nal things, and the value of our souls: then we see the need we have of an infinite redeemer and sanctifier: then a man perceives the nature and glory of the gospel, and Jesus becomes precious to his soul: he feels innumerable wants, and he sees no other source of supply: he sees by faith a fulness in Christ: the word of God assures him he is welcome to all he wants: he is invited and commanded to ask, that he may receive: he says, Lord teach me to pray! he begins to ask and to receive; persists in the midst of discouragements and hindrances, and continues to receive; and, the more he receives, the more he hungers and thirsts, and the more his desires and capacities of receiving are enlarged. Thus he receives from Christ daily; he lives to him, constrained by love; grows more like him; hates sin more, and despises the world more: and thus glorifies God here, and is ripening for the enjoyment of him hereafter. In this way I hope you and your dear wife are beginning to walk. Be assured that you are welcome to all the unsearchable riches of Christ, if you desire them, and ask for them: Ask, therefore, and receive, that your joy may be full.

"My younger son has been ill above this quarter of a year, but is recovering. My wife joins in love.

"Pray for your's,

"T. SCOTT."

2

The reader cannot possibly, I think, rise from the perusal of this series of letters without being struck with the piety, zeal, faithfulness, wisdom, and affection, which so eminently distinguish them. One is struck also with the freshness of impression with which they exhibit fundamental doctrines, and with the vividness of their description of the earlier stages of Christian experience. In short, they strikingly illustrate the character of the writer's religion. They are remote, indeed, from "that wretched quality, by which the sacred name of charity is now so generally and so falsely usurped, and which is no other than indifference; which, against the plainest evidence, or at least when there is strong ground of apprehension, is easily contented to believe that all goes on well, because it has no anxieties to allay, no

fears to repress: but they abound with that "true charity" which is "wakeful, fervent, full of solicitude, full of good offices, not so easily satisfied, not so ready to believe that every thing is going on well as a matter of course; but jealous of mischief, apt to suspect danger, and prompt to extend relief."-They are equally remote also from that indiscriminate religion, whose first object seems to be, to inspire consolation rather than to produce safety; and which, unscripturally confounding faith with personal assurance of salvation, seems, at least, to press upon every one a confidence of his own good state, and acts as if no evil were so prevalent, or so much to be deprecated, as doubting of our own present ac

1 Wilberforce's Pract. View, c. vii. § 1.

E

50 TO MRS. SCOTT'S BROTHER IN LAW. [No. ceptance with God. The writer of these letters hesitates not to address our fears, as well as our hopes, and brings every scriptural principle and consideration, and not one only, to bear upon us, each in its proper place and direction.-We may apply in this connexion, his own observation made many years after, in speaking of Mr. Hart's Hymns: "To doubt the truth of God's word, or the power and willingness of Christ to save all that truly come to him, is direct unbelief: but to doubt whether I come aright, and am a true believer, when many things in my experience and conduct seem inconsistent with the life of faith and grace, is the grand preservative against delusion, and incitement to watchfulness, self-examination, and circumspection. And the same is the case with respect to fear."1

1 See Letter in Life, p. 339. (349.)

III.

LETTERS TO THE SISTERS OF THE PRECEDING

CORRESPONDENT.

1783-1784.

To Mrs. R., described in the Author's Life as his "Friend in Northumberland."1

"WHEN your letter came to hand, I was in Lincolnshire, whence I returned on the 19th of last month; and, the very day I arrived at home, it pleased the Lord to begin to afflict me with my very common asthmatical complaint, which I had very bad, and with several relapses; so that, though I was never quite laid by, so as not to preach on the Lord's day, yet I was brought low, and am scarcely recovered yet. This is the only reason of my so long delaying to answer your letter.

"I had a very comfortable journey, found my friends more cordial, and more disposed to give me a patient hearing, than I expected, and some of them treading the ways of the Lord; others somewhat hopeful. I had a door of utterance opened unto me beyond expectation, and return

'A small part of this Letter has appeared in the Life, p. 162, 163. (166.)

ed home full of sanguine hopes that some good would be done by my journey. This, it seems, was more than my poor foolish heart could bear: there needed some bitter to qualify and counteract all this sweet; some physic after so much feasting. Therefore my wise and kind Physician, (having in mercy brought me home first,) immediately discerning the danger, applied the remedy, and I am very base if I do not heartily thank him for it. (2 Cor. xii. 1-10.)

"This you will find in your experience continually (supposing, as I verily believe, that you are the Lord's, and longing after nearness and conformity to him,) either in a way of providence, by outward things, or in his dealings with your soul in respect to inward exercises. When he sees that, by needful chastisements, disappointments, temptations, and humbling experimental discoveries of the badness of our hearts, we are drooping, and beginning to yield to discouragement; our hands to hang down, and our knees to wax feeble; our minds to be heartless in duty, and dispirited about means, as if praying, reading, hearing, availed nothing then he will give us some cordial, something to encourage our hopes, to cheer and strengthen us, and enable us to run and not be weary, to walk and not faint; yea to sing in the ways of the Lord. But, when our gracious Lord sees that, by having our desires in outward things, a freedom from trials and temptations, and much liberty and comfort in religion, our silly hearts begin to be lifted up; that we grow prone to selfconfidence, and self-preference, and to shine in our own eyes, as something better and more ex