p to the time of the glorification of Jesus to
pray to the Father in his name. It is a fullness of joy peculiar to
the dispensation of the Spirit to be able to do so.--_Alford_.

[5] It were well for us to give more heed to the voice of Christian
history as related to such questions as these. The rise of "sporadic
sects" like the "Quietists," the "Mystics," the "Friends," and the
"Brethren," with their emphasis on "the still voice" and "the inward
leading," is very suggestive. If we may not go so far as some of these
go in the insistence on speaking only as sensibly moved by the Spirit
we may be admonished of the hard, artificial man-made worship which
made their protest necessary.

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VIII

THE INSPIRATION OF THE SPIRIT

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"Have you visited the Cathedral of Freyburg, and listened to that
wonderful organist, who with such enchantment draws the tears from the
traveler's eyes while he touches, one after another, his wonderful
keys, and makes you hear by turns the march of armies upon the beach,
or the chanted prayer upon the lake during the tempest, or the voices
of praise after it is calm? Well, thus the Eternal God, embracing at a
glance the key-board of sixty centuries, touches by turns, with the
fingers of his Spirit, the keys which he had chosen for the unity of
his celestial hymn. He lays his left hand upon Enoch, the seventh from
Adam, and his right hand on John, the humble and sublime prisoner of
Patmos. From the one the strain is heard: 'Behold the Lord cometh with
ten thousand of his saints'; from the other: 'Behold he cometh with
clouds.' And between the notes of this hymn of three thousand years
there is eternal harmony, and the angels stoop to listen, the elect of
God are moved, and eternal life descends into men's souls."--_Gaussen's
Theopneustia_.

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VIII

THE INSPIRATION OP THE SPIRIT

Inspiration signifies inbreathing. Both the scribe and the Scripture,
both the man of God and the word of God were divinely inbreathed. In
that memorable meeting of the risen Lord and his disciples within the
closed doors, we read that "_He breathed on them_ and saith unto them,
Receive ye the Holy Ghost; whosesoever sins ye forgive, they are
forgiven unto them; whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained"
(John 20: 22, R. V.). Well may the question of the scribes concerning
Jesus now arise in our hearts concerning his disciples: "Who can
forgive sins but God only?"