thy pilgrimage, any thing to confirm that common faying of many, namely, that those who, by the Spirit, are brought once into liberty, are never exercised .with, nor entangled in, legal bondage again? or whether this bondage be not one ingredient in the cup of Zion's forrow, which all must drink of, more or lefs, who follow the Lamb whitherfoever he goeth? A folution of these matters will lay me under an obligation, which fhall be acknowledged with that thankfulnefs which I hope will ever abound in

Your affectionate friend and brother,

From the Defert.

NOCTUA AURITA.

LETTER XXVII.

To NOCTUA AURITA, in the Defert.

I RECEIVED your kind letter, and

am obliged to you for your kind inquiry after my spiritual welfare. Your letter found me in the footsteps of the flock; though I must tell it

you

did

did not find me on the heights of Zion. I am got on the barren mountains of Sinai; and my foul is as the mountains of Gilboa, without either dew or rain therefore these words of David fuit me, "I have gone aftray like a loft sheep; seek thy fervant:" for I can fay alfo, with him, that I do not forget God's commandments. Since I wrote to you laft, which is now more than four months, I have been led in a strange path. If you recollect, I wrote to you just before the Lord had granted me that fecond enlargement from the bondage in which I had lain for five months. This was a sweet revival of the work. But, alas! gradually did those sweet fenfations on my foul wither, and down from the mount I came before I was aware; and for two months I had not the leaft light on the path I was in; only I knew what I had loft. Nor could I get any help from the fanctuary, nor ftrength out of Zion; and, for want of light, I could not defcribe my strange feelings to any one; yet I was not in deep diftress all this time, though I knew I was not comfortable. However, I was fure it was a path I had not been in before. But, about a month ago, under one of the orations of his Majefty's herald, the Lord was pleased to fhine with a ray of light while he was defcribing a speech of my great great grandmother's, recorded in the annals of antiquity; where the fays, "I fleep, but my heart waketh." In a moment I was given to fee that I was in the

fame

fame cafe, and her prayer was that moment mine; and from my heart I could fay, "Awake, O north wind, and come, thou fouth;, blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out." Ever fince the Lord brought me into the liberty of the gofpel, these words have perplexed me, why the venerable spouse should wish to awake the north wind. But I believe I know the fecret now; for I had rather be under the influence of that gale than to lie wind-bound, which is my cafe at prefent. But, upon this discovery of my ftate, my beloved feemed to put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. This seemed, in a measure, to rouse me from my fpiritual lethargy, and a little fervour was communicated to my fpirit, which enabled me to arise and open to my beloved. But, as it fared with her of old, fo it does with me; for my beloved has withdrawn himself, and is gone; I fought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no anfwer; and, fince that time, I have loft that little fervour I then found on my fpirit, fo that I have no heart to feek him. But the light which discovers where I am remains still with me. This is my prefent ftate; and how long I am to lie at anchor I know not; but I do not, at present, feel the least breeze from the everlafting hills to fill the fails. I feel this a fad cafe indeed, and can find no accefs to God; no faith in exercise to plead his word of promise at a throne K

of

of grace. Therefore, if you fee my beloved, tell

him that I am fick of love.

The queftions you afk a folution of are not (I am fure) for your own information; but, whatever your motive may be, I am bound, from a grateful fenfe of my obligations to you, to answer any question you fhall afk, if it lies in my power; and I hope I fhall ever bear my teftimony against fuch a lie as that, viz. that the believer, after being once brought into the liberty of the gospel, is never entangled again in legal bondage; my own experience is point blank against it. Therefore I know that those who affert fuch things know not what they fay, nor whereof they affirm. For I am fure this is the third time that I have been in legal bondage fince the Lord was pleased to proclaim liberty to my foul, which is but two years come next week; and I think my wanderings have been fomething fimilar to thofe of the prophet Elijah, when he went a day's journey in the wilderness. I have always been made to experience the wind, the earthquake, and the fire, before I have been favoured with the ftill small voice which has brought me back again; and have been made as bitter in my spirit as was the prophet, when he fat under the juniper-tree, and requested of the Lord that he might die, though he knew it was contrary to God's will. Moreover, I am in a strait to know what this can be. I know it is the effect of legal bondage; and I

have felt it as keen and as galling fince my deliverance as I did before, only with this difference (as you obferved to me in a former letter), "that unappeased wrath, and unatoned guilt, are not mixed with it."-But I muft conclude with thanking you kindly for all favours, and begging a continuance of them, attended with an interest in your prayers for me, that I may be kept from every fnare that Satan may spread for my feet, and that the Lord would condefcend to vifit me again, and restore to me the joys of his falvation, and uphold me with his free Spirit, that the wildernefs and the folitary place may be made glad and flourish, and the defert bloffom as the rofe. Then joy and gladness will be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of melody, and not till then. My partner joins in kind refpects. Believe me to remain, as much as ever,