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"porteth and strengtheneth us in temptation; he "advifeth and admonisheth, exciteth and encou"rageth us to all works of piety and virtue..

"Particularly he guideth and quickeneth us in "devotion, fhewing us what we should ask, raising "in us holy defires and comfortable hopes, dif"pofing us to approach unto God with firm dif"pofitions of mind, love, and reverence, and "humble confidence.

"It is also a notable part of the Holy Spirit's "office to comfort and fuftain us in all our reli"gious practice, fo particularly in our doubts, "difficulties, diftreffes, and afflictions; to beget ❝joy, peace, and satisfaction in us, in all our "performances, and in all our fufferings, whence "the title of Comforter belongeth to him.

"It is also another part thereof to affure us of "God's gracious love and favour, and that we "are his children; confirming in us the hopes of "our everlasting inheritance. We feeling our"felves to live fpiritually by him, to love God "and goodness, to thirst after righteousness, and "to delight in pleafing God, are thereby raised to "hope God loves and favours us; and that he "having, by fo authentic a feal, ratified his word "and promife, having already beftowed fo fure

a pledge, fo precious an earnest, so plentiful "firft-fruits, will not fail to make good the re"mainder defigned and promised us, of everlast"ing joy and blifs.".

Let no man be afraid or afhamed of maintaining opinions on the divine energy, which are thus fupported by a scholar and philofopher like ISAAC BARROW; a name which, at Cambridge, has ever stood next in honour to ISAAC NEWTON.

SECTION X.

Bishop Bull's Opinion on the Influence of the Spirit of God on the Mind of Man, and its Union with it; the Lofs of that Spirit by Adam's Fall, and the Recovery of it by Chrift.

OF

F Bishop Bull it may justly be faid that he was one of the greatest ornaments and firmest pillars of the church. If our modern objectors poffeffed a due degree of humility, they would at leaft hefitate before they condemned a doctrine fanctioned by a man of his profound learning and matchlefs fagacity.

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"The fecond way," fays Bishop Bull, " by "which the Spirit of God witneffeth with our spirit, that we are the fons of God, is by enlightening our understandings and ftrengthening the 66 eyes of our minds, as occafion requires, to difcern "thofe gracious fruits and effects which God hath "wrought in us.

"The Spirit of God, which in the first begin"ning of things moved upon the face of the great "deep, and invigorated the chaos, or dark and "confused heap of things, and caufed light to "fhine out of that darkness, can, with the greatest "eafe, when he pleases, cause the light of divine "confolation to arise and shine upon the dark and "difconfolate foul. And this he often doth. "may here appeal to the EXPERIENCE of many "good Chriftians, who fometimes find a fudden "joy coming into their minds, ENLIGHTENING their UNDERSTANDINGS, difpelling all clouds

* Grande decus columenque.

I

"from

"from thence, warming and enlivening their af"fections, and enabling them to discern the graces "of God fhining in their brightness, and to FEEL "them vigorously acting in their fouls, fo that "they have been, after a fort, TRANSFIGURED "with their Saviour, and wifhed, with St. Peter, "that they might always dwell on that mount " Tabor.****

"Man may be considered in a double relation; firft in relation to the natural, animal, and "earthly life; and fo he is a perfect man, that "hath only a reasonable foul and body adapted to "it; for the powers and faculties of these are suf"ficient to the exercife of the functions and ope"rations belonging to fuch a life. But fecondly,

man may be confidered in order to a supernatu"ral end, and as defigned to a fpiritual and ce"leftial life; and of this life the SPIRIT Of God "is the principle. For man's natural powers and "faculties, even as they were before the fall, EN

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TIRE, were not fufficient or able of themselves "to reach such a supernatural end, but needed the "C power of the DIVINE SPIRIT to ftrengthen, ele"vate, and raise them. He that denies this, op"poses himself against the stream and current of "the holy fcriptures, and the confent of the Ca

tholic church. Therefore to the perfect con"stitution of man, confidered in this relation, a "reasonable foul and a body adapted thereunto "are not fufficient; but there is neceffarily re"quired an union of the DIVINE SPIRIT with "both, as it were a THIRD ESSENTIAL PRINCIPLE. "This, as it is a certain truth, so it is a great MYSTERY OF CHRISTIANITY. ****

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"The great Bafil, in his homily intitled, Quod "Deus non eft Author peccati, speaking of the na"ture of man, as it was at first created, hath

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"these words: What was the chief or principal good it enjoyed? THE ASSESSION OF GOD AND ITS CONJUNCTION WITH HIM BY LOVE; from "which, when it fell, it became depraved with va"rious and manifold evils. So in his book, de

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"Spiritu Sancto, cap. 15, he plainly tells us, The "difpenfation of God and our Saviour towards man, "is but the recalling of him from the fall, and his "return into the friendship of that God, from that "alienation which fin had caufed. This was the end

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of Chrift's coming in the flesh, of his life and con"verfation defcribed in the gospel, of his passion, cross, "burial, and refurrection; that man, who is faved "by the imitation of Christ, might regain that AN"TIENT ADOPTION: where he plainly fuppofeth "that man before his fall had the adoption of a "fon, and confequently the Spirit of adoption. "And fo he exprefsly interprets himself after"wards in the fame chapter: By the Holy Spirit

we are reftored into paradife, we regain the king"dom of heaven, we return to the adoption of fons. "Again, (Homil. adverf. Eunomium 5, p. 117.) "which have these express words: We are called "in the fanclification of the Spirit, as the apoftle "teacheth. This (Spirit) renews us, and makes us

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again the image of God, and by the laver of rege"neration, and the renewing of the Holy Ghost, we 66 are adopted to the Lord, and the new creature "again partakes of the Spirit, of which being deprived, it had waxed old. And thus man becomes again the image of God, who had fallen from the "divine fimilitude, and was become like the beafts "that perish.

"St. Cyril (7th Dial. de Trin. p. 653.) delivers "the fame doctrine with great perfpicuity and elegancy, in thefe words: For when the animal "(viz. man) had turned afide unto wickedness, and

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"out of too much love of the flesh had fuperinduced on "himself the disease of fin, THAT SPIRIT WHICH

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"FORMED HIM AFTER THE DIVINE IMAGE, AND "AS A SEAL WAS SECRETLY IMPRESSED ON HIS "SOUL, WAS SEPARATED FROM HIM, and fo he "became corruptible and deformed, and every way "vicious. But after that the Creator of the univerfe "had defigned to restore to its priftine firmness and "beauty that which was fallen into corruption, and was become adulterated and deformed by fin fuper" induced, he fent again into it that divine and hely "Spirit which was withdrawn from it, and which "bath a natural aptitude and power to change us into "the celeftial image, viz. by transforming us into his 66 own likeness. And in the fourth book of the "fame work, When the only begotten Son was made "man, finding man's nature bereft of its antient and "primitive good, he haftened to transform it again "into the fame ftate, out of the fountain of his fulness, "fending forth (the Spirit), and faying, RECEIVE "THE HOLY GHOST."

The doctrine of receiving the Holy Spirit is undoubtedly mysterious. The operation cannot be made evident to the fenfes, like the tangible and vifible objects of experimental philofophy: but is not the whole of the Christian religion myfterious? Is not natural religion mysterious? Is not the material world, all that we see around us, mysterious to poor mortals, born juft to look about them and to die? UNIVERS ENIGMATIQUE, or, The whole World a Riddle, is the well-chosen title to a work of an ingenious foreigner *.

* Videmus nunc per fpeculum in ENIGMATE.-We See now through a glass as by an ENIGMA. 1 Cor. xiii. 12.

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