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368 CHRISTIAN LIBERTY/ AND ITS COUNTERFE...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
The Cause Which Is Represented Hy This M...
God . But it is true , nevertheless , tliat happiness of a noble kind does attend the consciousness of freedom and peace with God ; and
to such blessedness the love and goodness of God have undoubtedly called us . There is a , misery which all but the very torpid and dead
must feel , in subjection to appetites and passions . This slavery is ignoble and must be felt to be so . The consequences of it are painful
and humiliating . Those who yield to it become the prey of desponflashe dency s , and fears them , and and remorse they cannot . They meet cannot their fellow face - the men truth in the whe sp n irit it
upon , which they would desire . All such discomfort , misery , and shame , are witnesses that a man is not made to be a slave to the flesh . And ,
on the other hand , there is a glory and a joy in keeping sin aloof and claiming the right of peace and communion with God . It is a
blessed condition to love the truth instead of being afraid of it , to look with ladness and desire upwards and onwards into the invisible
world , to g g ive free play to the holier and worthier affections of our natureto be able to do that which we see we ought to do , and so
to be conscious , of a real harmony and order in our inward being . A man cannot but rejoice in the real freedom of his will ; not in
that awful responsibility in virfcue of which he is free to choose the evil from the good , but in the actual emancipation of his spiritual
or human will , when the love he would fain admit into his heart is not quenched and polluted by some unworthy desireand the fruits
, of the spirit have room to grow , unblighted by noisome lusts , nnchoked bweeds of passion and hatred .
The will y of the Son of God was perfectly free , as we should wish our wills to be . And how was this freedom realized ? In
perfect submission to the Father ' s will . And in this , as in all , He is our head and example . Our perfect joy in the consciousness
of human liberty must be sought in the surrender of ourselves to forth the Sp His irit fruit of God in , us in . order There th are at He no profounder may do His words work than , showing those
of the Prayer-book , " In knowledge of whom standeth our eternal life , in whose service is perfect freedom . " To know the Eternal
God is our life , to be bond-servants to Him is our freedom . Nothing higher or better for man can be imagined by any dreams of
human aspiration . But in that knowledge , and that freedom , are unlimited to God and activit to y , our variet S y avi , progress our Christ , and in joy likeness . As we in come trust nearer , in
, agreement of hopes and desires , new worlds , new experiences , new ambitions , will open to us . But these will never set us free
from the obligations of the , humblest duties . They will only enable us to dischthose duties with more love and with more
arge hope . _* The more free we are , the more we shall be ready to serve one another . We need freedom in order that we may be able to
serve one another as we ought . For there can be no good mutual service without love , and without love there is no freedom . He
who loves most purely , and most unselfishly , is most free . And he
368 Christian Liberty/ And Its Counterfe...
368 CHRISTIAN LIBERTY / AND ITS COUNTERFEIT .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Feb. 2, 1863, page 368, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_02021863/page/8/
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