purpose, without immediate impulses. As we have a reasonable, intellectual nature, there is no want of mechanical powers. The words of Christ, which are the words of God, are, our life, and will, if attended to, and powerfully enable us to practise good works, and to excel, and persevere therein. I can do all these things, through Christ, who strengtheneth me, that is, through the written directions of Christ, and through the argu∣ments and motives of the christian doctrine. To say otherwise of the gospel, is, in my opinion, injurious to it.God may, to be sure, give special aids to men, whenever he thinks fit. He may, by an extraordinary agency, render our faculties more capable of apprehension, where divine things are concerned:—may awaken a dor∣mant idea, which lay neglected in the me∣mory, with unusual energy;—may secretly attract the more attentive regard of the mind, and give it an inclination and an ability of tracing its various relations, with an unusual attention, so that a lustre before quite un∣known shall be (as it were) poured upon it; —the spirit of God may render the mind more susceptible and more tenacious of divine knowledge; I believe he often does by in∣terposition, if in the spirit of Christ's doc∣trine we ask it of the great Father of Lights, the Author of all the understanding divided 0