t16 MEMOIRS OP PERIOD 2tt. turning back of our broken fhip into the deeps, after we were brought within fight of land. But one day, as I going into the pulpit, in the time of our first diltrefs, the congregationwas tinging Pfal cxxviii. verf. 3. to the end, " Thy children like to olive- plants about thy table round," &c. That came feafon- ably to me, and was of great ufe td me all along thereafter. At length I got my wife and children fo planted about my table ; and on the family- thaukf iving, I told them how ufeful that pfalm had been to me in the day ofour diftrefs : and fó I fang it with them. And there is fomething more in that pfalm, that Í have forne expeítation offüll. Mean while this Mock by the gravel quite broke and fhatterecd my frame, and altered my conftitution ; fo that thereafter Í was no more as I had been formerly. PERIOD XII. From the notable breach in my health, to the time of the cloin of this account. THISTHIS notable alteration was the more remarkable, that it on when I was now going in the forty-ninth year of my age, the feventh feptenary : and here I reckon the groaning part of my life, more plainly pointing to my diffolution, to have begun. And whatever groanings -I had, in the former part of my life, been witnefs to by day or by night, it hath,,in the depth of fovereign wifdom, for my greater trial, been, from the pre- ceding April 1724, unto this day, my lot, to be folitary in my clofet by night, as Well as by day : but good is the will of the Lord ; he bath done all, things well. The fummer thus (pent as aforefaid, a weary feafon to me, at belt, as an idle time ; being engaged in a courfe of drinking Moffat -well water, at home, for the gravel ; I did, on the lait day of Auguft, put pen to paper again, in the beloved work aforefaid on the Hebrew text; not knowing whether I would be able to fit clofe any more at it or not. But it is but little I have had accefs to do in it fince ; however, I defire to be thank- ful, that I have got the dray on the accentuation done how the Lord may difpofe of me after, I know not ; but I delire to be refigned. Now as the winter came on, my teeth began to be loofened much pain in them going before ; and that feafon t loft three, whereof two were fore-teeth ; which marred my pronunciation in fome meafure. Neverthelefs I was helped clofely to ply the work aforefaid :.and my plan therein was carried to its height, with exceeding great labour : and when at any time I happened to go to bed, with fume difficulty entered into, but not got through ; the intenfenefs of the mind upón it bereaved me of fame fleep, which I think did harm.
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