To be converted, to be regenerated¹, to receive grace, to experience religion, to gain an assurance,are so many phrases which denote the process, gradual or sudden, by which a self hitherto divided,and consciously wrong inferior and unhappy, becomes unified² and consciously right superior andhappy, in consequence of its firmer hold upon religious realities. This at least is what conversionsignifies in general terms, whether or not we believe that a direct divine operation is needed tobring such a moral change about.

Before entering upon a minuter study of the process, let me enliven our understanding of thedefinition by a concrete example. I choose the quaint⁶ case of an unlettered man, Stephen H.

Bradley, whose experience is related in a scarce American pamphlet.[98]

[98] A sketch⁷ of the life of Stephen H. Bradley, from the age of five to twenty four years,including his remarkable⁸ experience of the power of the Holy Spirit on the second evening ofNovember, 1829. Madison, Connecticut, 1830.

I select this case because it shows how in these inner alterations⁹ one may find one unsuspecteddepth below another, as if the possibilities of character lay disposed in a series of layers or shells,of whose existence we have no premonitory knowledge.

Bradley thought that he had been already fully¹¹ converted at the age of fourteen.

"I thought I saw the Saviour¹², by faith, in human shape, for about one second in the room, witharms extended, appearing to say to me, Come. The next day I rejoiced with trembling; soon after,my happiness was so great that I said that I wanted to die; this world had no place in my affections,as I knew of, and every day appeared as solemn to me as the Sabbath. I had an

分享到：