervades the whole doctrine of divine grace. It gives a name to him who brought down the great gift of the Spirit, and who himself had the hallowed unction without measure; for what is signified by Christ, but the Anointed ? 5

4

I have introduced these observations on the name of Christ, partly with a view to expose the false learning of a French philosopher, who has attacked Christianity with singular artifice. The celebrated M. Volney affirms, that Christianity is but the allegorical worship of the sun-a mere mode of oriental superstition, under the cabalistical names of chrisen or Christ, the etymology of which, according to him, has no reference to the chrisma, unction, but to chris, an astrological name among the Indians for the sun, and signifying conservator; "whence," says he, "the Hin

! 1 John, ii. 20.

? Ib. ii. 27.

3 Dieu fait couler dans l'âme je ne scais quelle onction, qui la remplit. Bretonneau.-"God causes to flow into the soul an unction which I cannot describe, but which fills, or satisfies, it completely."

4 John, iii. 34.

5 κατ' εξοχην.

K

doo god, Chrisen, or Christna, and the Christian Christos, the son of Mary." Many of the French philosophers, and perhaps Volney, are unacquainted with Greek.

But I hope the Christian scholar will never give up the Greek etymology of the word Christ, evidently a translation of the Hebrew Messiah; nor the sublime and mysterious doctrine which it leads to, the metaphorical anointing of the Holy Ghost, the sanctifying, consecrating, purifying influence of divine grace.'

SECTION XXX.

On what is called by devout persons Experience in Religion.

THERE is a peace of God, which passeth all understanding, and baffles all power of description. The flavour of a peach or pine-apple is delightful to the palate, but words can give no idea of it to him who has never tasted them. There is a fragrance in a

Mr. Volney further says, that "Yesus, or Jesus, was an ancient name given to young Bacchus, the clandestine son of the virgin Minerva, who, in the whole history of his life, and even in his death, calls to mind the history of the God of the Christians; that is, the Star of the Day, of which they are both of them emblems." Let us avoid the folly of fanciful learning; and say rather that the Star of the Day, is an emblem of Jesus Christ, gloriously enlightening, and vitally warming, by his influence, the intellectual system.

rose, which, while the nerves perceive it with complacency, cannot be communicated, in the slightest degree, by language. Such also is the heavenly manna; and he who would form a just notion of its exquisite sweetness, must taste it. No learning, not even the argumentative skill of an Aristotle, can afford him the least idea of it without actual sensation.

"Were I to define divinity," (says the admirable author of Select Discourses,) "I should rather call it a divine life, than a divine science; it being something rather to be understood by a spiritual sensation, than by any verbal description.

"Divinity is a true efflux from the eternal light, which, like the sun-beams, does not only enlighten, but heat and enliven. The knowledge of divinity that appears in systems is but a poor wax-light; but the powerful energy of divine knowledge displays itself in 'purified souls,' the true IIɛdior Αληθειας.

"To seek our divinity merely in books and writings, is to seek the living among the dead. We do but in vain seek God, many times, in these, where his truth too often is not so much enshrined as entombed. No; intra te quære Deum; seek for God within thine own soul. He is best discerned νοερα επαφη, by an intellectual feeling. Έστι δε ψυχης αισθησις τις, “the soul itself has a certain feeling.'

1

93

"The reason why, notwithstanding all our acute

Bishop Taylor and Mr. Smith coincide here, not only in sentiment, but expression.

The soil in which truth grows and flourishes.

3 Plotinus.