3.  The third of the three Shining Ones who saluted Christian at the cross set a mark on his forehead, and put a roll with a seal set upon it into his hand.  A roll and a seal which he bid him look on as he ran, and that he should give that roll in at the Celestial Gate.  Bunyan does not in all places come up to his usual clearness in what he says about the sealed roll.  We must believe that he understood his own meaning and intention in all that he says, first and last, about the roll, but he has not always made his meaning clear, at least to one of his readers.  Theological students, and, indeed, all thoughtful Christian men, are invited to read Dr. Cunningham’s powerful paper on Assurance in his Reformers.  The whole literature of Assurance is there taken up and weighed and sifted with all that great writer’s incomparable learning and power and judgment.  Our Larger Catechism, also, is excellent on this subject; and this subject is a favourite commonplace with all our best Calvinistic, Puritan, and Evangelical authors.  Let us take two or three passages out of those authors just as a specimen, and so close.

“Can true believers”—­Larger Catechism, Question 80—­“Can true believers be infallibly assured that they are in an estate of grace, and that they shall persevere therein to the end? Answer:  Such as truly believe in Christ, and endeavour to walk in all good conscience before Him may, without extraordinary revelation, by faith grounded upon the truth of God’s promise, and by the Spirit enabling them to discern in themselves those graces to which the promises of eternal life are made, and bearing witness with their spirits that they are the children of God, they may be infallibly assured that they are in the estate of grace, and shall persevere therein unto salvation.”  Question 81:  “Are all true believers at all times assured of their present being in a state of grace, and that they shall be saved? Answer:  Assurance of grace and salvation not being of the essence of faith, true believers may wait long before they obtain it, and, after the enjoyment thereof, may have it weakened and intermitted through manifold distempers, sins, temptations, and desertions; yet are they never left without such a presence and support of the Spirit of God as keeps them from sinking into utter despair.”  “A Christian’s assurance,” says Fraser of Brea, “though it does not firstly flow from his holiness, yet is ever after proportionable to his holy walking.  Faith is kept in a pure conscience.  Sin is like a blot of ink fallen upon our evidence.  This I found to be a truth.”  “It was the speech of one to me,” says Thomas Shepard of New England, “next to the donation of Christ, no mercy like this, to deny assurance long; and why?  For if the Lord had not, I should have given way to a loose heart and life.  And this is a rule I have long held—­long denial of assurance is like fire to burn out some sin and then the Lord