feast the soul in its solitude, and
refresh it on journeys, and bring down so much of heaven to earth as this
delightful letter expresses. But the remark is so obvious, that I will
not enlarge upon it; but proceed to the other letter above mentioned,
which was written the next month, on the Tuesday after a sacrament day.

He mentions the pleasure with which he had attended a preparation sermon
the Saturday before; and then he adds:

"I took a walk upon the mountains that are over against Ireland; and, I
persuade myself, that were I capable of giving you a description of what
passed there, you would agree that I had much better reason to remember
my God from the hills of Port Patrick than David from the land of Jordan,
and of the Hermonites, from the hill of Mizar." I suppose he refers to
the clearer discoveries of the gospel with which we are favoured. "In
short," says he immediately afterwards, in that scripture phrase which
had become so familiar to him, "I wrestled some hours with the Angel of
the covenant, and made supplications to him with floods of tears, and
cries--until I had almost expired; but he strengthened me so, that, like
Jacob, I had power with God, and prevailed. This," adds he, "is but a
very faint description; you will be more able to judge of it by what you
have felt yourself upon the like occasions. After such preparatory work,
I need not tell you how blessed the solemn ordinance of the Lord's supper
proved to me; I hope it was so to many. You may believe I should have
been exceeding glad, if my gracious Lord had ordered it so, that I might
have made you a visit, as I proposed; but I am now glad it was ordered
otherwise, since he hath caused so much of his goodness to pass before
me. Were I to give you an account of the many favours my God hath loaded
me with, since I parted from you, I must have taken up many days in
nothing but writing. I hope you will join with me in praises for all the
goodness he has shown to your unworthy brother in the Lord."

Such were the ardours and elevation of his soul. But while I record these
memorials of them, I am very sensible that there are many who will be
inclined to censure them as the flights of enthusiasm; for which reason,
I must beg leave to add a remark or two on the occasion, which will be
illustrated by several other extracts, which I shall introduce into the
sequel of these memoirs. The one is, that he never pretends, in any of
the passages cited above