صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

CHAP.

V.

:

Henry's account of the converfion and happy death of a country-gentleman, the great fortune heleft to his kept mistress, with her after virtuous life, and comfortable marriage with a gentleman in London.

Henry, in a continued series of letters to his

[ocr errors]

Fanny, entertains her with the following very pleasant story. "I told you formerly, that your account of the dying penitent was very agreeable to me; and that I considered it as a fresh incitement to work out my own falvation with fear and trembling. I also told you, that I would inform you of another instance of the glorious effect of the gracious power and rich grace of! God in the falvation of an unclean and ignorant finner. I shall now give you a circumftantial account of the whole affair, with the happy effects thereof toward several perfons deeply interested

therein...

:

"About two years ago, Mr, a gentleman of a pretty considerable fortune in a neighbouring country, came to study law in the same inn with me, and with the very fame view, not as a profeffion, but an amusement, He did not ap. pear to be very rakish, except in the unaccountable practice of swearing, and vifiting some of the women of the town. He was of an obliging and engaging difpofition, and he contracted an intimate acquaintance with me. • We were often together; but I would not by any means accompany him in his lewd frolics, and often diffuaded him from them, but in vain. About a twelvemonthafter he came to town, he went to the country for a few days; and having had the address to debauch, and carry off from her parents, shopkeepers

keepers in a country-town. under a folemn promife of marriage, a very beautiful and amiable girl, aged about seventeen, he brought her to London, placed her in genteel lodgings, bought her many fine cloaths, gave her plenty of money, and kept her as his mistress, daily visiting her, and, fo far as I can learn, was faithful to her, except in a few vagrant amours with some of the moft celebrated courtezans. About a year after he brought this girl to town, he was seized with a flow fever, under which he languished for fome time, and then paid his debt to nature. Some days after he fell fick, he fent for me; and told me his cafe; that a physician he had employed, had expressed his doubts of the issue of his trouble, and that he himself was perfuaded it would. prove fatal to him. I exhorted him to make the best use of his time, and to cry inceffantly to the Lord for pardon of all his fins. I reminded him, that I had frequently diffuaded him with great. carnestness from indulging swearing and whoring, as they would be bitter in the end; but that he would not hear me. He answered, that it was too true; that he had been bred up in ignorance of religion, feldom going to church, or reading the Bible; that ever since he was eighteen years. of age, he had been exceffively addicted to women, and had debauched several country-girls, fome of whom had born children to him. He then gave me a particular account of his seducing his kept mistress; and then added, "I know I have been a very great finner, and deserve nothing but hell and damnation. Though ignorant of Christianity, yet I derided it; I never read the Bible, but to mock it, and make it the subject of ridicule, but not in your hearing. I foolishly imagined, that my happiness lay in a free indulgence of my paffion for the female sex; and that there

there was little harm in caressing a pretty girl. When I swore, I knew not what I said, but confidered oaths as unmeaning expletives, and sometimes ornaments of speech. I lived without God in the world; and never once confidered, that I was made for higher purposes than those beastly courses that I pursued. I have no good works to boast of, no charitable actions to support me in the view of death; but a train of impiety, profaneness, and sensuality presents itself to my view, which makes me abhor myself, and fear the vengeance of the Almighty. I remember, that the word of God expressly says, that, because of such things as I have done, the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience; that those who do such things, are worthy of death; that no whoremonger hath part in the kingdom of God; and that no fornicator shall enter into the new Jerufalem. What have I then to look for, but a fentence of condemination, con, signing me over to eternal wrath and destruction ? I have heard, that God is merciful: but what have I to recommend me to his favour? If I had ever done any good thing, as you, dear Sir, I know, have done, perhaps I might now hope for divine compassion; but my life from my infancy has been a continued tract of rebellion againft the Sovereign of heaven, who will, justly indeed, debar me from his blessed presence for ever."

I answered, "The account you give of yourself, shews you have been a great tranfgreffor, nay the chief of finners. You have hardened your neck against reproof, and persisted in a course of horrid impiety. God has not been in all your thoughts; and things sacred and serious, instead of attracting your regard, have been the objects of your ridicule. God is angry with the wicked every day. Every one that is proud in heart heart is an abomination to that God, who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, or look upon fin. The wicked shall be turned into hell, and every one that forgetteth God. What then shall be your lot, who have been hardened in wickednefs, and never fet the fear of God before your eyes? Dreadful must it be if you die in an unconverted and unjustified state. Yet there is hope in Ifrael concerning even you. We have heard that the Lord is very gracious, and full of compaffion. He is a Saviour as well as the just God. In him compaflions flow. What are you then to do? Why, your duty is to look to the mercy of God, manifested to finners through the blood of Jefus. Mercy has mifery for its object, and never deals but with miferable finners. You are a miferable finner, and therefore a proper object for receiving the difplays of mercy. Worthleffness is the object of -grace; and on whom did it ever, on whom will Sit ever rest, but the wvile and unworthy finner? God is a fin-pardoning God; and has he any to pardon but finners? Come to the Lord Jesus then, under a deep sense of your vileness, mifery, and finfulness, and he will save you. He came to seek and to save that which was loft; even you that are loft to God, to religion, and every thing valuable. He shed his blood for the vilest and most abominable finners, that he might wash and cleanse them, then believe in the Lord Jefus Chrift, as made of God to you in particular wifdom, righteousness, fanctification, and redemp. tion. He as a Prophet will teach you the mystery of God and of Chrift; he will enlighten your mind in the knowledge of himself, in the great truths of revealed religion; and make you fee out of darkness. As a Prieft he hath already catoned for the guilt of all that come unto him;

[ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors]

he will clothe you with his rightcousness, justify you by his grace, and give you faith to receive him as the Lord your righteousness. He will implant a principle of life and purity in your foul, killing fin and corruption, and exciting in you love to God and Christ. He will redeem you from all evil; he will fubdue your iniquities, and cast all your fins into the deeps of the fea; he will rescue you from the wrath to come, and save you from everlasting burnings. I obteft you then to be reconciled to God. Behold, Chrilt calleth you, faying, I am God, and beside me there is no Saviour; wilt thou come to me, that thou mayft be saved? Turn then to the strong hold of mercy in Christ. Apply to the fountain opened for fin and uncleanness. Receive Christ into your heart, and he will be your hope now, and the joy of your foul in paffing through the valley of the shadow of death. Thou art utterly unworthy; but worthy is the Lamb that was flain; he is worthy, on whose account God should bestow mercy on thee. Thou hast done no good works, thou haft no merit, nor any amiable qualifications to recommend thee to the divine favour. But the Lord Jesus has merit enough for thee and me, and every finner that will by faith betake himself to him. He came not to call the righteous, people that pretend to merit, proud of their good deeds, like the felf-righteous Pharifees; but finners, to repentance; fuch as the publican, who had nothing to say, but God be propitious to me a finner. If merit were the condition of falvation, not a finner of mankind could be faved. Every finner has merit enough to deserve hell, but none to procure heaven. We are faved by grace, through faith, which is the gift of God; and we are justified by faith, without the works of the law. It is God that justifieth,

Ff

« السابقةمتابعة »