464 LIVES OF THE PURITANS, All his excellent endowments could not screen him from the severities of the times. He felt the iron hand of Bishop Laud, when, on account of his conscientious nonconformity, he was suspended from his beloved work...,His mouth being stopped, he was like the fish out ofwater. His body 'even languished under the painful cross, and he said, " My preaching is my life. If I be laid aside from that, I shall quickly die.". Mr. Burr, finding himself totally disabled from preaching in his native country, without a conformity to the ecclesiastical impositions, contrary to the convictions of his conscience, renounced all prospects of worldly advan- tage, and 'retired to New England ; where he could enjoy the ordinances of the gospel without the inventions and impositions of men. On his arrival in the new colony, he was chosen assistant to Mr. Richard Mather, pastor of the church at Dorchestei.. The year following, he was taken ill of the small-pox ; hut, through divine goodness, he recovered, and .came forth as gold tried in the fire. On this occasion, he renewed his devotedness to God, and entered into a covenant with the Lord, to walk before him with greater exactness in future. In this covenant he expressed himself in the following manner : _ "I, Jonathan Burr, beingbrought in the arms of Almighty " God over the vast ocean, with my family and friends, " and graciously provided for in a wilderness ; and being "sensible of my own unworthiness and self-seeking ; yet " of infinite mercy, being called to the tremendous work of feeding souls; and being of late 'with my family, " delivered out of a great affliction of the small-pox: and " found the fruit of that affliction, God tempering, order- " ing, and mitigating the evil thereof; so that I have been " graciously and speedily delivered ; I do promise and vow " to Him, who bath done all these things for me That " I will aim only at his glory and the good of souls, and " not my own glory.-2. That I will walk humbly, with " lower thoughts of myself, considering that I am a puff of breath sustained by the power of his grace alone.- " 3. That I will -be more watchful over my heart, to keep " it in a due frame of holy obedience, without running out " so far after the creature : for I have seen that he is my " only help in time of need.-4, That I will put more " weight in that firm promise, and sure truth, that he is a " God hearingprayer.-5. That I will set up God more in Anther's Hist. of New Eng. b. iii, p. 78-80.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=