While in some cases God’s preparatory work occupies a long time, there are many cases in which he cuts short his work in righteousness (_Rom. 9:28_). Some persons are regenerated in infancy or childhood, cannot remember a time when they did not love Christ, and yet take long to learn that they are regenerate. Others are convicted and converted suddenly in mature years. The best proof of regeneration is not the memory of a past experience, however vivid and startling, but rather a present inward love for Christ, his holiness, his servants, his work, and his word. Much sympathy should be given to those who have been early converted, but who, from timidity, self‐distrust, or the faults of inconsistent church members, have been deterred from joining themselves with Christian people, and so have lost all hope and joy in their religious lives. Instance the man who, though converted in a revival of religion, was injured by a professed Christian, and became a recluse, but cherished the memory of his dead wife and child, kept the playthings of the one and the clothing of the other, and left directions to have them buried with him. As there is danger of confounding regeneration with preparatory influences of God’s Spirit, so there is danger of confounding regeneration with sanctification. Sanctification, as the development of the new affection, is gradual and progressive. But no _beginning_ is progressive or gradual; and regeneration is a beginning of the new affection. We may gradually come to the _knowledge_ that a new affection exists, but the knowledge of a beginning is one thing; the beginning itself is another thing. Luther had experienced a change of heart, long before he knew its meaning or could express his new feelings in scientific form. It is not in the sense of a gradual regeneration, but in the sense of a gradual recognition of the fact of regeneration, and a progressive enjoyment of its results, that “_the path of the righteous_” is said to be “_as the dawning light_”—the morning‐ dawn that begins in faintness, but—“_that shineth more and more unto the perfect day_” (_Prov. 4:18_). _Cf._ _2 Cor. 4:4_—“_the god of this world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn upon them._” Here the recognition of God’s work is described as gradual; that the work itself is instantaneous, appears from the following _verse 6_—“_Seeing it is God, that said, Light shall shine out of darkness, who shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ._”