How pos

diligently to examine our own. sible is it, to hold the strongest sectarian prejudices, and yet be wholly destitute of all vital godliness, and of all respect for the very first principles of divine truth.

May we continually pray for an understanding heart; a heart renewed in divine knowledge by the Spirit of God; that we may discern between the polar truths of the Gospel, and the doubtful inductions of unassisted human reason upon them!

Such, my dear, and very reverend Mother, is the short narrative of my little tour. May it beguile some of the dreary hours of your tedious captivity. M. de Brienne, who will deliver my packet to you, will give you an account of our proceedings. Well, the Lord is still with us! Though some of us are in exile, and some in prisons; though you are surrounded by an armed guard, and we wander over the face of the earth, without house or home, we all know in whom we have believed! In our prosperity we believed in him as our Redeemer, in adversity we experience him indeed to be our strength. Though separated far from each other, he

the Lord is present to every one. May we all renewedly look to that blessed God and Saviour, who is above all, and over all, and in us all; and by whom alone we spiritually live, and move, and have our being!

Blessed be God! he has given faith and love to all his suffering children, to bear each other on their hearts; and he has promised that where two agree on earth, touching any thing, it shall be done for his sake in heaven. Let us then pray in faith, that all his holy will be wrought in us; that waiting on him, we may daily renew our strength, and experiencing his faithfulness, that we may be more deeply rooted and grounded in the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge. My venerable mother, and dear sisters! be not faithless but believing. The Lord increase in us that faith which is the subsistence of things hoped for, ελπιζομένων ύποςασις, and the evidence of things

not seen.

Though armed men guard your walls, and keep you in on every side, yet the Lord is with you ; and God, even your God, dwells within in the temple of your hearts.

Cut off from the world, who hates us, let us rejoice, that we can more constantly commune with that Saviour, who loves us, and gave himself for us. Interdicted the sacrament by an arbitrary decree: rejoice, that whilst deprived of the external sign, the invisible grace is still your's; and you may still feed by faith in your hearts, on the true bread from heaven, and on the true wine of the kingdom. If no outward ministry be allowed you; if your oppressors abolish every outward ceremony in which ye seek Christ in the desert,* or in the secret chamber, still I trust you will know by experience, that the kingdom of God is within you; even righteousness, and peace, and joy, in the Holy Ghost. Be not discouraged that your chapel is levelled with the ground, your gardens torn up, and that serpents infest your retreats. God is a spirit, and his true worship is in spirit and in truth. If your ministers be dispersed over the face of the earth, and the an

*The desert of Port Royal.

them of praise be heard at Port Royal no more, submit it all to Christ our Saviour. To the priests of Baal, and not of Christ, are repetitions of words indispensably necessary. Christ dwells in the heart of true believers, in silent faith, speaking only by active love.

Whilst the pastors who have been accustomed to distribute to you the bread of life, are far off, remember that legions of the angels who minister to those who are heirs of salvation, wait unseen upon you. But above all, Jesus, the great angel of the covenant, is ever with you. Ever does his precious blood plead in your behalf, at the throne of God; and ever is his blessed Spirit with you, to guide you into all truth. Especially, will it guide us into that fundamental one; a deep sense of our own utter vileness, emptiness, and nothingness. Then only can we know his all-sufficient fulness. No doubt the day is hastening, which shall make these polar truths fully manifest. Whilst we pray for our unhappy persecutors, may our own theme of rejoi

cing ever be not that we have already attained, but that we live in the day of atonement. That the Lord has in infinite mercy revealed himself to us as the Lord, long-suffering and gracious, full of mercy and loving-kindness, and whose mercy endureth for ever.

On this free grace, on this boundless mercy, on this precious blood, as the only plea or hope of sin-polluted souls, I cast myself, you, and all our friends in Christ. Nay, I would that the whole world, and even our enemies, should draw near and partake with us.

And now, my dear and honored mother and sisters, farewell! If the heat of persecution should still continue, and if (according to the flesh) we should see each other's face no more; still am I well persuaded, that none of the dispersed members of our Jerusalem can ever forget each other before God. The same Lord who heard Jonah cry from the depths of hell, will listen to the prayers of his servants from the dungeons in which they are immured. Nor