rendered to them all. And such is the supreme reverence due to the Holy Ghost, that though every other sin should be forgiven unto men, yet the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, which consisted in ascribing his miraculous gifts to the prince and powers of darkness, should never be forgiven.

The Holy Ghost is thus a divine Person. But as there is only one essence in the unity of the Godhead, the next inquiry is, in what mode does the Holy Ghost become a partaker of this essence? On this point, as on every other concerning the divine nature, it is worse than folly to speculate. We know the divine nature only as it is revealed to us. The simple inquiry, then, as to the mode by which the Holy Ghost becomes partaker of the nature of the Godhead-what is revealed? and the Scriptures, the only source of authority on this subject, justify the language used by our church in her creeds and articles, that the Holy Ghost proceedeth from the Father and the Son.

He is said by our Saviour to "go out from the Father." He is styled by an apostle, "the Spirit that is out of God." But he is repeatedly spoken of as sent, not only by God the Father, but by Christ the Son; and he is expressly and repeatedly styled, the Spirit of the Father and the Son. Therefore, we are to revere and to worship the Holy Ghost, the third Person of the Godhead, proceeding from the Father and the Son.

What are the operations of this divine Person?

2. He is the Author of all miraculous and ecclesiastical gifts.

The Holy Ghost is the agent by which the Godhead conducts the dispensation of grace to man

kind. All spiritual light and knowledge proceeds from him; for it is his province to declare the mind and will of God, and therefore he is styled the "Spirit of revelation," the "Spirit of prophecy," the "Spirit of truth." Prophets and holy men, sent by God from the beginning, to testify of the Messiah that was to come, to reveal the will of this righteous Governor of the universe, to unfold the counsel and to declare the promises of this Father of mercies, and to denounce the threats of this God of justice and of holiness, "all spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."

By him especially were the apostles commissioned to promulgate the glad tidings of the redemption. In obedience to the command of their Lord and Master when he left them, they tarried at Jerusalem until they were endued with power from on high. "On the day of Pentecost they were all with one accord in one place," waiting, in awful solicitude, the fulfilment of their Lord's promisethe coming of the Holy Ghost, the Advocate, the Comforter. A rushing mighty wind announced his coming; cloven tongues, as of fire, emblems of his illuminating and penetrating gifts, sat upon the disciples. "The Lord gave the word, great was the company of the preachers;" and great the triumphs of these heralds of salvation. Kings with their armies did flee and were discomfited; the pagan hosts were vanquished; the kingdoms of the world became the kingdoms of God and of his Christ. This mighty revolution, which carried Gospel light into the recesses of pagan darkness, planted the cross in the very temples of idolatrous superstition, and consecrated the altars, on which had been vainly offered "thousands of rams and ten

thousands of rivers of oil," to the commemoration of the body and blood of Christ once offered to take away sin, was effected by those miraculous powers with which the apostles were endued by the Holy Ghost.

Gifted with the "word of wisdom and of knowledge," they unfolded God's counsel and will-the mystery of godliness in Jesus Christ, to whom the law and the prophets bore witness. Endowed with that faith which, as expressive of its singular power, is figuratively said to "remove mountains," they triumphed over the appalling assaults of the powers of earth and hell. The "gift of healing" enabled them to cure the maladies of body and mind; and the gift of miracles made all nature subservient to their word. By the "gift of prophecy" they looked back through the periods of time, and forward through the tract of future ages, and explained the past and foretold the future dispensations of God. By the same "gift of prophecy" they preached and prayed under a divine impulse, establishing the church, the spiritual kingdom of their Lord and Master, and putting all things in order in this divine fold of salvation. By the power of "discerning spirits," they detected all the devices and defeated all the machinations of the powers of darkness. And by the gift of tongues, and their interpretation," they were enabled to carry Gospel truth into all lands, and the glad sound of Gospel salvation to the ends of the earth.

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Not only miraculous, but ecclesiastical gifts does the Holy Ghost confer-that gift of office, by which men receive a commission to minister in holy things; for it is the dictate of common sense, it is the principle recognised in all civil institutions,

that the power of office no man taketh unto himself. From the source of power in civil governments are civil offices derived; and from Christ, the Head and Ruler of his church, the mystical body which he redeems and sanctifies, by the agency of the Holy Ghost, through the instrumentality of those originally set apart for the purpose, and perpetuated by a successive transmission of authority, is the commission derived to minister in holy things. "Receive the Holy Ghost for the work of the ministry," are the words of the commission, denoting neither the miraculous nor the ordinary gifts of the Holy Spirit, but the gift of office-the ministry of the word and sacraments, the discipline of the church. But these miraculous and ecclesiastical gifts were not common to all Christians, nor were they given for the sanctification of individuals. The former were confined to those who acted as the heralds of salvation, and ceased when the ends for which they were bestowed were accomplished in the establishment of the Gospel in the world; and though the latter, the ecclesiastical gift, is still continued in the standing ministry of the church, it is not common to all Christians; it is conferred only on those on whom, after the example of the apostles, those who derive their authority from the apostles lay on hands.

3. Not then with the miraculous or ecclesiastical, but with the less splendid, yet, in the sight of God, infinitely more valuable gifts of the Holy Spirit, are all Christians concerned-those which produce the Christian virtues, "love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." For "whether there be prophecies, they

shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away." But " charity," that divine principle of love, which produces universal obedience to all God's commands, and which is excited in the heart by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, "never faileth."

These ordinary operations of the Holy Spirit, imperceptible except by their fruits, do not violate that freedom of choice in which consists the essence of the virtue of every moral agent. They are persuasive and monitory, not overwhelming and compulsory.

These influences of the Divine Spirit are obtained by prayer, by pious reading and meditation, and especially by the participation of the ordinances of the church; through them the members of Christ's mystical body receive in due measure of the manifold gifts of grace. The Holy Spirit, thus humbly received and faithfully cherished, becomes the Spirit of illumination, enlightening the eyes of our understanding to know what is the hope of our Christian calling, and what the riches of our inheritance in the saints, made manifest in the Gospel. He is the Spirit of sanctification, transforming us by the renewing of our minds, rectifying our perverse wills, purifying our corrupt hearts, controlling and regulating our wandering and loose passions, and bringing all the dispositions of our souls into obedience to the will of God. He is the Spirit of quickening, exciting our cold and sluggish affections in all devout and holy. exercises, and animating us to walk with alacrity and zeal in the ways of God's law, and in the works of God's commandments. He is the Spirit of