Joshua Redivivus, or Mr. Rutherford's Letters

I am ashamed of my long silence to your L•: Your •ossings & wanderings are known to him, upon whom ye have been cast from the breasts, & who hath been your God of old. The temporal loss of creatures dear to you there, may be the more easily endured, that the gain of one who only hath immortality groweth. There is an universal complaint of deadness of spirit on all that know God; he that writes to you, Madam, is as deep in this as any, & is afraid of a strong & hot battle before time be at a close; but no matter if the Lord crown all with the victorious triumphing of faith. God teacheth us by terrible things in righteousness: we see many things, but we observe nothing. Our drink is sour, grey hairs are here & there on us, & we change many Lords & Rulers; but the same bondage of soul & body remains: We live little by faith, but much by sense, according to the times, & by humane policy: The watchmen sleep, & the people perish for lack of knowledge. How can we be enlightened when we turn our back on the Sun? And must we not be withered when we leave the fountain? It should be my only desire to be a minister gifted with the white stone & the new name written on it. I judge it were fit [now when tall Professors, & when many stars fall from heaven, & God poureth the Isle of great Britain from vessel to vessel, & yet we sit & are settled on our lees] to consider [as sometimes I do, but, ah, rarely] how irrecoverable a oe it is, to be under a beguile in the matter of eternity; & what if I who can have a subscribed testimonial of many, who shall stand at the right hand of the judge, shall miss Christ's approving testimony, & be set upon the left hand among the goats? there is such a beguile,