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could not one take place at ours? We professed to bear the same name, to love the same cause, and to be interested in the same promises, therefore we were determined to give God no rest until he should "open the windows of heaven, and pour down a blessing upon us." The prayer-meetings began to be better attended; fervent prayer was offered, and an anxiety was created for the out-pouring of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes we thought that appearances indicated that a great work was beginning amongst us, but we did not watch unto prayer as we ought to have done. We suffered favourable opportunites to pass away, when good impressions were evidently made, and waited for the Lord to be gracious unto us, when, in fact, he was waiting to be gracious." Thus we went on up to the commencement of the present year. At our annual teachers tea-party, held on new year'sday, the following question was discussed-"How can we promote a revival of religion in our school?" In answer to the important inquiry it was stated, That an anxious desire for the conversion of the children, more spirituality of mind, and special, fervent, importunate, believing prayer, connected with zealous and persevering effort, would accomplish the glorious design. A prayer-meeting for the object was recommended, and one was established, called the "Teachers and Scholars revival prayer-meeting." On the following Sabbath the first meeting was held many attended; love and union prevailed; a good feeling was produced; and many went away with the conviction that God was about to revive his work both in the school and in the Church.

From this period we may especially date the commencement of the revival. There were many connected with the school that were evidently labouring under convictions of sin, and were concerned about the salvation of their souls. These had long attended the means of grace, and had often been directed to the Saviour, but hitherto had not fully decided to be on the Lord's-side. We were convinced that what some may call new measures, were necessary; and accordingly we were resolved to try them. We thought that if such characters were placed in such a position that they could feel their state in the sight of God, and their real unwillingness to come to Christ, it would induce them to come to a decision. At the prayer-meetings the plan was adopted. At the close of each meeting a friend usually came forward and gave an address to the following effect:-That we had an anxious desire for the salvation of sinners; hence we had prayed for them earnestly; that we had prayed for those present especially; that the Spirit of God was striving with them; that they had often put off their salvation; that delay was dangerous; that Christ was ready to receive them; and that if their souls should be lost, the fault would be their own. Then present and immediate decision was pressed upom them. Repentance, faith, and obedience to Christ, were set before them as the means of salvation. They were told plainly that their pride of heart must be subdued, and the stubbornness of their wills conquered-that unless this was the case they could not be saved. In order to test their willingness to come to Christ, we then told them, that if any amongst them had come to the resolution to be on the Lord's side, we were willing to continue with them a little longer to pray with them, and to direct their inquiring minds. The plan was successful. Some felt their awful state, and like the Philippian jailer cried, "What must I do to be saved?" They were humbled on account of their sins, confessed them in the sight of God, and believed on the Saviour, and went home rejoicing in a sin-pardoning God.

Soon as this plan was adopted God poured out his Spirit more abundantly. The prayer-meetings were more numerously attended, extra meetings were established, and protracted ones held. A great concern about salvation was produced, especially amongst the teachers and scholars of the school; and often was the cry of penitence heard, and the voice of thanksgiving raised. The "times of refreshing had come," and we saw such a work as we never witnessed before, and felt such an influence ourselves that we were willing to spend and be spent for the cause of the Redeemer. Hearts as hard as adamant were melted before the fire of divine love, lion-like tempers and dispositions were tamed to the meekness of the lamb, and haughty and stubborn wills were brought into humble obedience to

Christ. This work proceeded until nearly every teacher, and several classes of our senior scholars, both male and female, were savingly acquainted with the Lord Jesus Christ. Persons in the congregation, who had heard the Gospel for years, and remained impervious to all the claims of the Saviour, could hold out no more, but came with deep penitence to him for salvation. Others, who came out of mere curiosity, were frequently awakened, convicted, and converted, at the same meeting, and have become some of the most consistent members of the Church of Christ. Parents and children, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, have rejoiced together because of the "great things the Lord bath done for them."

One of our most pleasing duties has been the receiving of the converted into the Church. On Lord's-day, March 7th, eighteen persons were received through the ordinance of immersion; on the 4th of April, thirteen more; May 2nd, thirteen others; and on the 6th of June, ten more; and others are waiting for admission. During the progress of the revival we have had to meet with many things calculated to discourage us. The work principally devolved upon a few individuals; but the God of Israel was with us. We met with opposition from those of our friends who ought rather to have helped us; we were evil-spoken of, our plans despised, and our motives misrepresented; and had it not been that we knew we were approved of the Lord, we should have grown "faint and weary in our minds." Sometimes we have almost been ready to exclaim, with the great apostle of the Gentiles, "Beware, lest that come upon you which is spoken of in the prophets; behold, ye despisers, and wonder and perish, for I work a work in your days, a work in which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you."

In conclusion, we would say, let other General Baptist Churches try the same plan, and we can assure them that the same glorious effects will follow. Let them arouse themselves from their supineness, and lay aside their prejudices to new measures, when they see them approved of God, and bring into exercise all their energies for the salvation of perishing souls. Let them go forth with holy determination, in full and entire dependance on the Holy Spirit, and success shall crown their efforts.

May the work of the Lord thus begun be carried on, until "Jerusalem becomes a praise in the earth."

CORRESPONDENCE.

JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH.

SIR,-In answer to a query which appeared in your June number, whether "a sinner be justified before God by faith only, or by faith and works," I answer in the words of the apostle James, ii. 24, "Ye see, then, how by works a man is justified, and not by faith only;" and this appears so evident from the reasoning in this chapter, that one would think it would need no further probation whence this argument is most clearly deducible. If no man be justified without faith, and no faith be living, nor yet available to justification without works, then works are necessary to justification; but the first are true, and therefore the last, for the inference is so clear that I think no one can question it. But when we say good works are necessary to justification, we do not mean to say that by them we merit the favour of God, for though faith in the death of Jesus Christ is the formal cause, (if I may so term it,) still good works are causa sine quâ non, i. e., the cause without which none are justified, which is most apparent from the following passages, and many more that might be mentioned. Heb. xii. 14, Matt. vii. 21, John xiii. 7, 1 Cor. vii. 19, Rev. xxii. 14; and, indeed, the apostle Paul, in that long list of worthies mentioned in Heb. xi., when he asserts they were justified by faith, couples good works with it as indispensable, for there is no one instance in which the faith was not proved by works, and works will result from faith, as certainly as fruit from a tree. Do we refer to Abraham? he was justified by faith. When? When he offered up Isaac his son. So Rahab, the harlot, was justified by faith

when she received the spies; and no men are said to be justified until their faith is proved by works. But though Paul, Rom. viii. 20, says, "Because by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in His sight;" and verse 28," and therefore we conclude, that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law." Still there is a great difference between the works of the law, and the works of grace, or the Gospel. The first are excluded, the last are not; the first are those performed by man's own strength or will, in conformity to the outward, or ceremonial law, which makes nothing perfect, the other are the works of the spirit of grace in the heart, in conformity to the inward, or spiritual law; and such works are absolutely necessary to salvation, for faith without works is dead, being alone, it is the faith of devils, and therefore perfectly useless for the salvation of a soul.

A justification by faith alone is Antinomianism, and will allow a man to be justified whilst he continues to commit flagrant acts of wickedness; and such a justification is to be found nowhere in the Holy Scriptures, for our Lord asserts, "By their fruits ye shall know them." "Men do not gather grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles, even so by their works ye shall know them."

JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH.

JAMES BRATBY.

[MR. EDITOR.-Sir,-The following remarks on a subject involved in a query to which you gave a brief reply in the June number of the Repository, I wrote in a letter to my father some four years ago. If you deem them worthy of a place in your excellent periodical they are entirely at your service, and the insertion of them will oblige, Sir, yours very respectfully,

Wolverhampton, June, 21st, 1841.

JOHN COLEY,]

WE sometimes hear of justification by faith alone. Justifying faith never was, and never will be, strictly speaking, alone. Can any man believe in Jesus with a saving or justifying faith, without a strong, an humbling, and a distressing sense of his need of pardoning mercy, and without a feeling of self-abhorrence, and a sentiment of loving, grateful admiration? True indeed, the apostle speaks of justification by faith without the deeds of the law; but if we attend to the whole of his argument, we shall find that his design was not to recommend a disregard and contempt of piety and morality, but to shew that on the ground of desert before God, both Jews and Gentiles were on a level, and that both equally needed his pardoning mercy. Piety and morality are binding upon every man; they are therefore not meritorious: even the constant and uniform observance of these obligations would not merit or deserve everlasting life. Every man, without respect to a life to come, ought to be moral and pious during the whole of his rational life. If, then, at any time he should act immorally or impiously, he would for that one act need pardon. Now it is plain, that the present or future observance of obligations which are binding upon a man every moment of his rational existence, cannot atone for former, repeated, and aggravated neglect of those obligations. If a man had robbed you once, would you say that he merited impunity for that one offence because he never after robbed you! His never robbing of you again may be the condition on which you would not punish him for his past theft; but this would be perfectly optional with you, and it would be an exercise and a display of unmerited mercy on your part towards the delinquent. Just so it is an act of mercy on the part of God to suspend the pardon of sin on certain conditions, of which faith is the principal. Faith may be, and, indeed, often is, represented as the only condition; hence the phrase, "Faith alone;" more properly, "Faith only." Two very good reasons may be assigned for this frequent and allowable restriction of the conditions of pardon and salvation to faith.

The first is, Faith cannot exist but in conjunction with the other conditions. Faith is not a bare assent to the truth of the evangelical histories and doctrines, but it is a believing and feeling of the truth of those doctrines which declare the guilt and pollution of human nature and human conduct, and which exhibit Jesus as the only Regenerator, through his Spirit, and Saviour, through his death, of the human family: hence, also, faith implies a reliance or dependance on the merits of his life, and death, and intercession. The second reason is, Faith is the only means by which the sinner apprehends the suitability of the Gospel salvation to his case, and by which he applies that salvation to his case. Repentance and holiness are not an apprehension of our need of salvation, and of the suitability of the Gospel salvation to our case; nor is either of them an appli

cation of that salvation to our case: but faith is such an apprehension-faith is such an application. We are therefore said to be justified by faith. Viewed in this light there is nothing objectionable in the doctrine; for though it should be contended, that faith is the only condition of our justification, because the only instrument by which we apprehend and apply the Gospel salvation, still that grace is an ever fruitful principle, which, wherever it exists, will fructify to the glory of God. Where the life does not accord with the Gospel, there faith does not exist.

QUERIES.

Is it right for persons administering the ordinance of baptism to wear waterproof clothing? If so, may not candidates do the same-may they not be so attired as to be buried beneath the stream without the water touching them? Is not baptism in danger of another abuse?

CAN any of the heathen be saved without the knowledge of Jesus Christ, they living in situations where the providence of God has never sent the divine revelation. J. B.

REVIEW.

THE FREEWILL BAPTIST QUARTERLY tellectual education, and 2dly. Their moral MAGAZINE.

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