fort at night, that I should find rest on my bed: or whilst in the day my spirit is overwhelmed within me, I think sometimes to deceive my pains a little by sleeping on my couch." Consider here, that the

most probable and proper means are unable of themselves to minister any ease or comfort to us. A man may go to his bed, and lie down upon his couch in vain: unless God command a bed to comfort us, it shall yield us no comfort; and unless he say to a couch, Ease such a man's complaint, it shall not do it. But if God say to an hard stone, Give such a man rest, he shall rest and sleep sweetly upon it; as Jacob did when he journeyed from Beersheba towards Haran, making stones his pillow in the place where he lay down to sleep, there dreaming of a ladder set upon the earth, the top whereof reached to heaven, and the angels of God ascending and descending on it, and the Lord standing above it, promising to give the land whereon he lay to him and his seed, and to multiply his seed exceedingly, and that in his seed all the families of the earth should be blessed, Gen. xxviii. 11—14.

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How often does God scare some men with dreams, and terrify them with visions! as Job speaks concerning himself. Some conceive, that the dream of Pilate's wife was from the devil, because Satan would thereby have hindered the work of man's redemption. She comes to Pilate, and desires him to have nothing to do with that just man, For," saith she, I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him," Matt. xxvii. 19. As our waking times are in God's hand, so are our sleeping times. Sometimes God makes sleep an affliction to us. Job's dreams were terrifying and scaring to him. Some dreams are for warning and admonition: the

Lord warned Joseph in a dream; the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream whilst he thought on those things, and gave him counsel what to do, Matt. i. 20. Holy meditations, even upon our beds, do many times meet with the Lord's messages. The angels are at God's service to assist his saints, as in the case of Joseph; the angel helps him out of his perplexing thoughts. He was contriving how to please God in that important business, and God sends an angel to assist him. No time is unseasonable for God to help his children: no time but he watcheth over them; when they are sleeping, when they think neither harm nor good, then the Lord watches over them for good. God can give us better direction sleeping, than we can find out waking. Many a one has tasted more of heaven in a nightdream, than in many days attendance on holy ordinances. Yet this is no pillow for laziness: if we do our best while we are waking, God will relieve us sleeping. Let us go to God, and not distract ourselves, nor be careless. Joseph thought what to do, yet his thoughts were not so distracting as to break his sleep: God helps him sleeping. God will have us be doing, and yet it may be, he will do his own work without us.

Let every Christian labour to be well employed in the day-time, for it is possible that our fancy in the night may hold some conformity with the day's employment. For if our mind in the day-time be intent upon good employment, and well fixed thereon, our sleep may relish of the same employment also, and our fancy may make return of something whereof we so fastened on in the day, as well as it will do in other vanities. The wise man saith, that in the multitude of dreams and many words there are also divers

vanities; "but fear thou God," Eccl. v. 7. If thou fearest God, thou needest not fear thy fancy, nor thy dreams. I shall conclude with the advice of Chrysostom :-"Close thine eyes with the thoughts of God and his goodness, and thou shalt have sweet dreams; thy fancy shall not be troubled."

AN APPENDIX.

MEDITATIONS AND

DIRECTIONS

SANCTIFYING OF THE LORD'S

CHRISTIAN SABBATH.

FOR THE

DAY, OR

THE very sight of the Lord's house and place of his worship was a recreation to holy David. "How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts!" they are lovely and beautiful. My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord: my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God." And, "Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, they shall be still praising thee. Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee, in whose heart are the ways of them," Psa. lxxxiv. 1, 2, 4, 5. Oh, it is a joyful and a blessed thing to be near the Lord, to be conversant in his service! And, "I was glad," says David," when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord," Psa. cxxii. 1. David needed no sport to make him merry upon the sabbath day. The very invitation made to him of going to the house of the Lord, and the very naming of the house of the Lord, were enough to make him a happy man. And mark how his heart leaps for joy within him. "Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together," ver. 2, 3. He was so pleased with the

city itself seemed the "Whither the tribes

house of God there, that the more beautiful to him for it. go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel," ver. 4. He goes on in such lively expressions of a glad and joyful spirit, that we may, as it were, feel his pulse beating, and his spirits exulting and triumphing in these passages. Thus was he delighted in the Lord, and in the presence, house, and worship of the Lord, who would not have thought a vain sport worth a cast of his eye to behold it.

And if yet you would more particularly understand what was holy David's recreation on the sabbath day, mark what is said in Psa. xcii. which is entitled, "A Psalm or Song for the sabbath day;" "It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord, and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High: to show forth thy loving kindness in the morning, and thy faithfulness every night, upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery; upon the harp with a solemn sound." Here was his recreation in the morning and evening, to praise and bless the Lord.

But this seems a tedious and melancholy work to a carnal heart. Mark then what he says in ver. 4, 5; "For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work; I will triumph in the works of thy hands O Lord, how great are thy works! and thy thoughts are very deep.' The Lord had made him full of joy in pardoning his sins, and also in protecting his church, and in avenging the cause of his church upon its enemies. But see what follows; "A brutish man knoweth not; neither doth a fool understand this," ver. 6. An earthly minded man finds no matter of rejoicing in the Lord, or in his works or worship; and therefore a brutish man