'But to believe in such a man,' he might go on to say, 'with such a
message, as I read of in the New Testament, is life from the dead. I
have yielded myself, to live no more in the idea of self, but with the
life of God. To him I commit the creature he has made, that he may live
in it, and work out its life--develop it according to the idea of it in
his own creating mind. I fall in with his ways for me. I believe in him.
I trust him. I try to obey him. I look to be rendered capable of and
receive a pure vision of his will, freedom from the prison-house of my
limitation, from the bondage of a finite existence. For the finite that
dwells in the infinite and in which the infinite dwells, is finite no
longer. Those who are thus children indeed, are little Gods, the divine
brood of the infinite Father. No mere promise of deliverance from the
consequences of sin, would be any gospel to me. Less than the liberty of
a holy heart, less than the freedom of the Lord himself, will never
satisfy one human soul. Father, set me free in the glory of thy will, so
that I will only as thou willest. Thy will be at once thy perfection and
mine. Thou alone art deliverance--absolute safety from every cause and
kind of trouble that ever existed, anywhere now exists, or ever can
exist in thy universe.'

But the people of the Lord's town, to whom he read, appropriating them,
the gracious words of the prophet, were of the wise and prudent of their
day. With one and the same breath, they seem to cry, 'These things are
good, it is true, but they must come after our way. We must have the
promise to our fathers fulfilled--that we shall rule the world, the
chosen of God, the children of Abraham and Israel. We want to be a free
people, manage our own affairs, live in plenty, and do as we please.
Liberty alone can ever cure the woes of which you speak. We do not need
to be better; we are well enough. Give us riches and honour, and keep us
content with ourselves, that we may be satisfied with our own likeness,