teous, thofe excellent in the earth; and do all in the name of our Lord Jefus Christ, and with a view to his glory.

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I ftill continue to languish under the burden of the wafting diftemper that has feized me, and I grow weaker and weaker every day, My health declines apace; I fhall foon wafte away, and give up the ghoft. My days are fwifter than a poft; they flee away, they fee no good; they are paffed away as the fwift fhips, as the eagle that hafteth to the prey. I am born unto trouble, as the fparks fly upward. My breath is corrupt, my days are near extinct, and the grave is ready for me. My days are determined, the number of my months is with God, he hath appointed my bounds that I cannot pafs. My youthful beauty fades away; my blooming complexion, which I once doted fo much upon, is now no more. languid paleness, and a black deformity, cover my once fair face. For when God with rebukes doth correct man for iniquity, he maketh his beauty to confume away like a moth: furely every man is vanity. Lord make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days, what it is, that I may know how frail I am: for thy ftroke is upon me, and I am confumed by the blow of thy hand. Sin is the caufe of all my trouble. How many are my iniquities and fins? Make me, O Lord to know my tranfgreffion and my fin. Wafh me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanfe me from my fin. Against thee, thee only have I finned, and done innumerable evils in thy fight. Purge me with hyffop, and I fhall be clean; wash me, and I fhall be whiter than fnow. Hide thy face from my fins, and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right fpirit within me.

The troubles of my mind continued for fome

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time

time after you retired to the country. During that time I was in the moft miferable condition imaginable. My heart was fore pained within me, and the terrors of death had fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling came upon me, and horror overwhelmed me. I was driven to despair of the mercy of God, and looked upon myself as fuel fit for the infernal Tophet. I often thought, that hell from beneath was moved for me to meet me at my coming; that every night would be my laft, and that in the morning I fhould lift up my eyes in torments. I was afflicted and ready to die; I was distracted with divine terrors. My foul was full of troubles, and my life drew nigh unto the grave. Divine wrath lay hard upon me, and the Lord afflicted me with all his waves. His fierce wrath went over me, and his terrors were like to cut me off. Terror broke my heart, and I was full of heavinefs; and I looked for fome to take pity, but there was none; and for comfort, but I found none. All perfons were miferable comforters to me, phyficians of no value. The arrows of the Almighty stuck faft in me, and his hand preffed me fore. I had no foundness in my flesh, because of his anger; neither had I any reft in my bones, because of my fin. I was troubled, I was bowed down greatly; I went mourning all the day long. I was feeble and fore broken; I roared by reafon of the difquietness of my heart. I was confumed by the anger of the Lord, and by his wrath was I troubled. My days were confumed like fmoke, and my bones were burnt as an hearth. My heart was fmitten, and withered like grafs. By reafon of the voice of my groaning, my bones claye to my skin. Thus because of my tranfgreflions, and because of mine iniquities, I was afflicted. My foul abhorred all manner of meat, and I drew near unto the gates of death.

The

The forrows of death compaffed me, and the pains of hell got hold upon me. I found trouble and forrow; I was greatly afflicted.

Nevertheless, in the midft of this mournful fcène, I cried night and day unto the Lord for mercy. I faid, Hear me fpeedily, O Lord, my fpirit faileth; hide not thy face from me, left I be like those that go down into the pit. Cause me to hear thy loving-kindness in the morning, and fpeak peace to my troubled foul. Though I have been a monfter of iniquity, and wallowed in all manner of filth and abomination; though I have profaned thy holy name and day, and have wafted my time, ftrength, and fubftance in rioting, chambering, and wantonnefs; though I have apoftatized from God, and he has not been in all my thoughts; though I have procured all this trouble to myself, and deserve nothing at thy hand, but the direful effects of accented wrath, and to fall into the hands of, the living God: yet, O moft gracious God, in whom compaffions flow, whofe tender mercies are very great, extend thy pity to me, and fave me for thy name's fake. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving-kindness; according to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my tranfgreffions. O pluck me as a brand out of the burning, and magnify thy mercy in my falvation. O thou who cameft into the world to fave finners, fave and redeem me; let me, accurfed me, partake of thy grace and falvation. Many eminent tranfgreffors, and remarkable offenders, a Manaffeh, a Mary Magdalen, a Paul, have tafted that the Lord is gracious; those who embrued their hands in the blood of the Son of God, have been redeemed by that blood; nay, fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate, fodomites, thieves, covetous, drunkards,

drunkards, revilers, extortioners, have been wash. ed, fanctified, and justified in the name of the Lord Jefus, and by the Spirit of God. Thofe who have walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the fpirit that worketh in the children of difobedience; thofe who were without Chrift, aliens from the commonwealth of Ifrael, and ftrangers from the covenants of promile, having no hope, and atheists, perfons without God; those who had their converfation in the lufts of the flesh, fulfilling the defires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath even as others; even thofe, when they were dead in fins, hath God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved them, quickened together with Chrift, and raised them up together, and made them fit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus; that in the ages to come he might fhew the exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness towards finners, through Chrift Jefus. The apostle Paul, who was a blafphemer, a perfecutor, and injurious, obtained mercy, through the exceeding abundant mercy of the Lord; and for this cause he obtained mercy,^ that in him first Jefus Christ might shew forth all long-fuffering, for a pattern to thofe who fhould hereafter believe on him to life everlasting. The apoftle Peter, who denied his Lord and Mafter with oaths and imprecations, obtained a look of grace from his divine Mafter, of whom he had wickedly faid, I know not the man; in confequence of which he wept bitterly, and afterwards expreffed his love and regard to his divine Lord, by a bold and courageous appearance for the caufe of Chriftianity, in the face of imprifonment, tortures, and death. There have been fome in all ages of the church, who were notori

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ons finners, and in a manner fold themselves to commit iniquity with greedinefs, and yet were reclaimed by the grace of God, and are now triumphing in glory, finging praises to God and the Lamb, and exulting in the bleffed vifion of their glorious Redeemer and exalted Saviour. Judah, from whofe tribe our Lord fprang, though he was guilty of inceft with his daughter-in-law, yet has his name infcribed on the gates of the new Jerufalem. Rahab, a Canaanitish harlot, was refeued from the carnage of her fellow-citizens, and became one of the beliving ancestors of the Lord of glory; and Ruth, a Moabitefs, concerning whofe nation it was faid, that they should not enter the house of the Lord till the tenth generation, was yet determined to come and dwell under the wings of the God of Ifrael, and from her in a direct line defcended Meffiah the Prince. David, after he had been raised from the low station of a thepherd, and exalted to the throne of Ifrael, and had more experience perhaps of real devotion and communion with God than any perfon fince his day; yet was left to feduce the godly wife of a brave man, who was venturing his life in battle for him, committed adultery with her, ufed fhameful artifices to hide his guilt, and caused the innocent husband to be flain by the sword of the Heathen : yet the Lord put away his fin; and he is as eminent for repentance and pardon, as for the fhocking crimes of deliberate adultery and forethought murder. Oh! Lord, have there been fo many instances of the efficacy of fovereign grace; are the manfions of glory peopled with inhabitants of the vileft characters; have all the general affembly and church of the first-born, who are written in heaven, been finners, and children of wrath? and fhall I, a poqr miferable wretch, a vile fornicator, a stupid drunkard, a feducer of others

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