and every way make me willing to be wholly thine. Let thy will ever be a law to me in all things and melt down this stubborn will into a ready compliance with thy holy pleasure. O let me love what thou lovest, and hate what thou hatest. Let my soul and body, and all the faculties and powers of both, be under thy control, and be employed to thy glory. Let all that I am, and all that I have, be thine; not in pretence only but in deed and in truth. And never let me think it hard to renounce all for thee, who art infinitely better to me than ten thousand worlds.

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O help me so sincerely to deny myself, that may own no guide and ruler, but my great Lord and Proprietor: that my eyes may be ever towards thee, and my whole dependence upon thee; and that in all things thou mayest ever be regarded, and preferred, and glorified by me through Jesus Christ. Amen.

Prayer and Humiliation for a public FastDay.

[See also Page 62.]

O LORD GOD, glorious in holiness, and of purer eyes than to behold iniquity without abhorrence of it, and indignation against it! How shall man, sinful man, that drinks iniquity like water, appear before thee! And how shall we, vile and frail, polluted and depraved as we are, show ourselves in the presence of such a just

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and holy God as thou art! When we look upon thy perfect law, and see what we should be, what manner of persons in all holy conversation and godliness; and when we reflect on our own hearts and lives, and find what we are, how wanting in our duty, and how contrary to what thou requirest of us; we cannot come into thy presence, O Lord, without confusion of face, and anguish of soul, and remorse of conscience, to think how foolishly and wickedly we have acted; and how abject and wretched we have made ourselves.

Besides that we brought with us a corrupt nature into the world, full of strangeness to thee, our God, and full of enmity against thy holy, good, and righteous laws: we have mis-spent the most of our time here in a neglect of thy work, and in disobedience to thy word; daily multiplying our offences against thee, as thou hast multiplied thy blessings unto us. O the precious time that we have lost, the means that we have neglected, the mercies that we have abused, the calls and warnings, the offers and invitations, that we have disregarded! What little regard have we had of thee! what little fear of offending thee! Alas! O Lord, we have grievously insulted thy glorious Majesty, and daringly trampled upon thy holy laws.

O the crying sins and abominations that prevail in every place! [The swearing and drunkenness, the pride and uncleanness, the cruel enmity and injustice, the corrupt communication and ungodly conversation whereby God is

so greatly dishonoured and provoked every day.] And O how large a share have we had in adding to the public guilt! sinning as we have done, in all estates and affairs, in all relations and circumstances of our lives! And not only through weakness and surprise, and the violence of temptations; but many times knowingly, wilfully and presumptuously; with a high hand, and stiff-neck, against thee, our Maker and our Judge! And O how great a weight have we added to all our other sins, by the hardness of our hearts and our impenitent continuance in our sins; committing great sins with little remorse, little penitent concernment for all the evils whereof we have been guilty! Yea, Lord, how unsuitable still are our hearts and lives to those holy rules, which thy word gives us in charge to follow! So much is there still amiss with us, and wanting in us, that it is of thy great mercy we are not consumed: it is because thy compassions fail not, that we have still these opportunities to humble ourselves before thee, and to cry for mercy.

We have not glorified thee, O Lord, in bearing fruits of holiness answerable to thy revealed will; but we desired to give glory to God, in confessing our sins, and humbling our souls, and acknowledging our desert: and more especially would we admire and magnify the riches of thy grace, which has spared us so long a time, and showed us such marvellous kindness still, notwithstanding all the high provocations of our sins. Lord, we have heard (and, blessed

be thy name, we have found) that the King of heaven is a merciful king; that with thee, our God, there is mercy; that our sins, though great and manifold, may be pardoned; and that our souls may yet be recovered, and healed, and saved. O help us so to judge and condemn ourselves, that we may not be judged of the Lord, and condemned with the world. Lay not our sins to our charge; but put them to the account of thy Son, our Saviour, whom thou hast given to be the propitiation for our sins; and in whom thou art reconciled to a guilty world. For his sake, O good Lord, give us repentance and pardon for all the sins whereby we have offended thee; whether they be our sins of omission, or commission; our sins of weakness or wilfulness; our failings or presumptions; our sins of ignorance, or such as we have committed against light and knowledge; O gracious Lord, humble us duly under the sense of them, and absolve us thoroughly from the guilt of them. O set our sins in order before us, and make us to know our transgressions; make every one of us to search and try our ways, that we may turn to the Lord, and bring forth fruits meet for repentance. May we not only loathe ourselves in our own sight for all the evils whereof we have been guilty, but also loathe, as much as ever we have loved, the things which have displeased thee. O that we may forsake our sins, not only in the outward commission, but in the inward affection; not reserving to ourselves any sin or lust to be

spared, but keeping at a distance from every evil and accursed thing; cleansing ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, and endeavouring to perfect holiness in the fear of God!

We have been accessary to the accumulated heinous guilt that endangers us all, and calls for judgments on the land. O that we may now contribute our help, by the humiliation of our souls and the reformation of our lives, to save our nation; and to turn away the anger which is gone out against us, that we perish not! Save us, O Lord, for our sins, which are the enemies of our own house; more mischievous to us than any other evils or enemies abroad. O pour out a spirit of serious repentance and reformation upon the whole nation; to heal the distempers of our souls, to curb the disorders of our lives, and to recover the decayed power of godliness in the land: yea, Lord, prepare and dispose us, not only for thy temporal mercies, but for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. Help us so to turn from the evil of our ways, that thou mayest turn from the fierceness of thy wrath, and cause thine anger towards us to cease. O that we may fear the rod, and him who has appointed it! and so prepare to meet thee, in the way of thy judgments, that thou mayest have thoughts of peace towards us, and not of evil; to give us an expected end, and the desired issue out of all our troubles.

Thou canst show us great and mighty things, which we know not, and canst exceed all our expectations, as well as our deservings, by thy