( 108 ) 08 ́). contrary prevalent errors.-In this answer we bind ourfelves, in our respective stations and callings, to endeavour, to our utmost, to promote the above-mentioned scope and design of the Act and Teftimony, in, (1.) Firmly adhering to, and declaring the divine truths therein afferted, in oppofition to the contrary errors. (2.) In cordially thanking God for the important mercies therein recorded, and exciting others to do the fame. (3.) In mourning over the finful backslidings therein condemned, and in exciting others to do the fame, and in watching against all approbation of these, or any fimilar fteps of apoftacy from our once attained reformation. PLEASANT PLEASANT AND PRACTICAL HINTS, CHIEFLY FROM SAMUEL RUTHERFORD, COLLECTED BY MR BROWN. You, my dearly beloved people of Anwoth, and longed for in the Lord, my joy and my crown in the day of Christ, on whom, next to him and his fallen church, my thoughts are fixed day and night, and who have the largest share of my sorrows and joys, and are the subject. of my cares, fears, prayers, and tears: As I am in bonds for my high and lofty, my only and princely Mafter, my Lord Jefus Christ, so I am in bonds on account of my faithfulness to your fouls. Could I have caused you to drink foul and muddy waters of human inventions, and fed you upon paftures trodden by mens feet, and en-, fnared you into finful compliances, I might have lived at eafe; but the Almighty was a terror to me, and his fear made me afraid. He knows that my exercise of my ministry was dear to me; but not fo dear as Jefus : Christ my Lord. My Lord. My one joy on earth, the apple of mine eye and marrow of my delight, was to preach him: This they have violently taken from me: But mine eyes are to the Lord, and I know that I fhall fee his falvation.-Oh that I could lay my dearest joys, next to Christ, between you and everlasting destruction!—Oh that I had paper as broad as heaven and earth, nay as ten thousand heavens, and had ink as the ocean and all the funtains and rivers on earth, and were able to write the worth, the excellence, the fweetnefs, and the due praises of my dear and well-beloved, and that you could read and understand it !What could I want, if my miniftrations among you iffued in the falvation of you all? How well beftowed I fhould then think my pained breaft, my fore back, and crazed body, in fpeaking early and late to you! God is my witness, that the eternal falvation of you all would be two heavens, two falvations to me. I take the fun and light which beheld us, the ftones and timber of the kirk which contained us, and your own confciences to witness, that I faithfully reprefented the covenant of grace as the marriage-contract betwixt Chrift and you, and travelled with free and full offers of falvation to you; and that, at sacramental and other occafions, I fent many love-letters and love-tokens to you. I hear that, fince my departure, many of you are returned to your former wicked courses. In the name, and by the authority of the Son of God, my great King, I fummon all fuch perfons, and arrest them, foul and body, to the day of our dreadful appearance before the Judge of the world; and I declare that their eternal damnation ftands fubfcribed and fealed in heaven by him; and that I am ready to stand up as a preaching witness against them, to their face, in that day, day, and to fay AMEN to their everlasting condemmation, except they repent. In this condition I leave all Sabbath-breakers, drunkards, fwearers, oppreffors, deceivers, time-ferving Atheists, gilded hypocrites, liars, flatterers, &c. bound over to the redoubled vengeance of the Mediator,-even though I could be glad to have my own heavenly happiness suspended hundreds of years if that could promote your being all in heaven be- . fore me. But, as for you, broken-hearted believers in Jefus Chrift, all his confolations contained in his Old and New Teftament, confirmed by his death, are your own. O what a Father and Husband you have! If heaven and earth were confolidated into pure gold, it could not weigh the ten thousandth part of Chrift's love to one foul, even to me his poor prifoner. If there were as many worlds as all the angels could number and multiply, joined together, they could not all be a fcale for weighing his infinite excellency, sweetness, and love.→→→ Should a rofe, larger than ten thousand worlds, and decked with all the poffible beauty and fragrance of a creature, fpring up, one view and smell of the Rofe of Sharon would render all its comeliness and smell comparatively contemptible. Oh that I could make an open proclamation of his infinite beauty and fweetnefs, while all the men and women, that ever did or fhall exist, flocked around, and stood looking on, admiring and adoring him! Oh that I could help you to difcern and love him; and that all the world would centre their love in him, upon whom the Father hath fixed his! Oh receive him into your houses and hearts!Since ever I knew him, Jefus Chrift hath been alway kind K. 2 kind to me; but now, while I fuffer for his fake, he outdoes himself in kindness. I would not, for all the profits, pleafures, and honours on earth, want his lovevifits, his kind breathings, kiffes, fmiles, and embracements. I, therefore, beseech you, by all the mercies of God, by all the fighs, tears, and blood of our Lord Jefus Chrift, and by the eternal falvation of your fouls, to prefs toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in him, that you and I may happily meet among the congregation of the firft-born before the throne of God and the Lamb, and for ever feed on his provifion and fruits, and drink his living water.-Strive to enter in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to deftruction, and many there be who go therein; but ftrait is the gate, and narrow is the way, that leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Many that feek to enter in shall not be able. Abftain from all appearance of evil; follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man fhall fee the Lord; beware of following the unfaithful paftors of this generation, who lead you from Jefus Chrift and his good old way. My fellow fufferers for the caufe of Chrift in Ireland, I rejoice to hear of your faith and love, and that perfecutions and cruel mockings have not chafed our alllovely Bridegroom from thoufands among you. You nee fearch for no other Christ, nor any other way of worshipping him, than he hath revealed to you in his word. I can now experimentally atteft, that we never come near to the due love and eftimation of Him who is fairer than the fons of men. Were ten thousand heavens |