608 / 652
APPLICATION.
TO
THE AFFLICTED.
Pray
over
the lessons
that
the
Spirit
of
God
teaches you
under
affliction,
that God
would
enforce
them
upon your
consciences,
bring
you to the
practice of
them,
and
mourn
often over
sin,
and
be
much
in
meditation
on such
sub-
jects. Had I pierced
my
Lord,
my
Redeemer
with
a
spear,
surely
I should hate
that
weapon again
:
now
every
sin
is
such
a
weapon, especially those
that God
afflicts
us
for.
Had
I
contended
with
God
and
suffered
under
sore
rebukes, had I
felt many bruises
from
him, on this
ac-
count
I
should
be
afraid of contending
with
him
again.
May
we
all'
then take up our
meditations
on
the
subject,
and
say,
What
have
I
learnt
by-
any
afflictions wherewith
God
has
instructed
me
?
Let
us
search
our
own souls,
and
ask,
Was
I
carnally-minded
before, and has
God
lifted
up
my
soul
to
spiritual
and
divine thoughts
now
?
Did
I
.make
the
pleasure of
this
life my
chief joy
and
comfort
before,
and
has
God
made them bitter
to me
now
?
Let
me be
afraid of
loving
earth
and
the pleasures
of
it
again.
Has God
discovered
to
me
that
I
was
too
vain, too proud,
and .humbled
me,
let
me
fear
vain
glory again.
Was
I
negligent
of
any religious duties
be-
fore,
and has
God
been
purging
away
my
iniquity
by
bringing sorrows
and
troubles upon
me
?
Oh
!
that
-I
may for the
future
come with
great
delight into the pre-
sence
of God, and
love to
approach
hirn in
his
ordi-
nances. Was
I
unfit
for
heaven
before,
unfit
to
die,
and
has God taught
me to die,
fitted
me
for the
inheritance
of
the
Saints above
by
any
afflictive
providences
?
Let
me
not
lose this
meetness for heaven
that
I have
Iearnt
by
troubles here
on
earth. Have I lived
too much
upon
things seen,
and
has
God cut
off
all, succours
from
the
things round
about
me
?
Let
me
live
more
by
faith,
less
by
sight.
Let
us -walk
humbly
all our days
till
our
souls
shall
be
received to the mansions of the Lord,
where
there
shall
be
no
more
sin
in
us,
and
no
more reason
of
con-
tention
between
,
God
and
our
souls.
Then
the
Spirit
shall cease his
office
of
conviction
of
sin,
and
shall
be
nothing.else but a spirit of
love,
and
light,
and joy, and
peace,
and
comfort, for ever
and
ever. Amen.