←1113
←1113
Judges 3.20. See Bishop Burnet’s admirable remarks upon application at the close of our discourses. Pastoral Care, ch. ix. on Preaching. Also Claude’s observations, with Mr. Simeon’s notes appended. Mr. Alleine’s preaching beautifully illustrated the ‘heart and soul,’ which the Bishop would bring to this point.—‘So loth was he to labour in vain, and to pass from one discourse to another, as one unconcerned whether he had sown any good seed or not on the hearts of his hearers; that in the close of his applicatory part on any text, he ever expressed his great unwillingness to leave that subject without some assurances, that he had not “fought” in that spiritual warfare, “as one that beats the air;” when also he expressed his great fear, lest he should, after all his most importunate warnings, leave them as he found them. And here, with how much holy taking rhetoric he frequently expostulated the case with impenitent sinners, in words too many to mention, and yet too weighty to be forgotten; vehemently urging them to come to some good resolve, before he and they parted, and to make their choice either of life or death!’ Alleine’s Life and Letters.