But before I come directly to this give me leave to premise a caution
or two.

And the first is, that I take it for granted you believe religion to
be an inward thing; you believe it to be a work of the heart, a work
wrought in the soul by the power of the Spirit of God. If you do not
believe this, you do not believe your Bibles. If you do not believe
this, tho you have got your Bibles in your hand, you hate the Lord
Jesus Christ in your heart; for religion is everywhere represented
in Scripture as the work of God in the heart. "The kingdom of God is
within us," says our Lord; and, "he is not a Christian who is one
outwardly; but he is a Christian who is one inwardly." If any of you
place religion in outward things, I shall not perhaps please you this
morning; you will understand me no more when I speak of the work of
God upon a poor sinner's heart than if I were talking in an unknown
tongue.

I would further premise a caution, that I would by no means confine
God to one way of acting. I would by no means say that all persons,
before they come to have a settled peace in their hearts, are obliged
to undergo the same degrees of conviction. No; God has various ways of
bringing His children home; His sacred Spirit bloweth when, and where,
and how it listeth. But, however, I will venture to affirm this: that
before ever you can speak peace to your heart, whether by shorter or
longer continuance of your convictions, whether in a more pungent or
in a more; gentle way, you must undergo what I shall hereafter lay
down in the following discourse.

First, then, before you can speak peace to your hearts, you must be
made to see, made to feel, made to weep over, made to bewail, your