our depravation, but, being once depraved, we can act evil of ourselves. And if Satan be the father of sin, our will is the mother; and sin is the cursed issue of both. He could not make our sin without ourselves; we concur to our own undoing. It was the charge of the apostle, that we should not " give place to the devil :" lo, he could not take it, unless we gave it: our will betrays us to his tyranny. In vain shall we cry out of the malice and fraud of wicked spirits, while we nourish their accomplices in our bosoms.

XXXVI. I cannot but think with what unspeakable joy old Simeon died, when, after long waiting for the consolation of Israel, he had now seen the Lord's Christ; when I hear him say, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." Methinks I should see his soul ready to fly out of his mouth in a heavenly ravishment, and even then upon its wing towards its glory; for now his eyes saw, and his arms embraced, in God's salvation his own, in Israel's glory his own. How gladly doth he now see death, when he hath the Lord of life in his bosom! Or how can he wish to close up his eyes with Yet when I have seriously considered it, I cannot see other object? any wherein our condition comes short of his. He saw the child Jesus but in his swathing bands, when he was but now entering upon the great work of our redemption; we see him, after the full accomplishment of it, gloriously triumphing in heaven. He saw him but buckling on his armour, and entering into the lists; we see him victorious. "Who is this that cometh from Edom; with died garments from Bozrah? this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength?" Isaiah Ixiii. 1. He could only say, “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given," Isaiah ix. 6; we can say, "Thou hast ascended on high; thou hast led captivity captive; thou hast received gifts for men," Psalm lxviii. 18. It is true the difference is, he saw his Saviour with bodily eyes; we, with mental; but the eyes of our faith are no less sure and unfailing, than those of sense. Lord, why should not I, whose eyes have no less seen thy salvation, say, "Now

let thy servant depart, not in peace only, but in a joyful sense of my instant glory?"

XXXVII. When I think on my Saviour in his agony and on his cross, my soul is so clouded with sorrow, as if it would never be clear again. Those bloody drops and those dreadful ejaculations, methinks, should be past all reach of comfort. But when I see his happy eluctation out of these pangs, and hear him cheerfully rendering his spirit into the hands of his Father; when I find him trampling upon his grave, attended with glorious angels, and ascending in the chariot of a cloud to his heaven; I am so elevated with joy, that I seem to have forgotten there was ever any cause of grief in those sufferings. I could be passionate to think, O Saviour, of thy bitter and ignominious death, and, most of all, of thy vehement strugglings with thy Father's wrath for my sake; but thy conquest and glory take me off, and calls me to hallelujahs of joy and triumph, "Blessing and honour, glory and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever,” Rev. v. 13.

XXXVIII. It is not hard to observe, that the more holy any person is, the more he is afflicted with others' sin. Lot vexed his righteous soul with the unclean conversation of the Sodomites; David's eyes gushed out rivers of water, because men kept not the law. Those who can look with dry and undispleased eyes upon another's sin, never truly mourned for their own. Had they abhorred sin, as sin, the offence of a God would have been grievous to them, in whomsoever. It is a godless heart, that doth not find itself concerned in God's quarrel, and that can laugh at that which the God of heaven frowns at. My soul is nearest to me; my sorrow therefore for my sin must begin at home; but it may not rest there: from thence it shall diffuse itself all the world over. "Who is offended and I burn not?" Who offendeth, and I weep not?

XXXIX. The world little considers the good advantage that is made of sins. Surely the whole church of God hath reason to bless God for Thomas's unbelief; not in the act, which was odious after so good assurances; but in the issue. His doubt proves our evidence; and his con

fession, after his touch had convinced him, was more noble than his incredulity was shameful. All his attendance upon Christ had not taught him so much divinity, as this one touch. Often had he said "My Lord;" but never "My God," till now. Even Peter's confession, though rewarded with the change of his name, came short of this. The flame that is beaten down by the blast of the bellows, rises higher than otherwise it would; and the spring-water that runs level in the plain, yet if it fall low, it will therefore rise high the shaken tree roots the deeper. Not that we should "sin, that grace may abound; God forbid :" he can never hope to be good, that will be therefore ill, that may be the better: but that our holy zeal should labour to improve our miscarriages to our spiritual gain, and the greater glory of that Majesty whom we have offended. To be bettered by grace is no mastery; but to raise more holiness out of sin, is a noble imitation of that holy God, who brings light out of darkness, life out of death.

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XL. Every man best knows his own complaints. We look upon the outsides of many whom we think happy, who, in the mean time, are secretly wrung with the inward sense of their own concealed sorrows; and, under a smooth and calm countenance, smother many a tempest in their bosom. There are those whose faces smile while their conscience gripes them closely within. There are those that can dissemble their poverty and domestic vexations, reserving their sighs till their back be turned; that can pick their teeth abroad, when they are fasting and hungry at home: but many a one forces a song, when his heart is heavy. No doubt Naomi made many a short meal, after her return to Bethlehem, yet did not whine to her great kindred in a bemoaning of her want: and good Hannah bit in many a grief which her insulting rival might not see. On the contrary, there are many whom we pity as miser.. able, that laugh in their sleeve, and applaud themselves in their secret felicity, and would be very loth to exchange conditions with those that commiserate them. A ragged cynic likes himself, at least as well as a great Alexander. The mortified Christian that knows both worlds, looks with a kind of contented scorn upon the proud gallant that contemns him, as feeling that heaven within him, which

the other is not capable to believe. It is no judging of men's real estate by their semblance, nor valuing others' worth by our own rate. And, as for ourselves, if we have once laid sure grounds of our own inward contentment and happiness, it matters not greatly, if we be misknown of the world.

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XLI. For one man to give titles to another, is ordinary; but for the great God to give titles to a poor wretched man, is no less than wonderful. Thus doth the Lord to Job; "There is none like him in the earth, a perfect and right man." O what must he needs be, in whom his Maker glories! Lo, who would have looked for a saint in so obscure a corner of the east; and in so dark a time, before ever the law gave light to the world? Yet even then, the land of Uz yields a Job. No time, no place can be any bar to an infinite mercy. Even this while, for ought I see, the sun shined more bright in Midian, than in Goshen. God's election will be sure to find out his own any where out of hell; and if they could be there, even there also. Amongst all those idolatrous heathen, Job is perfect and upright; his religion and integrity are so much the more glorious, because they are so ill-neighboured; as some rich diamond is set off by a dark foil. Ŏ the infinite goodness of the Almighty, that picks out some few grains out of the large chaff-heap of the world, which he reserves for the granary of a blessed immortality! "It is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth; but of God that sheweth mercy." We might well imagine, that such a sprig must sprout out of the stock of faithful Abraham. What other loins were likely to yield so holy an issue? And if his Sarah must be the mother of the promised seed, yet why might he not also raise a blessed seed from Keturah? The birth doth not always follow the belly: even this second brood yields an heir of his father's faith. It is said, that "to the sons of the concubines Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away to the east," Gen. xxv. 6. Surely this son of the concubine carries away as rich a legacy of his father's grace, as ever was enjoyed by the son of the promise at home, The gifts that Abraham gave to Midian, were nothing to those gifts which the God of Abraham gives to the son of Midian, who was "perfect and upright,

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one that feared God and eschewed evil." I perceive the holy and wise God meant to make this man a pattern, as of patience, so of all heavenly virtues. He could not be fit for that use, if he were not exquisite; and what can be wanting to that man, of whom God holily boasts that he is perfect? And now what metal is so fit to challenge the fire of affliction, as this pure gold? and who is so fit a match for the great adversary, as this champion of God? Never had he been put upon so hard a combat, if God had not well known both the strength that he had given him, and the happy success of his conflict. Little doth that good man know what wager is laid on his head, but strongly encounters all his trials. The Sabeans have bereft him of his oxen; the Chaldees, of his camels; the fire from heaven, of his sheep; the tempest, of his children; Satan, of his health; and had not his wife been left to him for his greatest cross, and his friends for his further tormentors, doubt whether they had escaped. Lo, there sits the great potentate of the east, naked and forlorn in the ashes; as destitute of all comforts, as full of painful boils and botches; scraping his loathsome hide with a potsherd; yet, even in that woeful posture, possessing his soul in patience, maintaining his innocence, justifying his Maker, cheering himself in his Redeemer, and happily triumphing over all his miseries, and at last made the great mirror of divine bounty to all generations. Now must Job pray for his friendly persecutors, and is so high in favour with God, that it is made an argument of extreme wrath against Israel, that though Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in the land, they should deliver none but their own souls; Ezek. xiv. 14, 20. O God, this saint could not have had this strength of invincible patience without thee: thou that rewardest it in him, didst bestow it upon him. It is thy great mercy to crown thine own works in us. Thy gifts are free. Thou canst fortify even my weak soul with the same powers: strengthen me with the same grace, and impose what thou wilt.

XLII. As it shall be once in glory, so it is in grace there are degrees of it. The apostle, that said of his auditors, "They have received the Holy Ghost as well as we," did not say, They have received the Holy Ghost as