wicked that oppress me, from my deadly enemies who compass me about.' One while, One while, Thy lovingkindness is before mine eyes, and I have walked in thy truth;' another while, 'Lord, where are thy former lovingkindnesses? Yea, dost thou not hear him, with one breath, professing his confidence and lamenting his desertion? Lord, by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong: Thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled.' Psal. xxx. 7.

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Observe that chosen vessel, the great apostle of the gentiles. At one time thou shalt see him erecting trophies of victory to his God; In all these things we are more than conquerors, through him that loved us.' another time thou shalt find him bewailing his own sinful condition; Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' One while thou shalt find him caught up into the third heaven, into the paradise of God: another while thou shalt find him buffetted by the messenger of Satan, and sadly complaining of the violence of that assault. Hear the spouse of Christ, whether the church in common or the faithful soul, bemoaning herself: I opened to I opened to my Beloved; but my Beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake. I sought him, but I could not find him. I called him, but he gave me no answer.' Cant. v. 6.

Thus it will be with thee, my son, while thou art in this frail flesh. The temper of thy soul will be, like her partner, subject to vicissitudes. Shouldst thou continue always in the same state, I should more than suspect thee. This is the difference betwixt nature and grace: that nature is still unifom, and like itself; grace varies, according to the pleasure of the giver. The Spirit breathes when and where it listeth. John iii. 8. When therefore the gracious inspirations of the Holy Ghost are within thee, be thankful to the infinite munificence of that blessed Spirit; and still pray, 'Arise, oh north wind, and come, thou south wind; blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out.' Cant. iv. 16. But when thou shalt find thy soul becalmed, and not a leaf stirring in this garden of thine, be not too much dejected

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with an ungrounded opinion of being destitute of thy God. Neither do thou repine at the seasons or measures of his bounty that most free and infinitely beneficent Agent will not be tied to our terms; but will give what, and how, and when he pleaseth. Only do thou humbly wait upon his goodness, and be confident that he who hath begun this good work in thee, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Phil. i. 6.

SECTION 10.

Complaint of an unregenerate state and deadness in sin.

It is true, thou sayest, if God had begun his good work in me, he would at the last, for his own glory's sake, make it up. But as for me, I am a man dead in sins and trespasses; neither have I ever had any true life of grace in me. Some show indeed I have made of a christian profession, but I have only beguiled the eyes of the world with a mere pretense, and have not found in myself the truth and solidity of those heavenly virtues whereof I have made a formal display.

It were a pity, my son, thou shouldst be so bad as thou makest thyself. I have no comfort in store for hypocrisy no disposition can be more odious to the God of truth. When he would express his utmost vengeance against sinners, he hath no more fearful terms to set it forth, than I will appoint him his portion with the bypocrites?' Matt. xxiv. 51. Were it thus with thee, it were more than high time to resolve thyself into dust and ashes, and to put thyself into the hands of thine almighty Creator, to be moulded anew by his powerful Spirit; and never to give thyself peace, till thou findest thyself renewed in the spirit of thy mind.

But in the meanwhile, take heed lest thou be found guilty of misjudging thy own soul, and undervaluing the work of God's Spirit in thee. God hath been better to thee than thou knowest: thou hast the true life of grace in thee, and for the time perceivest it not. No heed is

to be taken of the doom thou passest upon thyself in the hour of temptation. When thy heart was free, thou wast in another mind; and shalt, upon better advice, return to thy former thoughts. It is with thee as it was with Eutychus, who fell down from the third loft, and was taken up for dead; yet for all that, his life was in him. We have known those who have lain long in trances, without any perception of life; and some have been put into their graves for dead; when as yet their soul hath been in them, though unable to exert those faculties which might evince her hidden presence. Such thou mayest be, at the worst yea, wert thou but in charity with thyself, thou wouldst be found in a much better condition.

There is the same reason of the natural life and the spiritual. Life, where it is, is discerned by Breathing, Sense, and Motion.

Where there is the Breath of life, there must be a life that sends it forth. If then the soul breathes forth holy desires, doubtless there is a life whence they proceed. Now deny, if thou canst, that thou hast these spiritual breathings of holy desires within thee. Dost thou not many a time sigh, for thine own insensibility? Is not thy heart troubled with the thoughts of thy want of grace? Dost thou not truly desire, that God would renew a right spirit within thee? Take comfort to thyself; this is the work of the holy Spirit within thee. As well may a man breathe without life, as thou couldst be thus affected without grace.

Sense is a quick descrier of life. Pinch or wound a dead man, he feels nothing; but the living perceive the easiest touch. When thou hast heard the fearful judgments of God denounced against sinners, and they have been brought home to the conscience, hast thou not found thy heart pierced with them? Hast thou not shrunk inward, and secretly thought, How shall I escape this dreadful damnation? When thou hast heard the mercies of God addressed to penitent sinners, hath not thy heart silently said, Oh that I had my share in them! When thou hast heard the name of Christ blasphemned, hast thou not felt a secret horror in thy bosom? All these argue a true spiritual life within thee.

Motion is the most perfect discoverer of life. He that can stir his limbs, is surely not dead. The feet of the soul are the affections. Hast thou not found in thyself a true grief of heart, for thy wretched indisposition to all good things? Hast thou not found a secret love to and complacency in those, whom thou hast thought truly godly and conscientious? Without a true life of grace, these things could never have been. Are not thine eyes and hands many times lifted up, in supplicating for mercy Canst thou deny that thou hast a true, though but weak, appetite to the means, and further degrees of grace? What can this be, but that hunger and thirst after righteousness, which our Saviour hath pronounced blessed.

Discomfort not thyself too much, my son, with the present disappearance of grace, during the hour of thy temptation. It is no otherwise with thee than with a tree in winter, whose sap is run down to the root; there is no more show of the life of vegetation by any buds or blossoms that it might put forth, than if it were stark dead. Yet when the sun returns, and sends forth his comfortable beams in the spring, it breaks out afresh, and betrays that vital juice which lay long hidden in the earth. It is no otherwise with thee, than with the hearth of some good housewife, which towards night is swept up, and the fire hidden under a heap of ashes. A stranger would think it were quite out: here is no appearance of light, or heat or smoke; but by the time she hath stirred it up a little, the bright embers show themselves, and are soon raised to a flame. Stay but till the spring, when the Sun of righteousness shall call up thy moisture into the branches; stay but till the morning, when the fire of grace which was raked up in the ashes shall be drawn forth and quickened; and thou shalt find cause to say of thy heart, as Jacob said of his hard lodging, Surely, the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. Gen. xxviii. 16. Only do thou, not neglecting the means, wait patiently upon God's leisure stay quietly upon the bank of this Bethesda, till the angel descend and move the water.

SECTION 11.

Unconsciousness of the time and means of conversion.

I COULD gladly, thou sayest, attend with patience upon this great and happy work of exciting grace, were I but sure that I had it, could I but be persuaded of the truth of my conversion. But it is my great misery, that here I am at a sad and uncomfortable loss. For I have been taught, that every true convert can assign the time, the place, the means, the manner of his conversion; can show how near he was brought to the gates of death, how close to the very verge of hell, when God, by a mighty and outstretched arm, snatched him away, in his own sensible apprehension, from the pit; and suddenly rescued him from that destruction, and put him into a new state of spiritual life, and undoubted salvation. All which I cannot do; not finding in myself any such sudden and vehement concussion and heart-breaking, any such forcible and irresistible operation of God's Spirit within 'me. I am not able to mention the sermon that converted me, or those particular approaches that my soul made towards a hardly-recovered desperation.

My son, it is not safe for any man to take upon him to set limits to the ways of the Almighty, or to prescribe certain rules to the proceedings of his infinite wisdom. That most free and alwise Agent will not be tied to walk always in one path; but varies his courses, according to the pleasure of his own will. One man he calls suddenly, another by leisure; one by a kind of holy violence, as he did Paul; another by sweet solicitations, as Philip, Nathanael, Andrew, Peter, Matthew, and the rest of the apostles. One man he draws to heaven with gracious invitations, another he drives thither by a strong hand.

We have known those who, having mispent their early life in notoriously wicked courses, living as without God, and even against him, have been suddenly stricken with some powerful denunciation of judgment, which hath so wrought upon them as to bring them within sight of hell; who after long and deep humiliation have been raised up,