ADVERTISEMENT.

AT the time when proposals for publishing Mr. Haslett's posthumous papers, were issued, and until after several Forms were printed, it was supposed that the manuscripts would make upwards of two hundred pages. But the printer who

made the calculations was mistaken.— Mistakes, however, do not exonerate from the duty of fulfilling the promises of the proposals. The Extracts from Mr. Haslett's favourite author, are, therefore, added. "The Touchstone of Sincerity," written by the REV. JOHN FLAVEL, has, for about one hundred and sixty years, been high in the esteem of the churches.

EXTRACTS FROM

THE

TOUCHSTONE

OF

SINCERITY:

OR,

THE SIGNS OF GRACE,

AND

SYMPTOMS OF HYPOCRISY.

BY JOHN FLAVEL.

EXTRACT

FROM MR. FLAVEL'S EPISTLE TO THE READER.

"READER,

The time will come when they that scoff at the serious diligence of the saints, and break many a pleasant jest upon the most solemn and awful things in religion, will tremble when they shall hear the midnight cry, Behold the bridegroom cometh! and see the lamps of all vain and formal professors expire, and none admitted into the marriage but such whose lamps are furnished with oil; that is, such whose professions and duties are enlivened and maintained, by vital springs and principles of real grace within them.

The design of this Manual is to bring every man's gold to the touchstone and fire; I mean every man's grace to the trial of the word; that thereby we may know what we are, what we have, and what we must expect and trust to, at the Lord's coming. I pretend not to any gift of discerning spirits. But the ordinary aids and assistances of the Spirit are with us still, and the lively Oracles are among us still. To them we may freely go to resolve all doubts, and decide perplexed cases. And thus we may discern our own spirits, though we want the extraordinary gift of discerning other men's spirits.

I have little to say of this treatise in thy hands, more than that it is well aimed and designed, however it be managed.

It is not the pleasing, but profiting of a man, that I have herein laboured for. I know of nothing in it, that is like to wound the upright, or slightly heal

M

the hypocrite, by crying peace, Peace, peace, when there is no peace. The Scripture hath been my guide; by its light, I have followed in search of hypocrisy through the labyrinths of the heart.— Some assistance I hope I have had also from experience; for scripture and experience are such relatives, and the tie betwixt them so discernible, that nothing in nature can be more so. What we feel

in our hearts, we might have read in the scriptures before ever we felt it.

That the blessing of God may go forth with it, and accompany it to thy soul, reader, is the heart's desire and prayer of,

Thine and the Church's

Servant in Christ,

JOHN FLAVEL."