eye
upon their hearts, that they did not use to have. They take more notice
of what sin is there, which is now more burdensome to them; they strive
more against it, and feel more of its strength.
They are somewhat surprised that they should in this respect find
themselves so different from the idea they generally had entertained of
godly persons. For, though grace be indeed of a far more excellent
nature than they imagined, yet those who are godly have much less of it,
and much more remaining corruption, than they thought. They never
realized it, that persons were wont to meet with such difficulties,
after they were once converted. When they are thus exercised with doubts
about their state, through the deadness of their frames, as long as
these frames last, they are commonly unable to satisfy themselves of the
truth of their grace, by all their self-examination. When they hear of
the signs of grace laid down for them to try themselves by, they are
often so clouded, that they do not know how to apply them. They hardly
know whether they have such and such things or no, and whether they have
experienced them or not. That which was the sweetest, best, and most
distingui****ng in their experiences, they cannot recover a sense of. But
on a return of the influences of the Spirit of God, to revive the lively
actings of grace, the light breaks through the cloud, and doubting and
darkness soon vanish away.
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