Let it be so, yet it is right in order to it, and it can only begin, as it begins at present. Your conviction is certainly not full and perfect; for if it was, you would patiently expect, and look for help from God alone. But whatever is wanting in your conviction, be it what it will, it cannot be added by yourself, nor come any other way, than as the highest degree of the divine life can come. Know therefore your want of this, as of all other goodness. But know also at the same time, that it cannot be had through your own _willing_ and _running_, but through God that sheweth mercy; that is to say, through God who giveth us Jesus Christ. For Jesus Christ is the _one only mercy_ of God to all the fallen world. Now if all the mercy of God is only to be found in Christ, if he alone can save us from our sins; if he alone has power to heal all our infirmities, and restore original righteousness, what room for any other pains, labour, or enquiry, but _where_ and _how_ Christ is to be found. *It matters not what our evils are, deadness, blindness, infatuation, hardness of heart, covetousness, wrath, pride, and ambition, our remedy is always one and the same, always at hand, always certain and infallible. Seven devils are as easily cast out by Christ as one. He came into the world, not to save from this, or that disorder, but to destroy all the power and works of the devil in man. If you ask _where_, and _how_ Christ is to be found? I answer, in your heart, and no where else. Hear him, reverence him, submit to him as a discoverer and reprover of sin. Own his power and presence in the feeling of your guilt, and then he that wounded, will heal, he that found out the sin, will take it away, and he who shewed you your _den of thieves_, will turn it into a holy temple of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And now, Sir, you may see, that your doubt whether your will was _really free, or not_, was groundless. You have no freedom, or power of will, to assume any holy temper, or take hold of such degrees of goodness, as you have a mind to. For nothing is, or ever can be goodness in you, but the one _life_, _light_, and _spirit_ of Christ, revealed, and formed in your soul. Christ in us, is our only goodness, as Christ in us, is our hope of glory. But Christ in us is the pure free gift of God to us. But you have a freedom of will, either to give up your helpless self, to the operation of God on your soul, or to rely upon your own _rational_ industry, and _natural_ strength of mind. This is the freedom in first setting out, which no man wants, or can want so long as he is in the body. If therefore you have not that which you want to have of God, or are not that which you ought to be in Christ Jesus, it is not because you have no free power of leaving yourself in the hands, and under the operation of God, but because the same freedom of your will, seeks for help where it cannot ♦be had, namely, in some strength of your own. ♦ “he” replaced with “be”