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answered with a discreet silence; so was our Lord, as a lamb, dumb before the shearers.

4. "My heart was hot within me; and while I was thus musing, the fire kindled." To abstain from good words is sometimes necessary for the avoiding of an evil construction: but such silence is grievous to the pious soul, which burns with the fire of divine love, and zeal to God's glory: the zeal of Thine house hath even eaten me up."-" And at the last I spake with my tongue" though it be often inconvenient to speak before wicked men, yet it is always necessary to speak unto God by prayer.

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5. "Lord, let me know mine end, and the number of my days that I may be certified how long I have to live." It is a blessing we ought alway to pray for, to be feelingly sensible of the shortness of our life.

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life, a vanity, not a verity of being.

7. "For man walketh in a vain shadow; he disquieteth himself in vain: he heapeth up riches, and cannot tell who shall gather them." The hearts of men are darkened with the shadows of happiness, whilst they vainly care for worldly wealth, which is as transitory and uncertain as the life itself.

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8. And now, Lord, what is my hope? truly my hope is even in Thee." It is not in riches, nor in all the world affords, but in God alone, that all hope of true happiness is attainable.

9. "Deliver me from all mine offences and make me not a rebuke to the foolish." Our sins deprive us of all true well-grounded hopes in God, and make us liable to the scorn even of foolish men.

10. "I became dumb, and opened not my mouth: for it was Thy doing." We must with a patient silence suffer the reproaches of others, because occasioned by our offences, and because sent from God for our amendment.

11. "Take Thy plague away from me: I am even consumed by the means of

Thy heavy hand." And confess withal, that we deserve to be consumed by the just judgments of God.

12." When Thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, Thou makest his beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment every man therefore is but vanity." Whose lightest chastisements do easily deface the beauty, and decay the strength of the corruptible body.

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13. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with Thine ears consider my calling hold not Thy peace at my tears." Therefore the devout soul is poured forth in prayers, with tears of godly sorrow for her offences, from whence all the miseries of this life do flow.

14. "For I am a stranger with Thee and a sojourner, as all my fathers were. The earth is a strange land to the immortal soul, whose native home is Heaven, where she was framed by the hands of the Almighty, after His own image.

15. "O spare me a little,

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that I may recover my strength: before I go hence, and be no more seen. Which image being defaced by her sins, she humbly begs with tears, time, and space, by repentance, faith, and new obedience, to recover her native strength and beauty, before she leave her tabernacle of flesh.

Glory be to the Father, &c.

As it was in the beginning, &c.

The Prayer.

Since my days are but as a span, short and uncertain, I humbly beseech Thee, O Lord, to wean my heart from the disquietude of worldly cares; and that I may be fruitful in all the good works of obedience and charity, to repair the breaches of Thy blessed image which mine offences have made, before my departure hence : that so recovering the spiritual health and strength of my soul, I may die in Thy grace and favour, through Jesus Christ, &c.

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and protection in all conditions.

2. "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the world were made Thou art God from everlasting, and world without end." Who being eternal, is also immutable in His mercy, goodness, power and providence over all. 3. "Thou turnest man to destruction again Thou sayest, Come again, ye children of men." Dispensing both health and sickness, prosperity and adversity, life and death to the sons of men, according to His alljust, all-merciful, all-wise good pleasure.

4. "For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday seeing that is past as a watch in the night." The longest course of man's life, in respect of God's eternal prevision, is but as a day that is already past, or as one of the night-watches, which is both swift and short, and also dark and gloomy through frequent cross and adverse occurrents.

5." As soon as Thou scatterest them, they are even as a sleep and fade away suddenly as the grass." As sleep is the image of death, so the life of man in this

world is but the image or shadow of life; for as a shadow it fleeth the pursuer, and fadeth as the grass.

6. "In the morning it is green, and groweth up in the evening it is cut down, dried up, and withered." Which the same day beholds both growing and cut down, flourishing and withered.

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7. "For we consume away in Thy displeasure and are afraid at Thy wrathful indignation. This frailty of human life is the punishment of sin, which incurs most justly God's indignation and wrath.

8. "Thou hast set our misdeeds before Thee and our secret sins in the light of Thy countenance." Whose eyes are ten thousand times brighter than the sun, both seeing and recording the most secret of our sinful ways.

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For when Thou art all our days are gone we bring our years to an end, as it were a tale that is told." It is through God's just anger for our sins that our days are shortened, and our years are spent in vanity and trouble.

10. "The days of our age

are threescore years and ten and though men be so strong, that they come

to fourscore years, yet is their strength then but labour and sorrow so soon passeth it away and we are gone." The miseries of man's life are not so great through the shortness thereof, as that his sorrows and troubles are increased with his days.

11. "But who regardeth the power of Thy wrath? for even thereafter as a man

feareth so is Thy displeasure." God's displeasure for our sins is either more or less, according as we do less or more stand in awe thereof.

12. "So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom." True wisdom is attained by the serious contemplation of the frailty of life, and certainty of death. 13. "Turn Thee again, O Lord, at the last and be gracious unto Thy servants." Intermixing with our meditations devout prayers for the propitious grace and favour of God.

14. "O satisfy us with Thy mercy, and that soon: so shall we rejoice and be glad all the days of our life." Which alone can satisfy the desires of the immortal soul, and throughly rejoice the

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15. "Comfort us again now after the time Thou hast plagued us and for the years wherein we have suf"" We may fered adversity.' reasonably allege our sufferings, though for our sins, as motives to implore the consolations of God's Spirit.

16. "Shew Thy servants Thy work : and their chilGod's dren Thy glory.” proper work is mercy, and it is His glory to be gracious, for the which the righteous do pray both for themselves and their children.

17. "And the glorious Majesty of the Lord our God be upon us : prosper Thou the work of our hands upon us; Oprosper Thou our handywork.” God's glorious Majesty appears by the gracious influences of His Holy Spirit: whereby we work the works of God, to His glory, and our own eternal happiness.

Glory be to the Father,
&c.
As it was in the begin-
ning, &c

The Prayer.

Almighty God, the Fountain of all wisdom, grant me so wisely to number and compare the short and sorrowful days of this mortal life with that joyful and

never-ending day of a bless- | of my sins: and let the

ed eternity; that despising the vanities of the one, I may zealously aspire to the happiness of the other. Oh, satisfy the panting desires of my soul, with the sense of Thy mercy in the pardon

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glory of Thy grace appear, in prospering me to perform all those good works of faith and obedience which conduce to my eternal salvation, through Jesus Christ, &c.

THE SECOND GENERAL MEDITATION
UPON JUDGMENT.

AND FIRST THE PARTICULAR JUDGMENT.

"It is appointed unto man once to die, and after that the judgment a." No sooner shall this house of flesh, wherein the immortal soul doth now inhabit, be shattered in pieces by the hand of death, but in the same moment the departing soul shall be conveyed by the Angels of God before His judgment-seat: and this is called "The Particular Judgment," that shall pass upon every person in particular, immediately upon his death: “When the dust shall return to the earth as it was, then shall the spirit return unto God that gave it to give an account of the works done in the body, whether they be good, or whether they be evil."

Heb. ix. 27.

That grand enemy of man, the devil, awaits thy soul's departure hence, to dog thee to the great tribunal of Heaven. "In this life he fawns to seduce, but in the other he will roar to devour, as a lion over his prey" to this end he will vehemently accuse thee, aggravating all thy miscarriages through his suggestions committed, and claiming thee as one of the subjects of his kingdom of darkness: saying to the great Judge of all, as several Fathers observed;

"This person (Thou Judge of the world) though he be Thine by creation, yet he is mine by depravation: He is Thine by nature, but mine by sin; for he has

b Eccl. xii. 7, 14.

Ille enim tunc sæviens capit quos nunc blandiens decipit.-Greg. a Euseb. Emiss. Hom.

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