ESSAY IV. I57 ignorant of these important concerns, and should perish in such a land of light, and for want of christian knowledge. II. Let us search diligently our own hearts: Have we all attained and kept., up such a due sense, of our danger without Çhrist as we should have ? Are we never inclined to depend on self-righteousness at all ? Are we never under any temptation to indulge this false hope ? Some pious souls have complained of this temptation, and corrupt nature is very ready in the best of christians, to build up some parts of their own righteousness as their sufficient refuge, and sometimes to put it in place of the perfect mediation and atonement of the blessed Jesus. M. However the case be now with us, and if wehave truly got the victory over all temptations of this kind, yet it is very proper to remember what once we were, and reflect upon what false hopes we once were ready to build on, and to bless the Holy Spirit of light and grace, that hath discovered our mis- takes unto us, that has turned our feet from every dangerous hope, and led us to the Father by the true and living way Christ Jesus. Let this thought also call us to mourn over the souls of men, even the greatest part of our fellow-creatures, inhabitants of this world, who are made of the same flesh and blood as we are, and who, through gross ignorance, are ever practising some foolish methods of pacifying God for past sins, and aiming at his favour and happiness in such ways as will never attain their end. O come, Lord Jesus, and spread thy light and thy truth through thedark nations, and scatter all the remainingmists and dark- nesses that lie upon countries which have only the name of Christ, and some of the forms of his religion among them. Thousands there are, even in Europe, who neither know the gospel in truth, nor come to God by this mediator : They live not by the faith of the Son of God, nor have just reason, accord- ing to the gospel, to expect divine favour and forgiveness. Blessed God, enlighten the thousands of dark and wretched mankind, and lead them in thy appointed way to happiness. The next essay will shew us a plain and easy account of faith in Christ, or of coming to God by Christ. I acknowledge, I have been sometimes uneasy and ashamed to hear a divine of the protestant church tell his people, that faith in Christ is a mysterious thing, and it is not to be well known, or clearly conceived in itself, but it may be much better conceived by its effects; therefore, saith he, I proceed, instead of speaking of faith itself; to give you an account of the fruits and effects of it. As though there was any thing in the affairs of human life, in reason, or in religion, clearer than this notion, viz. Upon a sight and sense of our sins and dangers, and our weakness to help ourselves, to commit ourselves into the hands of Christ, by a humble act of trust or dependence on hint, complying with his appointed methods ofreliefin thegospel. It is but as a man sensible of his sickness applieshimself to a wise and knowing physician, and gives himself up to him, and trusts himself in his hands to relieve him, complying with the remedies appointed in order to his cure : which I hope will appear veryplain in the following Essay.
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