Page:A Compendium of the Chief Doctrines of the True Christian Religion.djvu/75

Rh from his heart and life. But he must reflect upon what passes in his mind, and observe what is brought forth thence into act or speech. Especially he must examine the nature of his delights and propensities, as whether he feels a pleasure in any species of hatred, revenue, adultery, theft, false testimony, detraction, or any propensity and lust towards them; also whether he gives way to a spirit of blasphemy and contempt, in relation to God, his Holy Word, and the things of the church. If he refrains from any of these evils, he must further look into himself, and narrowly examine whether it be through fear of the law, or of the loss of reputation, health, friends, or the like: and if he finds, that he resists and abstains from evils from no such external considerations, but purely because they are sins, and prohibited by the divine law, he is then performing true, sincere, and effectual repentance.

But it is an essential condition of such repentance, that the Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ be alone applied to for power to resist evils: for he alone is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent; he alone is the God of the church, all-merciful and all-just; and it is he alone that can inspire the inclination and affection of doing good. Wherefore he himself says, "Without me ye can do nothing," John xv. 5.

Repentance avails, if the penitent person be in a state of liberty; but if he repents in a state of compulsion, it is of no avail. States of compulsion may be various, such as sickness, dejection of spirit under some great misfortune, the terrors of approaching death, and likewise all circumstances of sudden fear, which deprive a man of reason. When bad men in a state of compulsion make promises of repentance, and even begin the practice of virtue and goodness, they generally return to their former evil lives, when