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tresses, and amazements, God can bring his people into? He can put them into a furnace, a fire, and no tongue can tell what, so unsearchable and fearful are his fatherly chastisements, and yet never give them the spirit of bondage again to fear. Therefore, if thou art a son, take heed of sin, lest all these things overtake thee and come upon thee.

Dost thou fear the Lord? "The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on them that fear him.”

Child of God, thou that fearest God, here is mercy nigh thee, mercy enough, everlasting mercy upon thee. This is long-lived mercy. It will live longer than thy sin; it will live longer than temptation; it will live longer than thy sorrows; it will live longer than thy persecutors. It is mercy from everlasting to contrive thy salvation, and mercy to everlasting to resist all thy adversaries. Now what can hell and death do to him that hath this mercy of God upon him? And this hath the man that feareth the Lord.

Take that other blessed word, and O, thou man that fearest the Lord, hang it like a chain of gold about thy neck: As the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy to them that fear him." If mercy as big, as high, and as good as heaven itself will be a privilege, the man that feareth God shall have the privilege.

CHRIST OUR LIFE.

Here is my life, namely, the birth of this Man, the righteousness of this man, the blood of this man, the death and resurrection of this man, the ascension and intercession of this man for me, and the second coming of this man to judge the world in righteousness. I say, here is my life, if I see this by faith without me, through the operation of the Spirit within me: I am safe, I am at peace, I am comforted, I am encouraged; and I know that my comfort, peace, and encouragement is true, and given

me from heaven by the Father of mercies, through the Son of the Virgin Mary-the Son of man, the Son of God, the true God.

UNION WITH CHRIST.

Stay not in some transient comforts, but abide restless till thou seest a union betwixt thee and this blessed One, to wit, that he is a root and thou a branch-that he is head, and thou a member. And then shalt thou know that the case is so between thee and him, when grace and his Spirit have made thee to lay the whole stress of thy justification upon him, and have subdued thy heart and mind to be one spirit with him.

LIFE OF FAITH.

O man or woman, whoever thou art, that art savingly convinced by the Spirit of Christ, thou hast such an endless desire after the Lord Jesus Christ, that thou canst not be content with any thing below the blood of the Son of God to purge thy conscience withal; even that blood that was shed without the gates. Also thou canst not be at quiet, till thou dost see by true faith that the righteousness of the Son of Mary is imputed unto thee and put upon thee. Rom. 3:21-23. Then also thou canst not be at quiet, till thou hast power over thy lusts and corruptions, till thou hast brought them into subjection to the Lord Jesus Christ. Then thou wilt never think that thou hast enough of faith: no, thou wilt be often crying out, “Lord, give me more precious faith; Lord, more faith in thy righteousness; more faith in thy blood and death; more faith in thy resurrection; and, Lord, more faith in thisthat thou art now at the right hand of thy Father in thy human nature, making intercession for me a miserable sinner.' And then, O poor soul, if thou comest but hither, thou wilt never have an itching ear after another gospel.

If thou wouldst be faithful to do that work that God

has allotted thee to do in this world for his name, labor to live in the savor and sense of thy freedom and liberty by Jesus Christ; that is, keep this, if possible, ever before thee that thou art a redeemed one, taken out of this world and from under the curse of the law, out of the power of the devil, and placed in a kingdom of grace and forgiveness of sins for Christ's sake.

This is of absolute use in this matter; yea, so absolute that it is impossible for any Christian to do his work christianly, without some enjoyment of it.

The first thing of which the soul is sick, and by which the conscience receiveth wounding, is the guilt of sin and fear of the curse of God for it; for which are provided the wounds and precious blood of Christ, which flesh and blood, if the soul eat thereof by faith, give deliverance therefrom. Upon this the filth of sin appears most odious; for that it hath not only at present defiled the soul, but because it keeps it from doing those duties of love which by the love of Christ it is constrained to endeavor the perfecting of. For filth appears filth, that is, irksome and odious to a contrary principle now implanted in the soul; which principle had its conveyance thither by faith in the sacrifice and death of Christ going before. "The love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: and that he died for all, that they who live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but to him that died for them and rose again."

The man that has received Christ desires to be holy, because the nature of the faith that lays hold on Christ worketh by love, and longeth, yea, greatly longeth, that the soul may be brought not only into a universal conformity to his will, but into his very likeness; and because that state agreeth not with what we are now, but with what we shall be hereafter: "Therefore in this we groan, being burdened" with that which is of a contrary nature,

earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven;" which state is not that of Adam's innocency, but that which is spiritual and heavenly, even that which is now in the Lord in heaven.

Blessed be God for Jesus Christ, and for that he took our nature and sin and curse and death upon him; and for that he did also by himself, by one offering, purge our sins. We that have believed have found rest, even there where Christ and his Father have smelled a sweet savor of rest: because we are presented to God even now complete in the righteousness of him, and stand discharged of guilt even by the faith of him; yea, as sins past, so sins to come, were taken up and satisfied for by that offering of the body of Jesus. We who have had a due sense of sins, and of the nature of the justice of God, know that no remission of the guilt of any one can be, but by atonement made by blood.

Heb. 9:22.

We also know that where faith in Jesus Christ is wanting, there can be neither good principle, nor good endeavor; for faith is the first of all graces, and without it there is nothing but sin. Rom. 14:23.

We know also that faith, as a grace in us, severed from the righteousness of Christ, is only a beholder of things, but not a justifier of persons; and that if it lay not hold of and applieth not that righteousness which is in Christ, it carries us no further than to the devils.

We know that this doctrine killeth sin, and curseth it at the very roots: I say, we know it, who have mourned over him whom we have pierced, and who have been confounded to see that God by his blood should be pacified towards us for all the wickedness we have done. Yea, we have a double motive to be holy and humble before him: one, because he died for us on earth; another, because he now appears for us in heaven, there sprinkling for us the mercy-seat with his blood, there ever living to make inter

cession for them that come unto God by him.

"If any

man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, who is the propitiation for our sins." Yet this works in us no looseness nor favor to sin, but so much the more an abhorrence of it: 66 She loveth much, for much was forgiven her;" yea, she weeps, she washeth his feet, and wipeth them with the hairs of her head, to the confounding of Simon the Pharisee, and all such ignorant hypocrites.

DIVINE LOVE IMPROVED.

Empty notions of the love of God and of Christ will do nothing but harm; wherefore they are not empty notions that I press thee to rest in, but that thou labor after the knowledge of the savor of this good ointment which the apostle calls "the savor of the knowledge of this Lord Jesus.' Know it until it becomes sweet or pleasant to thy soul, and then it will preserve and keep thee. Make this love of God and of Christ thine own, and not another's. Many there are that can talk largely of the love of God to Abraham, to David, to Peter, and Paul. But that is not the thing. Give not over until this love be made thine own; until thou find and feel it to run warm in thy heart by the shedding of it abroad there, by the Spirit that God has given thee. Then thou wilt know it with an obliging and engaging knowledge; yea, then thou wilt know it with a soul-strengthening and soul-encouraging knowledge.

Wouldst thou improve this love of God and of Christ? then set it against the love of all other things whatsoever, even until this love shall conquer thy soul from the love of them to itself.

This is Christian. Do it therefore, and say, "Why should any thing have my heart but God, but Christ? He loves me with love that passeth knowledge. He loves me, and he shall have me; he loves me, and I will love him;

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