abideth in you. Ye have quenched the fiery darts of the wicked one, the doubts and fears, wherewith he disturbed your first peace, and the witness of God that your sins are forgiven, now abideth in your heart. I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. Ye have known both the Father and the Son, and the Spirit of Christ in your inmost soul. Ye are perfect men, being grown up to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
2. It is of these chiefly I speak in the latter part of this discourse. For these only are perfect Christians. But even babes in Christ are in such a sense perfect, or born of God (an expression taken also in divers senses) as first, not to commit sin. If any doubt of this privilege of the sons of God, the question is not to be decided by abstract reasonings, which may be drawn out into an endless length, and leave the point just as it was before. Neither is it to be determined by the experience of this or that particular person. Many may suppose they do not commit sin, when they do: but this proves nothing either way. To the law and to the testimony we appeal. Let God be true, and every man a liar. By his word will we abide, and that alone. Hereby we ought to be judged.
3. Now the word of God plainly declares, that even those who are justified, who are born again in the lowest sense, do not continue in sin; that they cannot live any longer therein (Rom. vi.
