4.  By supporting the soul under that dispensation, and keeping it from fainting, through the secret influences of grace, which he conveyeth into the soul; as he did to the poor woman of Canaan, Matth. xv.

5.  By setting the soul a-work, to use such means as God hath appointed for a recovery; as, to cry, to plead, to long, to wait, &c.  “Their heart shall live that seek him.”

6.  By teaching the soul to submit to and acquiesce in what God doth, acknowledging his righteousness, greatness, and sovereignty; and this quietness of heart is its life.

7.  By keeping the heart fast to the covenant of grace; so that whatever come, they will never quit that bargain, but they will trust in him though he should kill them; and they will adhere to the covenant of grace, though they should be dragged through hell.

8.  At length when he seeth it fit and convenient, he quickeneth by drawing back the veil, and filling the soul with joy, in the light of God’s countenance; and causing it to sing, as having the heart lifted up in the ways of the Lord.

As to the last particular, concerning the duty of a soul in such a case; we say,

1.  He should humble himself under this dispensation, knowing that it is the great God with whom he hath to do; and that there is no contending with him; and that all flesh should stoop before him.

2.  He should justify God in all that he doth, and say with David, Psal. xxii. 3.  “But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.”

3.  He should look upon himself as unworthy of the least of that kind:  “I am a worm,” said David, Psal. xxii. 6, “and no man.”

4.  He should search out his provocations, and run away to the fountain, the blood of Christ, that these may be purged away, and his conscience sprinkled from dead works, and his soul washed in the fountain opened to the house of David for sin and for uncleanness.

5.  He must also employ Christ, to discover to him more and more of his guiltiness, whereby he hath grieved the Spirit of God; and as sins are discovered to him, he would repent of them, and run away with them to the blood that cleanseth from all sin.  This was Elihu’s advice to Job, chap. xxxiv. 31, 32.  “Surely it is meet to be said unto God, I have borne chastisement, I will not offend.  That which I see not, teach thou me; if I have done iniquity, I will do no more.”

6.  He should grip to Christ in the covenant, and rest there with joy and satisfaction; he should hold that fast that he may ride out the storm in a dark night; “though he make not mine house to grow,” said David, 2 Sam. xxiii. 5; yet this was all his salvation and all his desire, that he “had made with him an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.”  The spouse took this course, when she could not get a sight of him whom her soul loved, Cant. vi. 3, and asserted her interest in him; “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.”