Dear sirs, I had much more to say, but I am afraid that I have already kept you too long from sucking of the honeycomb, from drinking at the fountain. I have held you too long in the porch ; and therefore I shall only crave, that you will bear with my plainness, and overlook my weakness ; remembering that other addresses would savour more of flattery than of sincerity, more of policy than of piety, and would be both unlovely in me, and displeasing to you.^
Now the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ bless you and yours with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places, and make you yet more and more instrumental for his glory, and this nation's good, that your names may be for ever precious among his people, that they may bear you still upon their hearts before the Lord; which Ls, and shall be, the earnest and constant prayer of him who is,
Right honourable and worthy Sirs,
Yours in all Christian observance,
1 One of the chiefest mirrors to behold God in, is a reasonable soul, which finds itself out, saith one.
* Had I a purse suitable to my heart, not a poor godly soldier or sailor in England, who carries his life in one hand, but should have one of these books in the other, &c.
EPISTLE TO THE SAINTS.
To all saints that hold to Christ the head, and that walk according to the laws of the new creature, grace, merc}'^, and peace be multi- plied from God the Father, though our Lord Jesus Clirist.
Beloved in ouk Dearest Lord,
You are those worthies * of whom this world is not worthy,' Heb. xi. 38. You are the princes 'that prevail with God,' Gen. xxxii. 28. You are those 'excellent ones' in whom is all Christ's delight, Ps. xvi. 3. You are his glory. You are his picked, culled, prime instruments which he will make use of to carry on his best and greatest work against his worst and greatest enemies in these latter days. You are 'a seal' upon Christ's heart, you are ' engraven on the palms of his hand ;' your names are written upon his breasts, as the names of the children of Israel were upon Aaron's breastplate ; you are the ' epistle of Christ;' you are the ' anointed' of Christ ; you have ' the spirit of discerning ;' you have 'the mind of Christ.'' You have the greatest advantages and the choicest privileges to enable you to try truth, to taste truth, to apply truth, to defend truth, to strengthen truth, to uphold truth, and to improve truth.^ And therefore to whom should I dedicate this fol- lowing discourse, but to yourselves ? You have the next place to Christ in my heart; your good, your gain, your glory, your edification, your satisfaction, your confirmation, your consolation, j^our salvation, hath put me upon casting in my little, little mite into your treasure.
Beloved, you know that in the time of the law, God did as kindly accept of goats' hair and badgers' skins, of turtle-doves and young pigeons — they being the best things that some of his children had then to offer — as he did accept of gold, jewels, silk, and purple from others.
1 hope you will shew out the same God-like disposition towards me, in a kind accepting of what is offered in this treatise to your wise and serious consideration. I could wish it better for your sakes, yet such as
' Isa. iv. 6 ; Rev. xvii. 14, and xix. 8, 14 ; Cant. viii. 6 ; Isa. xlix. 16 ; Exod. xxviii. 29 ;
2 Cor. ii. 3 ; 1 John ii. 27; 1 Cor. i. 10, 12, 15, 16.
* You will not, with Pythagoras his scholars, magnify the ip^e dixit of the greatest clerks; neither will you helieve with Anaxagoras, that snow is black: nor yet will you say, as Antipater, king of Macedonia did, when one presented him with a book treating of happiness, iu irxa>-aX,", I have no leisure ; neither will you judge like those that like nothing but the Minervas of their own brains.
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it is I do in all love and humility present you with, desiring the Lord to make it an internal and eternal advantage to you.
I shall briefly acquaint you with the reasons that have moved poor me, unworthy I, — who am the least of all saints, who am not worthy to be reckoned among the saints, — to present this following discourse to public view ; and they are these that follow :
First, To answer the desires, and gratify the earnest and pious re- quests of several precious souls, who long to have these things printed upon their hearts, by the hand of the Spirit, that are printed in this book. God speaks aloud through the serious and affectionate desires of the saints ; and this hath made me willing to echo to their desires. If great men's desires are to be looked upon as commands, why should good men's desires be looked upon with a squint eye ? Seneca, a hea- then, could say that ipse aspectus boni viri deledat, the very looks of a good man delight one. How much more then should the desires of a good man overcome one ?'
Secondly, The good acceptance, the fair quarter that my labours of the like nature have found among those that fear the Lord, especially that treatise called ' Precious Remedies ajjainst Satan's Devices,'^ hath encouraged me to present this to public view, not doubting but that the Lord will bless it to the good of many, as I know he hath done the former. Wliich that he may, I shall not cease to pray, that my weak service may be accepted of the saints, and that their ' love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all sense,' Philip, i. 9-11.' That they may approve things that are excellent ; that they may be sincere, and without offence till the day of Christ ; being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God. ^
Thirdly, It is exceeding useful to the saints at all times, but especially in changing times, in times wherein every one calls out, ' Watchman, what of the night? watchman, what of the night? and the watchman answereth. The morning Cometh, and also the night,' Isa. xxi. 11, 12. Ah! Christians, the Lord is a-shaking heaven and earth ; he is a-staining the pride of all glory ; he is a-staining his garments with the blood of his enemies ;* he is renting and tearing, he is burning and breaking, he is pulling up and throwing down, Jer. xlv. 4, 5. Now in the midst of all these concussions and revolutions, thrice happy are those souls that have gained a well- grounded assurance of celestial things, Heb. x. 34, Such souls will not faint, sink, nor shrink in an hour of temptation. Such souls will keep their garments pure and white, and will follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes, Kev. iii. 4, and xiv. 4. Assurance is a believer's ark, where he sits, Noah-like, quiet and still in the midst of all distractions and destruc- tions, combustions and confusions. They are doubly miserable that have neither heaven nor earth, temporals, nor eternals, made sure to them in changing times, Ps. xxiii. 3, 4, Rev. vi. 12.
The fourth ground of my presenting this treatise to public view, is,