and thirsting after righteousness? Are we taking up our cross daily, denying ourselves, and following Christ? Are we working out our own salvation with fear and trembling? Are we giving diligence to make our calling and election sure? Blessed indeed is the person who can say, I find this to be my case."

This letter, by the blessing of God, produced what was intended by Miss Hill, and what was desired by Lady Glenorchy. It was the means employed by the grace of God, to bring her out of the horrible pit and the miry clay of despondency, to set her feet on the Rock of Ages, to establish her goings, and to put a new song into her mouth, even praises unto God. It may now be said of Lady Glenorchy, Behold she prayeth.-She arose from her kness at Taymouth, as Saul of Tarsus did from the ground near Damascus, a wonderful monument of the power and grace of God. From that interesting moment, without hesitation or conferring with flesh and blood, she resolutely turned her back on the dissipated world, and without reserve devoted herself, and all that she could command and influence, to the service of Christ and the glory of God; and in this she invariably persisted to her latest breath. Here future path of life lay through evil report and through good report; in the midst of deep adversity and of high prosperity; of severe trials and strong temptations, both temporal and spiritual. But none of these things moved her from the steadfastness of her Christian profession. Although her road was often rough in the extreme, and her enemies cruel, strong, and numerous, yet on she went in her Christian course, never deviating to the right hand nor to the left, but ever pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

CHAPTER II.

Lady Glenorchy becomes sensible of her spiritual weakness-Miss Hill writes to her on this subject-Goes to London-Is afraid of being thereby diverted from serious subjects-Letter from Miss Hill endeavouring to strengthen her in her resolutions to resist the temptations there.

LADY GLENORCHY, like every other well informed Christian, very soon began to discover her spiritual weakness and infirmities. Of these, it seems, she complained to her friend Miss Hill, who accordingly wrote to her the following letter:

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August 30, 1765. "IT gives me great concern to hear of your bad state of health. May that God, in whose hands you are, command a blessing on the means used for your recovery! or, if it should be his will that this sickness be a sickness unto death, may you, as you see the outward man decaying, see the inward man renewed day by day! The Lord has merciful intentions even in his most bitter dispensations. Whom he loveth he chasteneth; and he scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. May you, my dear friend, be enabled to see love in his rod, as well as justice in his dealings; and may the bitter cup which he has given you to drink be so mixed with sweet ingredients, that you may look forward with comfortable assurance that all shall work together for good! It is the Lord, he cannot mistake your interest; his will be done: if it is his will, most

earnestly do I wish and pray for your recovery. I am persuaded that you belong to Christ; and therefore desire patiently to wait his will in the event. What poor helpless creatures should we be, full of inward fears and outward pains, unwilling to die, and yet dissatisfied with a wretched life, could we not discover some tokens of the Lord's merciful intentions towards us, and of our interest in him! Press on, my dear friend, and be not discouraged: he that is for you is greater than he that is against you. Although trials await you from without as well as from within, he who I trust has brought you out of darkness into his marvellous light, and has refreshed your soul with the light of his countenance, will now be with you when you pass through the fire and water of affliction. These are the strokes of a loving Father's hand, whose wisdom knows how to temper them to your case and strength, and to make you not only bear them with submission, but to kiss the rod that smites, and to sing of judgment as well as mercy. The trials and temptations which you have to encounter are indeed great and many; but having taken to you the whole armour of God, you may bid defiance to them all. You fight against conquered enemies. The Lord of Hosts is engaged in your behalf; look to him then by faith and prayer for strength; he will assuredly show himself to be a strong-hold in the day of trouble, in which the weary may take shelter and be safe. He is faithful that promised, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.' Fear not, for I am with thee; be not dismayed, for I am thy God.' Cast thy burden on the Lord and he shall sustain thee;' and above all let us remember, and we shall never want comfort, the gracious declaration, In that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted !'—O

may your eyes and mine, my dear friend, be ever upon the Lord Jesus. Fixed upon him, we must be happy. He it is that has overcome Satan, death, and hell: they cannot hurt the soul that rests on Christ; he cannot fail the weakest believer that builds upon him. Strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might, we are enabled amidst every distress, and every trial, and every temptation, to endure: as some massy rock supported by pillars of basaltes, though surrounded by tempestuous waves, and beat upon by storms and winds, yet remains unmoved, so we, built upon the rock Christ, are enabled to look down on the foaming billows of affliction, and defy their impotent rage. If we are in Christ, we shall have strength, and none shall be able to pluck us out of his hand. The more we are encompassed with trials and temptations, the more earnestly let us fly to him, and then shall we find by sweet experience that he is able to keep us from falling, and that when we are weak, then shall we be strong-strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. I have found that I am no where safe, but at the foot of the Cross; there would I always be in the lowest prostration and subjection; in that posture I would always be looking to Jesus, viewing the fulness of the all-sufficiency which dwells in him: and when in that posture of soul, deeply sensible of my own nothingness, and firmly believing his faithfulness, as well as fulness, I dare defy all the powers of darkness. Again, although I desire always to approach the throne of grace with lively actings of faith, and pleading the divine promises, yet I would appear, not in the character of a saint, but of a sinner; and (as a friend of mine observes) there are two things in which I need not fear excess, in thinking humbly of myself, and highly of the Lord Jesus. I would approach him

as my dread sovereign, and yet as my dearest friend, who hath loved me with everlasting love, and drawn me with everlasting kindness. Within this fortnight I have met with a severe trial in the death of a most dear and intimate friend, who has been as a sister to me from my infancy; but my comfort is, that I firmly believe she is gone to glory, and my loss is her gain. There can be little doubt that she was washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God, as it evidently appeared both in her health and sickness. Although she was in the bloom of life, and God had given her such a portion of the good things of this world as might have attached her heart to it, yet did she wisely consider that this was not her rest, and looked beyond this transitory life to the world of spirits, where she was persuaded she must ere long appear before the judgment seat of Christ, to receive the things done in the body, according to that she had done, whether it was good or bad. This awful consideration led her to inquire into the nature, ground, and object of her hope, and through mercy she found it not only to be such as would administer comfort to her in a dying hour, but such as would give her confidence towards God in the great day of Christ's appearing. When she was in health, she was often under doubts and fears with respect to her interest in Christ, the reality of her grace, and the truth of her conversion. But in the time of her sickness, the Lord was pleased to remove this burden, and to give her (as she told me) a settled and composed confidence in his pardoning love through Christ. Hence she was enabled to look upon death as a disarmed enemy, who had no power to hurt her, Christ Jesus the Captain of her salvation having given her the victory over him, through faith in his most precious blood, through