the earth for his possession;" the scenes of pentecost, as to the effect of truth upon the conscience and the heart, must become frequent and extensive, until they shall every where be known and realized.

That every strong religious excitement constitutes a revival of religion, we do not pretend. We have seen multitudes crowding with eager minds to the place of worship; we have observed a sudden transition in some of them from anxiety and fear to religious thankfulness and joy; we have observed them borne onward, for a season, with fervent zeal, in a religious course; and we have also painfully found that all this has soon passed away, and been followed by a moral apathy deep and general, nearly in proportion to the strength and prevalence of the excitement which preceded it. But we hold it to be a contradiction in terms, to call this a revival of religion. A true revival of religion among a people, cannot leave them as lukewarm, as worldly minded, as far from God, and as unfit for heaven, as it found them. That which consists in the life of godliness, cannot leave them dead in sins: nor does the increased prevalence of love to God, and love to men, leave them as selfish, as hard hearted, and as indifferent to the honor of the Redeemer, and the best interests of men,

as they were before. Nor have we any apprehension that the religious excitements "in the Calvinistic churches of NewEngland," for the last thirty years, were they fairly judged by this rule, would sink in our estimation. To all impartial observers we make the appeal, that a great part, and we have no hesitation in saying by far the greater part, of those persons who have dated their conversion from these seasons, have sustained, although in different degrees, a new and progressively spiritual and evangelical character, in the subsequent trials of life. Whatever fruits of holiness now adorn the churches of this fair part of the Redeemer's heritage, are chiefly the fruits of these revivals. Hence have come the greater part of our most enlightened, serious, and useful pastors. Hence a still greater proportion of our devoted and divinely honored missionaries. Hence the multitudes, in the more retired and not less needful relations of life, whose walk is adorned with the beauties of holiness. The God of all grace multiply such fruits of revivals, a thousand fold!

Still we think it important to state, that neither do we pretend that in a revival of religion, all those individuals who appear to be converted are real christians; nor yet that the feelings of real converts, in the freshness of their experience, and the peculiar excitements of the scene, are purely spiritual. We are not surprised if some who received the word with joy, "by and by are offended;" nor if others are afterwards found to have imbibed the spirit of the gospel, in a far less measure than they had been

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posed to do this. Least of all, is there good reason for the assertion of our author, that a "divine influence upon any mind is supposed to afford a sanction for the human means which have been devised for it-for the human process through which that mind has been led." No where is it maintained that divine influence interferes with the freedom of human agency; nor, of course, that the feelings or the conduct of men, though under a divine influence, are, in all respects, so long as they are imperfect men, to be approved. The reverse of all this, is every where in our churches, avowed and understood. If there is any thing by which the revivals among us have been marked, it is the care which has been taken to distinguish true religion from false; to promote unceasing humility and contrition; and to hold up the scriptures as the only standard, both of christian experience, and of right action, in distinction from human feelings, and "human processes" of every kind. Had the writer of these letters been willing to acknowledge this, the greater part of them would not have been published; and were those persons in general who lightly esteem revivals, duly mindful of it, a host of objections and prejudices would

vanish.

That there are indiscreet, though zealous and well meaning persons in our churches, who do not always speak and act under the influence of these sentiments, is certainly not to be denied. It would be strange if our "English traveler" had not met with such. He may have found those who have spoken of revivals as though they were merely "religious excitements to be expected of course soon to subside." He may have heard some "both of the clergy and laity say, in reply to his inquiries into the state of religion, "We have had a great revival here, and there is always a season of coldness afterwards." This may have been stated as being "a matter of course and in the way of apology; and with seeming gladness that the case was no worse with them than with their neighbors." There is a propensity in zealous minds, until chastened by experience and observation, when they speak of revivals in distinction from an ordinary state of religious feeling, to present the contrast in the strongest light. Would they excite a spirit of revival in a church, they address it in terms of rebuke which would imply that no piety remained-not an individual there was alive to God-that the church as a body was "twice dead, as trees plucked up by the roots," or as "a valley of dry bones, very many and very dry;" as though all the fruits of the spirit in the retired walks and ordinary intercourse of life, were worthy of no account: and if at the same time they would present the happy state of others in the vicinity, christians there are described as having all awaked from their sleep, and recovered from backsliding, and being full of the spirit of the gospel; as though

the measure of excited feeling, were the true measure of vital religion. There is such extravagance in some persons, and, while we deny that it forms the character of the revivals which we have enjoyed, we lament that it exists. Beside the occasion which it furnishes for the scepticism and scoffs of the careless, it perverts the judgment, and misguides the efforts of the serious. It holds up a false standard of religion, and thus encourages delusive hopes. Nor do we wonder if, so far as it exists, it tends to give to revivals the transient character which it ascribes to them. The kind and degree of excitement which it seems to produce, cannot very long be sustained; and when this subsides, it can furnish no effectual motives to continued exertion. The measures adopted under the influence of such feelings, are accordingly all calculated to make the most of the favored season while it lasts, in the expectation that it will be short. As these measures, in continuance are found incompatible with the ordinary duties of life, they are remitted, as soon as the first symptoms of declension furnish a plausible excuse for remitting them; and then one after another, are neglected, until the whole system and form of a revival, give place to a system of worldly pursuits and gratification in its stead. Let those who enjoy a reviving influence, carefully distinguish between the essential nature of religion and its unessential accompaniments. While they acknowledge the day of visitation, both as an occasion for gratitude and a motive to diligence, let them not "compare themselves with themselves," or with their less favored neighbors, but lose sight of all which they have attained, in fixed contemplation of that to which they are encouraged to aspire. Let their faith and hope be fixed on God, to be with them while they will be with him. Let their prayers and all their endeavors be conducted with the view of his holding among them a lasting reign, and of their yielding to him an untiring obedience; and they may be among the happy churches of our land in whose experience, for a succession of years, has been verified the declaration-" the ploughman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes, him that soweth seed, and the mountains and the hills shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt."

Various are the prudential measures which have been adopted and recommended, as means either of producing revivals, or of extending and prolonging them. Without adverting particularly to these, many of which, no doubt, are useful, we have remarked, in the perusal of these letters two things, against which their reasoning and invective are mainly directed; and, we doubt not, it is because the writer perceived them to be those on which the very existence of revivals depends. On these we shall offer a few remarks; and shall do this the more freely because we are not without apprehension, that, familiarly as they are acknowledged in our churches, the vital importance of them, in comparison with other

things, is not suitably felt. We refer to the simplicity of our dependence upon the special influence of the Holy Spirit, as the efficient cause of revivals; and to a bold, unreserved, and fervent preaching of the peculiar doctrines of the gospel in their application to the consciences and hearts of men, as the indispensable means. "I cannot help suspecting," our author says, "from what I have seen of these excitements, that there is fanaticism always and necessarily at the bottom of them; that they are based upon false ideas, and upon this in particular, the root of all fanaticism, that they are the special work of God, the fruit of his supernatural interposition. Let these things be looked upon as the natural results of human feeling, let the idea of any thing extraordinary and supernatural be taken away, and I suspect that three quarters of that which supports them in the public mind would be taken away." p. 30. His suspicion is just. Therefore let all those who desire revivals, honor the office of the Holy Spirit. Let them, in obedience to the Divine Savior, "wait for the promise of the Father." Let them beware of ascribing to the men who are honored as instruments of revivals, or to any system of means employed in them, the efficiency which God claims as peculiarly his own; and be able to show, from his own word, that this is not fanaticism, but is only giving to Him who is "the author and finisher of faith," the glory which is his due. There is truth in the description which the writer subjoins to the passage which we have just quoted, although mingled with expressions of contumely which we forbear to introduce. "It is the work of God, is the declaration," he says, "that carries awe over the minds of the body of the people. This impression of something supernatural is very obvious and striking in case of the conversion of an individual, especially if the individual be noted from any cause, and the event takes place in a time of general indifference. The people talk of it with awe and rapture in their countenances-the whole neighborhood feels as if the power of God had appeared in the midst of it." On reading this we could not help inquiring with ourselves what was the impression in the assemblies at Thessalonica, when from the lips of Paul, "the gospel came to them, not in word only, but in power and with the Holy Ghost ;" and in those at Corinth also, when "if one came in who believed not, or one unlearned, he was convinced of all, he was judged of all, and thus were the secrets of his heart made manifest, and so falling down on his face, he worshiped God, and reported that God was in them of a truth." If the conviction referred to is just, well may the impression of awe prevail. The conversion of a sinner, considered by the light of the scriptures only as an event, and much more considered in connection with its causes and results, transcends in importance, infinitely, every other event in the history of man.

It

inspires heaven with solemn adoration. And, if it is to be ascribed to a special interposition of God, in application of the atonement of Christ for the salvation of a soul, well may the subject of it and all others who see the evidence of it, say "How dreadful is this place, for this is none other than the house of God; and this is the gate of heaven!" And even if we should doubt, we are bidden to beware. There was a time when blasphemy, on such an occasion, might be forgiven. But since the Holy Ghost is manifested, those who malignantly revile his operations should tremble. The only prayer for them in such a case, which compassion is permitted to breathe, is, "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do."

It is not, however, chiefly as a means of persuasion that we insist on the acknowledgment of a divine influence in revivals. As an ascription of honor to God which his jealousy demands; as a condition of his promises on which the communication of his Spirit is suspended; as a state of mind involved in the very nature of prayer for his influence, it is indispensable. If, in the economy of redemption, the Holy Spirit is revealed as the Divine Agent, to whom the whole work of dispensing and applying, as well as of revealing the truth of God, for the salvation of men, is to be ultimately ascribed, it is unquestionably high presumption in us to engage in this work, in the same manner, as though no such influence were needed, or to be expected. Nor is it sufficient that our dependence on his influence be assented to in speculation. It must be realized and felt in its practical bearing. The whole structure of the gospel shows that it is to the poor in spirit, ardently bent on glorifying God, and cleaving to him as their only helper, that he delights to afford his aid. What the uniform tenor of his promises inculcates on this subject, the experience of christians attests: and not only their individual experience, but also that of collective bodies. There is perhaps nothing by which the moral state of a church is more to be distinguished at the commencement of a revival of religion, and at the first declension of it, than by the prevalence of this feeling of dependence in the one case, and the want of it in the other. And if "in the calvinistic churches of New-England" collectively, this feeling shall decline, we have no hesitation in saying that revivals will be proportionably unfrequent or corrupted. If, now, after an unbroken series of revivals for more than thirty years, extended during this whole period over large portions of our territory, the spirit of humble dependence in which they began, shall be succeeded by a spirit of self-reliance, or shall be made the occasion of self-esteem and vain glorious display; if the prevalent sentiment shall be, that they are to be continued of course, or although suspended, are soon to return unsought; if the great inquiry shall be how are they to be conducted, and not how to be VOL. II.

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