to impiety, be excluded from thy favour? fhall I die in my fins, and broil in the flames of hell through everlafting ages? If only finners are faved, and Chrift came to call fuch only to repentance; O let me be among the happy number. What had all the faved ones to recommend them unto thy favour; what good had they done to merit eternal life; what thing was valuable about them, and calculated to procure thy merciful regard? Sure they had nothing, they had done nothing, they poffeffed nothing. Guilt and fin was their portion, their bufinefs, and their chief qualification. Sure, this is my cafe, my dreadful cafe. O then, for Chrift's fake, fave me. Draw me unto thee with all the fin and guilt that lies heavy upon me; feeing thou requireft finners to come unto thee in their worst, their most undefirable ftate. I have nothing to prefent to thee but guilt, complicated, highly aggravated guilt. The only thing I have ever done, is finning; and my only merit is wrath. Yet, O Lord, thy call reacheth me. Unto you, O men I call, and my voice is to the fons of men. Come unto me, all ye that Jabour, and I will give you reft. Whofoever will, let him take the water of life freely. But though thy call be clear and distinct, yet I cannot acccept it; I cannot come unto thee; my heart is hard, my mind is blind, my will is rebellious, and my confcience feared: how then can I believe? I fee that thou callest finners, and as great finners as I have been; but who can believe? It is a work infuperable to me, impracticable by a finful creature. It is not the effect of free-will, nor of human ability. O then let it be given unto me to believe in the name of the Lord Jefus Chrift; for faith is the gift of God; and Chrift is the author and finifher of faith. Draw me, O Lord, then will I run after thee. Say unto me, I am thy God; and our. and I will fay, I am thy fervant. Say with power, Turn, O backslider, and I will heal thy backflidings; then will I anfwer, Behold, I come unto thee, for thou art the Lord my God. Say, Lord, O finner, feek my face; and my heart will reply, Thy face, Lord, will I feek. O Lord, I cry unto thee, unto the Lord Jehovah, a God reconciled to finners in Chrift, I make my fupplication. What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the pit? fhall the duft praise thee? fhall it declare thy truth? Hear, O Lord, and have mercy upon me; Lord, be thou my Savi Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble. Forfake me not, O Lord; O God, be not far from me. Make hafte to help me, O God of my falvation. Confider, and hear me, O Lord, and lighten mine eyes, left I fleep the fleep of death. Turn thee unto me, and have mercy upon me; for I am defolate and afflicted. The troubles of my heart are enlarged; O bring thou me out of my diftreffes. Look upon mine affliction, and my pain, and forgive all my fins. O Lord God of hofts, hear my prayer; give ear, O God of Jacob. Let my prayer be fet forth before thee as incenfe; and the lifting up of my hands, as the evening-facrifice. O happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whofe hope is in the Lord his God. Lord, make me thine; let me be thine; let me be reckoned a mong thine, in the day that thou makeft up thy jewels. Amen. Many days and nights I spent in fuch prayers and foliloquies; fometimes entertaining hopes of mercy, at other times depreffed with fear, and perplexed with an unbelieving distrust and despair of ever being delivered from my troubles. this my adverfary, the devil, no doubt, had a principal hand. And truly I need not be igno In rant rant of his devices; confidering the many temptations wherewith I have been haraffed, and the many blafphemous thoughts he has endeavoured to dart into my mind. Ŏ the fubtilty of this old O enemy of the human race! He firit allures men to fin by the bait of pleasure and profit; and when the fin is committed, the fancied pleasure fled, and the profit found to be defperate misery; when severe remorfe of confcience, and excruciating pain of body, are all the rewards of a vitious life, then defperation is the inftrument which he manages, and often with fuch fuccefs, that the finner, despairing of help, and afraid of his offended Maker, runs away from him, plunges into the commiffion of the most abominable wickedness, and sometimes puts an end to a miferable life by a halter. This deceiver and deftroyer of mankind brings the finner, by a perpetration of all manner of horrid crimes, to the gates of hell; and when the remedy, the only efficacious remedy, is, by the gospel, prefented to him, he caufes him fly from it, perfuades him it is not directed to fuch a vile wretch, or raises doubts of its efficacy and futiableness for fuch a deplorable cafe. The Lord rebuke this adversary and devourer. Thus I fpent a life in continual agony and pain. I was buffetted by the devil, lafhed with the whips of confcience, and choked by divine terrors. My hope fluctuated, defpair prevailed, and a fenfe of guilt made me fuccumb under the power of temp. tation. But it often, perhaps always, happens, that the finner's extremity is the Lord's opportu nity. This was my cafe. When I was reduced as low perhaps as ever I had been before; and my confeience had fearful forebodings of everlafting destruction; then, even in that critical mo ment, the God of mercy, the lover of fouls, ftepped in for my help, and, in great mercy, spoke peace peace to my troubled foul. I had gone to bed the preceding evening in inexpreflible horror and agony of foul, occafioned by a retrofpect to all the impiety I had been involved in, the fhocking circumftances of my lewdnefs and debauchery, the aggravations attending my crimes, as being perpetrated in spite of knowledge, convictions, and warnings, &c. and fully perfuaded my foul fhould be required of me that night. I was feized with a shivering cold, fo that every member of my body trembled, and my teeth chattered. I could only utter a few confused cries to heaven. In this fituation I fell afleep, as I suppose, about twelve at night. I flept very foundly and calmly, and had a fucceffion of pleasant dreams. I awaked between five and fix in the morning, with remarkable tranquillity of fpirit, with thefe words running in my mind, I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy tranfgreffions for my name's fake, and will not remember thy fins. I was uncommonly refreshed with fleep. My gracious God difcovered to me, that my help was in him alone; that, however vile and wicked I had been, yet fovereign mercy reached me; that he had laid help upon one that is mighty; that this Saviour and great. One came into the world to fave finners; that God had fo loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son, that whofoever believeth in him, might not perish, but have everlafting life. I faw clearly my warrant and title to believe in the Lord Jefus; that it was my indifpenfable duty to do fo; that it was Chrift's bufinefs to fave finners; that for that glorious purpose he was fet apart from eternity in the counfel of peace, promifed in paradife to the founders of mankind, as the feed of the woman that would bruife the ferpent's head, pointed out by the Old-teftament facrifices and ceremonies, reprefented in prophetical declarations, and at laft manifefted D manifefted in the flesh; that for this end he fulfilled all righteoufnefs, 'was arraigned, abandoned, condemned, and crucified. The Lord beftowed on me the Spirit of faith, and therefore I believed. I was engaged to hope in God, aud truft in his falvation. I was powerfully and fweetly perfuaded to receive the Lord Jefus Chrift, as my Teacher, my Saviour, my Governour. Thus I, who had long dwelt in the tabernacles of impiety and debauchery, pursuing a course disgrace ful and deftructive to human nature, and who had lived without God in the world, was made to return unto the Lord, and dwell under the wings of the God of Ifrael. Thus did Jehovah turn for me my mourning into dancing; he put off my fackcloth, and girded me with gladness, Then did I cry out, O Lord, I will praise thee: for though thou waft angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou haft comforted me. Bęhold, God is my falvation: I will truft, and not be. afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my fong, he alfo is become my falvation. Blefs the Lord, O my foul, and forget not all his be nefits; who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy difeafes; who redeemeth thy life from deftruction; who crowneth thee with loving-kindness, and tender mercies. Lord, thou wilt ordain peace for me; for thou wilt work all my works in me: thou wilt fulfil in me all the good pleasure of thy goodnefs, and the work of faith with power. O Lord my God, other lords befides thee have had dominion over me; but by thee only will I make mention of thy name. Then did the Lord fay unto me, I have blotted out as a thick cloud, thy tranfgreffions, and as a cloud, thy fins: return unto me, for I have redeemed thee. Look unto me, and be thou faved; for I am God, and there is none elfe. Hearken unto L. my |