heaven, and brought him down from his Father's bosom to our earth: It is deeper than hell, and brought us up from thence: It is larger than the sea, and can never be exhausted: Broader than the earth, and can never be described. How vehemently did the heavenly flame burn, even "when the sorrows of death compassed him about, when the pains of hell took hold on him!"

How has art and oratory embellished human loves! What surprising narratives have been written of the amours of princes! and what pages have been filled with the fictitious adventures of lovers! But what has been said to purpose of the Supreme Lover, who loved his own to the end, in the hour of death, in the pangs of dissolution, and amidst the keenest sense of his Almighty Father's wrath! This is what no mortal ever could do; for death flings another theme into their mind, and as their breath expires, their thoughts perish. Death, in the person loving or beloved, finishes the strongest affection, though their memory may be dear; but death cannot separate from his sacred love.

There never was such disproportion between parties loving and beloved, as here; no, not though kings should choose their queens from the dunghill. Here the Prince of peace, the King of kings, the flower of paradise, the darling of his Father's love, the express image of his person, and brightness of his glory, the heir of all things, the eternal God, loves an ugly, deformed, miserable creature, a crawling worm, a condemned criminai, an insolvent debtor, a rebel against heaven, a daring sinner, a drudge to hell, a slave to lust, a captive of satan, a prisoner of the pit! This is love indeed, love that will be the

wonder of angels, and the song of the church of the first-born through endless ages.

For shame, ye celebrated bards! will ye choose such lifeless, tasteless, dying themes, and neglect the work of angels, the employment of heaven? How ardently, O Divine Lover! should my soul go out after thee! Longing for that thrice-welcome day, when I shall mourn thine absence no more, but, admitted into thy presence, shall talk of all thy love, and feast on all thy charms, world without end.

MEDITATION LV.

ETERNITY.

Spithead, Nov. 13, 1758.

ARITHMETICIANS have been much puzzled

with given numbers; but none ever attempted eternity, or the duration of the world to come, though they have shown mighty art in figures. Here the finite mind has no idea of eternity but by succession of ages, and yet succession belongs to time, not to eternity. Though all the angels in heaven, and all the men in the world, since their creation, had been employed in dotting down figures, which at the end of the world were to be arranged into one straight line, stretched through an unmeasured space, which would give every figure ten times its force, yet this line would not be so much to eternity, by all the disproportion of comparison, as the number one bears to it; for one bears some proportion to the greatest numbers, but the greatest numbers bear none to eternity.

Days, weeks, and months, are nothing there; years, ages, and generations are lost there; hundreds, thousands, and millions are no more there; times, æras, and determinate durations are past for ever there; all is fixed, all eternal there! There is no first and last, sooner and later, in eternity; for though Abel, with respect to time, was sooner plunged into perpetuity, yet no sooner than the saints that shall be alive at the last day, with respect to eternity. For it is like a circle, which, besected any where, is always in the middle. The saints are like so many guests assembling to a feast, some are set down, some sitting down, some standing ready to sit down, some entering the door, and some at a little distance from the house, yet all come in due time for the feast. Adam, Enoch, and Elias, are set down at the banquet of love; the prophets and apostles are set down at the marriage-supper of the Lamb; some are entering the door of bliss, and many are on their way thither; but they shall all come time enough to the divine entertainment which shall satisfy all the guests in the mansions of glory.

Alas! with what desperate madness am I chargeable, that am thus taken up with transitory trifles, and neglect the realities of the everlasting world? When I consider the vanity of earthly glory, I cannot help concluding, that such as pursue after it are intoxicated with poison more dangerous than that of the tarantula, which makes men die by dancing; as the one effects the soul, the other only the body. But though the pleasures of this world were real and solid, yet they are so transient, that they are not worthy our pursuit. O how wise for time, but how improvident for eternity! for what man, to appear in all the majes

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ty and grandeur of a king for one day, would forfeit his estate, and spend the rest of his miserable life in poverty and reproach? And yet for vanity, for trifles of a day, we throw ourselves away for eternity! I look forward a few years, perhaps a few days, and see myself in eternity: but I cannot look still more forward, and see myself out of eternity into another state.

Eternity! I am to be in thee for ever; and why shouldst thou not be in all my thoughts? Thou shalt shortly overtake me; why then should I chase thee from me, or fly myself from thee?

It matters not much to him who is going but out of one door into another, whether it be in a summerblink, or winter-blast, since a few steps finish his journey; nor does it much more concern him who comes out of the door of the womb, and enters by the gate of death into the palace of the great King, his mansion for eternity, whether it be under the sunshine of prosperity, or the bitter blast of adversity; because the one cannot profit him, nor the other pain him there. And our journey, from our coming into this world, till our going into the world of spirits, though we should reach the age of Methuselah, is performed sooner with respect to eternity, than our going from one room to another in respect of time. Now, my moments are numbered, and precious; but, O that blessed state when numbers are no more! No incursions there on the adoring soul, from the world, or from vanity, from sin, satan, or the flesh. No weariness there, where mine adorations shall not be measured by minutes, cramped by corruption, or cut short by bodily indisposition. But when I have stood an ardent adorer before the throne ten thousand years, I shall be as vigorous in my love, as active in my adora

tions, as in the first moment I began the work of angels, the employment of heaven. Now vain thoughts mingle with my contemplations, distractions with my devotions, impertinent rovings with my most importunate prayers; unbelief resists my faith, carnality is a clog to the heavenly mind, corruption a dead weight on the soul, and the things of time an hindrance to all. But then I shall be delivered into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. Once a great king made a great feast to his grandees for an hundred and fourscore days; nothing less than a royal treasury could support the expense of such an entertainment. But the King of kings shall feast and satiate all his mighty angels, all his chosen people, on his own undiminished fulness through eternity itself! There is bliss without a blank, abundance beyond all bounds, and possession without period! No matter, then, what years I lose; for whenever the lamp of life expires, the sun shall rise and shine for ever.

MEDITATION LVI.

ON LOVING GOD.

Spithead, Nov. 20, 1758.

To love thee, is my honour; that I may, is my privilege; and in as far as I do it, so far am I happy. How is it, then, that this divine duty of loving thee meets with so much opposition? Hell and earth bid me hate thee ; sinners will not let me avow my love to thee; corruption within, cares and concerns without, check my love; unbelief cools my love," for faith works by love," and love bears proportion to faith;