of the house that we are come of, it is when they come up into the great no new thing, my dear brother, for Angel's golden censer, that compasus to be under jealousies and missionate Advocate will put together takes about the love of God. What my broken prayers, and perfume think ye of this, that the man Christ them: words are but accents of was tempted to believe there were prayer. Oh (say ye) I am slain but two persons in the blessed God- with hardness of heart, and troubled head, and that the Son of God, the with confused and melancholious substance and co-eternal Son, was thoughts. Answ. My dear brother, not the lawful Son of God? Did What would ye conclude thence, not Satan say, If thou be the Son that ye knew not well who aught of God? 5. Ye say, that ye know you! I grant: Oh, my heart is hard! not what to do. Your Head said Oh, my thoughts of faithless sorrow! once that same word, or not far from Ergo, I know not who aught me, it, John xii. 27. Now is my soul were good logic in heaven amongst troubled, and what shall I say? angels and the glorified; but down And faith answered Christ's What in Christ's hospital, where sick and shall I say? with these words, O distempered sculs are under cure, it tempted Saviour, askest thou, What is not worth a straw; give Christ shall I say? Say, Pray, Father, time to end his work in your save me from this hour. What heart; hold on in feeling and be Course can ye take but pray and wailing your hardness; for that frist Christ his own comforts? He is softness to feel hardness. 2. is no dyvour, take his word. Oh I charge you to make psalms of say ye) I cannot pray. Answ. Christ's praises for his begun work Honest sighing is faith breathing of grace; make Christ your musić and whispering in the ear: the life and your song; for complaining and is not out of faith, where there is feeling of want doth often swallow sighing, looking up with the eyes, up your praises. What think ye of and breathing toward God. Lam. those who go to hell never troubled iii. 36. Hide not thine ear at my with such thoughts? If your exerbreathing. But what shall I do in cises be the way to hell, God help spiritual exercises? ye say, Answ. me; I have a cold coal to blow at, 1. If ye knew particularly what to and a blank paper for heaven: I do, it were not a spiritual exercise. give you Christ's caution, and my 2. In my weak judgment ye would heaven surety for your salvation. first say, I would glorify God in Lend Christ your melancholy, for believing David's salvation, and the Satan hath no right to make a bride's marriage with the Lamb, and chamber in your melancholy; bor love the church's slain Husband, al-row joy and comforts from the though I cannot for the present be- Comforter; bid the Spirit do his lieve mine own salvation. 3. Say, office in you; and remember, that I will not pass from my claim; sup- faith is one thing, and the feeling pose Christ would pass from his and notice of faith another; God claim to me, it shall not go back forbid that feeling were proprium upon my side: howbeit my love to quarto modo to all the saints; and him be not worth a drink of water, that this were good reasoning, nó yet Christ shall have it such as it is. feeling, no grace. I am sure, yè 4. Say, I shall rather spill twenty were not always, these twenty years prayers, than not pray at all: let by-past, actually knowing that ye my broken words go up to heaven; live; yet all this time ye are living Yours in his sweet Lord Jesus, St. Andrews, Jan. 8, 1640. Madam, LETTER XXXI. so it is with the life of faith. But, [Lord shall be Midwife. Oh that alas! dear brother, it is easy for this land be not like Ephraim, an me to speak words and syllables of unwise son, that stayeth too long in peace; but Isa. lvii. 19. telleth you, the place of breaking forth of chil I create peace; there is but one dren! Your Ladyship is blessed Creator ye know. Oh, that ye may with children, who are honoured to get a letter of peace sent you from build up Christ's waste places again; heaven! Pray for me, and for grace I believe your Ladyship will think to be faithful, and gifts to be able them well bestowed on that work, with tongue and pen to glorify God. and that Zion's beauty is your joy I forget you not. this is a mark and evidence from heaven, which helpeth weak ones to & Rhold their grip, when other marks fail them. I hope your Ladyship is at a good understanding with Christ; and that, as becometh a Christian, ye take him up aright (for many mistake and mishape Christ) in his comings and goings; your wants and I RECEIVED your Ladyship's let- falls proclaim, ye have nothing of ter; but because I was still going your own, but what ye borrow; (nay, through the country for the affairs yourself is not your own) but Christ of the church, I have had no time hath given himself to you; put to answer it. I had never more Christ to the bank, and heaven shall cause to fear than I have now, when be your interest and income; love my Lord hath restored me to my him, for ye cannot over-love him; second created heaven on earth, and take up your house in Christ, let hath turned my apprehended fears him dwell in you, and abide in him; into joys, and great deliverance to and then ye may look out of Christ, his church, whereof I have my share and laugh at the clay heavens, that and part. Alas that weeping prayers, the sons of men are seeking after on answered and sent back from heaven this side of the water, Christ mindwith joy, should not have laughing eth to make your losses grace's great praises! O that this land would re- advantage; Christ will lose nothing pent, and lay burdens of praises of you; nay, not your sins, for he upon the top of the fair mount hath an use for them, as well as for Zion! Madam, except this land be your service; howbeit ye are to humbled, a reformation is rather my lothe yourself for these. I hope ye wonder than belief at this time; but fetch all the heaven ye have here in surely it must be a wonder, and what this life from that which is up ais done already is a wonder; our bove; and that your anchor is casten Lord must restore beauty to his as high and deep as Christ; oh, but churches without hire; for we were it is far and many a mile to his botsold without money, and now our tom! If I had known long since, buyers repent them of the bargain, as I do now, (though still alas ! I and would gladly give again better am ignorant) what was in Christ, I cheap than they bought us; they would not have been so late in startdevoured Jacob, and ate up his peo- ing to the gate to seek him. Oh, ple as bread; now Jacob is growing what can I do or say to him, who a living child in their womb, and hath made the north render me back they would fain be delivered of the again! A grave is no sure prison to child, and render the birth; our him for the keeping of dry bones. your own Wo is me, that my foolish sorrow ing to the Fountain, when and unbelief, being on horseback, cistern is dry a difference there did ride so proudly and witlessly must be betwixt Christ's well and over my Lord's providence; but your borrowed water; and why but when my faith was asleep, Christ ye have need of emptiness and drywas awake; and now, when I am ing up, as well as ye have need of awake, I say, he did all things well. the well? want, and a hole, there Oh, infinite wisdom! Oh, incom- must be in our vessel, to leave room parable loving kindness! Alas, that to Christ's art; his well hath its own the heart I have, is so little and need of thirsty drinkers, to comworthless for such a Lord as Christ mend infinite love, which from eteris! Oh, what odds find the saints nity did brew such a cellar of living in hard trials, when they feel sap at waters for us Ye commend his free their roots, betwixt them and sun love; and it is well done: oh, if I burnt withered professors! crosses could help you, and if I could be and storms cause them to cast their master-conveener, to gather an earth blooms and leaves. Poor worldlings. full and an heaven full of tongues, what will ye do when the span dipped and steeped in my Lord's length of your forenoon's laughter is well of love, or his wine of love, ended, and when the weeping side even tongues drunken with his love, of providence is turned to you? Ito raise a song of praises to him, put all the favours ye have bes-betwixt the east and west end, and towed on my brother upon Christ's furthest points of the broad heavscore, in whose books are many ens! If I were in your case (as such counts, and who will requite alas! my dry and dead heart is not them; I wish you to be builded now in that garden) I would borrow more and more upon the stone laid leave to come, and stand upon the in Zion, and then ye shall be the banks and coasts of that sea of love, more fit to have a hand in rebuilding and be a feasted soul, to see love's our Lord's fallen tabernacle in this fair tide, free love's high and lofty land, in which ye shall find great waves, each of them higher than ten peace, when ye come to grips with earths, flowing in upon pieces of death the king of terrors. The God lost clay. O welcome, welcome, of peace be with your Ladyship, great sea! Oh, if I had as much and keep you blameless till the day love for wideness and breadth, as of our Lord Jesus. Your Ladyship's at all obedience in his sweet Lord and Master. St. Andrews. LETTER XXXII. twenty outmost shells and spheres of the heaven of heavens, that I might receive in a little flood of his S. R. free love! Come, come, dear friend, and be pained, that the king's wine cellar of free love and his banqueting house (O so wide, so stately! O so God-like, so glory-like!) should be so abundant, so overflowing, and your shallow vessel so little, to take GRACE, mercy and peace be to you: in some part of that love: but since the necessary impediments of my it cannot come into you, for want of calling have hitherto kept me from room, enter yourself into this sea of making a return to your letter, the love, and breathe under these waheads whereof I shall now briefly ters, and die of love, and live as one answer; as, 1. I approve your go-dead and drowned of this love. But To his very dear friend JOHN FENNICK. great why do ye complain of waters going come and conquer. It shall be over your soul, and that the smoke victory, to blow out the flame of of the terrors of a wrathful Lord that furnace ye are now in, with the doth almost suffocate you, and bring breath of faith: and when hell, men, you to death's brink? I know the malice, cruelty, falsehood, devils, fault is in your eyes, not in him; it the seeming glooms of a sweet is not the rock that fleeth and mov Lord, meet you in the teeth, if ye eth, but the green sailor; if your then as a captive of hope, as one sense and apprehension be made fettered in hope's prison, run to your judge of his love, there is a graven strong hold, even from God's gloomimage made presently, even a changing to God glooming; and believe ed god, and a foe god who was once the salvation of the Lord in the (when ye washed your steps with dark, which is your only victory: butter, and the rock poured you out your enemies are but pieces of marivers of oil, Job. xxix. 6.) a Friend-licious clay; they shall die as men, God. Either now or never let God and be confounded. But that your work: ye had never, since ye was a troubles are many at once, and arman, such a fair field for faith; for rows come in from all airts, from a painted hell, and an apprehension country, friends, wife, children, foes, of wrath in your Father, is faith's estate, and right-down from God, opportunity to try what strength is who is the hope and stay of your in it. Now, give God as large a soul, I confess is more, and very measure of cliarity as ye have of heavy to be borne: yet all these are sorrow; now see faith to be faith not more than grace; all these bits indeed, if ye can make your grave of coals, casten in your sea of merbetwixt Christ's feet, and say, cy, cannot dry it up. Your troubles Though he should slay me, I will are many and great, yet not trust in him; his believed love shall ounce-weight beyond the measure of be my winding-sheet, and all my infinite wisdom, I hope, nor beyond grave-clothes; I shall roll and sew the measure of grace that he is to in my soul, my slain soul, in that bestow; for our Lord never yet web, his sweet and free love;' and brake the back of his child, nor spilt let him write upon my grave, 'Here his own work. nature's plaistering lieth a believing dead man, breathing and covnterfeit-work he doth often out and making an hole in death's break in shreads and putteth out a broad-side, and the breath of faith candle not lighted at the Sun of cometh forth through the hole.' See righteousness; but he must cherish now if ye can overcome and prevail his own reeds, and handle them softwith God, and wrestle God's tempt ly; never a reed getteth a thrust ing to death quite out of breath. as with the Mediator's hand, to lay tothat renowned wrestler did, Hos.gether the two ends of the reed. O xii. 3. And by his strength he what bonds and ligaments hath our had power with God; ver. 4. Yea, Chirurgeon of broken spirits, to he had power over the Angel, and bind up all his lame and bruised ones prevailed.' He is a strong man in- with! cast your disjointed spirit in deed, who overmatcheth heaven's his lap, and lay your burden upon strength, and the holy One of Is- One, who is so willing to take your rael, the strong Lord, which is done cares and your fears off you, and to all by a secret supply of divine exchange and niffer your crosses, strength within, wherewith the and to give you new for old, and gold weakest being strengthened, over- for iron, even to give you garments an : of praise for the spirit of heaviness. upon such a King's love, were a bed It is true in a great part what ye next to the flower of beaven's glory. write of this kirk, that the letter of I am sorry to hear you speak, in religion only is reformed, and scarce your letter, of a God angry at you, that: I do not believe, our Lord and of the sense of his indignation, will build his Zion in this land, upon which only ariseth from suffering for this skin of reformation: so long as Jesus, all that is now come upon our scum remaineth, and our heart-you. Indeed, apprehended wrath idols are keeped, this work must be flameth out of such ashes as appreat a stand; and therefore our Lord hended sin, but not from suffering must yet sift this land, and search for Christ: but, suppose ye were in us with candles; and I know, he hell, for by-gones and for old debt, shall give and not sell us his king. I hope ye owe Christ a great sum of dom. His grace and our remaining charity, to believe the sweetness of guiltiness must be compared, and his love. I know what it is to sin the one must be seen in the glory of in that kind; it is to sin out (if it it, and the other in the sinfulness of were possible) the unchangeableness it but I desire to believe, and of a God-head out of Christ, and to would gladly hope to see, that the sin away a lovely and unchangeable glancing and shining lustre of glory God. Put more honest apprehen. coming from the diamonds and stones sions upon Christ, put on his own set in the crown of our Lord Jesus, mask upon his face, and not your shall cast rays and beams many vail made of unbelief, which speak. thousand miles about. I hope eth as if he borrowed love to you Christ is upon a great marriage; from you, and your demerits and and that his wooing and suiting of sinful deservings. Oh, no! Christ his excellent bride doth take its be-is man, but he is not like man; he ginning from us, the ends of the hath man's love in heaven, but it is earth. O what joy and what glory lustred with God's love, and it is would I judge it, if my heaven very God's love ye have to do with : should be suspended till I might when your wheels go about, hestandhave leave to run on foot to be a leth still. Let God be God, and be witness of that marriage-glory, and ye a man, and have ye the deserving see Christ put on the glory of his of man, and the sin of one, who last married bride, and his last mar- hath suffered your Well-beloved to riage love on earth, when he shall slip away, nay, hath refused him enenlarge his love-bed, and set it upon trance, when he was knocking, till the top of the mountains, and take his head and locks were frozen: yet, in the elder sister, the Jews, and what is that to him? His book the fulness of the Gentiles! It were keepeth your name, and is not printheaven's honour and glory upon ed and re-printed, and changed and earth, to be his lackey, to run at corrected; and why, but he should his horse's foot, and hold up the go to his place and hide himself? train of his marriage-robe royal, in howbeit his departure be his own the day of our high and royal Solo- good work, yet the belief of it in mon's espousals. But O what glory that manner is your sin; but wait to have a seat or bed in Jesus's cha on till he return with salvation, and riot, that is bottomed with gold, and cause you rejoice in the latter end. paved and lined over, and floored It is not much to complain; but within with love for the daughters rather believe than complain, and sit of Jerusalem! Cant. iii. 10, To lye in the dust, and close your mouth, |