compare their privileges with ours: yea, though it he oppressive to every one of us, and force us to weep for the extremity of anguish and shame at our past unfaithfulness, yet we dare not add to our sin by denying the exceeding greatness of the treasures with which we were entrusted.
Regeneration then, or the new-birth whereby we are made sons of God, is a privilege of the Church of Christ; and we dare not extend it where His word doth not warrant us. To the Church alone in this life, it belongs to be the mother of the sons of God. We dare not speculate further. Sanctification, on the contrary, as it includes various degrees, yea! as the Son of God "sanctified" Himself, so also in their several degrees is there the holiness of the blessed Angels, of Apostles, Martyrs, Confessors, Prophets, Patriarchs, Saints in all ages of the world: "one star differeth from another star." We limit too much the manifold operations of God by contracting them within the bounds of our systems. Doubtless, the history of that primeval influence of the Spirit of God upon the chaotic elements was recorded as a type of His universal agency through our whole moral nature; and they, "who having not the law, did by nature the things contained in the law," had that "law written in their hearts" by the Holy Spirit of God. Here we are not left to conjecture. He strove against the deepening corruption of the descendants of Cain; nor have we any reason to think that He withdrew His influences from the cleansed and new-baptized world. As then, inspiration includes every imparting "of wisdom to the wise-hearted," (Ex. xxxi. 6.) from Bezaleel the son of Hur, who was "filled with the Spirit of God in wisdom and understanding, and in knowledge, and all manner of workmanship" for the work of the tabernacle, up to the blessed Evangelist, who saw "Him that sat on the throne" and declared the mystery of the Incarnate Word, so does sanctification comprehend the imparting of all holiness, from the faintest spark that ever purified the heart of a benighted Heathen, to the holiest Angel who stands before the throne of God. And so we may recognize, with thankfulness and without misgiving, the virtues and wisdom which were granted to the Heathen world, as an
