WORK OF THE LAW IN THE HEART.
Going into a monastery in China with a clergyman who could converse in Chinese, we saw among the inmates a woman who seemed to be ever praying, as she sat a little retired from the rest. The superior told us that she was praying all the time, being overheard frequently in the night upon her bed in supplication. He said that there was some great burden upon her mind, which she would not disclose. She was evidently not insane; and, from all that I could learn about her, I came to the conclusion that she was under conviction of sin; sinfulness, rather than any particular transgression, was the burden upon her heart. That there are many throughout the heathen world thus exercised, we cannot question; the second chapter of Romans speaks of them, among others, “with the work of the law written in their hearts.” They may be few compared with the whole heathen world; yet how interesting to think that such may be in a state of mind fitting them to accept the gospel, should it be made known to them, and that they will not perish merely for not being acquainted with it. Thus, where sin abounds, grace may much more abound, choosing its subjects independently of human instructors. ‘Thou canst not tell whither it goeth,’—this superhuman agency. This thought is some little relief to one, as he wanders about in those regions of the shadow of death, impressed by much that he sees with the reflection how true to the letter is the apostle’s description, in the first chapter of Romans, of the heathen world.