food.  Oh to be at the end of the race, or so near it as dear E. Stephens, by whose bed of pain and joy I could not but mingle tears.  But why thus?  Surely, O Lord, Thou hast heard the desire of thy poor creature.  Thy help must have been with me when I knew it not, or life had been quite extinct ere now.  Extinct it is not; and for this will I bless Thee, even that I am not yet cast out as an abominable branch, though so unfruitful.  I fear it can be only by much tribulation that the enemy of my own house will ever be quelled; and perhaps salutary pains are sent, in the very perplexities of things which might be more ensnaring if all went on smoothly.  I have declined more cotton goods from Ireland, and asked for woollen, which is one burden gone.

10th Mo. 7th.  I believe study and taste must be kept very subordinate to duty.  Enough, yea, heaven is this, to do my Father’s will, if it were but as it is done in heaven—­all willing, loving, joyful service!  Oh to be more like my Saviour!  Surely I love Him!

10th Mo. 20th.  If Martha should not have been cumbered with the outward attention to Christ Himself, cares for others on plea of duty can never be enough excuse for a peaceless mind.  “They which believe do enter into rest.”  Oh for rest this hour in Jesus’ bosom!

10th Mo. 21st.  This book will present no fair account of my state if I write only in hours of comfort.  I have passed through dark and sinful days—­no hope, no love.  I thought I must have wearied out the Saviour—­that He had given me up for lost.  Perhaps some self was in the feelings described in my last, and so this faithless sorrow came to teach me what I am.  Oh that nothing impure might mix in the consolation which has visited me last evening and this morning, when the gracious regard of my all-merciful Saviour has been witnessed, some blessed sight of “the water to cleanse and the blood to atone.”  Oh, how fervently I wish to be kept by faith in Him, in still deepening humility!

11th Mo. 27th.  What would be my present condition but for the unchangeable faithfulness of my God and Saviour?  Ah! how well may He say, “Thou hast destroyed thyself,” and yet how constantly add, “but in me is thine help.”  Yes, though we ofttimes believe not, yet “He abideth faithful, He cannot deny Himself;” and so, where there is any thing of His own left in a wandering heart, again and again returns, “upbraiding not,” or else only in accents of the tenderest love:  “O thou of little faith!” Often have I admired not only His great love as shown in the main features of redemption, but, if such a word is allowable, His minute loving kindness.  Kindness—­such a tender regard for the comfort and peace of the soul.  Oh, the spiritual sorrows are far more from ourselves, our own wilful work, than from Him whose language is, “I the Lord do keep it,