A few days ago Mr. H. reproved me in a very friendly manner, which made me weigh my conduct in the balance of the fanctuary. The refult is, I doubt whether I do not live too much to myfelf: whether I am not reproved by 1 Cor. x. 33. Even as I pleafe all men, not seeking mine own profit, but the profit of many that they may be faved. Retirement is the foil in which my foul profpers. There I endeavour to remember the way by which the Lord has led me in the wilderness, and to raife my Ebenezer of thanksgiving and praife. In company, my fpirit feems removed from its place of reft; for which reafon I go out less than ever. I do not know but love of folitude grows upon me, perhaps more than it ought. I have not strength to follow that advice, "Prefent with God by recollection feem, Yet present, by your cheerfulness, with men." While in, and after returning from company, I am often oppreffed: I dare not fay with a guilty confcience; but with an anxious fcrupulofity, fearing I have neither done, nor got the good I ought. Is falvation from this felf-occupation included in the promife? Luke i. 74. Till I fully experience it, may I venture, for the fake of others, to be unbent, diffufive, and communicative; without endangering the profperity of my own foul, or expofing myself to the torturing reflection, "Mine own vineyard I have not kept?" He that is mighty hath already done great things for me; but I want to be more fully faved, that I may ever abide in him, and that my fruit may remain. I make no apology for the liberty I have taken; being perfuaded you will willingly affift, Rev. Sir, your unworthy Servant, [Concluded from page 167.] NOUGH. The Tyrant ran his race; * His foul is gone to its own place, In every empire, town and freet, In ominous array! Except a few, but thinly fown, Who dare their God and Saviour own, While millions fall a prey. Go to the regal domes and fee Doth meannefs dirt these shrines? Attend the lower clafs of life, Defert each focial tie: Domeflic broils, and curfes fhow, The lifping babes proficient too In hellith liberty. * Nero. Y. Shall Shall I exempt the hallowed fane ? O what a contrast to behold But there are fome exceptions here, Adorn with humble zeal; Whofe lives are comments on the creed, Whose words, from heterodoxy freed, Child of the duft, if thou wouldst be Attend my words with care: Not fo,- for human nature fhowed A holy purifying flame, And man flood forth complete, But foon the portraiture divine Through thy ancestor's frame: That facred will which Angels fwayed, One cafy pofitive command Determined them to fall or ftand; Creation's faireft work complyed; Not long!His other felf began And lured him into fin! The fatal prefent foon she gave, Thus, Death in all its pomp took place, As ftreams, through all their mazy courfe So all of human-kind, Proceeding from the fœderal head, Like him, emphatically dead, In chains of guilt confined. But But fee! the great Delivérer fee! See heaven's eternal Son! He lays his robes of flate afide, And God with God, was man with man, He weeps, and bleeds, and dies! He dies for all the ruined race; To fuch, the Almighty fufferer cries, Shall feel the fprinkled blood: Shall feel, from faith's ftrong evidence, 223 She |