If the Heavens and the Air, Sea and Land, Light and Darkness, scorching Heats, and refreshing Shades; if Showers and Dew, Winds and Storms, Fowls and Fishes, Beasts and Vegetables; if Herbs and Trees, the artful and the voluntary Productions of the Earth, do all conspire to serve us, and so carefully perform their Part, to entertain us with a Variety, that may render Life not only supportable, but even delightful; what are the Comforts, what the Entertainments, how great, how rich, how innumerable, how inconceivable, which thou hast prepared for them that love thee, in that heavenly Country where they shall behold thee Face to Face! If fuch Provision be made for us in our Prison, what may we expect to find in our Palace!

Great are the Advantages of Virtue, which gives the Soul immediate Access with Confidence to God, and stands in need of no other Introducer; a Soul thus affected hath God continually in its Thoughts and Discourse; all its Reflections, all its Converfsation, relish of his Love.

The way to know God truly is to love him, it is to very little purpose that we read or meditate, that we hear or pray, if this be not at the bottom of our religious Exercises.

A Confession of Faith.

I Believe in, and heartily pray to, the great King of Heaven and Earth. I acknowledge Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, three Persons, but one Essence; the true, the Almighty God; of one uncompounded, incorporeal, invisible, uncircumscrib'd Being: With whom there is nothing higher or lower, greater or lesser; but perfect and equal all: Great, without Quantity; good, without

without Quality; eternal, without Time; Life, without Death; Strength, without Weakness; Truth, without Falshood; omnipresent, without Space; filling all Things and Places, without Extenfion; passing every where, without Motion; abiding every where, without Confinement; communicating to all thy Creatures, without diminishing thy own Fulness; governing all things, without Labour; without Beginning, and yet giving Beginning to all; making all things mutable, and yet unchangeable thy felf: Infinite in Greatness; unbounded in Power; of Goodness indefectible; of Wisdom incomprehensible; wonderful in thy Counsels; just in thy Judgments; unsearchable in thy Thoughts; true in all thy Words; holy in all thy Works; abundant in Mercies; long-suffering towards Sinners; compaffionate to all that repent; always the fame, without Mixture or Defilement, Allay, or Accidents; eternal, immortal, unchangeable; thy Will alters not; thy Justice is not biafs'd; thy Mind is not disturb'd with Griefs, or Pleasures, or Passions; with thee, nothing is forgotten, nothing which was once lost call'd to Remembrance again; but all things paft or future, are present to thy capacious Mind, whose Duration, neither begun in Time, nor encreases by length of Time, neither shall it ever end; but thou livest before, and in, and after, all Ages; thy Glory is eternal; thy Power supreme; thy Kingdom everlasting, and World without end. Amen.

MEDITATION before Singing PSALMS.

B

EFORE you begin to fing a Pfalm, imagine that you fee the Heavens open, and all the glorious Choirs of Cherubims and Seraphims about the Throne of God; imagine that you hear the Musick

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Musick of those angelick Voices, which cease not, Day and Night, to fing the Glories of him that is, and was, and is to come; contemplate on such Texts of Scripture as these, Rev. vii. 9. ' I beheld, and lo, in Heaven a great Multitude which no Man could number, of all Nations, and Kin• dreds, and People, and Tongues, standing be'fore the Throne, and before the Lamb, cloathed • with white Robes, and Palms in their Hands, and they cried out with a loud Voice, Salvation to our God, which fitteth on the Throne, and unto 'the Lamb; and all the Angels stood round about 'the Throne, and fell before the Throne on their Faces, and worshipped God, saying, Amen. Blessing, and Glory, and Wisdom, and Thankf' giving, and Honour, and Power, and Strength, • be unto God for ever and ever.' Amen.

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Sometimes imagine that you see Holy David, with his Hands upon his Harp, and his Eyes fix'd on Heaven; calling in Transport upon the whole Creation, Sun, Moon, Light and Darkness, Men and Angels, to join with his rapturous Soul in praising the Lord of Heaven.

A Paraphrafe on the First Book of Canticles.

W

ILT thou deny the Bounty of a Kiss, And see me languish for the melting Bliss, More sweet to me than bright delicious Wine, Press'd from the purple Clusters of the Vine; As fragrant too, as Ointments poured forth, Are the loud Echoes of thy matchless Worth, Which makes the Virgins, kindled by thy Fame, Wish to expire in the celestial Flame. Come then, display thy lovely Face, and we, Drawn by refiftless Charms, will follow thee

I nto thy royal Chambers; blest where I
May see my Lord, and fear no Witness by;
When thy two lovely Eyes inflame my Heart,
It leaps for Joy, and meets th' unerring Dart :
O thou more fair, more vastly bright, than all
The World did ever great and glorious call;
My constant Love, still flourishing to thee,
Shall fixt as our eternal Mansions be.

/

POEM by a YOUNG LADY.

Ndulgent Death,

Indulgent

prepare thy gentle Dart,

}

To ftrike a willing and unguarded Heart; Where are thy dreadful Looks and gloomy Train? Fantastick Mortals all these Terrors feign, Thou hast an Angel's Smile and heavenly Grace, I find transporting Beauties in thy Face, And yield, unforc'd, unto thy cold Embrace : I come a joyful Captive to thy Arms, This Moment has for me ten thousand Charms; For thee all human Things I here resign, My spotless Faith, and Virgin Vows are thine, Mirtillo's Sighs, and Silvia's Tears in vain, In these dull Regions would my Soul retain; Forbear your fruitless Grief, I go to prove Unbounded Pleasures and immortal Love: O let me unmolested close my Eyes, We'll meet again in yonder blissful Skies : Young Virgins hafte, a flow'ry Wreath prepare, And dress with guiltless Ornaments my Hair: Adorn me with the Summer's painted Pride, And lay the Vestments of the Dead aside : Nor let a pensive Look, nor mournful Tear, To cloud the Lustre of your Eyes appear; Each Nymph be dress'd in Robes of spotless white, The folding streaming far with filver Light;

Let

Let Smiles on all your lovely Faces shine,
Nor at my glorious Destiny repine;
With decent Joy conduct me to the Tomb,
And hang your Garlands round the mournful Room.

POEM ON HEAVEN.

N

Stormy Winter enters there,
'Tis jovial Spring thro' all the Year;
Soft Gales thro' Groves of Myrtle blow;
The Streams o'er golden Pebbles flow;
Fresh Youth and Love, their sportive Train;
Led o'er the ever-verdant Plain ;
Ethereal Forms in bright Array;
Along the blissful Currents stray;
Or wander thro' Elysian Groves;
Or banquet in the gay Alcoves;
And oft in Aramantine Bowers,
Repose on fragrant Beds of Flow'rs,
While Musick with her foothing Strains,
Warbles thro' all the Woods and Plains;
The Hills and Dales, and Fountains round,
With heav'nly Harmony resound.

Q. What are those three Works St. Bernard fo greatly wondered at, the like whereof never can, nor never shall, be done again upon the face of the Earth.

A. Three Works: Three Conjunctions hath that omnipotent Majesty, made in the Assumption of the Flesh, wonderfully fingular, and fingularly wonderful; even such as the very Angels were amazed at it: The first, Conjunction of God and Man; Secondly, of a Mother and a Virgin ; Third, of Faith and the Heart of Man to believe this. The first Conjunction is wonderfully great, wherein is conjoined Earth and God; Majesty and Infirmity;