35. But if _Enthusiasm_ be so great an evil, beware you are not intangled therewith yourself. Watch and pray that you fall not into the temptation. It easily besets those who fear or love God. O beware you do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think. Do not imagine you have attained that grace of God, to which you have not attained. You may have much joy: you may have a measure of love, and yet not have living faith. Cry unto God that he would not suffer you, blind as you are, to go out of the way: that you may never fancy yourself a believer in Christ, till Christ is revealed in you, and till his Spirit witnesses with your Spirit, that you are a child of God. 36. Beware you are not a fiery, persecuting _Enthusiast_. Do not imagine that God has called you, (just contrary to the spirit of him you stile your Master) to destroy men’s lives, and not to save them. Never dream of forcing men into the ways of God. Think yourself, and let think. Use no constraint in matters of religion. Even those who are farthest out of the way, never _compel to come in_, by any other means, than reason, truth and love. 37. Beware you do not run with the common herd of _Enthusiasts_, fancying you are a Christian when you are not. Presume not to assume that venerable name, unless you have a clear, scriptural title thereto: unless you have the mind which was in Christ, and walk as he also walked. 38. Beware you do not fall into the second sort of _Enthusiasm_, fancying you have those _gifts_ from God which you have not. Trust not in visions or dreams; in sudden impressions, or strong impulses of any kind. Remember, it is not by these you are to know, what is _the will of God_ on any particular occasion; but by applying the plain scripture-rule, with the help of experience and reason, and the ordinary assistance of the Spirit of God. Do not lightly take the name of God in your mouth: do not talk of _the will of God_ on every trifling occasion. But let your words as well as your actions be all tempered with reverence and godly fear. 39. Beware, lastly, of imagining you shall obtain the end, without using the means conducive to it. God _can_ give the end, without any means at all: but you have no reason to think he _will_. Therefore constantly and carefully use all these means, which he has appointed to be the ordinary channels of his grace. Use every means which either reason or scripture recommends, as conducive (thro’ the free love of God in Christ) either to the obtaining, or increasing any of the gifts of God. Thus expect a daily growth in that pure and holy religion, which the world always did, and always will call _Enthusiasm_: but which, to all who are saved from real _Enthusiasm_, from merely nominal Christianity, is the wisdom of God and the power of God, the glorious image of the Most High: righteousness and peace: a fountain of living water, springing up into everlasting life! SERMON XXXVIII.