Discourses on various important subjects, nearly concerning the great affair of the soul's eternal…

1. Remember that if ever God bestows Mercy upon you, he will use his sovereign Pleasure about the Time when. He will bestow it on some in a little Time, and on others not till they have sought it long. If other Persons are soon enlightened and comforted, while you remain long in Darkness, there is no other Way but for you to wait. God will act arbitrarily in this Matter, and you can't help it. You must even be content to wait, in a Way of laborious and earnest Striving, till his Time comes. If you refuse, you will but undo your self; and when you shall hereafter find your self undone, and see that your Case is past Remedy, how will you condemn your self for foregoing a great Probability of Salvation, only because you had not Patience to hold out, and was not willing to be at the Trouble of a persevering Labour? And what will it avail before God, or your own Conscience, to say that you could not bear to be obliged to seek Salvation so long, when God bestowed it on others that sought it but for a very short Time? Though God may have bestowed the Testimonies of his Favour on others in a few Days, or Hours after they have begun earnestly to seek it, how does that alter the Case as to you, if there proves to be a Necessity ⟨p. 151⟩of your laboriously seeking many Years before you obtain them? Is Salvation the less Worth the taking a great Deal of Pains for, because, through the sovereign Pleasure of God, others have obtained with comparatively but little Pains? If there are two Persons, the one of which has obtained converting Grace with comparative Ease, and another that has obtained it after continuing for many Years in the greatest and most earnest Labours after it, how little Difference does it make at last, when once Salvation is obtained! Put all the Labour, and Pains, and long continued Difficulties and Strugglings of the one, in the Scale against Salvation, and how little does it subtract; and put the Ease with which the other has obtained, in the Scale with Salvation, and how little does it add? What is either added or subtracted, is lighter than Vanity, and a Thing worthy of no Consideration, when compared with that infinite Benefit that is obtained.

1. Remember that if ever God bestows Mercy upon you, he will use his sovereign Pleasure about the Time when. He will bestow it on some in a little Time, and on others not till they have sought it long. If other Persons are soon enlighten'd and comforted, while you remain long in Darkness, there is no other Way but for you to wait. God will act arbitrarily in this Matter, and you can't help it. You must e'en be content to wait, in a Way of laborious and earnest Striving, till his Time comes. If you refuse, you will but undo your self; and when you shall hereafter find your self undone, and see that your Case is past Remedy, how will you condemn your self for foregoing a great Probability of Salvation, only because you had not Patience to hold out, and was not willing to be at the Trouble of a persevering Labour? And what will it avail before God, or your own Conscience, to say that you could not bear to be obliged to seek Salvation so long, when God bestowed it on others that sought it but for a very short Time? Though God may have bestowed the Testimonies of his Favour on others in a few Days, or Hours after they have begun earnestly to seek it, how does that alter the Case as to you, if there proves to be a Necessity