It

capricious sovereignty which had fore-ordained her own rejection. God, however, of whom she judged so unrighteously, mingled mercy with her great affliction; for another passage from the work I have mentioned, by the teaching of his Spirit, checked her profane prying into his secret decrees, and quieted her mind. "I must say, it is presumption in you to inquire into your election.--What God hath folded, no man, no angel, no devil, no creature, can unfold till God himself do it. If an angel from Heaven should come to you, before you come to Christ, and say, you are an elect person, you ought not to believe him; for it is a lie to tell you what he does not know; if the devil from Hell should come, and tell you, that you are not elected, you ought as little to credit him; but tell him he is a liar, for telling you what he does not know, for that is the folded leaf which no creature can unfold. is like the book you read of, Revel. v. 1-6, and it is not lawful for you to pry within the folded leaf. It is not the first object of your faith to believe your election; secret things belong to God, but to us, the things that are revealed, the things that are written within the open leaf; and till you read, and subscribe what is written there, it is not possible for you to know if your name be written within the folded leaf; nor are you concerned to know. If it were possible for you to know your election, before you come to Christ, it would do you no service, but real hurt : it would make you secure in your natural state, and therefore it is in infinite wisdom and mercy, both, that it is hid from your eyes. Some are hardened with the very fancy of it, saying, if I be elected I will win to heaven, and so neglect God's call; but now the open leaf of Christ's commission is before your eyes."

But although Isabella's mind ceased to be agonized in this particular way; either from conceiving that she had committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, or, in vainly

attempting to ascertain her election; yet, peace seemed as far away and hopeless as ever.-Although not dis tracted by the imagined commission of an unpardonable sin, or the terror of irrevocable reprobation, she felt in her soul an utter incapacity of happiness. Neither any idea of the sovereignty of God wrathfully regarding her, nor any fear lest the fountain of his mercy was sealed, now distressed her; but the enmity of his glorious excellencies pervading and stimulating her entire soul, still was the source and element of all her misery. The dread of pu nishment comparatively little affected her mind; her con scious vileness was the burden of wo under which she groaned. For at this period she had most clear conceptions of the holiness of the divine law-the transcript of God's own glorious and loveable excellency; and her conscious non-conformity to what she saw ought to be loved and embraced, (which her desire of happiness made her long for, notwithstanding the recoilings of her hostile and carnal heart,) constituted that moral condition of her soul, which, to use her own words to a venerable father of our church, she felt to be "a very hell of pollution and of torment."

The passage you have read having effectually rescued her mind from the terrible thought of eternal reprobation, she now saw no reason, why she might not, like other mi serable sinners, lay hold of the great salvation in Christ Jesus, through whose blood there is redemption from sin. Yet, so long as she felt that she could not believe, the agitation and misery of her mind continued. The all-suf ficiency of Christ's mediatorial labours she seemed to see; of which, indeed, she could not but admit from Scripture, the guiltiest sinners were warranted to avail themselves, in securing their eternal peace: she, however, for herself, could not realize this blessedness, although what he had done equalled in virtue all that could be imagined of the

necessities of depraved souls; for hers she regarded as a peculiar case, not to be judged of by the analogies of guilt, or by any thing hitherto recorded of the feelings of dark souls searching after truth.

In such a state of mind, it may easily be imagined, how all representations of Christ's power to save would fail to affect her heart, or communicate any comfort. The ima gined peculiarity of her case, obviously rendered impossible the appropriation of her completed salvation; and she seems to have indulged in exaggerating to herself her guilt, so as to justify the putting away from her that which cleanseth from all sin. As an illustration of this, the following incident may be selected from many that might be recorded:-While listening one morning to her brother and a stranger conversing about a person who had been guilty of some infamous profligacy, she said to herself, "O did they but know how much more abandoned and depraved I am! would they allow me to remain in their presence?"

To those who know little of the workings of the soul, panting to be delivered from the conscious dominion of sin; or of those temptations of Satan fearful lest he should lose his prey, which suggest such views either of God or of itself, as perpetuate its misery, by continuing its unbelief; these feelings of Isabella will be regarded as the result of a morbid delicacy and tenderness of conscience: but in those, who have sounded the depths, where awakened souls find no rest, nor hiding place from the requirements of that inexorable law which demandeth, in all thoughts and feelings, holiness to the Lord, they will excite a deep interest, and draw forth many kindred sympathies. They know how natural it is, when the needed redemption seems never to be drawing nigh, to think that some peculiar guiltiness occasions the delay; while delu. sions, fostered in the evil heart of unbelief, multiplying every moment, and darkening more deeply on the mental

vision, conceal the mighty power of him who hath abolished death, and is the destroyer of all sin.

She

Isabella was still the prey of those delusions. wandered into the fields, on the side of the mountain, or along the solitary shore, seeking rest, but finding none. She fasted and she prayed. Her soul, as it were, "abhorred all manner of meat." "Wearisome nights" were appointed to her. No sooner did she lie down in her bed, than she would rise again, venting her agonies in piteous moanings; or, if she found herself falling asleep, she would start from her pillow, terror seizing upon her, lest her awakening should be in a place of torment.

Her bodily strength decayed; while her mind seemed to retain its strength, only for the endurance of greater suffering. But no words can more fitly express her condition, than those which she herself once used in her sister's presence. One of her cousins had been observing "how miserable Isabella is! What can be the matter with her? she has a look of such great anguish ;" and Mary a little afterward approaching where she was, heard her thus mournfully express herself, rather in the way of soliloquy, than in the form of an address to her, "O sin! sin is just hell. I can understand well that which David said, 'the pains of hell took hold of me.' For one to experience a little more of this awful enmity against God would make life insupportable. I feel it to be so almost as it is," and she turned away her face, and groaned deeply.

She began now to think that it was sinful in one with so much conscious hatred to God and all things holy, to dare to hold communion with him, or to examine the revelations of his will. She seems, accordingly, at this time, to have abandoned altogether the reading of the Bible, and refrained from intercessory prayer; although she continued to deplore and confess her guiltiness.

It may be recorded also as very remarkable, that the

passages of Scripture, which she had got by heart, entirely faded from her remembrance. She seemed to have no kindred thought, or feeling, none that corresponded or sympathized with the sentiments they contained; so that her mind, as it were, lost the power of retaining them. It is scarcely necessary to observe, that she likewise absent. ed herself from church, were it not for the purpose of alluding to the reason, which she assigned for doing so, illustrative amid all her anxieties and distresses, of the integrity and conscientiousness of her mind. "Had she felt otherwise able for such an exertion," as she expressed herself," she would have recoiled from any such outward profession of piety," while her enmity against God was unabolished, and reigning with all its virulence in her mind.

Were you to regulate your attendance on public worship by the severe righteousness of feeling, which, at this time, prevailed in Isabella's mind, how many of you would be present in the solemn assemblies? Although God loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob; who among you would be worshippers there? Alas! it is a strange delusion, as it is a bold presumption in men, to appear in holy places, presenting with their bodies a visi ble reverence to the Eternal Father, while their spirits riot in unnatural rebellion against his holy sovereignty; confess. ing with their lips Jesus to be the Son of God,-the good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep; although their haughty and unbroken hearts wreck upon that most blessed of all truths-unbelieving scorn. Constrained to regard as hypocrisy, the assumption of the least appearance even of the form of godliness, poor Isabella was thus bereft, by her own conscientious feelings, of whatever comfort she might have found in social devotion. But was she less happy, than those have a right to be, that worship with worldly or careless minds in the presence of Him, who, in the wilds of Midian, cried to Moses, "Draw not