hart, have been petrified and fossilised into a mere dogma.

I know far better than you do how absolutely inadequate all my words
are, but I want to bring it to you and to lay it not on your heads only
but on your hearts, as the good news that we all need, that we have not
to buy, that we have not to work to get salvation, but that having got
it we have to work thereafter. 'What shall we do that we might work the
works of God?' A whole series of diverse, long, protracted, painful
toils? Christ swept away the question by striking out the 's' at the end
of the word, and answered, 'This is the _work_' (not 'works') 'of God,'
the one thing which will open out into all heroism and practical
obedience, 'that ye believe on Him to whom He hath sent.'

III. That leads me to the last point--viz. the Christian requirement of
the condition of salvation.

Note the precision of the Apostle's prepositions: 'Ye have been saved
_by_ grace'; there is the source--'Ye have been saved by grace,
_through_ faith'--there is the medium, the instrument, or, if I may so
say, the channel; or, to put it into other words, the condition by which
the salvation which has its source in the deep heart of God pours its
waters into my empty heart. 'Through faith,' another threadbare word,
which, withal, has been dreadfully darkened by many comments, and has
unfortunately been so represented as that people fancy it is some kind
of special attitude of mind and heart, which is only brought to bear in
reference to Christ's Gospel. It is a thousand pities, one sometimes
thinks, that the word was not translated 'trust' instead of 'faith,' and
then we should have understood that it was not a theological virtue at
all, but just the common thing that we all know so well, which is the
cement of human society and the blessedness of human affection, and
which only needs to be lifted, as a plant that had been running along
the ground, and had its tendrils bruised and its fruit marred might be
lifted, and twined round the pillar of God's throne, in order to grow up
and bear fruit that shall be found after many days unto praise, and
honour, and glory.

Trust; that is the condition. The salvation rises from the heart of God.
You cannot touch the stream at its source, but you can tap it away down
in its flow. What do you want machinery and pumps for? Put a yard of
wooden pipe into the river, and your house will have all the water it
needs.

So, dear brethren, here is