'The power which wills
Bears not supreme control; laughter and tears
Follow so closely on the passion prompts them,
They wait not for the motion of the will
In natures most sincere.'

Now, just here lies a deep distinction that has not been enough taken
account of by our popular, or even by our more profound, spiritual
writers. The will is often regenerate and right; the will often bends,
as Bunyan has it, to that which is good; but behind the will and beneath
the will the heart is still full of passions, affections, inclinations,
dispositions that are evil; instinctively, impulsively, involuntarily
evil, even 'in natures most sincere.' And hence arises a conflict, a
combat, a death-grip, an agony, a hell on earth, that every regenerate
and advancing soul of man is full of His will is right. If his will is
wrong; if he chooses evil; then there is no mystery in the matter so far
as he is concerned. He is a bad man, and he is so intentionally and
deliberately and of set purpose; and it is a rule in divine truth that
'wilfulness in sinning is the measure of our sinfulness.' But his will
is right. To will is present with him. He is every day like Thomas
Boston one Sabbath-day: 'Though I cannot be free of sin, God Himself
knows that He would be welcome to make havoc of my sins and to make me
holy. I know no lust that I would not be content to part with to-night.
My will, bound hand and foot, I desire to lay at His feet.' Now, is it
not as clear as noonday that in the case of such a man as Boston his mind
is one thing and his heart another? Is it not plain that he has both a
good-will and an ill-will within him? A will that immediately and
resolutely chooses for God, and for truth, and for righteousness, and for
love; and another law in his members warring against that law of his
mind? 'Before conversion,' says Thomas Shepard, 'the main wound of a man
is in his will. And then, after conversion, though his will is changed,
yet, _ex infirmitate_, there are many things that he cannot do, so strong
is the remnant of malignity that is still in his heart. Let him get
Christ to help him here.' In all that ye see your calling, my brethren.

5. 'Now, if I do that I would not,' adds the apostle, extricating
himself and giving himself fair-play and his simple due among all his
misery and self-accusation--'Now, if I do that I would not, it is no more
I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.' Or, again,