1. In the first place, as they are no sooner ushered into life, than they cry for that nutriment, which the God of nature hath so wisely adapted to their weak condition; in like manner, must we evidence the reality of our regeneration, by an insatiate thirst for that spring of salvation opened in the scriptures of truth. Thus the Apostle Peter says, “As new-born babes desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.” 1 Pet. ii. 2. And St. Paul uses the same idea, when writing to the Corinthian Church, he says, “I have fed you with milk and not with strong meat.” 1 Cor. ii. 2. See also Heb. v. 13, 14. As the new-born babe, by instinct of nature, cries for the breast, so the new-born soul first evidences its introduction into divine life, by its love to the scriptures. For this spiritual food, other things are thrown aside; and what constituted the soul’s repast, when dead in sin, is, after its regeneration, esteemed as chaff, or dreaded even as poison. The midnight lamp, that had been often exhausted in the perusal of publications of the most frothy or the most pernicious tendency, is now extinguished, that the soul might indulge in sweet meditation on the word of God. In the streams, which flow from this fountain, there are no dregs of latent error or poison of lurking impurity. And, while they communicate life and health by their salubrious influence, they convey also the most refined enjoyment to the renewed mind. The sacred pages, like the fragrant _name_, which gives them all their preciousness, are as “ointment poured forth.” Solomon’s Song, i. 3. They emit an odor that regales the senses and ravishes the heart. The promises are those “breasts of consolation,” from whence the new-born soul derives all its nourishment; and while it “hears them, reads, marks, learns, and inwardly digests them,” {259} its life is fed, and its happiness enlarged. This made the Royal Psalmist say, “How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth.” Psal. cxix. 103. So that they who can delight more in frothy novels, and the pernicious productions of the stage, than in a perusal of the word of God; or who can make any other book whatever take the lead of the Bible, have no more pretensions to refinement of taste, than they have to true religion. And such persons need not go far to find out whether they be converted or not; their disrelish to the scriptures is as decisive a mark against them as possible. And till their vitious taste is refined, and their depraved nature renewed, they cannot resemble little children, according to the idea suggested in the text, and must, therefore, be far from the kingdom of heaven.