fertion of even Chrift's difciples; if his repentance be therefore judged real, because he feems to be more concerned in the remembrance of Chrift's future kingdom than his own death; if St. Paul was approved by the fame more abundant labours which he commended in the Corinthians, " yea, what "zeal? what fear? what vehement defire ?" 2 Cor. vii. 11. I think 1 fhall make it appear, that the repentance of this perfon was accompanied with the like hopeful fymptonis: and I am fo fenfible of that awful prefence both of God and man, before whom I speak, who are eafily able to difcover my failings, that I shall not deliver any thing but what I know to be a strict and religious truth.

Upon my firft vifit to him, (May 26, just at his return from his journey out of the West,) he most gladly received me, fhewed me extraordinary refpects upon the fcore of mine office, thanked God who had in mercy and good providence sent me to him who fo much needed my prayers and counfels; and acknowledged how unworthily heretofore he had treated that order of men, reproaching them that they were proud, and prophefied only for rewards; but now he had learned how to value them; that he esteemed them the fervants of the most high. God, who were to fhew to him the way to everlasting life.

At the fame time I found him labouring under

ftrange trouble and conflicts of mind, his fpirit wounded, and his confcience full of terrors. Upon his journey, he told me, he had been arguing with greater vigour against God and religion than ever he had done in his life time before, and that he was refolved to run them down with all the arguments and fpite in the world; but, like the great convert, St. Paul, he found it hard to kick against the pricks; for God, at that time, had so struck his heart by his immediate hand, that presently he argued as ftrongly for God and virtue as before he had done against it; that God ftrangely opened his heart, creating in his mind moft awful and tremendous thoughts and ideas of the Divine Majefty, with a delightful contemplation of the divine nature and attributes, and of the lovelinefs of religion and virtue. I never (faid he) was advanced thus far towards happiness in my life before, though, upon the commiffion of fome fins extraordinary, I have had fome checks and warnings confiderable from within, but still struggled with them, and fo wore them off again. The most observable that I remeinber was this: one day, at an atheistical meeting at a perfon of quality's, I undertook to manage the caufe, and was the principal difputant against God and piety, and for my performances received the applaufe of the whole company; upon which my

mind

mind was terribly ftruck, and I immediately replied thus to myself: - Good God! that a man that walks upright, that fees the wonderful works of God, and has the use of his fenfes and reason, should use them to the defying of his Creator! But, though this was a good beginning towards my converfion, to find my confcience touched for my fins, yet it went off again; nay, all my life long, I had a fecret value and reverence for an honest man, and loved morality in others. But I had formed an odd fcheme of religion to myself, which would folve all that God or confcience might force upon me; yet I was not ever well reconciled to the bufinefs of Chriftianity, nor had that reverence for the Gofpel of Chrift as I ought to have. Which estate of mind continued till the fifty-third chapter of Ifaiah was read to him, (wherein there is a lively defcription of the fufferings of our Saviour, and the benefits thereof,) and fome other portions of scripture; by the power and efficacy of which word, affifted by his Holy Spirit, God fo wrought upon his heart, that he declared that the myfteries of the paffion appeared as clear and plain to him as ever any thing did that was represented in a glafs; fo that that joy and admiration, which poffeffed his foul upon the reading of God's word to him, was remarkable to all about him; and he had fo much delight in his teftimonies,

that, in my abfence, he begged his mother and lady to read the fame to him frequently, and was unfatisfied (notwithstanding his great pain and weakness) till he had learned the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah without book.

རྩྭ

At the fame time, difcourfing of his manner of life from his youth up, and which all men knew was too much devoted to the fervice of fin, and that the lufts of the flesh, of the eye, and the pride of life, had captivated him; ho was very large and particular in his acknowledgements about it, more ready to accuse himself than I or any one else can be; publicly crying out, O bleffed God, can fuch a horrid creature as I am be accepted by thee, who has denied thy being, and contemned thy power? Afking often, Can there be mercy and pardon for me? Will God own such a wretch as I? And in the middle of his fickness faid, Shall the unfpeakable joys of heaven be conferred on me? O mighty Saviour! never, but through thine infinite love and fatisfaction! O never, but by the purchase of thy blood adding, that with all abhorrency he did reflect upon his former life; that fincerely, and from his heart, he did repent of all that folly and madnefs which he had committed.

Indeed, he had a true and lively sense of God's great mercy to him, in ftriking his hard heart, and

laying

laying his confcience open, which hitherto was deaf to all God's calls and methods: faying, if that God, who died for great as well as lefs finners, did not speedily apply his infinite merits to his poor foul, his wound was fuch as no man could conceive or bear; crying out, that he was the vileft wretch and dog that the fun fhined upon or the earth bore ; that he now faw his error, in not living up to that reafon which God endued him with, and which he unworthily vilified and contemned; wifhed he had been a starving leper crawling in a ditch, that he had been a link-boy or a beggar, or for his whole life confined to a dungeon, rather than thus to have finned against God.

How remarkable was his faith, in a hearty embracing and devout confeffion of all the articles of our Chriftian religion, and all the divine mysteries of the Gospel! faying, that that abfurd and foolish philofophy, which the world so much admired, propagated by the late Mr. Hobbes and others, had undone him and many more of the best parts in the nation; who, without God's great mercy to them, may never, I believe, attain to fuch a repentance.

I must not omit to mention his faithful adherence to, and cafting himself entirely upon, the mercies of Jefus Chrift, and the free grace of God, declared to repenting finners through him: with a thankful remembrance of his life, death, and refurrection;