prayers, praises, rites, and ordinances dwindle into carcasses without a soul. Every performance will be carnal and corporal, unless the Savior fill it with his divine Spirit: and when this comes, then there is a sweet communion of heart, and reviving of the soul after Christ: then there appears a delightful view behind the veil of outward ordinances, such as no carnal eye can behold, of the Lord in his goodness, beauty, grandeur, blessedness, and glory.

Mere professors stick in the flesh, and mistake the worship of the body and the motion of the lips, for the love, taste, action, and adoration of the soul. Religion is too sentimental for those, who rather walk by a course than live in it. The road indeed may be a

good one; but these no more travel therein, than a corpse in a hearse can be said to be making a journey. My soul, thy life and thy liveliness are all laid up in Christ, and to be drawn from him according to thy need. Thou hast no stock left to thy own disposal, As the manna was received daily from above, so thou must live out of thyself for thy spiritual daily bread. Having pleaded thy pardon by his blood, and thy justification by his righteousness, thou must live on him for grace still to plead both, to enjoy both, to commune with him from time to time, to deny thyself, to renounce the world and the devil, to master corruptions, to be growing wiser in his word, and more rich in its experience, and, in short, to use him for thine all in all. The whole of this is spiritual and therefore difficult work; and thou art quite unable to perform it in any respect, but through that strength which is made perfect in weakness. If Christ indeed be thy life, then, because he liveth, thou shalt live also.

In living thus upon Christ, thou art to live above thyself, and certainly above every thing which thou thyself canst perform. This is the true and sublime life of the inner man, which is not corruptible, nor de

pendeth for vigor upon corruptible things. It is therefore a hidden life. "Ye are dead (says the apostle) and your life is hid with Christ in God." No outward or carnal eye can see it at all, except in some of its holy outward effects, the true excellence of which it cannot apprehend; and the spi.itual understanding of other believers can only discern its inward truth and growth, but in proportion as they themselves are spiritually grown up in Christ Jesus the Lord.

As thou art not to live upon thyself, O my soul, so thou canst not live this true life by the aid or opinion of others. If they are instruments of good to thee, it is thy heavenly Father, who employeth them for that end. They themselves must live upon him, as well as thou, for all their wisdom, grace, and strength, and not by the life of their own hand. Christ is and must be as much their life, as he is thine.

Thou sometimes waxest and wanest in thy duties, as the moon in her light. At one time, thou art full of spiritual appetite and vigor; at another, in lowness and want of strength. The cause is not in the Sun of righteousness, who is always alike; but in thee, who turnest not the same aspect always to him, and therefore hast not always the same light and heat. If thou thinkest to get brightness from the stars around thee, instead of thy Sun; thou wilt be like the dark part of the moon turned away from the natural Sun, which often scarce appears, or, when it doth, appears very dull. In all providence, ordinances, and situations, Christ must be thy point of view, thy succor, thy light, thy life, and thy all; or they will be found, however excellent in his hand, only beggarly elements in thine.

In all things that are truly divine and spiritual, the flesh soon becomes weary, and flags, and fails. When the exercise grows difficult especially, then corrupt nature soon declines, and cannot sustain or endure the toil. Hence it is, that so many seem to receive the

word with joy, and to run well for a time, who, when persecutions or trials arise, having no root in themselves, begin to find dislikes and offences, and so presently fall away. Their fallow hearts have not been broken up deep enough by the gospel plough, (i. e. the law) to cover well the gospel seed. The seed of the word hath

never been hidden in the heart; and so hath taken no root downward in humble and secret contrition, nor grown into substance upward to bring forth fruit unto perfection.

This hidden and spiritual life is often most active and strong, when the flesh is lowest and hath least to do. "Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord; for he is raised up out of his holy habitation." When the Lord is risen upon the soul, all that is weak and carnal, is as nothing before him. A sweet proof of this may sometimes be found in sick and dying believers. How do they triumph in spirit, with a glorious liveliness, over all the infirmities of a dying body? When their heart and their flesh fail, God then appears most eminently to be very strength of their heart, and their portion for

the

ever.

There is a knowledge of Christ after the flesh, which will carry men a great way into all the splendors of religious profession. It shall make a man look and talk seriously; carry him constantly to ordinances; give him great personal zeal and confidence; enable him to be very exact in all outward discipline and form of doctrine; nay, it shall bring him with a fervent activity (if a Minister) into the pulpit, help him to deliver sound discourses with seeming earnestness and able oratory, so that multitudes shall hear and admire, and perhaps be wrought upon by him; and yet in himself it may be mere flesh, and the poor low knowledge of Christ by the flesh, after all. There is sometimes a little true life in this, and then it is strengthened and refined by trials and temptations; but when there is

none, then by time or trouble it will finally fall away. "If they had (really) been of us, no doubt they would have continued with us.'

O my soul, there are depths of Satan, as well as of God; and there is no security for thee, but in renouncing the flesh, and all the secret as well as open works of the flesh, and by following Jesus thoroughly in the regeneration. In the poverty of carnal nature, the Lord will manifest the riches of his grace. Thou must

be poor in thine own spirit, or thou canst not be rich in his. He filleth the hungry with good things; but those that are increased with their own goods, he will always send empty away.

O Lord, look upon me, a poor and helpless creature, who cannot so much as look up to thee for aid, without thy special grace for that end. How can I live upon thee, my Savior, unless thou come down to me in this dark and wretched world, and visit me with thy salvation! I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord; and I would still patiently wait in all the ways of thine appointment, expecting thy presence in the troubled pool to bless me. I expect thee, and only thee. None else can do me good. My soul craveth for true and immortal life; and this is thy gift: O give it unto me. In all thy means of grace, let my heart wait for thy grace by the means. Without thy presence all outward things are barren and dry; and my soul can find no sustenance: Lead me, 0 my gracious shepherd, by thine own hand to the green pastures, and beside the waters of thy holy rest; restoring my soul, and conducting me in the paths of righteousness for thy name's sake. So shall I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, neither fearing nor finding any evil; and at length arrive at the heavenly house of my God, in which I shall dwell for ever and ever,

CHAPTER IV.

ON SELF-SEEKING.

As they, that are in the flesh, cannot please God at all; so they that follow the flesh in any instance, do so far displease him. This flesh is a subtle adversary, and will creep into our duties as well as our sins; mixing itself, under a thousand forms, into almost all that we can say, think, or do.

Who could expect to feel this deceiver in the deepest contrition of soul, or to find him in peals of groans and showers of tears? Yet self will endeavor to make a man proud of this very humility, to be plumed upon his own abasements, and to be fancying himself something, in the midst of his confessions about his vileness and nothingness.

A poor soul shall own itself, with much pain and sincerity, to be a miserable sinner; and self, from this very acknowledgment, will stir up a notion of worth in the creature, and give it to believe, that there are some seeds at least of excellency within itself, which others have not, and for having of which he is higher and better than they. Self will bid some men confess themselves sinners, that they may be considered as saints. To take them at their word, would mortify and displease them.

When the heart of the believer is melted in duty, and enjoys the liveliest frame of communion and love; how often and how much is self to be found therein, either attempting to puff up with an high opinion, or to instill a carnal security concerning its spiritual interest and welfare? If it can abate the power and watchfulness of faith, it will lay a ground of distress to the believer in the next trial; so that he will soon find himself yet to be in the flesh, and that (as one says) "he must never