is no other real joy. I feel that thou hast made my mind to know thee, and I feel thou hast made my heart to love thee, my tongue to praise thee, and all that I am and have, to serve thee; and even in the panting, languishing desires and motions of my soul, I find that thou, and only thou, art its resting place; and though love do now but search, and pray, and cry, and weep, and is reaching upward, but cannot reach the glorious light, the blessed knowledge, the perfect love for which it longeth, yet by its eye, its aim, its motions, its moans, its groans, I know its meaning, where it would be, and I know its end. My displaced soul will never be well till it come near to thee, till it know thee better, till it love thee more. It loves itself, and justifieth that self-love, when it can love thee; it loathes itself, and is weary of itself, as a lifeless burthen, when it feels no pantings after thee. Wert thou to be found in the most solitary desert, it would seek thee; or in the uttermost parts of the earth, it would make after thee. Thy presence makes a crowd, a church; thy converse maketh a closet, or solitary wood or field, to be kin to the angelical choir. The creature were dead if thou wert not its life; and ugly, if thou wert not its beauty; and insignificant, if thou wert not its sense. The soul is deformed which is without thine image; and lifeless, which liveth not in love to thee, if love be not its pulse, and prayer, and praise, its constant breath. The mind is unlearned which readeth not thy name on all the world, and seeth not 'Holiness to the Lord' engraven upon the face of every creature. He doteth that doubteth of thy being or perfections; and he dreameth who doth not live to thee. O let me have no other portion, no reason, no love, no life but what is devoted to thee, employed on thee, and for thee here, and shall be perfected in thee, the only perfect, final Object for evermore. Upon the holy altar, erected by thy Son, and by his hands, and his mediation, I humbly devote and offer thee this heart: O that I could say, with greater feeling, this flaming, loving, longing heart! But the sacred fire which must kindle on my sacrifice, must come from thee, it will not else ascend unto thee; let it consume this dross, so the nobler part may know its home. All that I can say to commend it to thine acceptance is, that I hope it is washed in precious blood, and that there is something in it that is thine own; it still looketh towards thee, and groaneth to thee, and followeth after thee, and will be content with gold, and mirth, and honour, and such inferior fooleries, no more; it lieth at thy doors, and will be entertained or perish: though,

alas! it loves thee not as it would, I boldly say it longs to love thee, it loves to love thee; it seeks, it craves no greater blessedness than perfect, endless, mutual love; it is vowed to thee, even to thee alone, and will never take up with shadows more, but is resolved to lie down in sorrow and despair if thou wilt not be its Rest and Joy. It hateth itself for loving thee no more, accounting no want, deformity, shame, or pain, so great and grievous a calamity.

For thee, the glorious, blessed God, it is that I come to Jesus Christ if he did not reconcile my guilty soul to thee, and did not teach it the heavenly art and work of love, by the sweet communications of thy love, he could be no Saviour for me. Thou art my only ultimate End; it is only a guide and way to thee that my anxious soul hath so much studied: and none can teach me rightly to know thee, and to love thee, and to live to thee, but thyself; it must be a teacher sent from thee, that must conduct me to thee. I have long looked round about me in the world, to see if there were a more lucid region, from whence thy will and glory might be better seen, than that in which my lot is fallen: but no traveller that I can speak with, no book which I have turned over, no creature which I can see, doth tell me more than Jesus Christ: I can find no way so suitable to my soul, no medicine so fitted to my misery, no bellows so fit to kindle love, as faith in Christ, the Glass and Messenger of thy love. I see no doctrine so divine and heavenly, as bearing the image and superscription of God; nor any so fully confirmed and delivered by the attestation of thy own omnipotency; nor any which so purely pleads thy cause, and calls the soul from self and vanity, and condemns its sin, and purifieth it, and leadeth it directly unto thee; and though my former ignorance disabled me to look back to the ages past, and to see the methods of thy providence, and when I look into thy word, disabled me from seeing the beauteous methods of thy truth, thou hast given me a glimpse of clearer light, which hath discovered the reasons and methods of grace, which I then discerned not; and in the midst of my most hideous temptations and perplexed thoughts, thou kepst alive the root of faith, and kepst alive the love to thee, and unto holiness, which it had kindled. Thou hast mercifully given me the witness in myself; not an unreasonable persuasion in my mind, but that renewed nature, those holy and heavenly desires and delights, which surely can come from none but thee. And O, how much more have I perceived in many

of thy servants, than in myself! Thou hast cast my lot among the souls whom Christ hath healed; I have daily conversed with those whom he hath raised from the dead. I have seen the power of thy Gospel upon sinners: all the love that ever I perceived kindled towards thee, and all the true obedience that ever I saw performed to thee, hath been effected by the Word of Jesus Christ. How often hath his Spirit helped me to pray; and how often hast thou heard those prayers! What pledges hast thou given to my staggering faith, in the works which prayer hath procured, both for myself and many others? And if confidence in Christ be yet deceit, must I not say, that thou hast deceived me? who I know canst neither be deceived, or by any falsehood or seduction deceive.

On thee, therefore, O my dear Redeemer, do I cast and trust this sinful soul! with thee, and with thy Holy Spirit, I renew my covenant; I know no other, I have no other, I can have no other Saviour but thyself: to thee I deliver up this soul which thou hast redeemed, not to be advanced to the wealth, and honours, and pleasures of this world, but to be delivered from them, and to be healed of sin, and brought to God, and to be saved from this present evil world, which is the portion of the ungodly and unbelievers; to be washed in thy blood, and illuminated, quickened, and confirmed by thy Spirit, and conducted in the ways of holiness and love, and at last to be presented, justified and spotless, to the Father of spirits, and possessed of the glory which thou hast promised. O thou that has prepared so dear a medicine for the cleansing of polluted, guilty souls, leave not this unworthy soul in its guilt, or in its pollution: O thou that knowest the Father, and his will, and art nearest to him, and most beloved of him, cause me in my degree to know the Father; acquaint me with so much of his will as concerneth my duty, or my just encouragement: leave not my soul to grope in darkness, seeing thou art the Sun and Lord of Light. O heal my estranged thoughts of God: is he my Light and Life, and all my hope; and must I dwell with him for ever, and yet shall I know him no better than thus; shall I learn no more that have such a teacher; and shall I get no nearer him, while I have a Saviour and a Head so near? O give my faith a clearer prospect into that better world, and let me not be so much unacquainted with the place in which I must abide for ever: and as thou hast prepared a heaven for holy souls, prepare this too-unprepared soul for heaven, which hath not long to stay on earth; and

when at death I resign it into thy hands, receive it as thine own, and finish the work which thou hast begun, in placing it among the blessed spirits, who are filled with the sight and love of God. I trust thee living, let me trust thee dying, and never be ashamed of my trust.

And unto thee, the eternal Holy Spirit, proceeding from the Father and the Son, the communicative Love, who condescendest to make perfect the elect of God, do I deliver up this dark, imperfect soul, to be further renewed, confirmed, and perfected, according to the holy covenant. Refuse not to bless it with thine in-dwelling and operations, quicken it with thy life, irradiate it by thy light, sanctify it by thy love, actuate it purely, powerfully, and constantly, by thy holy motions: and though the way of this thy sacred influx be beyond the reach of human apprehension, yet let me know the reality and saving power of it by the happy effects. Thou art more to souls than souls to bodies, than light to eyes. O, leave not my soul as a carrion, destitute of thy life; nor its eyes as useless, destitute of thy light; nor leave it as a senseless block without thy motion! The remembrance of what I was without thee, doth make me fear lest thou shouldest withhold thy grace. Alas! I feel, I daily feel, that I am dead to all good, and all that is good is dead to me, if thou be not the life of all. Teachings and reproofs, mercies and corrections, yea, the Gospel itself, and all the liveliest books and sermons are dead to me, because I am dead to them; yea, God is as no God to me, and heaven as no heaven, and Christ as no Christ, and the clearest evidences of Scripture verity are as no proofs at all, if thou represent them not with light and power to my soul. Even as all the glory of the world is as nothing to me, without the light by which it is seen. O thou that hast begun, and given me those heavenly intimations and desires, which flesh and blood could never give me, suffer not my folly to quench these sparks, nor this brutal flesh to prevail against thee, nor the powers of hell to stifle and kill such a heavenly seed. O pardon that folly and wilfulness which hath too often, too obdurately, and too unthankfully striven against thy grace, and depart not from an unkind and sinful soul. I remember, with grief and shame, how I wilfully bore down thy motions: punish it not with desertion, and give me not over to myself. Art thou not in covenant with me, as my Sanctifier, and Confirmer, and Comforter? I never undertook to do these things

for myself, but I consent that thou should work them on me. As thou art the Agent and Advocate of Jesus, my Lord, O plead his cause effectually in my soul against the suggestions of Satan and my unbelief, and finish his healing, saving work, and let not the flesh or world prevail. Be in me the resident witness of my Lord, the author of my prayers, the spirit of adoption, the seal of God, and the earnest of mine inheritance. Let not my nights be so long, and my days so short, nor sin eclipse those beams which have often illuminated my soul. Without thee books are senseless scrawls, studies are dreams, learning is a glow-worm, and wit is but wantonness, impertinency, and folly. Transcribe those sacred precepts on my heart, which, by thy dictates and inspirations, are recorded in thy holy word. I refuse not thy help for tears and groans; but O, shed abroad that love upon my heart, which may keep it in a continual life of love and teach me the work which I must do in heaven. Refresh my soul with the delights of holiness, and the joys which arise from the believing hopes of the everlasting joys. Exercise my heart and tongue in the holy praise of my Lord. Strengthen me in sufferings, and conquer the terrors of death and hell. Make me the more heavenly, by how much the faster I am hastening to heaven; and let my last thoughts, words, and works, on earth be likest to those which shall be my first in the state of glorious immortality, where the kingdom is delivered up to the Father, and God will for ever be all, and in all of whom, and through whom, and to whom, are all things; to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

CHAP. XIII.

Consectaries.-I. What Party of Christians should we join with, or be of, seeing they are divided into so many Sects."

I SHALL briefly despatch the answer of this question in these following propositions :

Sect. 1. Godliness and Christianity is our only religion; and if any party have any other, we must renounce it.p

Sect. 2. The church of Christ being his body, is but one, and

。 Vid. Pet. Damian. Dom. vobisc. c. 6. de Unit. Eccles.

P Psalm i.; Matt. xvii. 19; Acts xi. 26.