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taken zeal while they tune their golden harps to the praises of Him who loved them, and washed them from their sins in his own blood. I hope, my dear boy, you will study to recommend yourself in all your connections by a humble, kind, and obliging carriage, and especially let your behaviour to your tutor ever be respectful: ever consider him as your truest friend; and may the best of friends be with you and bless you! I am, my dear R

R,

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THE account you gave us, in your last, of the fire at N was very awful and affecting. How much are we indebted to a watchful and merciful Providence for that exemption from many temporal evils with which we are distinguished; and especially for that eternal deliverance from eternal evil which, I trust, we have to rejoice in through Jesus Christ! "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus." The blood of Jesus, the true Pascal Lamb, sprinkled by faith on the heart, is a full security against the approach of all real evil; and

the covenant of God's glorious grace is a sure foundation of real good: for this covenant constitutes every believer in Christ a child of God, and places him immediately under his kind superintendance as an infinitely tender parent, and an all-sufficient God. This real interest is therefore eternally secure, and must be in the wisest and best manner promoted. "He dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, and abideth under the shadow of the Almighty." You speak, my dear boy, of the use and abuse of the promises. They have undoubtedly, as you observe, been misapplied and perverted in many cases: they are children's meat, and no stranger may intermeddle with the joy they are intended to inspire: they are the heavenly manna sent down to supply the daily wants of God's pilgrim people: they are sweet as honey and the honey-comb to every true Israelite, and wisely adapted to all the circumstances of his present state: they afford milk for babes, and strong meat for strong men: they are a rich treasury of pardoning mercy and sanctifying grace, of counsel, and comfort, and strength, and quickening energy, and of whatever the Christian can need. For the Lord knows our frame: he had a perfect foresight of it from all eternity; and in the purpose and provision of his grace, he had respect to all the infirmities and wants of every kind with which his children would in after-ages be encompassed. This purpose and provision, this covenant with all its precious promises, is represented to us under the beautiful image of a

river clear as chrystal, proceeding from the Throne of God and of the Lamb. The streams of this river, flowing in ten thousand directions, make glad the city of our God: they visit every family of God's Israel, and are found as a well of living waშ. ter springing up in every heart. Precious streams! they afford the richest delight, and are followed by no remorse. They satisfy, but do not cloy. They sometimes have found their way into the stately palaces of the great, but more usually they bless the cottages of the needy poor, and ever beautify the meek with salvation.-Two things are requisite, to justify our humble claim to the grace of the promises. The first is this: we must have reason on scriptural ground to conclude that we are the seed of Abraham and the children of God. "If we are Christ's, then are we Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." But I have no authority to say, "I am Christ's," unless my temper and conduct make it appear that I am no longer the servant of sin, the willing slave of corruption; and that I have practically chosen the way of the Divine precepts. I have no just reason to say that I ain Christ's, unless I can find in me that humiliation and poverty of spirit, that prevailing bias towards the Gospel covenant, which will make it appear that I am no longer under the law but under grace; and as a sinner, self-condemned and without strength, have fled for refuge to lay hold on the glorious Hope which the Gospel sets before me. Nor

have I any just reason to say I am Christ's, unless it be manifest from the heaven-aspiring bent of my soul, that I am not of the world, but chosen out of it, and prevailingly seeking those things which are above and I may add, if I am Christ's, I must doubtless think affectionately, and gratefully, and honourably, and highly of him. He will be precious unto me as he is unto them that believe; I shall delight in the mention and memory of his name, and be actuated with a becoming zeal for his glory: I shall love all them who love him, and who bear his image: I shall rejoice in the growth of his kingdom, and devoutly pray for the peace and prosperity of Jerusalem. Let it be your concern, my dear R-, and mine, to make good our claim to the promises on such grounds as these; and then, while they who mind earthly things think lightly of them, we shall call them the joy and rejoicing of our heart: while the iniquitous person and the enthusiast deceive their own souls by a misapplication of them, we shall, by faith, live upon them, and in sweet experience know the good of God's chosen. The other thing requisite to justify our claim to the promises is a careful improvement of the light and strength we have. "Trust in the Lord and do good," is the counsel of Heaven; and, indeed, then only have we reason to expect the Divine blessing in a renewed communication of his grace, when we are using the means, employing the ability, and walking by the light we already have. If we are found transgressing

the rules of duty, or remiss in our regards to them, no wonder if we find ourselves in the sad state of Sampson, when he arose to shake himself as at other times, and wist not that the Lord was departed from him. Our Lord has made it our duty, not only to believe, but also to watch and to pray, that we enter not into temptation. Oh, my dear R, the more you are acquainted with the corruptions of the heart, the snares of the world, and the devices of Satan, the more occasion you will find for a serious and daily attention to this kind and important admonition. Oh, be it your concern to converse much with God and your heart in secret, and that will be the happy means of keeping your soul alive in its opposition to sin, and of defeating the cruel designs of an ever-watchful and crafty foe, who has long been practised in the arts of deceiving precious souls. I am, my dear R—,

very affectionately your father,

LETTER XXI.

TO MR. R— B.

J. BOWDEN.

April 4, 1794.

MY DEAR R~~,

I AM glad to find you often think with pleasure and inward delight of the Gospel-scheme, and the

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