Christianity substitutes for the old sources of excitement the power of the Holy Spirit. Here is a source of comfort, energy, and joy, infinitely superior to any which the sinner knows. God does not leave the soul to fall back upon itself. The higher up we get in the scale of being, the more does the new life need nursing and tending,—compare the sapling and the babe. God gives to the Christian, therefore, an abiding presence and work of the Holy Spirit,—not only regeneration, but sanctification. C. E. Smith, Baptism of Fire: “The soul needs the latter as well as the former rain, the sealing as well as the renewing of the Spirit, the baptism of fire as well as the baptism of water. Sealing gives something additional to the document, an evidence plainer than the writing within, both to one’s self and to others.” “Few flowers yield more honey than serves the bee for its daily food.” So we must first live ourselves off from our spiritual diet; only what is over can be given to nourish others. Thomas à Kempis, Imitation of Christ: “Have peace in thine own heart; else thou wilt never be able to communicate peace to others.” Godet: “Man is a vessel destined to receive God, a vessel which must be enlarged in proportion as it is filled, and filled in proportion as it is enlarged.” Matthew Arnold, Morality: “We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides; The Spirit bloweth and is still; In mystery our soul abides. But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be in hours of gloom fulfilled. With aching hands and bleeding feet, We dig and heap, lay stone on stone; We bear the burden and the heat Of the long day, and wish ’t were done. Not till the hours of light return All we have built do we discern.” (_f_) The mediate or instrumental cause of sanctification, as of justification, is faith. _Acts 15:9_—“_cleansing their hearts by faith_”; _Rom. 1:17_—“_For therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith: as it is written, But the righteous shall live from faith._” The righteousness includes sanctification as well as justification; and the subject of the epistle to the Romans is not simply justification by faith, but rather righteousness by faith, or salvation by faith. Justification by faith is the subject of _chapters 1‐7_; sanctification by faith is the subject of _chapters 8‐16_. We are not sanctified by efforts of our own, any more than we are justified by efforts of our own.