Dr. Owen.

What if, as you suggest, the sober Dr. Owen, though he told me and others, at first, he would write an epistle to my book, ("Peaceable Principles and True,”) yet waved it afterwards; this was also to my advantage; because it was the earnest solicitations of several of you that at that time stopped his hand:  and perhaps it was more for the glory of God that truth should, go naked into the world, than as seconded by so mighty an armor-bearer as he.

Truth.

The truth is of that nature, that the more it is opposed, the more glory it appears in; and the more the adversary objects against it, the more it will clear itself.

There belongs to every true notion of truth, a power; the notion is the shell, the power the kernel and life.

It is impossible that a carnal heart should conceive of the weight that truth lays upon the conscience of a believer.  They see nothing, alas, nothing at all but a truth; and, say they, Are you such fools as to stand groaning to bear up that, or what is contained therein?  They see not the weight, the glory, the weight of glory, that is in a truth of God; and therefore they laugh at them that will count it worth the while to endure so much to support it from falling to the ground.

Truths are often delivered to us, like wheat in full ears, to the end we should rub them out before we eat them, and take pains about them, before we have the comfort of them.

Style.

    I could, were I so pleased, use higher-strains,
    And for applause on tenters stretch my brains;
    But what needs that?  The arrow out of sight
    Does not the sleeper nor the watchman fright: 
    To shoot too high doth make but children gaze,
    ’Tis that which hits the man doth him amaze.

        Should all be forced their brains to lay aside,
        That cannot regulate the flowing tide
        By this or that man’s fancy, we should have
        The wise unto the fool become a slave.

Words easy to be understood do often hit the mark, when high and learned ones do only pierce the air.  He also that speaks to the weakest, may make the learned understand him; when he that striveth to be high, is not only for the most part understood but of a sort, but also many times is neither understood by them nor by himself.

The old and new dispensations.

There is as great a difference between their dispensation and ours for comfort, as there is between the making of a bond with a promise to seal it, and the actual sealing.  It was made indeed in their time, but it was not sealed until the blood was shed on Calvary.

The pilgrim in new England.