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النشر الإلكتروني

Nov. 5.

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ET every Soul be fubject unto the higher Powers. For there is no Power but of God: The Powers that be, are ordained of God, Rom. xiii. 1.

To own and acknowledge the Sovereignty of Princes, their Authority, in their Officers and in the fubordinate Magistrates, and the Obedience which is due to them. Both are of divine Right. Let every Soul, both Clergy and Laity be subject by a hearty Submiffion. Let us not confider their perfonal Failings, which proceed from themselves, but their Power and Authority which proceeds from GoD, and is always good. The King has no Perfon fuperior to him but GoD only, GOD is the first Majefty, the King the fecond. His Crown is independent on all created Power. No Arms are to be used against a King, but Sighs and Prayers; no other Resistance to Authority is lawful, but the powerful Tears of Piety, the gentle Endeavours of Pity, and the holy Violence of Submission and Humility.

Honour the King, who God adore,
The King his Place fuftains,
As Image of his awful Power,
As God's Vicegerent reigns :

And when the King of Kings, and Lord

Of Lords, from Heaven comes down He fhall our Royal Zeal reward

With an immortal Crown.

WE

E fee that they could not enter in, because of Unbelief,
Heb. iii. 19.

As there was no Land of Promise for the Jews, who obeyed not the Voice of God fpeaking by Mofes, fo there is no Salvation for Chriftians who obey not the Voice of God, who speaks to us by his own Son, God fwears this; and yet we do not believe him. The Event will make known, but too late, as it did to the Jews, what it is not to hearken to the Voice of God. Lord Jefus, do Thou continually take away this Heart of Unbelief, for to be accounted a believer by my Fellow Creatures it is not fufficient: Give me therefore a firm Faith on Thee, that works by Love, that purifies the Heart, that gains Admittance into the eternal Reft which remains for the People of God.

And let my Carcass fall
Here in this Wilderness,

So Thou my Soul in Mercy call,
And bid me die in Peace.

For my Rebellion past,

Condemn'd 'till Death I rove, But give me to behold at laft Immanuel's Land above.

Now

OW the Juft fhall live by Faith; but if any Man draw back, my Soul fhall have no Pleasure in him, Heb. x. 38.

Faith makes us belong to God, if it makes us love him; it juftifies us, if it makes us imitate him; it makes us live, if it lives itself. In a Word, the Just lives by his Faith, if he lives according to his Faith. We rely upon the Word of a Man of Honour; we part with our Substance upon a little Credit; and yet we are afraid to advance any Thing upon the Word of God, and upon the Letters of the eternal, infallible, and Almighty Truth. Let us believe, upon the Teftimony of the Scriptures, that the good and the evil Things of this Life are only a Dream, that none are really fuch but those which are eternal, and that Eternity is at Hand; and then our Faith will make us live in cleaving to God alone. All the past is counted for nothing, unless Perfeverance fecure the future.

But may the righteous Man,

Who lives by Faith divine, Receive the faving Grace in vain, And from his God decline?

His God he can forfake,
With Sin again comply,

Perdition's Son, he can draw back,
And unrepenting die.

BY Y two immutable Things (his Counfel confirmed by an Oath) in which it was impoffible for God to lie, we might have a ftrong Confolation, who have fled for Refuge to lay hold upon the Hope set before us, Heb. vi. 18.

Nothing affords fo ftrong a Confolation to a Soul, which has Abundance of Faith, as to know that its Salvation is in the Hands of God, who can neither deceive himself in his Defigns, nor us in his Promises.. Let us feek that which we do not fee; let us contemn that which we do. A Christian has no other Refuge in the midft of his Mifery, but the Time to come; nor any other Support, but his Faith and Hope.

Let the Winds blow, and Billows roll,
Hope is the Anchor of the Soul;
But can I by fo flight a Tie,
An unfeen Hope on God rely?

Stedfaft and fure, it cannot fail,
It enters deep within the Veil,
It fastens on a Land unknown,
And moors me to my Father's Throne.

W

Hofoever is born of God, doth not commit Sin; for his Seed remaineth in him: and he cannot fin, because he is born of God, 1 John iii. 9.

The Advantages of Love, are 1. By Love we know we are the Children of God. 2. It is by preferving Love that we keep his Commandments. 3. No Sin is confiftent with Love, for how can Sin, which kills the Soul as it were at one Blow, fubfift with Love, which is the Life thereof. 4. It is Love which puts the Law of God into the Heart; and fo long as a Man loves this Law he cannot violate it. Who fhall preferve in me, O my God, this divine Seed, but Thou who haft fown it in my Heart. Grant, Lord, that I may never act but by thy Spirit, by whom. thou haft given me the new Being, and the new Life of thy Grace..

Son of God, thine Anger fhew
Against our Foes and thine,
Manifefted here below,
Fulfill thine own Defign;

Satan's Reign and Works to end,

Thine own Almighty Grace employ, Thruft him out, this inbred Fiend, And all our Sins destroy.

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