280 THE PALE BELL OF THE HEATH. 



and that God can so regenerate a child, even be- 

 fore its eyes have opened to behold the light of 

 day, we have distinct proof in Scripture. His 

 work accomplished, will any one venture to assert, 

 that, because the undeveloped state of the mental 

 faculties, and feebleness of the bodily organs, pre- 

 clude the manifestation to us of what is passing 

 between the soul and its God, therefore nothing 

 does pass ? I cannot believe it. I remember an 

 instance of a confirmed idiot, whose faculties up 

 to the age of thirty or forty, had acquired no great- 

 er degree oi expansion than was seen in the cra- 

 dle ; but who, during her last illness, at that age, 

 gave most incontestible proofs of a glorious work 

 wrought in her soul, by the power of divine grace, 

 which she seemed enabled to communicate to those 

 about her, for their special encouragement in tasks 

 so apparently hopeless : for, in other things, she 

 was an idiot to the last. Now, of all cases, the 

 infant and the idiot most nearly assimilate — I 

 speak, of course, of extremely young infants — and 

 I am assured that God can — that he does — work 

 in the soul, without the customary medium of the 

 bodily and mental faculties. Who, by searching, 

 can here trace his steps ? No one : but it is a 

 very sweet thought to engage us over the cradle 

 of a baby , sweeter still, when we look upon its 

 coffin. 



When the Lord has willed it, that some tender 



