lean on yea and amen promises, feeling no comfortable enjoyments. I have thought, what a mercy it is that God remains the same.

Bless the Lord, the sick, maimed, wounded, and broken, are those to whom he will appear; the rich he will send empty away. All you say tells me that you are a fit sinner to be saved by grace, and by grace only. You cannot stay God's ark, but need him to stay your soul upon himself. "Fear not, thou worm Jacob;" God will bring you through all; "the gates of hell shall not prevail.” Your standing depends on a faithful and covenant-keeping God, who never loved you for what he saw in you, and never will cast you off for what you feel. Atoning blood is still sufficient. Christ died unto sin once, and sin died in his death; and though it lives in us, it cannot destroy us. Faith brings this to view, when felt in the power of the Holy Ghost. "Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory," which victory always stands complete for us in Christ, though we feel overcome in ourselves. It is thus that we are to rejoice in Christ, and put no confidence in the flesh.

I wish that you may be favoured to look much above, and see that more are they who are for you than they who are against you, entering into a full Christ and finished salvation as containing all your desire.

Farewell. I hope to see you soon.-Believe me yours in the bond of love,

Leicester, Feb. 1, 1822.

A MONUMENT OF MERCY.

E. VORLEY.

Dear Brother,-Your last I received, and in my mind have been sending you a few lines for some time. I was sorry to hear of your trials and troubles in the church, having myself passed through similar things. You know that the apostle Paul says, "Every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward; if any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire." My soul felt for you, and, I believe, was enabled to meet you at a throne of grace, the meeting-place where all the family of God are, out of real necessity, obliged to come in storms, troubles, miseries, and sore afflictions; for "In their trouble," says God, "they will call upon me;" yea, and he has promised that he will hear them, and "will say, It is my people; and they shall say, The Lord is my God." And did ever a promise of our God fall to the ground unaccomplished? No, no, nor never shall; for all his promises are yea and amen, and never were forfeited yet; and both you and I are to this ay living witnesses that not one good thing of all that ever he promised us has failed us; they have all come to pass, notwithstanding all the cursed workings of the devil and our old man of sin. Ó the dreadful scenes of sorrow, misery, despair, and sinkings, that my sou has passed through; and the times I have verily believed that it

was all over, that my devilish workings of old nature were so Godprovoking that he neither would nor could ever look again in mercy, love, and compassion, upon the old hell-deserving wretch! But, bless his dear name, he has left this text upon record: "The beasts of the field shall honour me, the dragons and the owls; because I give waters in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen. This people have I formed for myself; they shall show forth my praise." Yes, they shall, in spite of all the ragings and roarings of the devil and the wretched crew that he works up in our hearts. Our God knows how and when to bring the poor beasts, dragons, and owls to praise his name; not one moment sooner nor one moment later than the fixed time. "For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.' Yea, he says, "I have long time holden my peace; I have been still, and refrained myself: now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once. I will make waste mountains and hills, and dry up all their herbs; and I will make the rivers islands, and I will dry up the pools. And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them." Bless the Lord, you and worthless I have proved this in our souls, by heart-felt experience, numbers of times for nearly fifty years' journeying in this vale of tears; and will our covenant, faithful, promise-keeping God leave us at last to sink never to rise up again? "He abideth faithful; he cannot deny himself." How sweet and humbling it is to feel the power and unction of God's wills and shalls in our souls! It is quite another thing from reading it, assenting and consenting to it with our judgment.

I am more and more at a point that, when my soul is famishing with hunger, there is nothing short of finding God's word and eating it that can satisfy; when my soul is overwhelmed with darkness, thick darkness that is to be felt, nothing will do for me but "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee;" when my poor soul is panting after God like the hunted hart after the water brook, till my very tongue has cleaved to my mouth for thirst, nothing short of drinking of the river of God can satisfy; when my soul is sinking in floods of awful blasphemies, nothing short of the Spirit lifting up the glorious standard again in my soul will do for me; when my soul is cleaving to the dust, and nothing but the world, world, world, from morning to night, nothing short of visitations of the Spirit can revive it; when my soul is as hard as the nether millstone, nothing can soften it but the precious love and mercy of a covenant God; when my soul is sunk into the foul pit of corruption, and feels as guilty and filthy as a devil, nothing can do for me but a fresh plunging and washing in the "fountain opened for sin and uncleanness. In these things my soul lives, and in these things is the life of my spirit, and in them it has been going on for fifty years, and, I believe, will be to the end of my journey; and I have times and seasons

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when I can bless God from my heart that it is so fixed. It is a way that is so self-abasing, so pride-mortifying, and so God-glorifying. None but fools ever walk in this way; for it is such an obscure path that no fowl could ever find it out, nor could even the vulture's piercing eye ever perceive it; no, nor shall any ravenous beast go up thereon; it shall not be found there; but the redeemed shall walk there, and none else. And is it any wonder, then, that so many, both preachers and hearers, are pouring contempt upon the changes that the redeemed have to pass through, of nights and days, sorrows and joys, woundings and healings, groans and songs, bondage and liberty, death and life, heaven and hell? How can they know anything about it who have never set one foot in the path? No, they cannot. And I do not wonder at their calling experimental preaching preaching corruption, preaching fleshly cant, and preaching self. Wisdom is only justified of her children; and I am as confident of it as I am of my own existence, that the glorious work of God the Holy Ghost, in leading, teaching, stripping, clothing, emptying, filling, wounding, healing, drawing, softening, supporting, and comforting, is all hid from the wise and prudent, and only revealed unto babes. O how it does humble and crumble my soul at times to see and feel that worthless I am one of those babes! It appears too much for such a worthless wretch! O, when my poor soul is sometimes sunk down with a sense of my own ignorance, the Bible a sealed book, the time approaching to carry a message to the people, and I have been crying and groaning to God by the hour, that he would be pleased to tell me what I must go with, but for a long time have had no answer, -how good it has been when he has whispered with his still small voice! "Have ye never read that out of the mouths of babes and sucklings he has ordained praise?" How my poor soul has been humbled at his feet, and begged him to take the little ignorant, worthless, useless lad and set him by himself in the midst of the people, and whisper into the heart of the boy what was his mind and will for him to say! And how smilingly sometimes he has looked upon me, and said, "It shall be given thee in the hour of need!”

O how satisfied I am if I can but have his word sealed home in my heart that he will be with me! It is quite enough for me. I want neither pen, ink, nor paper, to write it down; neither heads nor tails, divisions nor subdivisions, nor any such fleshly shifts, to strengthen the memory! When this is the case, I can trust the dear Comforter to bring to my remembrance what he has designed for his own glory; and surely He that hath made the tongue and the memory knows best how to strengthen it and refresh it, and how to guide the tongue what to say. But they that are looking after the praise of men more than the praise of God, must be at their own work; and, therefore, they will be after the works of men, and stealing their words from their neighbours; and they are heartily welcome to it for me, for I do not envy them of it. I desire nothing but what has God's approbation. I do not mean that my old nature does not thirst and long for the praises and smiles of men; for I verily believe, and am confident of it, that I carry an old man about with me,

that sticks at nothing, is ashamed at nothing, is confounded at nothing, and fears and dreads nothing but the Son of God and his glorious kingdom, majesty, honour, and power. This he hates, dreads, and fears. All manner of deception, hypocrisy, sin, and iniquity that he is capable of working, I find in my heart, to my sorrow and grief; and bless the Lord that it is to my sorrow, and that it teaches me I have no stone to throw at either men or devils.

The dear Lord keeps me, from day to day, very little, weak, and helpless in myself; and when this is the case, I "lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help;" for "my help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth," when he will, and how he will.

It is my heart's desire and prayer to God, at times, for you, that you may have much of the presence of the Lord in all the trials God has fixed for you to pass through; for neither you nor I will ever have one more than Infinite Wisdom has fixed. Bless our God, the lot is cast into the lap, and the whole disposal thereof is of the Lord. O that it may please our dear Lord to bless you and me with a sweet resignation to the will of Him that cannot err, and that we may ever be preserved from rewarding evil for evil! O what a blessing it is to be favoured of God, to learn of Jesus, who was meek and lowly of heart! What rest and peace it brings to the soul, and what meekness and quietness it produces in it! How comfortably, when our souls are with Jesus, can we leave all the hard speeches and ill treatment which we receive from professors or possessors in the hands of Jesus, who knows how to manage them better than we do! My soul's desire is, that you and I may be much with Jesus. There is neither wrath, anger, malice, prejudice, pride, nor cruel jealousies there. O blessed, blessed Jesus, keep us near to thy dear feet, willing to be anything or nothing that thou mayest be glorified!

I am firmly persuaded that God will make all plain that has been suffered to take place amongst you as a church. There is a needs be for it; and you will be brought to see it in God's own time. What a solemn text is this: " 'Be still, and know that I am God," who has said, "No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord." "When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee; for I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour." When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him. And can the blessed wills and shalls of our covenant God be overthrown? No, my dear brother; they are firm as the everlasting hills. O that our dear and heavenly Comforter would but help us to sit still and wait till we shall see the salvation of our God; for it is our God that fights for us; whenever we gain a victory, it is when we hold our peace; and whenever we have soul-transportings, it is when we have nothing to do but look on, and the angel of God is doing wondrously.

But where am I going? It just strikes my mind that you will be quite sick of my scrawl; and, therefore, I will conclude with my kind love to all friends. May the best of blessings ever rest upon you in your going out and coming in, to the end of the journey; and when your work of faith and labour of love and patience are ended in this vale of tears, that you may fall asleep in the arms of a dear Jesus, and be carried into Abraham's bosom, for ever to be in the presence of a covenant God, is the prayer of

Trowbridge, Sept. 22, 1843.

Your unworthy brother,

J. W.

THE ALMIGHTY MAKETH MY HEART SOFT.

My dear Friend and Brother in the bosom of mercy, I hope you are in the sweet enjoyment of the love of God, looking forward to the blessed day of exaltation with your elder Brother, Jesus, when you will be freed for ever from doubts, fears, and perplexities, and from a polluted body of sin and death, and sound forth your loud hallelujahs to the Three-One Jehovah for ever, in high and exalted strains. A blessed day, my brother, will that be, when all the redeemed are gathered to one home, all alike clad, all alike crowned, all alike adoring one Object, and all alike in highest strains crowning him Lord of all. The thought at this moment revives me a little, hoping I shall be one among the happy number; for I desire to love the Lord now, and to enjoy his presence, and live under his smiles.

But I have been in a very, very low state, and have at times thought that I never should rise again. "All is over!" my poor soul has often cried; for when I have been looking for evidences of my interest in the Lord, I could at times find none. There has been a shutting up of everything; and I have then thought that it would be better never more to attempt to speak in the Lord's name. Yet I have been mercifully kept on, and have often wondered how the Lord could bear with me, or enable me still to speak to the people.

And then, after a season like this, I have been melted down, and have been ashamed of my distrust and rebellion. His love has melted me into tears, and I have said, “Why dost thou regard me, Lord? Why dost thou thus bless such a poor, vile worm?" and he has answered, "Because I will be gracious." Then I have said, "Lord, never let me act again as I have done." But ah! my brother, I find that I am just the same again as soon as the Lord leaves me, and I am plunged deeper and deeper, which makes me sigh and groan under my burden, and cry for fresh tokens of his love; for I find, by experience, that I cannot rest nor be happy at a distance from him; neither can I live upon my doubts, fears, and temptations.

I hope that you are more comfortable as a church, and that things are more straight. I have carried you all in turn to the Lord's feet, and entreated him to appear for you; for I do love you in the Lord. Give my love to the friends in Jesus, and believe me ever yours in the Lord,

Oddington, Nov. 23rd, 1848.

G. G.