he
has to judge from; whereas the object of discipline is to rectify the
operations themselves. If a man confesses to his bosom friend that his
devotional feelings have been for some time past sensibly weakening;
that he looks on the beautiful world of nature with apathy, and thinks
on the perpetual presence of God without awe or delight; that his spirit
is dead in the public offices of devotion, and roving when it ought to
be fixed in prayer; his friend may mourn with him over so painful an
experience, and suggest, more or less wisely, methods of arousing the
sleeping faculties, and kindling anew the failing fires of devotion. But
he does this as an adviser, and not as a judge; for the power of judging
is not given to him. He knows not whether the origin of the distemper be
bodily or mental: he knows nothing of the thousand influences, from
within and from without, which have of late modified the delicate
processes of the intellect and the soul. He cannot therefore know what
restorative influences are most needed; whether mute converse with
nature or busy intercourse with men; whether the terrifying or the
alluring appeals of the Gospel; whether the awful claims of the Divine
holiness, or the mild persuasions of the Divine compassion; whether any
or all of these, or of the manifold influences besides which are
perpetually dispensed by Him who knoweth our frame, but have never been
confided to the empirical disposal of man.

If, as is evidently the case, all human judgment of sin and holiness is
comparative instead of positive, and therefore ever changing as the
means of comparison become more ample and the faculty stronger, it is
manifestly impossible for any one mind to form an exact estimate of the
qualities of another by any but its own imperfect and varying measure:
and since to God alone are the principles of morals present in their
complete development, to Him alone can their infallible application
belong. The agency of men on each other is appointed accordingly. They
may confess their sins one to another for their mutual relief and
guidance; but such confession must be strictly voluntary, and carefully
disconnected with all inclination towards spiritual usurpation on the
one hand and subservience on the other.

There is no subject on which the sacred writers are more explicit than
this, and none on which their practice exhibited a more eloquent
commentary. Hear what the Apostle of the Gentiles asserts in defenc