ike a perpetual
star; the witness of the Spirit, here in the heart on earth, burns
like a flickering flame, never to be extinguished, but still not
always bright, wanting to be trimmed, and needing to be guarded from
rude blasts. Else, brother, what does an Apostle mean when he says to
you and me, 'Quench not the Spirit'? what does he mean when he says
to us, 'Grieve not the Spirit'? What does the whole teaching which
enjoins on us, 'Let your loins be girded about, and your lights
burning,' and 'What I say to you, I say to all, Watch!' mean, unless
it means this, that God-given as (God be thanked!) that conviction of
Fatherhood is, it is not given in such a way as that, irrespective of
our carefulness, irrespective of our watching, it shall burn on--the
same and unchangeable? The Spirit's witness comes from God, therefore
it is veracious, divine, omnipotent; but the Spirit's witness from
God is in man, therefore it may be wrongly read, it may be checked,
it may for a time be kept down, and prevented from showing itself to
be what it is.

And the practical conclusion that comes from all this, is just the
simple advice to you all: Do not wonder, in the first place, if that
evidence of which we speak, vary and change in its clearness and
force in your own hearts. 'The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and
the spirit against the flesh.' Do not think that it cannot be
genuine, because it is changeful. There is a sun in the heavens, but
there are heavenly lights too that wax and wane; they _are_ lights,
they _are_ in the heavens though they change. You have no reason,
Christian man, to be discouraged, cast down, still less despondent,
because you find that the witness of the Spirit changes and varies in
your heart. Do not despond because it does; watch it, and guard it,
lest it do; live in the contemplation of the Person and the fact that
calls it forth, that it may not. You will never 'brighten your
evidences' by polishing at them. To polish the mirror ever so
assiduously does not secure the image of the sun on its surface. The
only way to do that is to carry the poor bit of glass out into the
sunshine. It will shine then, never fear. It is weary work to labour
at self-improvement with the hope of drawing from our own characters
evidences that we are the sons of God. To have the heart filled with
the light of Christ's love to us is the only way to have the whole
being full of light. If you would have clear and irrefragable,