mental calm and tranquillity of mind, where I am filled with rapture, while I by faith foresee all my requests fulfilled, and the causes of my sorrow annihilated in his love. By prayer, the soul's embassy on the most interesting affairs is carried to the court of heaven, sometimes in broken sentences, devout ejaculations, pious aspirations, sighs, and groans. By it I reveal my mind to the Most High, ease my burdened breast, and devolve all my difficulties on God, and then composedly rest, This is the Christian's evening and morning sacrifice to God; but the prayerless person is the profane atheist, whỏ denies adoration to the Author of his being. O! then, to be sensible of the majesty of God, for fear of whom my very flesh should tremble!

O deluded Papist! why commit thy suits to angels, or departed saints? Though they were concerned for thee, which they are not, yet, seeing they attend the throne of God in the highest heavens, they can neither know of thy complaints nor thee, unless possessed of omnisciency, which it were blasphemous to suppose. But is not God every where, and fills the very heart? As in him thou livest, movest, and breathest, so in him thou thinkest; and to him alone, through his beloved Son, thou shouldst pour out all thy complaints and supplications. Friends may be removed, acquaintance taken away, public worship without reach, liberty denied, I banished from my native land; yet the soul and prayer must never separate. The royal charter is lodged within my breast, that I may be robbed of every thing sooner than of liberty to come with boldness, through the blood of Jesus, to the throne of grace. The wicked, through his pride of face, will not call upon God; but it is my highest

honour to be admitted into the presence of the King eternal, and to have his ear open, and attentive to my request. What is the saint's prayer book? Just affliction, and a body of sin and death lying hard upon him, and Christ, in all his divine offices and endearing relations. The first teaches him for what to pray, and the last to whom. In this divine exercise, God condescends to wrestle with his people, and in the struggle to be prevailed upon: "Let me go," says God; "I will not," says the wrestler, "till thou bless me." In prayer God and the soul meet, and hold communion together; then the curtain of heaven is drawn aside, that I may look in, and see my large possessions; then do I get a glance of the King in his beauty, and a glimpse of the excellencies of the life above, so that I am filled with wonder, and desire to depart, and to be with Jesus. This is the well at which I drink the heavenly water, and am refreshed and strengthened for my journey. Lord, while allowed to come into thy presence with boldness, let secret sin (ah! what avails it that the world does not know?) never cause a secret shame before thee. Meantime, may I know in whom I believe, to whom I reveal my cause, and utter my complaint, and rejoice because the day is approaching when I shall not need to ask any thing, because possessed of all. O eternal triumph! when my prayers shall be turned into praise, my complaints into acclamations of joy, my mourning, sighs, and groans, into hosannas and endless hallelujahs; when beams of glory shall dilate my ravished powers of mind, and sacred plenitude overflow my raptured soul for ever.

MEDITATION XXVI.

POOR

ON A BLIND BEGGAR.

June 1, 1757.

Thou

man! thou walkest in darkness, though presented on every side with noon-day beams. must commit thyself to the conduct of thy fellowcreatures, and by them be led from door to door, seeing "those that look out at the windows are darkened." Who can but sympathize with thy condition, and pity thee? Poison unknown to thee may be poured into thy cup; thou mayest fall into the fire or the water, or the ditch; mayest dash thy foot against every stone, and have the naked sword brandished at thy breast, while, ignorant of thy danger, thou makest no attempts to escape.

How melancholy, then, the case of the men that are spiritually blind, that drink the cruel "poison of asps," that fall into every sink of sin, that run into every danger, rush "on the bosses of Jehovah's buckler," and oppose their hardened breast against the naked point of justice's flaming sword! And how sad that the persons in this condition, ignorant of their danger, should sport with wrath, and make a mock at sin!

If we heard of whole nations struck blind, and not one left to lead another, but all perishing in this deplorable situation, how would we feel in the tenderest manner for them! Now, are there not whole nations that sit in the region and shadow of death, that grope in the darkness, and never find their way to heaven? For them, therefore, we should feel in a manner tender above expression, from the very bottom of our

souls. To the benighted tribes, would not mankind from every quarter of the globe, send to afford them all possible relief? And should not all Christian powers exert themselves to their very utmost, to spread the saving knowledge of a Saviour among the heathen? Could a man recover the blind, how would they gratefully accept the cure, and bless the healing hand! But, in a land where life and immortality are brought to light, how many sit in the shade, and will not quit their gloomy cell for all the beauties of the day? Happy those who have the eyes of their mind opened, and in his heavenly light see light clearly; who see the deformity of sin, the beauty of holiness, the excellency of religion, the necessity of the new birth, the preciousness of Christ, and shortly, in the light of glory, shall see as they are seen.

MEDITATION XXVII.

LOVE IN SAINTS.

LOVE is a passion planted in the human breast,

which once was wholly a right seed, but is now turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine. Ere sin entered into the world, love wholly centered on God; then the fire burnt purely, and the soul ascended in the sacred flame to God. Then there was sweet intercourse between heaven and earth, and man maintained communion with his Maker. Admiring the beauties of creation, his soul with pleasure ascended up the streams of created excellencies, to the fountain of uncreated glory; and, ravished with the view, he saw his interest in his Maker to be of

another kind than the lower world could claim. This was bliss, and it was this made paradise so near akin to heaven. This, and not the blowing flowers; this, and not the verdant groves; this, and not the spreading streams; this, and not the fragrant gums; this, and not the bending boughs; this, and not the warbling tribes; this, and not a cloudless sky; this, and not the sight of angels; this, and not their mutual love, made our first parents happy in their first abode.

But man no sooner admitted sin and satan in, than God in justice drove him out of paradise, and from his station too; and what tongue can tell his sad condition now? His love is not only cooled towards God, but corrupted from God; hence he worships the creature more than the Creator, who is God over all blessed for ever. As the lion with terrible majesty hunts his prey through the trembling forest, while the spider, with silent cunning, catches the fly sporting on the window, or entangled under the web; so, from the throne to the dunghill, every person pursues vanities adapted to his state, but quite destructive to his immortal soul. O how has man gone back by a perpetual backsliding! God punishes it in an awful manner; for as they like not to retain God in their knowledge, so God gives them up to a reprobate mind. They choose their ways, and God chooses their delusions. God is not in the counsel of their heart, and they are not under the conduct of his Spirit. They provoke God to anger by their vanities, and he puts them to pain with vexation and wo. But what is still more to be wondered at, is, that after God has given the brightest manifestations of his infinite love, in re-admitting the rebel into friendship, through the sufferings of his well-beloved Son, man should still