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LETTER XVII.

TO MR. AND MRS. W- -B

MY DEAR W- AND M~,

Tooting, Feb. 1803.

YOUR letter of the 5th instant gave us much pleasure, and awakened sentiments of gratitude. Blessed be God! whose everlasting mercy blotteth out the cloud of affliction, and sweetly says, "Your sins will I remember against you no more!" My dear W's partial recovery, I hope, if consistent with God's wise and gracious and holy will, we shall soon hear is perfected. But, ah! the uncertainty of life, the precarious nature of health, and our dearest connections here!-how proper, how profitable, how good is it to be dying daily, to be trimming our lamps, (that is, cleaning and enlivening them, and providing them a fresh supply of oil); to be laying up treasure in Heaven; that is, making sure our interest in the infinite treasure already laid there, and, by active piety and the fruits of faith, providing for an abundant recompense of reward! How can we contemplate, but with grateful wonder, the condescension of the Most High God, in suffering himself to be represented as a debtor to sinful dust and worms! "God is not unrighteous to forget your work of faith and labour of

love," &c. It is his own grace, his promise, and the blood of his own Son, that is the only ground of our claim; yet, when he dispenses everlasting good, and ushers the hell-deserving sinner into all the joys and glories of heaven, he proclaims himself his debtor. Who, that knows the grace of God, but must be his ready servant? His "yoke

is easy" and why should not we be reconciled to all his will? In infinite grace it consults our good; it means our sanctification. Truly, my dear W I rejoice to find your mind pacified and satisfied by this consideration in affliction. Indeed, it is the part of wisdom to submit to nauseous medicines and painful operations, in order to be delivered from threatening disease. That is a friendly hand, whatever suffering it unavoidably occasion, that undertakes to pluck the viper from our breasts that has already infused its venom into our blood, has often made the wound to bleed afresh, and is still aiming at our life. Oh! let me welcome the suf fering by which my Saviour bids me hope for such a deliverance: let me not tremble at the sight of the furnace wherein I am to be melted and tried, while He, whose skill, and compassion, and love, are abundantly proved and attested, promises to sit by, and secure the precious gold, and cause the trial to be found unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Truly, that dear Friend, with all the bitterness of affliction he has allotted me, has mingled so much kind

ness and sweetness in the cup, that it were inexcusable folly and base ingratitude to resist his will. His gifts, his promises, and many of his dealings with me, proclaim with united and powerful energy, "God is love." His conduct, his word, his heart, is love; love itself; pure, unmingled love: the sweet answer to that great question, "What is God?" Yes, it will be the business of eternity to explore the unbounded glories of this wondrous name; to trace the manifestation which God has been pleased to make of this delightful character-this brightest star in the constellation of the Divine attributes-this principal wheel in the machine of Providence, that sets all the rest in motion, "working all things after the counsel of his own will." Had it pleased the Most High to have consigned to me the mightiest monarchy on earth, and to have guaranteed the peaceable possession of it to me for an hundred years, and to my posterity for a thousand generations, in the regards of the world this had been enviable greatness. Yet, how deficient! The carnal mind would have been elated, and for a while gratified; but herein would have been no rest for an immortal soul. What a mere shadow, what a nothing is this, when compared with the good pleasure of his goodness which his word reveals, and which his Providence and his Spirit, with an energy that no power can resist, are fulfilling, and will fulfil in What is this to the unspeakable gift of his

us!

O!

love; the adoption and the inheritance of sons; the image of his holiness; the treasure that faith embraces? Well is it said, "We that believe do enter into rest;" for "this is the promise that he hath promised us eternal life, and this life is in his Son." Herein is a good adequate to the largest desire of an immortal mind. It comprehends whatever its sin and misery have made necessary. to live under the impression of this love!-to feel it so as to be dissolved, and cast into a new mould by it! While its influence prevails, how easy the yoke of service or suffering! how sweet, how powerful, its constraint! It is the mighty, and, indeed, the only conqueror of the heart of man. It prevails where the severest judgments, and all the terrors of the law, had been tried in vain. I do not wonder, my dear W, that, thus constrained, you should feel a ready mind when duty seems to call; yet when Providence is pleased to permit a restraint by bodily frailty, as of old by persecuting fury, however hard it be to bear, (and in many instances it was the severest trial of silenced ministers), it becomes a duty to yield, "humbling ourselves under the mighty hand of God." I pray God to confirm your health, and to prolong your usefulness. I rejoice to hear of your Missionary success. We have much to be thankful for in that respect.

I am, my dear children,

very affectionately, your father,

J. BOWDEN.

LETTER XVIII.

TO MR. AND MRS. W- -B

MY DEAR W-
- AND M~,

Tooting, June 17, 1805.

YOUR letter of the 29th ult. produced very lively sensations of both pain and pleasure. We cannot help bearing a part very feelingly in

your afficon, and being very solicitous about your recovery. However, "it is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.”— Salvation! how great a blessing, great beyond all our conception.-What a crown and joy await the saved sinner! What a mercy is it to be able to trace the beginning and pledge of it. But what works of salvation are yet to be wrought in us; what grace and blessings yet to be received!"Wonders of grace to God belong." When he proclaims his name, and grants a manifestation of his glorious majesty, power, and goodness, there is a voice which breaks from the Excellent Glory, saying, "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." When we hear him speak in exceeding great and precious promises, and are persuaded of them, we can let every thing drop to embrace them, eagerly crying, "This is all my salvation; this is all my desire." When he is pleased to open a page in the book of Providence, and to reveal his superior, well-directed, and never-failing measures, we can

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