with more habitual thoughtfulness than your vigorous and juvenile spirit perhaps is capable of. Yet there are seasons, I trust, even in your experience, when the apparent uncertainty of life, and the thought of death, judgment, and eternity, constrain a solemn pause; and then, all that your vain mind has been aspiring after, with "all that earth calls good or great," weighed, in the balance of sound reason, with the favour of God, has appeared light as a feather. But when you thought of the favour of God, perhaps it has appeared so very distant, and separated from you by so many discouraging impediments, that your desire was checked, by a desponding sigh. Nor can I wonder, that (when with attention you read what the Scripture saith of man in his natural state, as a child of sin and of wrath, and when you find in yourself so much disinclination to spiritual duties, such strong propensities to what is evil, and such an impossibility to repress vain and sinful thoughts, even on the most solemn occasions), you should admit a fear, that you shall never gain the blessedness of that man whose God is the Lord. But why indulge a desponding thought? It is true, that all you can possibly do, or suffer, cannot merit your acceptance and forgiveness with God. Were you to presume to appear before him, even in the best adorning of your own duties, without Christ, you must appear as a "child of wrath,” with awful stains of unpardoned guilt upon you. Nor is it in your hower to change your sinful na

ture, to cleanse the fountain of your evil propensities, and "direct your heart into the love of God." Perhaps you have sometimes tried, and been obliged to confess, "I cannot do the things that I would." Cherish, my dear grandson, the conviction: let it sink deep into your heart. heart. Let Him who seeth in secret, witness the tremblings of your spirit, the shame and abasement with which you regard the sin of your nature, and the fearful alienation of your heart from God and holiness. God was well pleased, when he saw Ephraim, under such a conviction, in an agony, and heard him say, "I was ashamed, yea, even confounded, because I did bear the reproach of my youth," Such a humble, contrite, broken spirit, notwithstanding all the pain and grief that attends it, is well pleasing to God, and a pledge of eternal mercy and salvation to man. This the publican found, when he had been smiting on his breast, and with anguish of spirit crying, "God be merciful to me, a sinner!" Such convictions of sin and of our sinful nature, the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, is sent to produce; and such broken hearts the Lord Jesus is anointed and commissioned to bind up. Indeed, there is enough in the sovereign balm found in the doctrine of Christ crucified, to effect this. From his Cross flows a precious, abundant stream of pardoning mercy; and "though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Yea, and his Spirit brings the joyful assu

rance, "I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean;"" a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you." Thus you see, what man would attempt but cannot do, that God, in his great mercy, does for him. The glory is His, while man with humble gratitude confesses, "Not by the works of righteousness which we have done, but of his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost, through Jesus Christ our Saviour." So then you may learn "salvation is of the Lord;" it is entirely his work and this salvation is in and through Jesus Christ; you cannot be accepted, you cannot be saved from wrath and sin, but in him. God can be pleased with nothing in

:

you, except Christ be in you. But if with faith and love, you can come to "Jesus the Lord," "the Mediator of the new covenant," and "to the blood of sprinkling," you will be joined to the saved of the Lord, and he will put his sanctifying Spirit upon you. When the doors of the Israelites were sprinkled with the blood of the paschal lamb, the Egyptians could detain them no longer; so will you go forth with joy, and be led forth with praise," if heart be "sprinkled from an evil conscience, by the blood of Jesus." Then Christ will be to you all you want for time and eternity; and you will be "complete in

him."

your

Seek to

Let your desire be towards Christ. know more of him: read, and hear, and converse,

and pray to find this treasure.

Be earnest with

God, that his Holy Spirit may open your eyes to see his glory; open your ears to hear his voice; open your heart, that, with the dearest affections, you may receive and honour him, as your Saviour and your Lord. Then see to it, that he has your heart, and that you have his Spirit. Prove your interest in him, by the influence his grace has on your temper and life; and let the world see, that you are not less happy in yourself, or pleasant to others, because of the grace of God in you. The Lord make his grace to abound in you, and cause you from a child to know the Scriptures, which are able to make you wise unto salvation!

LETTER XI.

TO MASTER B

J. BOWDEN.

Tooting, Jan. 25, 1809.

MY DEAR GRANDSON, .

You have been greatly afflicted, and are now in good measure recovered.-I could not help thinking of you with very tender anxiety, when you hung between life and death. I besought the Lord for you, that of his great mercy he would put you amongst his own dear children, and then, with his fatherly wisdom and love, determine whether to continue your mortal life a little longer, or receive you

at once into his own delightful palace, which is eternal in the heavens. Now, I cannot help thinking of you with a thankful heart, and with cheerful hope, as a child of peculiar mercy. The Lord has brought you down almost to the gates of death, and he has wonderfully revived your dying life, and brought you up again. It is the hand of the Lord, my dear, that has done this. It was not by chance that the fever seized on you, and raged so long; it was not the skill of the doctor, and the power of his medicines, that brought you back from the pit of corruption; but it is all the Lord's doing, and he always has some design to answer in what he does. You are now a wonder unto many who had almost given up the expectation of your recovery; and sometimes, perhaps, you look back upon your illness, as the Israelites from the shore of the Red Sea looked back on the awful deeps they had passed, wondering atthe deliverance which God had wrought. It therefore concerns you, my dear W——, to inquire, "What design had the blessed God in all this? Why has he so greatly afflicted me, and marvellously restored me?" It is no wonder that any. man or child should be afflicted; it is no wonder that you should be afflicted; for, though young, you have sinned against God. I hope you know it, and are grieved when you think of it; and instead of complaining, say in your heart, “It is of the Lord's mercies that I am not consumed;" for one sin deserves God's wrath and curse, both in the