rent notions. They
are the outgoings of the soul to Christ for life,--the breathings of the
soul after him, for more of him, when it hath once tasted how good he is.
Faith is not a speculation, or a wandering thought of truth, it is the
truth, not captivated into the mind, but dwelling in the heart, and
getting possession of the whole man. You know a man and his will are one,
not so a man and his mind, for he may conceive the truth of many things he
loves not, but whatever a man loves, that and he in a manner become one
with another. Love is unitive, it is the most excellent union of distant
things. The will commands the whole man, and hath the office of applying
of all the faculties to their proper works _Illa imperat, aliae
exsequuntur_. Therefore when once divine truth gets entry into the heart
of a man, and becomes one with his will and affection, it will quickly
command the whole man to practise and execute, and then he that received
"the truth in love" is found a walker in the truth. Many persons captivate
truth in their understandings, as the Gentiles did, they hold or detain it
in unrighteousness, but because it hath no liberty to descend into the
heart, and possess that garrison, it cannot command the man. But oh! it is
better to be truth's captive than to captivate truth, saith the apostle,
"Ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered
you," Rom. vi. 17. O a blessed captivity! to be delivered over to
truth,--that is indeed freedom, for truth makes free, John viii. 32. And it
makes free where it is in freedom. Give it freedom to command thee, and it
shall indeed deliver thee from all strange lords; and thou shalt obey it
from the heart when it is indeed in the heart. When the truths of
God,--whether promises, or threatenings or commands,--are impressed into the
heart, you shall find the expressions of them in the conversion. Faith is
not an empty assent to the truth, but a receiving of it "in love," and
when the truth is received in love, then it begins to work by love. "Faith
worketh by love," saith Paul, Gal. v. 6. That now is the proper nature of
its operation which expresses its own nature. Obedience proceeding from
love to God flows from faith in God, and that shows the true and living
nature of that faith. If the soul within receive the seal and impression
of the truth of God, it will render the image of that same truth in all
its actions.

Love is put for all obedience. It is ma