A few days ago Mr. H. reproved me in a very friendly manner, which made me weigh my conduct in the balance of the fanctuary. The refult is, I doubt whether I do not live too much to myfelf: whether I am not reproved by 1 Cor. x. 33. Even as I pleafe all men, not seeking mine own profit, but the profit of many that they may be faved.

Retirement is the foil in which my foul profpers. There I endeavour to remember the way by which the Lord has led me in the wilderness, and to raife my Ebenezer of thanksgiving and praife. In company, my fpirit feems removed from its place of reft; for which reafon I go out less than ever. I do not know but love of folitude grows upon me, perhaps more than it ought. I have not strength to follow that advice,

"Prefent with God by recollection feem,

Yet present, by your cheerfulness, with men."

While in, and after returning from company, I am often oppreffed: I dare not fay with a guilty confcience; but with an anxious fcrupulofity, fearing I have neither done, nor got the good I ought.

Is falvation from this felf-occupation included in the promife? Luke i. 74. Till I fully experience it, may I venture, for the fake of others, to be unbent, diffufive, and communicative; without endangering the profperity of my own foul, or expofing myself to the torturing reflection, "Mine own vineyard I have not kept?"

He that is mighty hath already done great things for me; but I want to be more fully faved, that I may ever abide in him, and that my fruit may remain. I make no apology for the liberty I have taken; being perfuaded you will willingly affift, Rev. Sir, your unworthy Servant,

[Concluded from page 167.]

NOUGH. The Tyrant ran his race;

*

His foul is gone to its own place,
Beyond thy world of ftrife.
But, fon of Adam, let thy mind
Unbialled view all human kind,
And take a tour through life.

In every empire, town and freet,
Sce pride, and felf, and envy meet,

In ominous array!

Except a few, but thinly fown,

Who dare their God and Saviour own,

While millions fall a prey.

Go to the regal domes and fee
Are they the fount of Liberty?

Doth meannefs dirt these shrines?
Even at Verfailles was there a peer
Who fold his confcience every year,
To drudge on base designs?

Attend the lower clafs of life,
There, parents, children, hufband, wife,

Defert each focial tie:

Domeflic broils, and curfes fhow,

The lifping babes proficient too

In hellith liberty.

* Nero.

Y.

Shall

Shall I exempt the hallowed fane ?
Do none the awful tafk prophane ?
Are all the priesthood free
From filthy lucre, pomp and show?
Do their examples, doctrines flow
From chriftian liberty?

O what a contrast to behold
A modern preacher, and his fold,
In pleafure's downy road!
And then, to view an earnest Paul,
Defpifing grandeur, riches-All,
To gain mankind to God!

But there are fome exceptions here,
Who the apoftolic character

Adorn with humble zeal;

Whofe lives are comments on the creed,

Whose words, from heterodoxy freed,
Declare the truths they feel.

Child of the duft, if thou wouldst be
A candidate for liberty,

Attend my words with care:
Confider well thy natural flate;
Could God, all purity, create
Mankind juft as they are?

Not fo,- for human nature fhowed
A transcript of the triune God,
In its primæval state:
Then genuine liberty became

A holy purifying flame,

And man flood forth complete,

But foon the portraiture divine
Was clouded, did no longer shine

Through thy ancestor's frame:
Thy general parents difobeyėd

That facred will which Angels fwayed,
And mifery was their name!

One cafy pofitive command

Determined them to fall or ftand;
Death edged the penalty:
When lo! the angel-fiend appeared,
Whofe fophiftry our Eve enfnarėd
In devilish Liberty.

Creation's faireft work complyed;
That moment, morally fhe dyed
To peace and innocence!
As yet, the fire of human race,
Untainted held his facred place,
Nor dared the dire offence.

Not long!His other felf began
To practice on the faultlefs man,

And lured him into fin!

The fatal prefent foon she gave,
As fhe his temptrefs, he her flave
Drank all the poison in!

Thus, Death in all its pomp took place,
And Sin, its caufe, enthraled thy race:
Này, Nature’s valt machine
Groaned to its centre, and confeffed,
In heaving pangs of ftrong un-reft,
The lamentable scene!

As ftreams, through all their mazy courfe
Are poisoned, from their pois'nous fource,

So all of human-kind,

Proceeding from the fœderal head,

Like him, emphatically dead,

In chains of guilt confined.

But

But fee! the great Delivérer fee!
Infhrined in thy humanity,

See heaven's eternal Son!
Divefted of his Godhead's rays,
While angels with amazement gaze
At God and man in One.

He lays his robes of flate afide,
And pours contempt on moral pride--
(O hear his infant cries!)

And God with God, was man with man,
To finish the redeeming plan,

He weeps, and bleeds, and dies!

He dies for all the ruined race;
But only thofe receive his grace,
Who feel their hapless state;
Who, confcious of their guilt and fin,
With humble penitence begin
The ftroke to deprecate.

To fuch, the Almighty fufferer cries,
Who on my merit now relies,

Shall feel the fprinkled blood:
Who dare despair themselves to fave
From falling lower than the grave,
Shall find a pardoning God.

Shall feel, from faith's ftrong evidence,
An inftantaneous change commence
Through all the human powers;
Shall fee the Christian jubilee,
The evangelic Liberty,
Which man again reflores.

223

She