and an archangel in perception—because your vessel bears not CHRIST; because you are on no journey with CHRIST to cast out evil spirits and drive them over steep places into the sea. O, my brethren, it is an awful sign, a death-boding distinction, when Satan lets us alone in this sea of life, and deems it unnecessary to keep us by violent efforts from reaching heaven. It is the expression of his informed and deliberate judgment that we are not going thither! O ye who dwell at ease and glide smoothly along the journey of life, put back, take CHRIST on board, and joy when you find in yourselves the signs of His presence, the assaults of Satan, the warring within you of good and evil, the stirrings of conscience, the flutterings of spiritual fear. I do not mean become morbid, and delight in what is mournful and terrible; but suspect and refuse the peace which Satan offers without contest, and determine to have only that which in CHRIST’S strength you win and maintain. Next, consider the meaning of CHRIST’S lying asleep in the storm, and interfering not to control it, till so earnestly called up. In providence and in grace GOD delights, so to speak, to hide Himself, though He exhibits the results of His works. He is the Author of every gift, and the Ruler and Promoter of its use; but He puts it into our hands as His agents, and bids us with it accomplish His will. As the heart is the fountain of the blood which flows through our members, as it is bone and muscle that give strength to the arm, so is GOD the Source of grace to the soul, and the prevailing Power of our efforts. Still, it is not Himself prominently and foremost that does the work in the world, but we from and by Him. The explanation of this economy seems to be, first, that He would have us walk by faith—remembering Him, relying on Him, working for Him—rather than by right, constrained, whether we will or not, without feeling or desire, or dependence, to see, and admit, and feel His power. And, secondly, that He would give us an individuality, a certain dependent independence, which shall make us feel personal responsibility, and allow us to deserve (in a sense) the recompense of personal effort. Thus, He leaves the fool to say, There is no GOD, and rewards the faithful by revealing Himself to belief. Thus, while there is a GOD, while He is not far from us, while in Him we live and move and have our being, we are required and stimulated to seek Him, to feel after Him, and find Him. Besides, or more properly _therefore_, we have to call upon Him before He answers. Even when He had determined, and declared His determination, to bless the Israelites, He made the condition, “Nevertheless, for these things I will be inquired of.” He would have us live by spiritual dependence. He would have us communicate to Him our wants. He would have us draw down by prayer the supply. And this He effects by making it a law, that He will know nothing of us, at