Imitation of Christ
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ADVICE ON SPIRITUAL READING.
PART OF THE PREFACE
TO JOHN WESLEY'S ABRIDGMENT
OF THOMAS A KEMPIS' TREATISE OF
THE IMITATION OF CHRIST.
Nee) 1. It is to these alone who, knowing they have not yet attained, neither are already perfect, mind this one thing, and, pressing toward the mark, despise no assistance which is offered them, that the following advices are proposed, concerning the manner of reading this (or any other religious) treatise.
2. First: Assign some stated time every day for this employment, and observe it, so far as you possibly can, inviolably. But if necessary business, which you could not foresee or defer, should sometimes rob you of your hour of retirement, take the next to it; or, if you cannot have that, at least the nearest you can.
3. Secondly: Prepare yourself for reading, by purity of intention, singly aiming at the good of your soul, and by fervent prayer to God, that he would enable you to see his will, and give you a firm resolution to perform it. An excellent form of prayer for this very purpose you have in the second or third book of this treatise.
4. Thirdly: Be sure to read, not cursorily or hastily, but leisurely, seriously, and with great attention; with proper pauses and intervals, and that you may allow time for the enlightenings of the divine grace.
To this end, recollect, every now and then, what you have read, and consider how to reduce it to practice. Further, let your reading be continued and regular, not rambling and desultory. To taste of many things, without fixing upon any, shows a vitiated palate, and feeds the disease which makes it pleasing. Whatsoever book you begin, read, therefore, through in order: Not but that it will be of great service to read those passages over and over that more nearly concern your-
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self, and more closely affect your inclinations or practice; especially if you press them home to your soul, by adding a particular examination of yourself upon each head.
5. Fourthly: Labor to work yourself up into a temper correspondent with what you read; for that reading is useless which only enlightens the understanding, without warming the affections. And therefore intersperse, here and there, earnest aspirations to God, for his heat as well as his light. Select also any remarkable sayings or advices, and treasure them up in your memory; and these you may either draw forth in time of need, as arrows from a quiver, against temptation (more especially against the solicitations to that sin which most easily besets you) or make use of as incitements to any virtue, to humility, patience, or the love of God.
6. Conclude all with a short ejaculation to God, that he, without whom netther ts he that planteth anything, nor he that watereth, would so bless the good seed sown in your heart, that it may bring forth fruit unto life eternal.
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JOHN WESLEY'S TRANSLATIONS
OF SOME GERMAN HYMNS
1. (344) ((433)) THOU hidden love of God, whose height, Whose depth unfathom'd no man knows, I see from far thy beauteous light, Inly I sigh for thy repose.
My heart is pain'd, nor can it be At rest, till it finds rest in thee.
Thy secret voice invites me still The sweetness of thy yoke to prove; And fain I would: but though my will Be fix'd, yet wide my passions rove.
Yet hindrances strew all the way; I aim at thee, yet from thee stray.
"Tis mercy all, that thou hast brought My mind to seek her peace in thee; Yet while I seek, but find thee not, No peace my wandering soul shall see.
Oh, when shall all my wanderings end, And all my steps to thee-ward tend?
Is there a thing beneath the sun That strives with thee my heart to share?
Ah, tear it thence, and reign alone, The Lord of every motion there:
Then shall my heart from earth be free, When it has found repose in thee.
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Oh, hide this SELF from me, that I No more, but CHRIST in me may live!
My vile affections crucify, Nor let one darling lust survive.
In all things nothing may I see, Nothing desire or seek but thee!
O LOVE, thy sovereign aid impart, To save me from low-thoughted care:
Chase this self-will through all my heart, Through all its latent mazes there.
Make me Thy duteous child, that I Ceaseless may, "Abba, Father," cry.
Ah no! ne'er will I backward turn:
Thine wholly, thine alone I am!
Thrice happy he who views with scorn Earth's toys, for thee his constant flame.
Oh, help, that I may never move From the blest footsteps of thy love!
Each moment draw from earth away My heart, that lowly waits thy call:
Speak to my inmost soul, and say, "T am thy Love, thy God, thy All!"
To feel thy power, to hear thy voice, To taste thy love is all my choice!
Gerhard Tersteegen 1697-1769 2. (831) (507) COMMIT thou all thy griefs se And ways into his hands, To his sure truth and tender care, Who earth and heaven commands.
Who points the clouds their course, ne Whom winds and seas obey; He shall direct thy wandering feet, He shall prepare thy way. zal
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Thou on the Lord rely, So safe shalt thou go on; Fix on his work thy steadfast eye, So shall thy work be done.
No profit canst thou gain By self-consuming care:
To him commend thy cause, his ear Attends the softest prayer.
Thy everlasting truth, Father, thy ceaseless love Sees all thy children's wants, and knows
What best for each will prove.
And whatso'er thou will'st, Thou dost, O King of kings; What thy unerring wisdom chose Thy power to being brings.
Thou everywhere hast way, And all things serve thy might; Thy every act pure blessing 1s, Thy path unsullied light.
When Thou arisest, Lord, What shall Thy work withstand?
When all thy children want Thou giv'st, Who, who shall stay thy hand?
Give to the winds thy fears, Hope, and be undismay'd; God hears thy sighs, and counts thy tears,
God shall lift up thy head.
Through waves and clouds and storms He gently clears thy way; Wait thou His time, so shall this night Soon end in joyous day.
Still heavy is thy heart?
Still sink thy spirits down?
Cast off the weight, let fear depart, And every care be gone. a2
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What though thou rulest not?
Yet heaven and earth and hell Proclaim, God sitteth on the throne And ruleth all things well! wz Leave to his sovereign sway To choose and to command; So shalt thou wondering own, his way How wise, how strong his hand.
Far, far above thy thought His counsel shall appear, When fully he the work hath wrought That caused thy needless fear.
14.
5S.
Thou seest our weakness, Lord, Our hearts are known to Thee; Oh, lift thou up the sinking hand, Confirm the feeble knee!
Let us in life, in death, Thy steadfast truth declare, And publish with our latest breath Thy love and guardian care!
Paulus Gerhardt 1607-1676 3. (431) ((573)) JESU, thy light again I view, Again thy mercy's beams I see, And all within me wakes, anew To pant for thy immensity:
Again my thoughts to thee aspire In fervent flames of strong desire.
But, Oh! what offering shall I give To thee, the Lord of earth and skies?
My spirit, soul, and flesh receive A holy, living sacrifice.
Small as it is, tis all my store:
More shouldst thou have, if I had more.
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Now then, my God, thou hast my soul, No longer mine, but thine I am:
Guard thou thy own: possess it whole, Cheer it by hope, with love inflame.
Thou hast my spirit; there display Thy glory to the perfect day.
Thou hast my flesh; thy hallow'd shrine, Devoted solely to Thy will:
Here let thy light forever shine, This house still let thy presence fill:
O Source of Life, live, dwell, and move In me, till all my life be love.
Oh, never in these veils of shame, Sad fruits of sin, my glorying be!
Clothe with salvation through thy name My soul, and may I put on Thee!
Be living faith my costly dress, And my best robe thy righteousness!
Send down thy likeness from above, And let this my adorning be:
Clothe me with wisdom, patience, love, With lowliness and purity, Than gold and pearls more precious far, And brighter than the morning star.
Lord, arm me with thy Spirit's might, Since I am call'd by thy great name:
In thee my wandering thoughts unite, Of all my works be thou the aim.
Thy love attend me all my days, And my sole business be thy praise!
Joachim Lange 1670-1744
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4. (494) ((683)) LO, God is here! Let us adore, And own how dreadful is this place!
Let all within us feel his power, And silent bow before his face.
Who know his power, his grace who prove, Serve him with awe, with reverence love.
Lo, God is here! him day and night The' united choirs of angels sing:
To him enthroned above all height Heaven's hosts their noblest praises bring:
Disdain not, Lord, our meaner song, Who praise thee with a stammering tongue.
Gladly the toys of earth we leave, Wealth, pleasure, fame, for thee alone:
To thee our will, soul, flesh we give; O take, O seal them for thy own!
Thou art the God; thou art the Lord:
Be thou by all thy works adored!
Being of beings, may our praise Thy courts with grateful fragrance fill; Still may we stand before thy face, Still hear and do thy sovereign will.
To thee may all our thoughts arise, Ceaseless, accepted sacrifice!
In thee we move. All things of thee Are full, thou Source and Life of all!
Thou vast, unfathomable Sea!
Fall prostrate, lost in wonder, fall, Ye sons of men; for God is man!
All may we lose, so Thee we gain!
As flowers their opening leaves display, And glad drink in the solar fire, So may we catch thy every ray,
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So may thy influence us inspire:
Thou Beam of the Eternal Beam, Thou purging Fire, thou quickening Flame!
Gerhard Tersteegen 1697-1769 5. (210) ((445)) THEE will I love, my strength, my tower;
Thee will I love, my joy, my crown; Thee will I love with all my power, In all my works, and thee alone!
Thee will I love, till the pure fire Fill my whole soul with chaste desire.
Ah! why did I so late thee know, Thee, lovelier than the sons of men!
Ah! why did I no sooner go To thee, the only ease in pain!
Ashamed I sigh, and inly mourn That I so late to thee did turn.
In darkness willingly I stray'd; I sought thee, yet from thee I roved:
For wide my wandering thoughts were spread, Thy creatures more than thee I loved.
And now, if more at length I see, Tis through thy light, and comes from thee.
I thank thee, Uncreated Sun, That thy bright beams on me have shined; I thank thee, who hast overthrown My foes, and heal'd my wounded mind; I thank thee, whose enlivening voice Bids my freed heart in thee rejoice.
Uphold me, in the doubtful race, Nor suffer me again to stray; Strengthen my feet, with steady pace
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Still to press forward in thy way; My soul and flesh, O Lord of Might, Fill, satiate with thy heavenly light.
Give to my eyes refreshing tears; Give to my heart chaste, hallow'd fires; Give to my soul, with filial fears, The love that all heaven's host inspires:
'That all my powers, with all their might In thy sole glory may unite."
Thee will I love, my joy, my crown!
Thee will I love, my Lord, my God!
Thee will I love, beneath thy frown Or smile, thy sceptre or thy rod.
What though my flesh and heart decay?
Thee shall I love in endless day!
Johann Scheffler 1624 -1677 6. (189) ((375)) NOW I have found the ground, wherein Sure my soul's anchor may remain— The wounds of Jesus, for my sin Before the world's foundation slain:
Whose mercy shall unshaken stay, When heaven and earth are fled away.
Father, thy everlasting grace Our scanty thought surpasses far:
Thy heart still melts with tenderness, Thy arms of love still open are Returning sinners to receive, That mercy they may taste, and live.
O Love, thou bottomless abyss!
My sins are swallow'd up in thee:
Cover'd is my unrighteousness, o7
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Nor spot of guilt remains in me, While Jesu's blood, through earth and skies, Mercy, free, boundless mercy, cries!
With faith I plunge me in this sea; Here is my hope, my joy, my rest:
Hither, when hell assails, I flee, I look into my Savior's breast!
Away, sad doubt, and anxious fear!
Mercy is all that's written there.
Though waves and storms go o'er my head, Though strength, and health, and friends be gone,
Though joys be wither'd all, and dead, Though every comfort be withdrawn, On this my steadfast soul relies, Father, thy mercy never dies.
Fix'd on this ground will I remain, Though my heart fail, and flesh decay:
This anchor shall my soul sustain, When earth's foundations melt away; Mercy's full power I then shall prove, Loved with an everlasting love.
Johann Andreas Rothe 1688-1758
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EXTRACTS FROM JOHN WESLEY'S
JOURNAL 8th January to 24th May I7SS SUNDAY 8 January 1738: In the fullness of my heart, I wrote the following words:
By the most infallible of proofs, inward feeling, I am convinced:
1. Of unbelief—having no such faith in Christ as will prevent my heart from being troubled, which it could not be if I believed in God and rightly believed also in [Christ];
2. Of pride throughout my life past, inasmuch as I thought I had what I find I have not; 3. Of gross irrecollection, inasmuch as in a storm I cry to God every moment; in a calm, not; 4. Of levity and luxuriancy of spirit, recurring whenever the pressure is taken off; and appearing by my speaking words not tending to edify; but most by my manner of speaking of my enemies.
Lord, save, or I perish! Save me:
1. By such a faith as implies peace in life and in death; 2. By such humility as may fill my heart from this hour forever, with a piercing, uninterrupted sense, nihil est quod hactenus fect; (I have done nothing hitherto) having evidently built without a foundation,
3. By such a recollection as may cry to thee every moment, especially when all is calm. Give me faith, or I die; give me a lowly spirit: otherwise, mihi non sit suave vivere; (Let life be a burden to me).
4. By steadiness, seriousness, o€uv677¢, sobriety of spirit, avoiding, as fire, every word that tends not to edifying, and never speaking of any who oppose me; or sin against God, without all my own sins set in array before my face.
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TUESDAY 24: We spoke with two ships, outward-bound, from whom we had the welcome news of our wanting but one hundred and sixty leagues of the Land's End. My mind was now full of thought, part of which I wrote down as follows:
I went to America to convert the Indians but, oh, who shall convert me? Who, what, is he that will deliver me from this evil heart of unbelief? I have a fair summer religion. I can talk well, nay, and believe myself, while no danger is near. But let death look me in the face, and my spirit is troubled. Nor can I say, to die ts gain.
I have a sin of fear, that when I've spun My last thread, I shall perish on the shore!
I think, verily, if the Gospel be true, I am safe, for I not only have given and do give all my goods to feed the poor; I not only give my body to be burned, drowned, or whatever God shall appoint for me; but I follow after charity (though not as I ought, yet as I can) if haply
I may attain it. I now believe the Gospel is true. / show my faith by my works by staking my all upon it. I would do so again and again a thousand times, if the choice were still to make. Whoever sees me, sees I would be a Christian. Therefore are my ways not like other men's ways?
Therefore, I have been, I am, I am content to be, a by-word, a proverb of reproach. But in a storm I think, "What if the Gospel be not true?
Then thou art of all men most foolish. For what have you given up your goods, your ease, your friends, your reputation, your country, your life? For what are you wandering over the face of the earth— a dream, a cunningly devised fable? Oh, who will deliver me from this fear of death? What shall I do? Where shall I fly from it? Should
I fight against it by thinking or by not thinking of it?" A wise man advised me some time since, "Be still and go on." Perhaps this is best, to look upon it as my cross; when it comes, to let it humble me and quicken all my good resolutions, especially that of praying without ceasing, and at other times to take no thought about it, but quietly go on in the work of the Lord.
1. For many years I have been tossed by various winds of doctrine. I asked long ago, "What must I do to be saved"? The scripture answered, "Keep the commandments, believe, hope, love; follow after these tempers till you have fully attained (that is, till death) by all those outward works and means which God has appointed, by walking as Christ walked."
2. I was early warned against laying, as the papists do, too much
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stress on outward works—or on a faith without works; which, as it does not include, so it will never lead to, true hope or charity. Nor am I sensible that to this hour I have laid too much stress on either; having from the very beginning valued both faith and the means of grace and good works, not on their own account, but as believing that God, who had appointed them, would by them bring me in due time to the mind that was in Christ.
3. But before God's time was come, I fell among some Lutheran and Calvinist authors, whose confused and indigested accounts magnified faith to such an amazing size that it quite hid all the rest of the commandments. I did not then see that this was the natural effect of their overgrown fear of popery, being so terrified with the cry of merit and good works that they plunged at once into the other extreme. In this labyrinth I was utterly lost, not being able to find out what the error was, nor yet to reconcile this uncouth hypothesis either with scripture or common sense.
4. The English writers, such as Bishop Beveridge, Bishop Taylor, and Mr. Nelson, a little relieved me from these well-meaning, wrong-headed Germans. Their accounts of Christianity I could easily see to be, in the main, consistent both with reason and scripture.
Only when they interpreted scripture in different ways I was often much at a loss. And again, there was one thing much insisted on in scripture—the unity of the Church—which none of them, I thought, clearly explained or strongly inculcated.
5. But it was not long before Providence brought me to those who showed me a sure rule of interpreting scripture, viz: Consensus veterum: quod ab omnibus, quod ubique, quod semper creditum (The consensus of antiquity: that which has been believed by everyone, everywhere and always). At the same time they sufficiently insisted upon a due regard to the one Church at all times and in all places.
Nor was it long before I bent the bow too far the other way:
1. By making antiquity a coordinate rather than subordinate rule with scripture.
2. By admitting several doubtful writings as undoubted evidences of antiquity.
3. By extending antiquity too far, even to the middle or end of the fourth century.
4. By believing more practices to have been universal in the ancient Church than ever were so.
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5. By not considering that the decrees of one provincial synod could bind only that province; and that the decrees of a general synod
[bound] only those provinces whose representatives met therein.
6. By not considering that the most of those decrees were adapted to particular times and occasions; and consequently, when these occasions ceased, must cease to bind even those provinces.
These considerations insensibly stole upon me as I grew acquainted with the mystic writers, whose noble descriptions of union with God and internal religion made everything else appear mean, flat and insipid. But, in truth, they made good works appear so, too; yea, and faith itself, and what not?
What occurred on WEDNESDAY 24th (May), I think best to relate at large, after premising what may make it the better understood. Let him that cannot receive it ask the Father of lights that he would give more light both to him and me.
1. I believe, till I was about ten years old, I had not sinned away that washing of the Holy Ghost which was given me in baptism, having been strictly educated and carefully taught that I could only be saved by universal obedience, by keeping all the commandments of God—in the meaning of which I was diligently instructed. And those instructions, so far as they respected outward duties and sins, I gladly received and often thought of. But all that was said to me of inward obedience or holiness I neither understood nor remembered. So that I was indeed as ignorant of the true meaning of the law as I was of the Gospel of Christ.
2. The next six or seven years were spent at school, where, outward restraints being removed, I was much more negligent than before, even of outward duties, and almost continually guilty of outward sins which I knew to be such, though they were not scandalous in the eye of the world. However, I still read the scriptures and said my prayers, morning and evening. And what I now hoped to be saved by was (1) not being so bad as other people; (2) having still a kindness for religion; and (3) reading the Bible, going to church and saying my prayers.
3. Being removed to the university for five years, I still said my prayers both in public and in private, and read with the scriptures several other books of religion, especially comments on the New Testament. Yet I had not all this while so much as a notion of inward holiness; nay, went on habitually, and for the most part very content-
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edly, in some or other known sin—indeed, with some intermissions and short struggles, especially before and after the Holy Communion, which I was obliged to receive thrice a year. I cannot well tell what
I hoped to be saved by now, when I was continually sinning against that little light I had, unless by those transient fits of what many divines taught me to call ''repentance."
4. When I was about twenty-two, my father pressed me to enter into Holy Orders. At the same time, the providence of God directing me to Kempis's Christian Pattern, I began to see that true religion was seated in the heart and that God's law extended to all our thoughts as well as words and actions. I was, however, very angry at Kempis for being too strict, though I read him only in Dean Stanhope's translation. Yet I had frequently much sensible comfort in reading him, such as I was an utter stranger to before. Meeting likewise with a religious friend, which I never had till now, I began to alter the whole form of my conversation, and to set in earnest upon "a new life." I set apart an hour or two a day for religious retirement. I communicated every week. I watched against all sin, whether in word or deed.
I began to aim at, and pray for, inward holiness. So that now, doing so much and living so good a life, 1 doubted not but I was a good Christian.
5. Removing soon after to another college, I executed a resolution which I was before convinced was of the utmost importance— shaking off at once all my trifling acquaintance. I began to see more and more the value of time. I applied myself closer to study. I watched more carefully against actual sins; I advised others to be religious, according to that scheme of religion by which I modeled my own life. But meeting now with Mr. Law's Christian Perfection and Serious Call (although I was much offended at many parts of both, yet) they convinced me more than ever of the exceeding height and breadth and depth of the law of God. The light flowed in so mightily upon my soul that everything appeared in a new view. I cried to God for help and resolved not to prolong the time of obeying him, as I had never done before. And by my continued endeavor to keep his whole law, inward and outward, to the utmost of my power, I was persuaded that I should be accepted of him and that I was even then in a state of salvation.
6. In 1730 I began visiting the prisons, assisting the poor and sick in town, and doing what other good I could by my presence or my little fortune to the bodies and souls of all men. To this end I abridged
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myself of all superfluities, and many that are called necessaries of life.
I soon became a by-word for so doing, and I rejoiced that my name was cast out as evil. The next spring I began observing the Wednesday and Friday fasts commonly observed in the ancient Church, tasting no food till three in the afternoon. And now I knew not how to go any further. I diligently strove against all sin. I omitted no sort of self-denial which I thought lawful. I carefully used, both in public and private, all the means of grace at all opportunities. I omitted no occasion of doing good. I for that reason suffered evil. And all this I knew to be nothing unless as it was directed toward inward holiness. Accordingly this, the image of God, was what I aimed at in all, by doing his will, not my own. Yet when, after continuing some years in this course, I apprehended myself to be near death, I could not find that all this gave me any comfort or any assurance of acceptance with God. At this I was then not a little surprised, not imagining I had been all this time building on the sand, nor considering that other foundation can no man lay than that which 1s laid by God, even Christ Jesus.
7. Soon after, a contemplative man convinced me still more than I was convinced before that outward works are nothing, being alone; and in several conversations instructed me how to pursue inward holiness, or a union of the soul with God. But even of his instructions
(though I then received them as the words of God) I cannot but now observe (a) that he spoke so incautiously against trusting in outward works that he discouraged me from doing them at all; (b) that he recommended (as it were, to supply what was wanting in them) mental prayer and the like exercises, as the most effectual means of purifying the soul and uniting it with God. Now these were, in truth, as much my own works as visiting the sick or clothing the naked; and the "union with God" thus pursued was as really my own righteousness as any I had before pursued under another name.
8. In this refined way of trusting to my own works and my own righteousness (so zealously inculcated by the mystic writers), I dragged on heavily, finding no comfort or help therein till the time of my leaving England. On shipboard, however, I was again active in outward works, where it pleased God of his free mercy to give me twenty-six of the Moravian brethren for companions, who endeavored to show me a more excellent way. But I understood it not at first.
was too learned and too wise, so that it seemed foolishness unto me. And I continued preaching and following after, and trusting in that righteousness whereby no flesh can be justified.
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9. All the time I was at Savannah I was thus beating the air. Being ignorant of the righteousness of Christ, which, by a living faith in him, bringeth salvation to every one that believeth. I sought to establish my own righteousness, and so labored in the fire all my days. I was now properly under the law. I knew that the law of God was spiritual; I consented to it that it was good. Yea, I delighted in it after the inner man. Yet was I carnal, sold under sin. Every day was I constrained to cry out, What I do, I allow not: for what I would, I do not; but what I hate, that I do. To will is indeed present with me; but how to perform that which 1s good, I find not. For the good which I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do. I find a law that when I would do good, evil is present with me, even the law in my members, warring against the law of my mind and still bringing me into captivity to the law of sin.
10. In this state I was indeed fighting continually, but not conquering. Before, I had willingly served sin; now it was unwillingly, but still I served it. I fell and rose and fell again. Sometimes I was overcome and in heaviness: sometimes I overcame and was in joy. For as in the former state I had some foretastes of the terrors of the law, so had I in this of the comforts of the Gospel. During this whole struggle between nature and grace which had now continued above ten years, | had many remarkable returns to prayer, especially when
I was in trouble. I had many sensible comforts, which are indeed no other than short anticipations of the life of faith. But I was still under the law, not under grace (the state most who are called Christians are content to live and die in), for I was only striving with, not freed from, sin. Neither had I the witness of the Spirit with my spirit, and indeed could not, for I sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law.
11. In my return to England, January 1738, being in imminent danger of death and very uneasy on that account, I was strongly convinced that the cause of that uneasiness was unbelief and that the gaining a true, living faith was the one thing needful for me. But still
I fixed not this faith on its right object: I meant only faith in God, not faith in or through Christ. Again, I knew not that I was wholly void of this faith but only thought J had not enough of it. So that when
Peter Bohler, whom God prepared for me as soon as I came to London, affirmed of true faith in Christ (which is but one) that it had those two fruits inseparably attending it, "dominion over sin, and constant peace from a sense of forgiveness," I was quite amazed and looked upon it as a new Gospel. If this was so, it was clear I had not
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faith. But I was not willing to be convinced of this. Therefore I disputed with all my might and labored to prove that faith might be where these were not, especially where the sense of forgiveness was not; for all the scriptures relating to this I had been long since taught to construe away and to call all Presbyterians who spoke otherwise.
Besides, I well saw no one could, in the nature of things, have such a sense of forgiveness and not fee/ it. But I felt it not. If, then, there was no faith without this, all my pretensions to faith dropped at once.
12. When I met Peter Bohler again, he consented to put the dispute upon the issue which I desired, namely, scripture and experience. I first consulted the scripture. But when I set aside the glosses of men and simply considered the words of God, comparing them together, endeavoring to illustrate the obscure by the plainer passages,
I found they all made against me and was forced to retreat to my last hold, "that experience would never agree with the /iteral interpretation of those scriptures. Nor could I therefore allow it to be true, till I found some living witnesses of it."" He replied he could show me such at any time; if I desired it, the next day. And, accordingly, the next day he came again with three others, all of whom testified of their own personal experience that a true living faith in Christ is inseparable from a sense of pardon for all past, and freedom from all present, sins. They added with one mouth that this faith was the gift, the free gift of God, and that he would surely bestow it upon every soul who earnestly and perseveringly sought it. I was not thoroughly convinced and, by the grace of God, I resolved to seek it unto the end, first, by absolutely renouncing all dependence, in whole or in part, upon my own works or righteousness—on which I had really grounded my hope of salvation, though I knew it not, from my youth up; second, by adding to "the constant use of all the 'other' means of grace," continual prayer for this very thing—justifying, saving faith, a full reliance on the blood of Christ shed for me, a trust in him, as my Christ, as my sole justification, sanctification, and redemption.
13. I continued thus to seek it (though with strange indifference, dullness and coldness and unusually frequent relapses into sin) till
Wednesday, May 24. I think it was about five this morning, that I opened my Testament on those words, Td wéytora nutv Kat Tia emayyéAmata Sedmpyrar, iva [Sia TovTwv] yévnobe Oeiac Kowwvol dvaEws, There are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, even that you should be partakers of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4).
Just as I went out, I opened it again on those words, You are not far
SELECTED WRITINGS
Srom the kingdom of God. In the afternoon I was asked to go to St.
Paul's. The anthem was Out of the deep have I called unto you, O Lord:
Lord, hear my voice. O let your ears consider well the voice of my complaint.
If you, Lord, will be extreme to mark what is done amiss, O Lord, who may abide it? For there is mercy with you; therefore shall you be feared. O Israel, trust in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and with bim is plenteous redemption. And he shall redeem Israel from all bis sins.
14. In the evening, I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ,
Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.
15. I began to pray with all my might for those who had in a more especial manner despitefully used me and persecuted me. I then testified openly to all there what I now first felt in my heart. But it was not long before the enemy suggested, '"This cannot be faith, for where is your joy?" Then was I taught that "peace and victory over sin are essential to faith in the Captain of our salvation but that, as to the transports of joy—that usually attend the beginning of it especially in those who have mourned deeply—God sometimes giveth, sometimes withholdest them, according to the counsels of his own will."
16. After my return home, I was much buffeted with temptations, but cried out and they fled away. They returned again and again. I as often lifted up my eyes and he sent me help from his holy place. And herein I found [in what] the difference between this and my former state chiefly consisted. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace. But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered; now, I was always conqueror.