THE EYE OF FAITH. "_Believing_ is the gift of _the God of Grace_, as _breathing_, _moving_, and _eating_ are the gifts of _the God of Nature_. He gives me lungs and air, that I may breathe; He gives me life and muscles, that I may move; He bestows upon me food and a mouth, that I may eat; but He neither _breathes_, _moves_, nor _eats_ for me. Nay, when I think proper, I can accelerate my breathing, motion, and eating: and, if I please, I may _fast_, _lie down_, or _hang myself_, and, by that means, put an end to my _eating_, _moving_, and _breathing_. _Faith_ is the gift of God to believers, _as sight_ is to you. The parent of good freely gives you the light of the sun, and organs proper to receive it. Everything around you bids you use your eyes and see; nevertheless, you may not only drop your curtains, but close your eyes also. This is exactly the case with regard to faith. Free grace removes, in part, the total blindness which Adam's fall brought upon us; free grace gently sends us some beams of truth, which is the light of _the sun of righteousness_; it disposes the eye of our understanding to see those beams; it excites us, in various ways, to welcome them; it blesses us with many, perhaps with all the means of faith, such as opportunities to hear, read, enquire, and power to consider, assent, consent, resolve, and re-resolve to believe the truth. But, after all, _believing_ is as much our own act as _seeing._ We may in general do, suspend, or omit the _act_ of faith. Nay, we may do by the eye of our faith, what some report Democritus did by his bodily eyes. Being tired of seeing the follies of mankind, to rid himself of that disagreeable sight, he put his eyes out. We may be so averse from _the light, which enlightens every man_ that _comes into the world;_ we may so dread it because our works are evil, as to exemplify, like the Pharisees, such awful declarations as these: _Their eyes have they closed, lest they should see: wherefore God gave them up to a reprobate mind, and, they were blinded_." * * * * * FROM ANIMAL MAN TO SPIRITUAL MAN.