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more on any thing till I can more willingly think of thee? But I must suppress that wish for life will act the mercies and motions of nature are necessary to those of grace. Therefore in the life of nature, and in the glimmerings of thy light, I will wait for more of the celestial life! My God, thou hast my consent! It is here attested under my hand: separate me from what and whom thou wilt, so I may but be nearer thee! Let me love thee more, and feel more of thy love, and then let me love or be beloved of the world, as little as thou wilt.

I thought self-love had been a more predominant thing: but now I find that repentance hath its anger, its hatred and its revenge: I am truly angry with my heart that hath so often and foolishly offended thee; methinks I hate that heart that is so cold and backward in thy love, and almost grudge it a dwelling in my breast. Alas, when love should be the life of prayer, the life of holy meditation, the life of sermons and of a holy conference, and my soul in these should long to meet thee, and delight to mention thee, I stray, Lord, I know not whither or I sit still and wish, but do not rise and run, and follow thee; yea, I do not what I seem to do. All is dead, all is dead, for want of love; I often cry, O where is that place where the quickening beams of heaven are warmest, that my frozen soul might seek it out! But whither I go, to city, or to solitude, alas, I find it is not place that makes the difference. I know that Christ is perfectly replenished with life and light, and love divine: I hear him as our head and treasure proclaimed and offered to us in the gospel! This is thy record, that he that hath the Son, hath life! O why then is my barren soul so empty? I thought I had long ago consented to thy offer; and then according to thy covenant, both head and life in him are mine? Yet must I still be dark and dead?

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Ah, dearest Lord, I say not that I have too long waited; but if I continue thus to wait, wilt thou never find the time of love; and come and own thy dying worm? Wilt thou never dissipate these clouds, and shine upon this dead and darkened soul? Hath my night no day? Thrust me not from thee, O my God; for that is a hell, to be thrust from God. But surely the cause is all at home, could I find it out, or rather could I cure it; it is surely my face that is turned from God, when I say, his face is turned from me. But if my life must here be out of sight, and hidden in the root, with Christ in God, and if all the rest be reserved for that better world, and I must here have but

these small beginnings, O make me more to love and long for the blessed day of thine appearing, and not to fear the time of my deliverance, or unbelievingly to linger in this Sodom, as one that had rather stay with sin, than come to thee; Though sin hath made me backward to the fight, let it not make me backward to receive the crown: though it hath made me a loiterer in thy work, let it not make me backward to receive the wages which thy love will give to our pardoned, poor, accepted service. Though I have too often drawn back, when I should have come unto thee, and walked with thee in thy ways of grace, yet heal that unbelief and disaffection, which would make me to draw back, when thou callest me to possess thy glory? Though the sickness and lameness of my soul have hindered me in my journey, yet let their painfulness help me in my desire to be delivered from them and to be at home, where, without the interposing nights of thy displeasure, I shall fully feel thy fullest love, and walk with thy glorified ones in the light of thy glory, triumphing in thy praise for evermore. Amen.

But now I have given you these few directions for the improvement of your solitude, for converse with God, lest I should occasion the hurt of those that are unfit for the lesson I have given. I must conclude with this caution, which I have formerly also published, that it is not melancholy or weak-headed persons, who are not able to bear such exercises, for whom I have written these directions. Those that are not able to be much in serious, solitary thoughtfulness, without confusions, distracting suggestions, and hurrying, vexatious thoughts, must set themselves for the most part to those duties which are to be done in company by the help of others; and must be very little in solitary duties: for to them whose natural faculties are so diseased or weak, it is no duty, as being no means to do them the desired good; but while they strive to do that which they are naturally unable to endure, they will but confound, distract themselves, and make themselves unable for those other duties which yet they are not utterly unfit for. To such persons, instead of ordered, well digested meditations and much time spent in secret thoughtfulness, it must suffice that they be brief in secret prayer, and take up with such occasional abrupt meditations as they are capable of; and that they be the more in reading, hearing, conference, praying and praising God with others until their melancholy distempers are so far overcome, as that by the direction of their spiritual guides, they may judge themselves fit for this improvement of their solitude.

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DYING THOUGHTS.

DYING THOUGHTS

ON PHIL. I. 23.

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS.

THE exercise of three sorts of love-to God, to others, and to myself, afford me a threefold satisfaction to be willing to depart.

I. I am sure my departure will be the fulfilling of that will which is love itself, which I am bound above all things to love and please, and which is the beginning, rule, and end of all. Antonine could hence fetch good thoughts of death.

II. The world dies not with me when I die : nor the church, nor the praise and glory of God, which he will have in, and from this world unto the end and if I love others as myself, their lives and comforts will now be to my thoughts, as if I were to live myself in them. God will be praised and honoured by posterity when I am dead and gone. Were I to be annihilated this would comfort me now, if I lived and died in perfect love.

III. But a better and glorious world is before me, into which I hope by death to be translated, whither all these three sorts of love should wrap up the desires of my ascending soul; even the love of myself, that I may be fully happy; the love of the triumphant church, Christ, angels, and glorified men, and the glory of all the universe which I shall see ; and above all, the love of the most glorious God, infinite life, and light, and love, the ultimate amiable object of man's love in whom to be perfectly pleased and delighted, and to whom to be perfectly pleasing for ever, is the chief and ultimate end of me, and of the highest, wisest, and best of creatures. Amen.

THE INTRODUCTION.

the sense of the text, shall only observe what is useful to my heart and practice.

It was a happy state into which grace had brought this apostle, who saw so much not only tolerable, but greatly desirable, both in living and dying. To live to him was Christ, that is, Christ's interest, or work: to die would be gain, that is, his own interest and reward. His strait was not whether it would be good to live or good to depart: both were good, but which was more desirable was the doubt.

I. Quest. But was there any doubt to be made between Christ's interest and his own? Answer. No, if it had been a full and fixed competition : But by Christ, or Christ's interest, he means his work for his church's interest, in this world: but he knew that Christ also had an interest in his saints above; and that he could raise up more to serve him here: yet because he was to judge by what appeared, and he saw a defect of such on earth, this did turn the scales in his choice; and for the work of Christ and his church's good, he more inclined to the delay of his reward, by self-denial: yet knowing that the delay would tend to its increase. It is useful to me here to note:-That even in this world, short of death, there is some good so much to be regarded, as may justly prevail with believers to prefer it before the present hastening of their reward.

I the rather note this, that no temptation carry me into that extreme, of taking nothing but heaven to be worthy of our minding or regard; and so to cast off the world in a sinful sort, on pretence of mortification, and a heavenly mind and life.

I. As to the sense, the meaning is not that any thing on earth is better than heaven; or I write for myself, and therefore supposing simply, and in itself, to be preferred before it :

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