have all I wish, and all I want. With a fettled indifference I fhall then look upon the highest advantages of this world. I fhall have nothing to hope or to fear. The will of God will be to me unmixed felicity.

52. Such

indeed in the heaven of heavens after the moft glorious manner, as the High and Lofty One, and by fome fplendid appearance, manifefts a prefence to the fenfes of the bleffed fpirits; but as he is an infinite Spirit,

*As to the expreffion juft now used, to wit, that this infinite Spirit manifefts himself to the fenfes of his ·bleffed fubjects,—it may be asked how this can be -can the eye behold what is infinite and invifible?

The answer is this, that although God's effence be invifible, yet there is a glory, the train and attendance of his effence, which exhibits a bodily and fenfible vifion of God. He decketh himself with light as with a garment. This is the dwelling of his effence. He dwelleth in light that is unapproachable.

We must distinguish then between the essential and the majeftatic prefence of God. The majeftatic prefence is the difcovery of his effential prefence in a deverminate place by a magnificent luminous appearance; and this the apoftle calls the excellent glory-megaloprepous doxes. This glory appeared on Mount Sinai fix days together. It refted and dwelt in the fanctuary. It filled the house. Mofes faw its back parts, that is, a fmall measure and fcantling of it, in proportion to the weakness of his mortal eyes; but, in

D 3

the

A meditation

52. Such was the foliloquy in the clofet. fpoke, as I gazed on the skeleton of John Orton; and juft as I had ended, the boys brought in the wild turkey, which

they

Spirit, diffufed thro' all things, filling as well as con taining them, Jeeing and knowing all, even the most secret things; for, His eyes (to fpeak after a popular manner) are ten thousand times brighter than the fun, beholding all the ways of men, and confidering the most fecret paths; knowing all things ere ever they were created, and looking upon all things after they were perfected; it follows, that fince nothing can exclude the prefence of this infinite Spirit; then, in him we live, move, and have our being: He is not far from any of us; but altho' he is above all, yet he is through all and in us all; within us, as well as without us; and therefore, in the hearts of the faithful, he muft be confidered, as an immenfe, intellectual, pure light, ready

the other world, when mortals fhall have put on immortality, and our bodies shall be invested with the new powers of Spirituality and incorruption, then face to face: we fhall be able to fee the whole luftre of divine Majefty as familiarly as one man beholdeth the face of another *.

There

As grateful objects of fenfe make up a great part of human delectation; may we not fuppofe, that this glory of God, accommodated to our fenfes, will produce a more ravishing and transcendent delight, than all the objects in nature are capable of producing?

they had very ingeniously roafted, and with fome of Mrs. Burcot's fine ale and bread, I had

ready to enlighten and enliven them, and to shed forth the bright beams of his love upon them. I imagine this illuftrates the thing. To me it seems

reafon.

There are two ways then (as an excellent one obferves) of feeing God, to wit, by intelligence, and, in fome manner, by fenfe: but we must not imagine that these two make up the beatific vifion. There is a cause of more importance to beatitude. The fight and contemplation of the divine glories is our act; but the act of God is the communication of them. This makes the faints perfectly blessed. By the communication of the divine glories, we come to be, not bare fpectators, but, theias koinonoi phufeos, partakers of the divine nature.

As we are more obliged, (fays the writer I have mentioned) to the fun (who is the cheer and vigor of nature, and the very life of all animal and vegetable beings), for his influences than for his fight-fo are the heavenly inhabitants much more obliged to God for their receptions from him as the fountain of life and wisdom, than for the fight and contemplation of him as the fubject of perfection. This illuftrates the matter; and we may fay, there is a third way of feeing God, to wit, in the enjoyment of him; the beamings of his favour, and the effufions of his love, paffing thro' the whole man, and producing an intimate fen-, fation of him both in body and foul, and filling both with an unconceivable and endlefs delectation. This is feeing God as he is.

had an excellent fupper. The bones of the penitent Orton, I removed to a hole I had ordered my lad to dig for them; the skull excepted, which I kept, and still keep on my table, for a memento mori; and that I may never forget the good leffon, which the percipient who once refided in it, had given. It is often the fubject of my meditation. When I am alone of an evening, in my closet, which is often my cafe, I have the skull of John Orton before me, and as I fmoke a philofophic pipe, with my eyes faftened on it, I learn more from the folemn object, than I could from the most philofophical and laboured fpeculations. What a wild and hot head once: how cold and still now; poor skull, I fay: and what was the end all thy daring frolics and gambolsthy licentiousness and impiety?-A fevere and bitter repentance. In piety and goodness John Orton found at last that happiness the world could not give him. There is no real felicity for man, but in reforming all his errors and vices, and entring upon a ftrict and conftant courfe of virtue. This only makes life comfortable; renders death ferene and peaceful; and fecures eternal joy and blessedness hereafter. Such are the leffons I extract from the skull of John Orton.

53. When

An inventory of the goods of John Orton.

53. When I had fupped, I went about, to fee what things Mr. Orton had left behind him in his little cottage, and I found a field bedstead large enough for two, with a mat trafs, filk blankets, quilt, and cotton curtains; two oak ftools, and a strong square table of the fame wood. An oak fettee, on which his bones lay; a filver lamp to burn oil in: a tinder-box and matches; a cafe of razors; fix handsome knives and forks in a cafe; half a dozen china plates, two china difhes; and two pint mugs of the fame ware; half a dozen drinking-glaffes, a large copper kettle, a brafs fkillet, two filver fpoons, and a filver ladle; in a chest were clothes and linnen, fhoes and stockings, and various ufeful matters. There were pens, ink, and paper in a writing-desk, and half a fcore guineas; and on a shelf over it, a dozen good books; three of which were, a large English bible, Thomas: a Kempis, and Sir Walter Raleigh's history of the world: under the shelf hung a plain gold watch, and a large ring fun-dial. In a dark closet, I found a box of fea-biskets, many flasks of oil for eating, and jars of it. for the lamp; honey, falt, and vinegar; four dozen of quart bottles of meath, and two ftone bottles, that held three gallons each, full of brandy: this I fuppofe was