t all thy sap and all thy life-powers rise up into
this graft from yonder beautiful tree which I have put on thee, so shalt
thou bring forth sweet and much fruit.' And the language of the tree to
the gardener would be: 'When thou graftest me, oh, spare not a single
branch, let everything of the old self, even the smallest bud, be
destroyed, that I may no longer live in my own, but in that other life
that was cut off and brought and put upon me that I might be wholly new
and good.' And once again, could you afterwards ask the renewed tree, as
it was bearing abundant fruit, what it could say of itself, its answer
would be this: 'In me (that is, my roots) there dwelleth no good thing;
I am ever inclined to evil; the sap I collect from the soil is in its
nature corrupt, and ready to show itself in bearing evil fruit. But just
where the sap rises into the sunshine to ripen into fruit, the wise
gardener hath clothed me with a new life through which my sap is
purified and all my powers are renewed to the bringing forth of good
fruit.'"

This author has entirely reversed the scriptural order of grafting in
his application of the graft and root, and has illustrated the relation
of Christ and the believer by the natural grafting process which can in
no sense scripturally apply to this holy relation. Christ is the vine or
root, and not the graft. The natural process of grafting is to graft the
good graft into a poor root. The graft will grow into a tree and bear
the same kind of fruit as the tree from which it was taken, and thus the
gardener increases the production of good fruit. But the divine process
of grafting is just the reverse. In Rom. 11:24 the apostle says we are
grafted into the olive tree (Christ) "contrary to nature." The
husbandman takes the penitent sinner out of the kingdom of darkness and
translates him into the kingdom of his dear Son. In this regeneration
process the sinner (the graft) that was sinful and bore fruit is by
God's own process grafted into Christ, the holy vine, and from thence to
bear holy fruit. This is certainly a great mystery, like all the works
of God's grace, and is indeed contrary to nature, but in perfect
conformity with the plan of redemption.

Now, in this condition, there is a certain requirement of the graft
necessary that it may bear the vine-fruit; it must =abide= in the vine.
This abiding requires a careful watchfulness lest there might be some
sprout of the old inward nature, whic