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my humble apprehenfions, I am
below them all. I believe there
shall never be an anarchy in hea-
ven, but as there are hierarchies a-
monst the angels, fo fhall there be
degrees of priority amongst the
faints. Yet is it (I protest) be-
yond my ambition to afpire unto
the first ranks, my defires only are,
and I fhall be happy therein, to be
but the last man, and bring up the
"The
rear in heaven. the dog, eat the crumbs
from the children's
table"

Mos Bruntons

letter to

SECT. LIX.

Again, I am confident, and fully perfwaded, yet dare not take my oath of my falvation; I am as it were fure, and do believe, without all doubt, that there is fuch a city as Conftantinople, yet for me to take my oath thereon, were a kind of perjury, because I hold no infallible warrant from my own sense to confirm me in the certainty thereof. And truly, tho' many pre

tend

tend an abfolute certainty of their falvation, yet when an humble foul shall contemplate her own unworthinefs, fhe fhall meet with many doubts, and fuddenly find how little we stand in need of the precept of St. Paul, Work out your own falvation with fear and trembling. That which is the cause of my election, I hold to be the cause of my falvation, which was the mercy, and beneplacit of God, before I was, or the foundation of the world. Before Abraham was, I AM3, is the saying of Christ, yet it is true in fome fenfe if I fay it of myself, for I am; that is in before was not only before myself, but t

the idea of God, and the decree of that fynod held from all eternity. And in this fenfe, I fay, the world was before the creation, and at an end before it had a beginning; and, thus was I dead before I was alive, tho'

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tho' my grave be in England,, my dying place was in paradife, and Eve mifcarried of me before fhe conceiv'd of Cain.

SECT. LX.

Infolent zealots, that "do decry good works and rely only upon faith, take not away merit: for depending upon the efficacy of their faith, they enforce the condition of God, and in a more fophiftical way do feem to challenge heaven. It was decreed by God, that only those that lapt in the water like dogs should have the honour to deIdeftroy the Midianites; yet could none of thofe juftly challenge, or imagine he deferved that honour thereupon. I do not deny, but that true faith, and fuch as God requires, is not only a mark or token, but alfo a means of our falvation; but where to find this, is as obfcure to me, as my last end. And if It cannot be found where it our is not nor missed where it is.

our Saviour could object unto his own difciples, and favourites, a faith, that, to the quantity of a grain of mustard feed, is able to remove mountains; furely that which we boaft of is not any thing, or at the leaft, but a remove from nothing. This is the tenor of my belief, wherein, tho' there be many things fingular, and to the humour of my irregular felf, yet, if they square not with maturer judg→ ments I disclaim them, and do no further father them than the learned and best judgements fhall authorize them.

The

The SECOND PART.

SECT. I.

OW for that other virtue of

Ncharity, without which faith

is a meer notion, and of no exiftence, I have ever endeavoured to nourish the merciful difpofition, and humane inclination I borrowdebe ed from my parents, and regulate it to the written and prescribed laws of charity; and if I hold the true anatomy of myself, I am delineated and naturally framed to fuch a piece of virtue: for I'am of a conftitution fo general, that it conforts, and fympathizeth with all things; I have no antipathy, or ven? rather idio-fyncrafy, in dyet, humour, air, or in any thing; I wonder not at the French, for their difhes of frogs, fnails and toadstools, nor at the Jews for locufts and grass

hoppers;

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