end to but how comprehenfive are our fouls in their capacities? We are made in the image of God; we can look beyond prefent things, and are capable of the highest happiness, and that to all eternity: the foul of a beaft is but a material form, which, wholly depending upon, muft needs die with the body; but our fouls are a divine fpark or blaft; and when the body dies, it dies not with it, but fubfifts even in its separated state.

REFLECTIONS.

A reflection for an unthankful finner.

1. How great a fin is ingratitude to God for fuch a common, but choice mercy of creation and provifion for me in this world? There is no creature made worfe by kindness, but man. There is a kind of gratitude which I may observe, even in these brute beasts: they do in their way acknowledge their benefactors; "The ox "knows his owner, and the afs his master's crib." How ready are they to serve such as feed and cherish them? But I have been both unthankful and unferviceable to my Creator and Benefactor, that hath done me good all my days; those poor creatures that sweat and groan under the load that I lay upon them, never finned against God, nor tranfgreffed the laws of their creation, as I have done; and yet God hath dealt better with me than with them. O that the bounty of God, and his distinguishing mercy between me and the beafts that perifh, might move and melt my heart into thankfulness! O that I might confider feriously what the higher and more excellent end of my creation is, and might more endeavour to answer and live up to it! Or elfe, O my foul, it will be worse with thee than the beafts: it is true, they are under bondage and mifery; but it is but for a little time; death will end all their pains, and ease them of all their heavy loads; but I fhall groan to all eternity, under a heavier burden than ever they felt; they have no account to give, but fo have I. What comfort is it, that I have a larger capacity than a beaft hath? That God hath endowed me with reafon, which is denied to them? Alas! this will but augment my mifery, and enlarge me to take in a greater measure of anguifh.

A reflection for an elect foul.

2. By how many fteps, O my foul! mayest thou afcend in the praises of thy God, when thou confidereft the mercies that God hath bestowed upon thee; not only in that he made thee not a ftone or tree without fenfe, or an horfe or dog without reason; but that thou art not an infidel without light, or an unregenerate perfon without grace? What! to have fenfe, and all the delights of it, which ftones have not! Reafon, with the more high and noble pleafures of it, which beafts have not! the light and knowledge of the great things of the golpel, which the heathens have not! and fuch an expectation and hope of inconceivable glory and felicity, which the unfanctified have not! O my foul! how rich, how bountiful hath thy

God been to thee! These are the overflowings of his love to thee who waft moulded out of the fame lump with the beasts that groan on earth, yea, with the damned that howl in hell: well may I fay that God hath been a good God to me!

THE POEM.

THEN I behold a tired jade put on

WH

With whip and fpur, till all his ftrength be gone;
See ftreams of fweat run down his bleeding fides,
How little mercy's fhewn by him that rides.
If I more thankful to my God would prove
Than fuch a rider mercilefs, 'twill move
My foul to praife: For who fees this, and can
But blefs the Lord that he was made a man.
And fuch a fight the rider ought to move
This meditation duly to improve.

What hath this creature done, that he fhould be
Thus beaten, wounded, and tir'd out by me?
He is my fellow-creature; 'tis mere grace
I had not been in his, he in my cafe.
Ungrateful, ftupid man! God might have made
Me bear the faddle, as I fee this jade.
He never finn'd, but for my fin doth lie
Subjected unto all this mifery.

Lord, make my heart relent, that I should be
To thee more useless than my horse to me :
He did his utmoft, went as long as ever
His legs could bear him; but for me I never
Thus ipent my ftrength for God, but oft have been

'Too prodigal thereof in ways of fin.

Though he's the horfe, and I the man, 'twill be
Far better with my horfe one day than me:
Unless thy grace prevent and fuperadd

A new creation unto that I had.
Could every reader fix a ferious thought
On fuch a fubject, and hereby be taught
To fpiritualize it, and improve it thus ;
How fweet would tedious journeys be to us!
But fuch a task a graceless heart tires out,
More than the tired horfe I write about.

W

CHAP. III.

Upon the feeking of loft Cattle.

When fecking your loft cattle, keep in mind,
That thus Chrift Jefus feeks your fouls to find.

OBSERVATION.

HEN cattle are ftrayed away from your fields, you use all care and diligence to recover them again; tracing their footfteps, crying them in the market-towns, fending your fervants abroad, and enquiring yourselves of all that you think can give news of them. What care and pains men will take in such cases, was exemplified in Saul, Sam. ix. 4, 5. who with his fervant, paffed through mount Ephraim to seek the affes that were ftrayed from his father, and through the land of Shalifha, and through the land of Shalim, and they were not there, and through the land of the Benjamites, but found them not.

TH

APPLICATION.

HE care and pains you take to recover your loft cattle, carries a fweet and lively representation of the love of Jefus Chrift, in the recovery of loft finners. Jefus Chrift came on purpose from heaven upon a like errand, to feek and to fave that which was loft, Matth. xviii. 11. There are feveral particulars in which this glorious defign of Chrift, in feeking and faving loft man, and the care and pains of husbandmen in recovering their loft cattle, do meet and touch, though there be as many particulars alfo in which they differ: all which I hall open under the following heads.

1. We fometimes find that cattle will break out of those very fields where they have been bred; and where they want nothing that is needful for them. Juft thus loft man departed from his God, brake out of that pleasant enclosure where he was abundantly provided for, both as to foul and body; yet then he brake over the hedge of the command, and went aftray, Ecclef. vii. 29. "Lo, this only have I "found, that God made man upright, but he fought out to himself "6 many inventions :" He was not content and fatisfied with that bleffed ftate God had put him into, but would be trying new conclufions, to the lofs and ruin both of himself and his posterity.

2. Strayers are evermore fufferers for it; all they get by it is to be pined and poinded: And what did man get by departing from his God, but ruin and mifery to foul and body? Will you have an abbreviate of his fufferings and loffes? The full account none can give you: Why, by ftraying from his God, he loft the rectitude and holinefs of his nature; like a true ftrayer, he is all dirty and miry, overfpread and befmeared both in foul and body with the odious filthinefs

of fin; he loft the liberty and freedom of his will to good, a precious jewel of inestimable value. This is a real mifery incurred by the fall, though fome have fo far loft their underftandings and humility, as not to own it; he hath loft his God, his foul, his happiness, and his very bowels of compaffion towards himself in this miferable state.

3. When your cattle are ftrayed, yea, though it be but one of the flock or herd, you leave all the reft, and go after that which is loft: So did Jefus Chrift, who, in the forcited place, Matth. xviii. 12. compares himfelf to fuch a fhepherd; he left heaven itself, and all the bleffed angels there, to come into this world to feek loft man. O the precious cfteem, and dear love that Christ had to poor man! How did his bowels yearn towards us in our low ftate! How did he pity us in our mifery! As if he had faid, poor creatures, they have loft themfelves, and are become a prey to the devil in a perifhing state; I will feek after them, and fave them. The fon of man is come to feek and to fave.

4. You are glad when you have found your strayers, much more is Chrift when he hath found a loft foul. O it is a great fatisfaction to him to fee the fruit of the travail of his foul, Ifa. liii. "Yea, there " is more joy in heaven over one finner that repenteth, than over "ninety-nine just persons that need no repentance." What demonftrations of joy and gladnefs did the father of the prodigal give, when he had found his fon that was loft? Luke xv. 20.

5. When you have brought home your ftrayers, you fometimes clog them to prevent their wandering again, and ftop up the gaps with thorns; and fo doth God oftentimes by fuch fouls as are recovered and brought home to Chrift; he hangs a clog of affliction to prevent their departure from God again, 2 Cor. xii. 7.

But then there are five particulars in which Chrift's seeking loft fouls, and your feeking loft cattle differ.

1. Your cattle fometimes find the way home themfelves, and retnrn to you of their own accord; but loft man never did, nor can do fo; he was his own destroyer, but can never be his own faviour; it was poffible for him not to have loft his God, but having once loft him, can never find him again of himself. Alas! his heart is bent to backfliding, he hath no will to return. Hear how Chrift complains, John v. 40. "Ye will not come unto me." Man's recovery begins in God, not in himself.

2. Your fervants can find, and bring back your loft cattle as well as you; but fo cannot Chrift's fervants: Minifters may discover, but cannot recover them: they daily fee, but cannot fave them; lament them they can, but help them they cannot ; intreat and beg them to return they can, and do, but prevail with them they cannot. Melanéthon thought, when he began to preach, to perfuade all; but old Adam was too hard for young Melancthon.

3. You feek all the cattle that are strayed from you, especially the beft; but Jefus Christ only feeks poor loft man. There were other

treatures, and fuch as by nature were more excellent, that loft their God and themselves: I mean, the apoftate angels; but he came not to feek them: herein his fingular love to man appears.

4. When you have recovered and brought home your loft cattle, you may lose them the second time, and never recover them again; but fo cannot Chrift. Man once recovered is for ever fecured by him. "All that thou haft given me, I have kept, and not one of them is "loft but the fon of perdition;" and he was never favingly found, John xvii. 12.

5. Though you prize your cattle, yet you will not venture your life for the recovery of them; rather let them go than regain them with fuch an hazard; but Jefus Chrift not only ventured, but actually laid down his life to recover and fave loft man: he redeemed them at the price of his own blood; he is that good fhepherd that laid down his life for the sheep. O the furpaffing love of Chrift to lost fouls!

REFLECTIONS.

A reflection for a loft foul.

1. Lord, I am a loft creature! an undone foul! and herein lies my mifery, that I have not only loft my God, but have no heart to return to him: nay, I fly from Chrift, who is come on purpose from heaven to feek and to fave me: his meffengers are abroad, feeking for fuch as I am, but I avoid them, or at least refuse to obey their call and perfuafions to return. Ah, what a miferable state am I in! Every step I go is a step towards hell; my foul, with the prodigal, is ready to perifh in a strange country: but I have no mind, with him, to return home. Wretched foul! what will the end of this be? If God have loft thee, the devil hath found thee; he takes up all ftrayers from God: yea, death and hell will fhortly find thee, if Christ do not; and then thy recovery, O my foul! will be impoffible! Why fit I here perithing and dying? I am not yet as irrecoverably loft as the damned are. O let me delay no longer, left I be loft for ever!

A reflection for one that was loft, but is found.

2. O my foul! for ever blefs and admire the love of Jefus Chrift, who came from heaven to feek and fave fuch a loft foul as I was. Lord, how marvellous! how matchlefs is thy love! I was loft, and am found: I am found, and did not feek; nay, I am found by him from whom I fled. Thy love, O my Saviour! was a preventing love, a wonderful love; thou lovedft me much more than I loved myfelf; I was cruel to my own foul, but thou waft kind; thou foughtest for me, a loft finner, and not for loft angels; thy hand of grace caught hold of me, and hath let go thoufands, and ten thoufands, as good as myself by nature: like another David, thou didft refcue my poor loft foul out of the mouth of the destroyer; yea, more than fo, thou didst lose thine own life to find mine: And now, dear Jefus, fince I am thus marvellously recovered,