tunity of letting you know what the Lord does for my foul and body. With respect to my better part, I feel a degree of righteoufnefs, peace, and joy, and wait for the establishment of his internal kingdom in the Holy Ghoft; and the hopes of my being rooted and grounded in the love that cafts out every degree of flavifh fear, grow more lively every day. I thank God, I am not afraid of any evil tidings, and my heart ftands calm, believing in the Lord, and defiring him to do with me whatsoever he pleafeth. With refpect to my body, I know not what to fay, but the phyfician fays, "he hopes I fhall do well:" and fo I hope and believe too, whether I recover my ftrength or not. Health and ficknefs, life and death are best when the Lord fends them; and all things work together for good to thofe that love God.

I am forbid preaching; but, blessed be God, I am not forbid by my heavenly Phyfician, to pray, believe, and love. This is a fweet work which heals, delights, and ftrengthens. Let us do it till we recover our fpiritual ftrength; and then, whether we shall be feen on earth or not will matter nothing. I hope you bear me on your hearts, as I do you on mine. My with for you is, that you may be inward poffeffors of an inward kingdom of grace: that you may fo hunger and thirft after righteousness as to be filled; and that you may fo call on your heavenly Father in fecret, that he may reward you openly with abundance of grace, which may evidence to all, that he honours you, because you honour him.

O! be hearty in the caufe of religion. I would have you either hot or cold; for it is a fearful thing to be in danger of falling into the hands of

the

the living God, and fharing the fate of the lukewarm. Be humbly zealous for your own falvation, and for God's glory; nor forget to care for the falvation of each other. The cafe of wicked Cain is very common, and the practice of many fays, with that wretch, An I my brother's keeper? O pray God to keep you by his mighty power, through faith, to falvation. Keep yourselves in the love of God if you are there; and keep one another by example, reproof, exhortation, encouragement, focial prayer, and a faithful ufe of all the means of grace. Ule yourfelves to bow at Chrift's feet; as your Prophet, go to him continually for the holy anointing of his Spirit, who will be a teacher always near, always with you and in you. If you have that inward Inftructor, you will fuffer no material lofs, when your outward teachers are removed. Make the most of dear Mr. Greaves while you have him. While you have the light of God's word, believe in the fight, that you may be the children of the light, fitted for the kingdom of eternal light, where I charge you to meet, with joy, your affectionate brother and minister, I. F.

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O all who fear and love God in and about Madeley: Grace and peace, power and love, joy and triumph in Chrift be inultiplied to you, through the blood of the Lamb, through the word that teftifies of that blood, and through the Spirit who makes the application.

I Expected I should have been

with you to fee your love, and be edified by your converfation, but Providence has hindered. Twice i had fixed the day of my departure from this place; and twice, the night before that day, I was taken worfe than ufual, which, together with the unanimous forbiddings of my fpiritual, temporal, and medical friends here, made me put off my journey. The argument to which I have yielded is this," There is yet fome little probability, that if you stay here you might recover ftrength to do a little ministerial work; but if you go now you will ruin all." However, God is my witnefs, that, if I have not ventured my life to come and fee you, it was not from a defire to indulge myself, but to wait and see if the Lord would restore me a little ftrength, and add a few years to my life, that I might employ both in your service; juft as a horse is sometimes kept from his owner, and confined to the yard of a farrier, until he recovers the ability of doing his mafter fome fervice. I only defire to know, do, and fuffer the will of God concerning me; and I affure you, my dear brethren, if I faw it to be his will, that I fhould give up the means of health I have here, I would not tarry another day, but take my chance, and come to my dear charge, were the parifh fituated ten times more North than it is.

I do not, however, despair of praifing God with you in the body; but let us not ftay for this to praife him. Let us blefs him now; and if any of you are under a cloud of unbelief, and fee no matter of praife in being out of hell, in being redeemed by Chrift, crowned with thousands of fpiritual and temporal mercies, and called to take poffeffion of a kingdom of glory; I beg you would

praise

praise him on my account, who raifes me fo many friends in time, who afflicts me with fo gentle a hand, who keeps me from all impatience, and often fills me with confolation in my trouble; giving me a fweet hope that all things work, and fhall work together for good.

Love one another. The love you fhew one to another will greatly refresh my heart. Keep united to our common head, Jefus. Pray for your infirm minifter as he does for you; and let me hear of your growth in grace, which will be health to the withering bones of your unprofitable fervant, I. F.

P. S. Medicine does not feem to relieve me; but I rejoice that when outward remedies fail, there is one, the blood, and word, and Spirit of Jefus, which never fails;--which removes all spiritual maladies, and will furely give us eternal life. Let me recommend that remedy to you all: You all want it, and, bleffed be God, I can fay, Probatum eft-tried.

Newington, Dec. 28th, 1776.

To the Parishioners of Madeley.
My dear Parithioners,

I hoped to have spent the Chriftmas holydays with you, and to have miniftered to you in holy things; but the weakness of my body confining me here, I humbly fubmit to the divine difpenfation, and eate the trouble of my abfence, by being prefent with you in Spirit, and by reflecting on the plealure I have felt, in years paft,

while finging with you, Unto us a child is born, unto us a fon is given, Sc. This truth is as true now as it was then, and as worthy to be thankfully received at Newington as at Madeley. Let us, then, receive it with all readinefs, and it will unite us: we shall meet in Chrift the centre of lasting union, the fource of true life, the fpring of pure righteousness and joy; and our hearts fhall be full of the fong of angels, Glory be to God on high! Peace on earth! Good-will towards each other, and all mankind!

In order to this, may the eye of your underftanding be more and more opened to fee your need of a Redeemer; and to behold the fuitablenefs, freeness, and fulness of the redemption, which was wrought out by the Son of God, and which is applied by the Spirit, through faith. The with which glows in my foul is so ardent and powerful, that it brings me down on my knees, while I write, and, in that fupplicating pofture, I entreat you all, to confider and improve the day of your visitation, and to prepare in good earnest, to meet, with joy, your God and your unworthy paftor in another world. Weak as I was when I left Madeley, I hear that feveral, who were then young, healthy, and ftrong, have got the ftart of me; and that fome have been hurried into eternity, without being indulged with a moment's warning. May the awful accident ftrike a deeper confideration into all our fouls. May the found of their bodies, dafhed to pieces at the bottom of a pit, roufe us to a fpeedy converfion, that we may never fill into the bottomlefs pit, and that iniquity and delays may not be our eternal ruin. Tottering as 1 ftand on the brink of the grave,

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