ful because the light of millions is blended together. Alone, they all show God's power and wisdom; blended, they evince the same power and wisdom when he groups all their beauties and wonders into one. So in conversion from sin to God. Take the case of a single true conversion to God, and extend to a community—to many individuals passing through that change, and you have all the theory of a revival of religion. It is bringing together many conversions; arresting simultaneously many minds; perhaps condensing into a single place, and into a few weeks, the ordinary work of many distant places and many years.

The essential fact is, that a sinner may be converted by the agency of the Spirit of God from his sins. The same power which changes him, may change others also. Let substantially the same views, and feelings, and changes, which exist in the case of the individual, exist in the case of others; let a deep seriousness pervade a community, and a spirit of prayer be diffused there; let the ordinary haunts of pleasure and vice be forsaken for the places of devotion, and you have the theory, so far as I know, of a revival of religion.

2. The second fact is, that there may be times

in the life of a Christian of unusual peace and joy. To whatever it may be owing, it will be assumed as a fact-for the truth of which I now depend on an appeal to the Christian's own feelings-that there are times in his life of far more than usual elevation in piety; times, when his "peace is like a river," and his love to God and man "like the waves of the sea." There are times when he feels an irresistible longing for communion with God; when the breath of praise is sweet; when every thing seems to be full of God; when all his feelings prompt him to devotion; and when he becomes so impressed with the great truths of Christianity, and filled with the hope of heaven, that he desires to live only for God and for the skies. Earthly objects lose their lustre in his view; their brightest, gayest colours fade away; and an insatiable panting of soul leads him away from these to hold communion with the Redeemer. A light, pure, tranquil, constant, is shed on all the truths of religion, and the desire of the salvation of children, partners, parents, friends, of the church and of the world, enchains all the affections.

Then to pray is easy, and to converse with Christians and with sinners is easy, and the prospect of boundless wealth and of the brightest

honours would be gladly exchanged for the privilege of converting and saving a single soul.

When this occurs in a church, and these feelings pervade any considerable portion of the people of God, there is a revival of religion so far as the church is concerned. Let Christians, as a body, live manifestly under the influence of their religion; let a feeling of devotion pervade a whole church, such as you have felt in the favoured times of your piety, and there would be a revival of religion—a work of grace that would soon extend to other minds, and catch, like spreading fires, on the altars of other hearts. Let a Christian community feel on the great subject of religion what individual Christians sometimes feel, and should always feel, and, so far as the church is concerned, there would be all the phenomena that exist in a revival of religion. A revival in the church is a revival in individual hearts-and nothing more. It is when each individual Christian becomes more sensible of his obligations, more prayerful, more holy, and more anxious for the salvation of men. Let every professing Christian awake to what he should be, and come under the full influence of his religion, and in such a church there would be a revival. Such a sense of obligation, and such joy, and peace, and love, and zeal in the indivi

dual members of a church would be a revival. But in the most earnest desires for your own salvation there is no violation of any of the proper laws of Christian action. In great, strenuous, and combined efforts for the salvation of others, in unceasing prayer for the redemption of all the world, there is no departure from the precepts of Christ, nor from the Spirit which he manifested on earth.

3. The third feature that occurs in a revival of religion, to which it is proper to direct your attention, is, that an extensive influence goes over a community, and affects with seriousness many who are ultimately converted to God. Many individuals are usually made serious; many gay and worldly amusements are suspended; many persons, not accustomed to go to the place of prayer, are led to the sanctuary; many formerly indifferent to religion, or opposed to it, are now willing to converse on it; many perhaps are led to pray in secret and to read the Bible, who before had wholly neglected the means of grace. Many who never enter into the kingdom of God seem to be just on its borders, and hesitate long whether they shall give up the world and become Christians, or whether they shall give up their serious impressions and return to their former indiffer

ence and sins. The subsiding of a revival, or the dying zeal of Christians, or some powerful temptation, or a strong returning tide of worldliness and vanity, leave many such persons still with the world, and their serious impressions vanish-perhaps to return no more.

4. It remains only to be added as an essential feature in a revival, that it is produced by the power of the Holy Ghost. It is not the work of man, however human agency may be employed. Imperfections there may be, and things to regret there may be, as in all that man touches there is -but the phenomenon itself we regard as the work of the Holy Ghost, alike beyond human power to produce it and to controul it. "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth;" and such is the work of the Spirit, alike in an individual conversion or in a revival of religion. The wind, sometimes gentle, sometimes terrific, sometimes sufficient only to bend the heads of the field of wheat, or to shake the leaf of the aspen, sometimes sweeping in the fury of the storm over hills and vales, illustrates the way in which God's Spirit influences human hearts. You have seen the pliant osier bend gently before the zephyr, and