Christian letters full of spiritual instructions tending to the promoting of the power of…

Most Honoured Sir,

Many charges have passed over both you and my self, since my last Writing to you, but I am glad to hear that in that great change of your condition, you have made so wise and happy a choice. Mine unfeigned desire to God is for your Temporal and Spiritual prosperity; and that the blessings of both Worlds may be heaped up upon you. Yet I should desire you not to expect too much here, nor to count it a strange thing, if you meet with disappointments. Is it enough if you have the Lord for your portion, and Heaven for your Inheritance; though the World should not answer your expectations. I doubt not but you will be likely, as well as we, to meet with manifold temptations: the Lord make you, when you have done all to stand. Hold out a while in faith, patience, and self-denial, and you shall be as sure as God can make you of the Crown. Now arise and shine, and hold forth the power of holiness in all your converse. We have lived in times when Religion was the way to credit and esteem, and then it was more difficult to discern sincerity of ones profession, because men might be drawn to it upon worldly ends. But now is the time when God will prove us, if we will appear for him, and own his ways, when they are the common scorn of the World. Oh Sir, think it not hard if God do call you forth to own him in such a time as this, when few of your rank and quality will bear you company: but look upon it as a special advantage to prove your sincerity, and your fidelity to the Lord your Maker. The holy and blessed life of that noble Marquess Galeacius, I should much commend to your reading and imitation. Court not the World nor its preferments, Moses his self-denying choice. which the World would have branded for unparalleled folly, when he voluntarily left all the Court-preferments and pleasures, the wisest Judge commends for the great• wisdom. If Religion will make you vile, resolve with tha• •yal Worthy, ⟨p. 128⟩that you will be yet more vile. Remember who accounted the reproaches of Christ greater riches, than the Treasures of Egypt. Verily it is a greater honour to you to be vilified for Christ, than to be ignified with the highest Titles that the greatest on Earth can confer: