paid to me in his white robes during these fix months paft. O what praife is due to God for keeping me from falling by this fnare of the fowler! I have had many of the lectures on election which you mention, and the doctrine applied, and his ends anfwered, in my last trial. Rebellion enough I felt. Safely he might withdraw for a feafon; he was fure he left me miferable enough. You have, indeed, prophefied of a dark path I have to travel, which has wrought fome discouragement in my heart. I am fure you will be a true prophet in all your predictions, and not one word of all you have fpoken fhall fall to the ground. Satan feems to me to be the most dangerous when he comes to bloat up the foul with pride. And I have found him approach in this when I have been much in the enjoy

way

ment of divine love, as Mr. Hart fays,

The heart uplifts with God's own gift,
And makes even grace a fnare.

I felt fo much of this about feven months ago as made me abhor myself. This was a little before my journey to the Bower, when God met me by the way. Our dear paftor made an obfervation in the pulpit, about a week before I received your last favour, which ftruck me very forcibly. It was this: that pride goeth before the deftruction of a finner, and a haughty fpirit before the fall of a faint;

and

and obferved, that it was the devil's aim to get us on this ground, and then he was fure to procure our fall. And your mentioning in yours the ways and means he makes use of to effect this, and that from your experience, was very seasonable to me; and I found that " a word fitly spoken is as apples of gold in pictures of filver;" for the Lord makes me to fear this more than any thing. I am fenfible there can be no fafety but at the feet of Jefus. But true it is, as you observe, it is not a little croffing and trying that will keep me there. I find I am wrong in my views of envy and jealousy. Pardon me, dear Sir; I have, perhaps, spoken for want of light. But you are looking forward to a time when, you say, I shall be a better judge of it, even when my preaching time is over. Indeed, Sir, I aspire to no fuch things as preaching. As you fay, prate I do, and that when I should keep filence, which is known by the effects, by its bringing on me hatred and envy inftead of love. I am often brought into fnares by my tongue, which is an unruly member; and I have smarted both for my speaking and my keeping filence. But, if I am to be left free among the dead, laid in irons a whole year, and be given up to the sleepy devil, I believe my mouth will be shut with a witness. If any thing less than this would do it, I fhould be thankful.

However, I hope ever to have an intereft in your prayers, and to be favoured with your cor

refpondence,

refpondence, which I feel are among my greatest privileges. Shall hope to hear from you very foon, and believe me to remain

I HAVE long been to thee as a dumb man, in whose mouth are no reproofs, having been much engaged. But you know "there is a time to keep filence, and a time to speak;" and "there is a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing." You have been, upon your returning to your heavenly Father, embraced, enrobed, entertained, and adorned, and long indulged with the foul-reviving melody of "let us eat and be merry; for this my fon was dead, and is alive again; he was loft, and is found." And

this mufic and dancing hath long continued with thee, during which time I could only be a fellowhelper of your joy, or a furtherer of your joy of faith. But now, perhaps, " the elders have ceafed from the gate, the young men from their mufic, the joy of our heart is ceased, our dance is turned into mourning." But, when the truth is received in the love of it; when the teftimony is bound up in the heart by the bond of the everlafting covenant, which is God's eternal love in Chrift Jefus accompanying the word of grace; then we are constrained, however coyly we might put it away before, we are conftrained, I fay, to embrace it. being attended with the comforting feal of affurance; for it comes " in power, in the Holy Ghoft, and in much affurance;" which feal ratifies, confirms, and makes the promise sure to all the feed. And then what remains? Why, the hand of faith is ftretched out to fubfcribe the evidences, both that which is open, and that which is fealed; namely, the whole word of God, which appears open to us, and is yet to be fulfilled, and that which is fealed on our hearts, as being fulfilled already. And this fetting to the feal is to be attended with the confeffion of the mouth unto falvation, without either an if or a but in it: "One fhall fay, I am the Lord's; another fhall call himfelf by the name of Jacob; and another fhall fubfcribe with his hand unto the Lord, and furname himself by the name of Ifrael." Every one that fends

fends a letter to another, giving an account of his deliverance, and of the affurance of his faith in Chrift Jefus, fubfcribe with his hand to the honour and glory of God, as being faithful to his word, and rich in mercy. And he does no less who, believing in his heart, makes confeffion with his mouth unto falvation. While these things are carrying on in the foul, the good old wine flics about, and the glorious days of the Son of Man afford nothing but new love tokens, fresh or new discoveries; but, if they laft never fo long, and we "rejoice in them all," yet we must "remember the days of darkness, for they shall be many." How paffive, refigned, compofed, and tranquil, is the clay in the hand of the potter while the lump is formed into another veffel, in order to fhew forth his praife! But the evil days that have rolled over my head fince! For many years did I keep looking back to the munitions of rocks, and to the views that I then had of the King in his beauty, and of the land that is very far off. But the bare and barren remembrance of them at last only made me lament my lofs, and fometimes aggravated my mifery; for, though I earnefily begged to have these restored, and to be upheld by his free Spirit, yet he appeared in this matter inflexible, as if it must not be fo done in our country. But the following things abode with me; that is, a full perfuafion that the work was genuine; a good hope of the great reward promised;