MR. GEORGE JONES.

IT has been the fervent desire in my mind in this meeting, that we may individually endeavour to have our minds centered on the Lord, and know him to be our dwelling place; for if this is not our blessed experience, we are not likely clearly to see what his will concerning us is, or the path in which he would have us to go, or to receive ability to walk therein; but are in danger of being like pillars that lean on one side or another, and the enemy of our souls' happiness endeavours to draw our attention from being thus fixed on the Lord, and knowing him to be our dwelling place; that so by his gilded baits, his snares, and temptations, he may draw us aside from that path in which the Lord would have us to go. We cannot by our own ability, as men and creatures, and our own wisdom, rightly direct our own steps or preserve ourselves in that way which brings peace, and leads unto everlasting happiness. O then that we may be more and more engaged individually thus to put our trust on the Lord, to trust in him with all our hearts, not leaning to our understanding, in all our ways acknowledging him, that so our steps may be rightly directed, and that we may be enabled to

glorify him whilst here on earth, and be prepared, by walking in his counsel, to be admitted, when time to us here shall be no more, through the mercy of God in Christ Jesus our Lord, into everlasting rest and happiness.

MR. SAMUEL TUKE.

THE present meeting seems to call to my remembrance that admonition of the apostle where he saith, Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of his own good pleasure. We believe, that this is one of those passages, my friends, in which in a very few words much of the economy of divine grace is set forth; its two great parts, which we are so apt to separate one from the other, are put in close connection, and into a connection that the wise men of the world might be ready to say that it was almost paradoxical, that we are to work out our own salvation, and yet that it is another who worketh in us both to will and to do; and yet, my friends, whilst the learned man in one sense of the term may make great mistakes in regard to the bearing of these two great parts of the christian economy, I believe that to the wayfaring man though esteemed a fool in this world, that it is plain and easy to be comprehended, and it is also full not only of powerful caution and warning, but also full of gracious encouragement, full of instruction my friends, in that it shows. to us the absolute necessity that there is for us to

be engaged in our own behalf, and full of gracious encouragement inasmuch as under the sense of our weakness, of our helplessness, and of our utter inability to do any good thing as of ourselves, we are assured that he who hath called us to work, hath also promised, and hath declared, that he will work in us to will aright, and to do aright inasmuch as it will be according to his own good pleasure which is ever right; very much my dear friends I believe hath the enemy of souls been engaged among us—amongst mankind at large, I mean, and perhaps also not a little amongst us, in seeking to separate these two great parts of the christian economy, in leading us to depend too much upon our own exertions; leading us to think that we shall be able by our own plannings, and contrivances, and determinations, to work out our own salvation, and so to establish some false righteousness; a self righteousness, but, perhaps, even more frequently in those by leading them by the continued evidences of their own failures to be ready to think that it is in vain that they would work out their salvation, and so to give up the matter as hopeless and desperate. I mistake much, my friends, if it is not in the experience of some of you, as it hath been in my own, thus to labour in the very fire, thus to be tossing ourselves to and fro, seeking to establish our own righteousness, seeking to cleanse ourselves, and to act aright, and yet not willing to come in simple faith, and to be subject to that powerful