“We are poor, and blind, and miserable, and naked; rich in our fancied wisdom, seeing by our own light, and compassing ourselves about with our own sparks; we feed on ashes:  a deceived heart has turned us aside.

“‘O Lord, the hope of Israel, and the Saviour thereof.’  It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed.  To us belong shame and confusion of face—­O cover us with it—­but to thee belongs mercy.  Humble us, O Lord, and we shall be humbled; ’turn us, and we shall be turned.’

“It is in our nature to backslide for ever; thou, and thou only, knowest the deceitfulness of the heart; thou, and thou only, canst search it.  O search us, and try us, and show us what wicked ways there are in us, and lead us in the way everlasting.  Deal not with us according to our sins, but according to the multitude of thine own mercies.  We have no other plea; our sins call for judgment, and until thou, thine own blessed self, turn us, we are in no situation to receive mercy.  Work with us for thy name’s sake, establish with us thine own covenant of free, unmerited, undeserved mercy.  Then shall we know that thou art the Lord.

“Make us thine by thine own covenant, established in Christ, thine own anointed; the blessed surety, by thine own appointment; our substitute, on whom it hath pleased thee to lay the iniquities of us all; in whose sacred person thou tookest vengeance for all our sins; by whom thy law is fulfilled, magnified, and made honorable; whose doing and suffering in our stead is accepted by Jehovah.  ’The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness’ sake.’  No covenant short of one fulfilled in every jot and tittle could benefit us.

     “Thy covenant is well-ordered in all things, and it is sure.

“Here, O Lord, I take my stand; here I lay my foundation, and on this thy covenant I build; or rather, here thou thyself hast laid my foundation, and on this rock hast thou set my soul and built my hopes, thou subduing my enmity.  I acquiesce.  I will now ’remember the years of thy hand,’ look back to thy dealings with thine own nation, whom thou didst choose and set apart from all other nations, though of the same blood with all those that dwell on the face of the whole earth.

“They, like us, destroyed themselves, but in thee was their help.  They also sinned, committed iniquity, and did wickedly; they remembered not thy mercy, but provoked thee at the Red sea, after the great deliverance thou hadst wrought for them, and the wonders thou madest to pass before them in the land of Egypt.  Nevertheless thou savedst them for thy name’s sake, that thou mightest make thy mighty power known; thou didst repeat thy wonders, and didst dry up the sea before them.  He fed them with corn from heaven; they did eat angel’s food.  He clave the rock in the wilderness, and caused waters to run down like a river.  After all, they forsook the God of their mercies; they believed not his promises, nor trusted in his salvation; they lusted, and they murmured, and desired to turn back to Egypt.  Thou didst chasten them sore for their sin, and didst bring down their heart with grief.