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do to be saved ? " But this is only the beginning of repentance . Thousands have gone thus far and no further . Thousands have gone thus far , and returned to plunge themselves yet deeper in perdition . And yet , on
such uncertain , and often deceitful app earances , ministers of the gospel have frequently implanted a hope , nay even a confidence in the Divine forgiveness : and he who one hour was the slave of sin , in the next assures himself of peace and pardon through the blood of Christ , and from the
depth of agonizing sorrow , rises to the ecstacy of transport , in the belief that he is now a child of God-But how , I would ask , does it become fallible . mortals , unaided by divine power , to pronounce as to the
spiritual condition of others , where the fruits are wanting by which alone the tree can be distinguished ? We may charitably hope that where there are the marks of sincere and deep contrition , and earnest purposes of amendment , the work of repentance will go on and lead to works meet
for repentance . We may encourage the contrite soul with the promises of the gospel , if the heart and life are really amended , if God and religion be henceforth sought in earnest , if past sins are forsaken , and those duties be henceforth in some good tneasure discharged which have been left undone . If such are the blessed fruits
of penitence , then , we cannot doubt it , will he receive forgiveness of sins , and an inheritance among , them which are sanctified through faith in Christ . « - * a ^ - * w * - * * ¦ * .- m , u . M . m . ^ - # * * . ** m . m m ^^ n ^ m % _ m . m m % ^ % m- rn . rn . Jt . 4 . a - ^ . ^ « .. * * * ur v <
It is not , indeed , for mortals to set limits to the exercise of divine mercy : He who knoweth the heart , sees all its secret emotions , and can correctly judge their value and efficacy , —He alone can tell whether that
repentance which is begun in the soul , is repentance unto salvation ; whether , if time were allowed to complete the work , it would be completed . And to his mercy must we leave those whose last days are their only good days ; w | io , in the immediate prospect
of eternity , hftve been awakened from their dreams of worldly pleasures and interests , and iheir heedlejssness of the great purposes of life ;—and those who , by the execution of human laws * are cut off from this life , for crimes against which the la < V « of God de-
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nounce the judgments of another . To pronounce their perdition might be a cruel , error ; but it is a much more
fatal one to suppose that in a few short days , or even . a few short hours , aye , and even a few moments , the Divine forgiveness can be secured for a life of carelessness and sin .
The mind naturally adverts , in tliis connexion , to those numerous cases which have of late years occurred , in which the execution of the criminal has resembled the triumphant martyrdom of the Christian professor ; and I must relate to you one amting the various instances in which the
strong appearance of repentances , inducing the religious friend to raise the mind of the unhappy sufferer to the feeling of assurance in the Divine forgiveness , have afterwards proved to be fallacious . The one I refer to
occurred many years ago at Northampton . A man , whose life had been one continued scene of desperate villainy , after having often escaped the hand of justice , was at last apprehended , convicted , and left for
execution . A minister of the gospel , prompted by a zeal which was no doubt in part under the influence of Christian love , but in no degree under the guidance of Christian knowledge , frequently visited him ; and , as he believed , was made the instrument of
his conversion . His own delusive views of the terms and exercise of divine mercy , were doubtless communicated to the prisoner ; and he went joyfully to the scaffold , and died , as it is termed , triumphantly . So strongly impressed
was the minister , with the conviction that his repentance was real , and his conversion complete , and that he had obtained the pardoning mercy of God , that in a book which he published on the occasion , he expressed his wisFi that his own soul was in his soul s
place ; and declared that he would stake his own salvation on the sincerity of his convert . It was afterwards ascertained , that the wretched man had confessed his guilt to his legal
adviser ; and in the midst of this fervour of feeling and fever of imagination , he had been contriving and executing means to secure to his friends the money of which he had unjustly deprived others . Surely we may say tjxat such transports are like the vivid gleams of
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¦ -JDrv Carjpeiiter on Divine Influences . @ £ 1
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vol . xiv . 4 n
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1819, page 621, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1777/page/33/
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