"As to the operations of the Holy Spirit," it may probably be further urged, that "it is perhaps scarcely worth while to spend much time in inquiring into the theory, when, in practice at least, it is manifest, that there is no sure criterion whereby any one can ascertain the reality of them, even in his own case, much less in that of another. All we know is, that pretenders to these extraordinary assistances, have never been wanting to abuse the credulity of the vulgar, and to try the patience of the wise. From the canting hypocrites and wild fanatics of the last century, to their less dangerous, chiefly because less successful, descendants of the present day, we hear the same unwarranted claims, the same idle tales, the same low cant; and we may discern not seldom the same mean artifices and mercenary ends. The doctrine, to say the best of it, can only serve to favour the indolence of man, while professing to furnish him with a compendious method of becoming wise and good, it supersedes the necessity of his own personal labours. Quitting therefore all these slothful and chimerical speculations, it is true wisdom to attach ourselves to what is more solid and practical; to the work which you will not yourself deny to be sufficiently difficult to find us of itself full employment: the work of rectifying the disorders of the passions, and of implanting and cultivating the virtues of the moral character."--"It is the service of the understanding which God requires of us, which you would degrade into a mere matter of bodily temperament, and imaginary impulses. You are contending for that which not only is altogether unworthy of our Divine Master, but which, with considerate men, has ever brought his religion into suspicion and disrepute, and under a shew of honouring him, serves only to injure and discredit his cause." Our Objector, warming as he proceeds, will perhaps assume a more impatient tone. "Have not these doctrines," he may exclaim, "been ever perverted to purposes the most disgraceful to the Religion of Jesus? If you want an instance, look to the standard of the inquisition, and behold the pious Dominicans torturing their miserable victims for the Love of Christ[25]. Or would you rather see the effects of your principles on a larger scale, and _by wholesale_ (if the phrase may be pardoned;) cast your eyes across the Atlantic, and let your zeal be edified by the holy activity of Cortez and Pizarro, and their apostles of the western hemisphere. To what else have been owing the extensive ravages of national persecutions, and religious wars and crusades; whereby rapacity, and pride, and cruelty, sheltering themselves (sometimes even from the furious bigots themselves) under the mask of this specious principle, have so often afflicted the world? The Prince of Peace has been made to assume the port of a ferocious conqueror, and forgetting the message of good will to men, has issued