Written by herself some years before her death, and now taken from her original Copy with great care and diligence.
“Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul.”—PSALM lxvi. 16.
“As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of Hosts.”—PSALM xlviii. 8.
“Beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”—2 COR. iii. 18.
(Continued from page 305.)
ANOTHER day, as I was lamenting my weary life when compared with the life I lived formerly, the tempter came with that temptation, “Curse the day wherein thou wast born;” and I could say no more against him but this, “Oh! shall that which was Job’s sin be my duty?” Thus I went for several days, thinking still my mouth would open and curse my day, but I desire to bless the Lord, who preserved me, for I do not remember that ever I opened my mouth or yet gave the least consent to this temptation; this was still presented to me, “Oh, shall that which was Job’s sin be my duty?” Yet the tempter continued from day to day, so that the poison of his arrows was like to drink up my spirits, and I thought it was with me as it was with those people—“In the morning thou shalt say, Would God it were even! and at even thou shalt say, Would God it were morning! for the fear of thine heart wherewith thou shalt fear, and for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see” (Deut. xxviii. 67). But, that which was worse than all this, my glorious Redeemer did still hide His face from me, and the spirit of prayer was withdrawn, and the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, was turned to be a dead letter; yet when I was in this sad condition, my soul clave to God, and said, “Although thou shouldest kill me, yet will I trust in thee” (Job xiii. 15). Thus I was allowed to hold fast my interest in God, as my covenanted God, notwithstanding all that was come on me.
After this, the tempter came with that temptation, and said, “Murder thyself, for thou needest not fear, thy eternal interest is secured.” This temptation he continued for many days.
One day I was praying alone in a secret place, and he set violently upon me, and presented to me both conveniency and instruments to murder myself; upon this I was forced to fly out of the place. Another day, I was going some space of way myself alone, and in the way there was a ditch of water, where he set violently on me to drown myself, busking his temptation with this: “Thou needest not fear; thou wilt immediately go to heaven, and the world will never know what is become of thee.”
Oh! now I was like to go distracted, for I could give no resentment; but I was kept from yielding to him, and helped by an unknown support of an Almighty God to resist the temptation in all its appearances.
When I was in this sad condition, and like to lose my reason, I was one day on my knees before God in prayer, and, as I thought, both hell and heaven were realised to my mind, and saw, as it were, the devil mocking at me, and ready to pull me in to him; yet in the meantime of this extremity, glorious Christ appeared for my relief, who hath the chain in His own hand that holds the devil, so that he could not win at me. Yet, being under great agony of mind through the violence of long and great temptations, I uttered unadvised and unbecoming words before the Lord; but, blessed ever be His name, He took me not at my word, as justly He might have done, but being full of pity, He forgave my sin, and did not destroy me because of my foolishness. So it pleased a gracious and merciful God to restrain the devil, and deliver me from his temptations for a season.
Yet, alas! my case was little better, for my Glorious Redeemer did still hide His face from me, and grace was as low and duties as lifeless as ever. Oh, now I knew not what way to take to win back to live the life I lived in the nineteenth year of my age. Now I fell a reasoning with myself, and also endeavoured to take a view of the experiences and exercises of the saints as recorded in the Scriptures, and I found them sometimes going to secret, sometimes to public duties, and sometimes to watchmen, and at other times to fellow-Christians; all this I found to be particularly in the case of the spouse, as recorded in the Song, where I saw the only thing she sought in all these means was Christ Himself, and finding this to be my own case, thought I would endeavour to follow her example; but, alas! I was very low, both as to spiritual and natural strength; I was not only low as to the exercise of grace, but also my natural faculties were much racked and distempered by reason of my long combat I had with the devil and his temptations, and my body was much weakened by reason of withholding those things by which nature is upheld.
After this I tried all those means, such as prayer and meditation, reading the Word, for in them I was wont to enjoy the presence of my Redeemer; as also I went to the public ordinances, and to ministers, and to Christians, but instead of outgate and healing I got wounds, and on the back of all I was left struggling with unbelief saying to me that I would never get a blink of my Beloved’s countenance this side of eternity. Yet my soul answered in me, that notwithstanding all the disappointments I had met with, I would seek on till my dying hour; for during all the time of this dark cloud I was allowed to hold fast my interest in God, as my covenanted God in Christ my Redeemer, although at this time He was withdrawn, and did withhold the sensible smiles and blinks of divine love and light.
And while I was in this distress, and could get no help from human hand, my gracious God remembered me with another visit, with His own salvation, which was one night in secret prayer. After this seasonable appearance of God for my relief, I found that the felt darkness that had been on my soul these four preceding years was in some measure removed, and I was again restored to enjoy the light of the Lord’s countenance, which at this time strengthened and revived both my soul and natural spirits; and by an impression that fixed in my mind, I was made to expect and believe that I was to be restored to former light and consolation in Christ, but by other means and instruments than formerly I did enjoy. This discovery I had in the end of the twentieth-and-third year of my life, being the fourth year of this dark cloud; on which I come to make the following reflections:—1. I observe that the great change I came under in my condition was all in a sudden to the worse. 2. I see the greatness of the mitigations and supports the Lord mercifully allowed me, as also the warnings He gave me from His Word. 3. I observe this darkness was not fundamental and universal, but partial and by degrees. 4. Here I may compare my case to the natural day when the sun is overclouded, the air turneth cold and unpleasant, and yet there are some flowers and herbs that grow as much under the cloud as in the sun-blink; here I observe that when under this cloud that overshadowed my soul, it became a proper season to exercise faith, hope, patience, and humility, which the sun-blink I enjoyed in the other years did not so much call for. 5. I observe how the divine perfections were displayed in the various changes I came under. 6. I see, and may say with the Psalmist, that when the sun goeth down the beasts of prey do go abroad, as Psalm civ. This I may say to my sad experience, that when the shining of the light of the Lord’s countenance was withheld, oh, how did the beasts of prey creep abroad to the spoiling of my soul! Those evils that prevailed against my soul in this night of desertion and temptation were these:—
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The devil, the destroyer of mankind. 2. I found a recursion of a body of death that formerly had got a death’s stroke; those two enemies opposed me, both jointly and separately, ways unexpressible and innumerable. 3. My wonted light and seasonable help was withheld. Oh, how comparable then was my case to Samson’s! I was in my enemies’ hands and my strength was gone, yet there were real good things even in this sad case.
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There was a real support and an almighty power surrounding me even when at my lowest, although unseen and unfelt by me. 2. There were some words of grace sent into my soul with power as means of my support and comfort. 3. There was a party in my soul that abhorred sin and those evils I was tempted to; but love to God as reconciled in Christ remained so as nothing could fill His room in His absence. 4. I was allowed to claim my interest in, and relation to God, as my God in Christ. Although Satan made use of this as an argument to make me comply with his horrible temptations, yet my glorious Redeemer, that had the same ingredient in His state of humiliation and suffering, as recorded in Matthew iv. 3-11, enabled me to stand it out against the enemy, and kept me from yielding to his temptations.
As to the effects of this desertion and temptation, I remark—1. That it much resembles hell; for in hell there is the punishment of loss and the punishment of sense. Ah! I have been made to see and prize the worth of my enjoyments by the loss of them. Many a time I have compared my case to the blind folk—the difference that was in the case of them that were born blind, and never had the benefit and pleasure of light, and the case of them that had enjoyed their sight, and afterward have lost it; the reflections of the one will be more bitter than the other. So was it with me, my reflections on my loss tormented me. 2. The evils I felt in me and about me, and the effects those evils had on both my soul and body, made up like a hell in my case. 3. I observe that the felt sense of the usurping and prevailing power of indwelling sin, with the horrible buffetings of Satan, and a withholding of the sensible or felt power of the Spirit of grace to batter down and resist those, is like a hell to the renewed soul. 4. Here I observe a display of infinite Wisdom, who only knew how to hide pride from my eyes, lest I should be lifted up above measure with my former enjoyments. He did so strip me, as to let me see and feel that I had nothing, and could do nothing of myself, but what came from a supernatural power. I often compared myself to a person that was brought up nicely and fared sumptuously, yet afterwards stript of all, and clothed with rags, and set down on a dunghill among the beggars. This person’s case is more smarting and harder to be endured than theirs that have lived on the dunghill all their days, and never knew a better. Oh, when I thought on the Pisgah views and foretastes of the promised land, with the various and sweet entertainment I had met with, and when I compared it with my condition now, in some respects it appeared worse than theirs that had lived all their days upon the dunghill of nature, for their life was agreeable to their disposition, and so they had a pleasure in it, but my life during these four years was like a hell. There were two scriptures passed often through my mind, while I was under this dark cloud, and, as I apprehend, they came from the enemy, to drive me to despair: the one is, “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!” etc. (Isa. xiv. 12); the other is in Daniel iv. 32, “And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field.” Thus did the enemy upbraid me, and so might every one, had they known my case.
And, 1. Here I have felt, to my sad experience, how far the Lord may depart from the soul, and yet not leave it altogether, his gifts and callings being without repentance. 2. I observe that the divine perfections shine more in carrying a soul through desertion and temptations, and delivering them out of the same, than any other trials they can meet with in the world. 3. I can say, from my experience, that desertion hath humbled me more than all that ever I yet met with. So much for reflection on those four melancholy and cloudy years.
(To be continued.)