Internal Hinderances of Self-Acquaintance

H. I come next to the internal impediments to self-acquaintance, especially in the worser sort of men.

I. The first that I shall acquaint you with is, That natural, deep-rooted sin of pride, which strongly inclineth men to think well of themselves, and to desire that all others do so too: so that, where pride is not discovered and subdued by grace, men will scarcely endure to be closely questioned by ministers or otlver friends, about their sin, and the condition of their souls. What! question them whether they are ungodly, unsanctified, the servants of sin and Satan; in a state of death and condemnation! Their hearts will rise with indignation against him that will put such questions to them. What! question them whether they have any saving grace! Whether they are regenerate, pardoned, and have any well-grounded hopes of heaven! They love not the searching word of God; they love not the distinguishing passages of Scripture; they love not a faithful, searching minister, because they would dishonour and trouble them with such doubts as these. A proud man judgeth not of himself as he is, but as his tumified, distempered fancy representeth him to himself to be: to “think himself something when he is nothing,” and so to be wilfully his own deceiver, is his disease. And as pride is one of the deepest-rooted sins in man, and of greatest strength, and most hardly extirpated and overcome, so true self-acquaintance must be accordingly difficult, it being carried on but by such degrees as we get ground and victory against our pride. A proud man, how wise soever in any other matters, as to the right knowledge of himself, is like one that is crack-brained, and hath not indeed the right use of reason: pride was his fir*t tutor, and taught him what to believe of himself: so that Christ, who comes after with a humbling doctrine, cannot be believed, nor scarcely with any patience heard. O what a disease is to be cured, before a proud person wUl well know himself! What labour do we lose in all our sermons! Yea, how oft doth the medicine irritate the disease! So that a poor wretch, that is under the wrath of God, and knoweth not, when he is gone out of the assembly, whether the justice of Heaven will not take vengeance on him before he can come hither again, yet cannot abide to hear of this, but, with Ahab, hateth the pr eacJicr that prophesieth evil of him, be it ever fio Uue. It is pride that leadeth up that array of corruptioos, that here strive against the light of itrutli, that is sent to convince and convert the guilty. And is a man like to be saved by the word, while S 2 he hateth it, and bends his thoughts and passions all against it?

Direct. 1. He, therefore, that will ever know himself, must first let in so much of the light as may take down his arrogancy, and bring him, as a little child, to the school of Christ. First know what thou art as a man; and then know what thou art as a sinner, and sentenced by God, that so thou mayest come to know what thou art as one that is under the hopes and duties of the redeemed. When thy proud heart rcbelleth against conviction, remember with whom thou hast to do. Will God speak submissively to thee for fear of offending thee? Will he cry thee mercy for handling thee so roughly as to tell thee thou art yet the child of wrath? Is he afraid to talk to thee of death or of damnation? Will he recal his threatenings, and repent him of the severity of his laws, because such worms are angry with them, or will not believe them? Perhaps thou mayest make a false-hearted, fearful, man-pleasing minister, to change his strain or plainer dealing, and become thy flatterer, or be silent: but will God be silenced? O no; he will one day tell thee what thou art with another voice than this of a a mortal and despised man, and in another manner than preachers tell it thee. If thou canst frown the preacher out of the pulpit, or out of his fidelity to God and thee, yet canst thou not frown God out of heaven. He will speak to thee more terribly than the most terrible preacher that ever thou heardst: and if thy pride shall rise up, and tell him that he doth thee wrong, how quickly will thy “mouth be stopped,” and thou be forced to confess thy guilt! O stoop to the humbling word of grace, or God will make thee stoop to the words and strokes of wrath! Fear Him that will make the proudest fear, before he hath done with them. Judged thou must be; by thyself, to self-abasing and conversion, or by God to desolation and confusion: and canst thou easier bear God’s judgment than thy own! Stoop, foolish, self-deluding dust! Stoop, sinful wretch, and know thy misery I If thou stand it out a little longer, an undiscerned blow may bring thee down; and thou shalt not see the hand that strikes thee, till thou art humbled in the grave and hell. O how absurd, yet pitiful a sight is it, to see poor sinners brave it out against the humbling message of the Lord, as if they could make good their cause against him! And scorn to know that they are going to hell, till they are there! And then will pride preserve them from the knowledge of it? It is shameful folly to be proud and obstinate, where a man knoweth beforehand that he must submit at last, and is not able to stand it out.

2. The second intrinsical impediment to self-acnuaintance, is an unreasonable tenderness of ourselves; when an inordinate love of ease and quietness of mind doth prevail with us to hold fast all that thus quieteth us at the present, without regard of due provision for the time to come; in this there is a mixture of unreasonableness and self-love: it is indeed the very brutish disposition. A beast will have at present what he loveth, though you feed him for the slaughter! for he hath not reason to foresee what followeth. Fleshly-minded men have thus brutified themselves, so that they judge of things by present feeling, and have not reason and faith to look before them, and judfre of things by the good or hurt that will follow in the end. It is a very terrible troublesome thing, for a man that is unregcnerate, unjustified, and unreconciled to God, to know it; for a man that hath any feeling left, to find himself in a state of condemnation: this is to stir up all the terrors of his soul, and cast him into perplexing fears and disquietments of mind; so that he cannot eat or drink, or sleep in quietness, but the troublesome thoughts of sin and everlasting wrath torment him; and the inconsiderate man, that judgeth of things by present feeling, will not endure this. As most men hate those that speak against them, be the matter ever so true, so they cannot endure those thoughts that do accuse them, nor to have a reprover so near them, even in their own breasts; a conscience within them, to preach to them night and day: not one hour in a week, but wherever they go, and whatever they are doing; to be so near, so constant, so precise, and so severe and terrible a preacher, as usually a newly enlightened and awakened conscience is: this seemeth intolerable to them; and whatever come of it, this preacher must be silenced, as turbulent and vexatious, and one that would make them melancholy or mad. “And this is the condemnation (of these miserable souls), that light is come into the world, and they loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil: for every one that doeth evil, hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.” And thus, while men are so tender of themselves, that they will do nothing that troubleth or hurteth them at the present, they venture upon all the miseries that they are forewarned of.

Direct. 2. Be not unreasonably tender of a little disturbance at the present, nor unbelievingly careless of the misery to come. Cannot you endure to know your sin and misery, and yet can you endure to bear it? Will you go to hell, for fear of knowing that you are in the way? Must you not know it w ith everlasting woe and vengeance when you come thither, if, by knowing your danger, you prevent not your coming thither? Is it easier to bear God’s wrath for ever, than to find at present that you have offended him.’’ Sirs, the question is, ‘hethcr you are under the condemnation of the law, or not? Whether you are regenerate and justified, or yet in your sin? If you arc justified, far be it from me to persuade you to think that you are under condemnation: I leave that to Satan and the malicious world, who arc the condemners of thase that Chiipt doth justify. But if you are unregenerate and unjustified, what will you do at death and judgment? Can you stand before God, or be saved upon any other terms? You cannot; if God be to he believed, you cannot: and, if you know the Scriptures, you know you cannot. And if you cannot be saved in an unrenewed, unjustified state, is it not needful that you know it? Will you cry for help before you find yourselves in danger? or strive to get out of sin and misery, before you believe that you are iii it? If you think that you have no other sin than the pardoned infirmities of the godly, you will never so value Jesus Christ, and pray and strive for such grace as is necessary to them that have the unpardoned, reigning sins of the ungodly. If it be necessary that you be saved, it is necessary that you value and seek salvation; and, if so, it is necessary that you know your need of it, and what you must be and do, if you will obtain it. If you can prove, that ever any was converted and saved, by any other way, than by the coming to the knowledge of their sin and misery, then you have some excuse for your presumption: but if Scripture tell us of no other way; yea, that there is no other way, and you know of none that ever was saved by any other, I think it is time to fall to work, and search and try your hearts and lives. You should rather think with yourselves. If we can so hardly bear the forethoughts of hell, how shall we be able, everlastingly, to bear the torments?

And consider, that Christ hath made the discovery of your sin and misery to be now comparatively an easy burden, in that he hath made them pardonable and curable. If you had not had a Saviour to fly to, but must have looked on your misery as a remediless case, it had then been terrible indeed; and it had been no great mistake to have thought it the best way to take a little ease at present, rather than to disquiet yourselves in vain. But, through the great mercy of God, this is not your case; you need not despair of pardon and salvation, if you will but hear while it is called To-day. The task that you are called to, is only to find out your disease, and come and open it to the physician, submit to his advice, use his means, and he will freely and infallibly work the cure. It is but to find out the folly that you have been guilty of, and the danger that you have brought yourselves into, and come to Christ, and, with hearty sorrow and resohition, to give up yourselves to his grace, to cast away your iniquities, and enter into his safe and comfortable service. And will you lie in hell and say, ‘We are suffering here, that we might escape the trouble of foreseeing our danger of it, or of endeavouring in time to have prevented it!’ O sirs, be warned in time, and own not, and practise not, such egregious folly, in a business of everlasting consequence. Believe it, if you sin, you must know that you have sinned: and if you are in the power of Satan it cannot long be hid. Did you but know the difference between discovering it now while there is hope, and hereafter when there is none, I should have no need to persuade you to be willing to know the truth, whatever it should cost you.

Hind, 3. Another great impediment of the knowledge of ourselves, is, that self-love so blindeth men that they can see no great evil in themselves, or any thing that is their own. It makes them believe that all things are as they would have them be; yea, and better than they would have them: for he that would not indeed be holy, is willing by himself and others to be thought so: did not the lamentable experience of all the world confirm it, it were incredible that self-love could so exceedingly blind men. If charity think no evil of another, much more will self-love cause men to see no evil by themselves. No argument so cogent, no light so clear, no oratory so persuading, as can make a self-lover think himself as bad as indeed he is, till God, by grace or terror, shall convince him. When you are preaching the most searching sermons to convince him, self-love confuteth or misapplieth them; when the marks of trial are most plainly opened, and most closely urged, self-love doth frustrate the preacher’s greatest skill and dilitrence. When nothincf of sense can be said to prove the piety of the impious, and the sincerity of the formal hypocrite, yet self-love is that wonderful alchymist, that can make gold not only of the basest metal, but of dross and dirt. No cause so bad which it cannot justify: and no person so miserable but it will pronounce him happy, till God, by grace or wrath, confute it. Self-love is the grand deceiver of the world.

Direct. 3. Subdue this inordinate self-love, and bring your minds to a just impartiality in judging. Remember that self-love is only powerful at your private bar; and it is not there that your cause must be finally decided: it can do nothing at the bar of God; it cannot there justify, where it is condemned itself: God will not so much as hear it, though you will hear none that speak against it. Self-love is but the vicegerent of the grand usurper, that shall be deposed, and have no show of power, at Christ’s appealing, when he will judge his enemies.

And if you would have the benefits of friendship, discourage not plain dealing. “I know a reprover should be wise, and love must be predominant if he will expect success;” but we must take heed of judging that we are hated, because we are reproved; that is, that a friend is not a friend, because he doth the office of a friend. Of the two, it is fitter to say of a reproving enemy, ‘Pie dealeth with me like a friend,’ than of a reproving friend, ‘He dealeth with me like an enemy.’ It is a happy enmity that helpeth you to deliver you from sin and hell; and a cruel friendship that will let you undo your soul foe ever, for fear of displeasing you by hindering it.

There are two sorts that deprive themselves of the saving benefit of necessary reproof, and the most desirable fruits of friendship: the one is the Hypocrite, that so cunningly hideth his greatest faults, that his friend and enemy never tell him of them: he hath the happiness of keeping his physician unacquainted with his disease, and, consequently, of keeping the disease. The other is the Proud, that can better endure to be ungodly than to be told of it, and to live in many sins, than to be freely admonished of one.

Consider, therefore, that it will prove self-hatred in the effect, which is now called self-love: and that it would seem but a strange kind of love from another, to suffer you to fall into a coal-pit, for fear of telling you that you are near it. If you love another no better than thus, you have no reason to call yourself his friend: and shall this be your wisest loving of yourselves? If it be love to damn your souls for fear of knowing your danger of damnation, the devil loveth you. If it be friendship to keep you out of heaven, for fear of disquieting you with the light that should have saved you, then you have no enemies in hell. The devil himself can be content to grant you a temporal quietness and ease, in order to your everlasting woe. Let go your hopes of heaven, and he can let you be merry a while on earth; while the strong armed man keepeth his house, the things that he possesseth are in peace. If it be not friendship, but enmity, to trouble you with the sight of sin and danger, in order to your deliverance, then you have none but enemies in heaven: for God himself doth take this course with the dearest of his chosen. No star doth give such light as the sun doth: no minister doth so much to make a sinner know himself, as God doth. Love yourselves, therefore, in the way that God loveth you: be impartially willing that God and man should help you to be thoroughly acquainted with your state: love not to be flattered by others, or yourselves. Vice is never the more lovely, because it is yours: and you know that pain is never the more easy or desirable to you, because it is yours. Your own diseases, losses, injuries, and miseries, seem the worst and most grievous to you: and why should not your own sins also be most grievous? You love not poverty or pain, because it is your own; O love not sin, because it is your own [

Hind. 4. Another impediment to self-acquaintance, is, that men observe not their hearts in a time of trial, but take them always at the best, when no great temptation puts them to it. A man that never had an opportunity to rise in the world, perhaps doth think he is not ambitious, and desireth not much to be higher than he is, because the coal was never blown. When a little affront doth ferment their pride into disquietness and desires of revenge; or applause doth ferment it into self-exaltation, they observe not then the distemper when it is up and most observable, because the nature of sin is to please and blind, and cheat the mind into a consent. And when the sin seems past, and they find themselves in a seeming humility and meekness, they judge of themselves as then they find themselves, as thinking that distemper is past and cured, and they are not to judge of themselves by what they were, but what they are. And, by that rule, every drunkard or whoremonger should judge themselves temperate and chaste, as soon as they forbear the act of sin. And what if poverty, age, or sickness, hinder them from ever committing either of them again? For all this, the person is a drunkard or fornicator still; because the act is not pardoned, nor the heart sanctified, and the habit or corrupt inclination mortified. And thus passionate persons do judge of themselves by their milder temper, when no temptation kindleth the flame. But little doth many a one know what corruption is latent in his heart, till trial shall disclose it, and draw it into sight. “If these persons be not always sinning, they will not take themselves for sinners: but he that hath once sinned knowingly, in God’s account continueth in the sin, till his heart be changed by true repentance.” — Augustine.

Yet, on the other hand, I would not wrong any upright soul, by persuading them to judge of themselves as they are at the worst, in the hour of temptation; for so they will be mistaken as certainly, though not as dangerously, as the other.

You may ask then, ‘What is to be done in such a difficult case.’’ If we must neither judge of ourselves as we are at the best, out of temptation, nor yet as we are at the worst, in the hour of temptation, when and how then shall we judge of ourselves?’

I answer, it is one thing to know our particular sins, and their degrees, and another thing to know our state in general, whether we arc justified and sanctified, or not. To discern what particular sin is in us, and how apt it is to break forth into act, we must watch all the stirrings and appearings of it, in the time of the temptation: but to discern whether it be unmortified and have dominion, we must observe these rules:

1. There is no man on earth that is perfectly free from sin; and, therefore, it is no good consequence that sin reigneth unto death, because it is not perfectly extinguished, or because it is sometimes committed, unless in the cases after expressed.

2. No sin that is truly mortified and repented of, shall condemn the sinner: for pardon is promised to the truly penitent.

3. Whatever sin the will, according to its habitual incl ination, had rather leave than keep, is truly repented of and mortified. For the will is the principal seat of sin; and there is no more sinfulness, than there is wilfulness.

4. There are some sins which cannot be frequently committed in consistency with true grace, or sincere repentance; and some which may be frequently committed in consistency with these. As where sins are known and great, or such as are easily subject to the power of a sanctified will, so that he that will reject them, may, as one such sin must have actual repentance, if actually known; so the frequent committing of such will not consist with habitual repentance. Whereas those sins, that are so small as upright persons, perhaps, may not be suflBciently excited to resistance; or such as, upon the sincere use of means, are still unknown, or such as a truly sanctified will may not subdue, are all of them consistent with repentance and a justified state: and in this sense we reject not that distinction between moral and venial sin; that is, between sin inconsistent with a state of spiritual life, and sin consistent with it, and consequently pardoned. He that bad rather leave the former sort, (the mortal sins,) will leave them; and he that truly repents of them, will forsake them. But for the other (consistent with life) we must say, that a man may possibly retain them, that yet had rather leave them, and doth truly repeat of them.

5. A sin of carnal interest (esteemed good, in order to something which the flesh desireth; and so loved and deliberately kept) hath more of the will, and is more inconsistent with repentance, “than a sin of mere passion or surprise, which is not so valued upon the account of such an interest.

6. They that have grace enough to avoid temptations to mortal or reigning sin, and consequently that way to avoid the sin, shall not be condemned for it, whatever a stronger temptation might have done.

7. Where bodily diseases necessitate to an act, or the omission of an act, the will is not to be charged with that which it cannot overcome, notwithstanding an unfeigned willingness. As if a man in a frenzy or distraction should swear or curse, or blaspheme; or one in a lethargy, or potent melancholy, cannot read, or pray, or meditate, &c.

8. As frequent commissions of venial sins (or such as are consistent with true grace) will not prove the soul unsanctified; so the once committing of a gross sin by surprise, which is afterward truly repented of, will not prove the absence of habitual repentance, or spiritual life, so as the frequent committing of such sins will.

So that I conclude, in order to the detection of the sin itself, we must all take notice of ourselves as at the worst, and see what it is that temptation can do: but in order to the discovery of our state, and whether our sins are pardoned or not, we must especially observe whether their eruptions are such as will consist with true habitual repentance, and to note what teinptations do with us. To this end,

Direct. 4. Observe then the workings and discoveries of the heart, and judge of its abundance, or habits, by your words and deeds. Note what you were when you had opportunity to sin, when the full cup of pleasure was held out to you, when preferment was before you, when injury or provoking words did blow the coal: if then sin appeared, judge not that you are free, and that none of the roots are latent in your hearts: or if you are sure that such dispositions are hated, repented of, and mortified, yet you may hence observe what diseases of soul you should chiefly strive against, to keep them under, and prevent a new surprise or increase. It is usual for such licentiousness, such self-seeking, such ugly pride and passion, to break forth upon some special temptations, which for many years together did never appear to the person that is guilty, or to any other, that it should keep the best in fear and self-suspicion, and cause them to live in constant watchfulness, and to observe the bent and motions of their souls: and to make use afterward of such discoveries as they have made to their cost in time of trial.

And it much concerneth all true Christians, to keep in remembrance the exercise and discoveries of grace, which formerly, upon trial, did undoubtedly appear, and did convince them of the sincerity which afterward they are apt again to question. Will’you not believe that there is a sun in the firmament, unless it always shine upon you? It is weakness and injurious rashness in those Christians, that, upon every damp that seizeth on their spirits, will venture to deny God’s former mercies, and say, that they had never special grace, because they feel it not at present; that they never prayed in sincerity, because some distemper at present discomposeth or over- whelmeth them; that their former zeal and life was counterfeit, because they are grown more cold and dull; that former comforts were all but hypocritical delusions, because they are turned now to sorrows: as much as to say, ‘Because I am now sick, I was never well.’ O, were it not for the tender compassions of our Father, and the sure performance of our Lord and Comforter, and that our peace is more in his hand than our own, (though more in our own than any others,) it could never be that a poor, distempered, imperfect soul, should here have any constancy of peace, considering the power of self-love and partiality on one side, and of grief, and fear, and other passions, on the other; and how little a thing doth shake so moveable and weak a thing, and muddy and trouble a mind so easily disturbed; and how hard it is again to quiet and compose a mind so troubled, and bring a grieved soul to reason, and make passion understand the truth, and to cause a weak afflicted soul to judge clean contrary to what they feel! All this considered, no wonder if the peace and comfort of many Christians be yet but little, and interrupted, and uneven. To show us the sun at midnight, and convince ns of love while we feel the rod; and to give us the comfortable sense of grace, while we have the uncomfortable sense of the greatness of our sin; to give us the joyful hopes of glory, in a troubled, melancholy, dejected state: all this is a work that requireth the special help of the Almighty, and exceeds the strength of feeble worms. Let God give us ever so full discoveries of his tenderest love, and our own sincerity, as if a voice from heaven had witnessed it to us, we are questioning all if once we seem to fed the contrary, and are per- % plexed in the tumult of our thoughts and passions, and bewildered and lost in the errors of our own disturbed minds. Though we have walked with God, we are questioning whether indeed we ever knew him, as soon as he seemeth to hide his face. Though we have felt another life and spirit possess and actuate us than heretofore, and found that we love the things and persons which once we loved not, and that we were quite fallen out with that which was our former pleasure, and that our souls broke off from their old delights, and hopes, and ways, and resolvedly did engage themselves to God, and unfeignedly delivered up themselves unto him; yet all is forgotten, or the convincing evidence of all forgotten, if the lively influences of heaven be but on’ce so far withdrawn, as that our present state is clouded and afflicted, and our former vigour and assurance is abated. And thus unthankfully we deny God the praise and acknowledgment of his mercies, longer than we are tasting them, or they are still before us: all that he hath done for us is as nothing, and all the love which he hath manifested to us, is called hatred; and all the witnesses that have put their hands to his acts of grace, are questioned, and his very seals denied, and his earnest misinterpreted, as long as our darkened, distempered souls, are in a condition unfit for the apprehension of mercy, and usually

when a diseased or afflicted body doth draw the mind into too great a participation of the affliction. And thus, as we are disposed ourselves, so we judge of ourselves and of all our receivings, and all God’s dealings with us. When we feel ourselves well, all goes well with us, and we put a good interpretation upon all things; and when we are out of order, we complain of every thing, and take pleasure in nothing. And thus, while the discoveries, both of sin and grace, are at present overlooked, or afterwards forgotten, and almost all men judge of themselves by present feeling, no wonder if few are well acquainted with themselves.

But as the word and the works of God must be taken together, if they be understood, and not a sentence, part, or parcel, taken separated from the rest, which must make up the sense; so also the workings of God upon your souls must be taken altogether, and you must read them over from the first till now, and set altogether, and not forget the part that went before, or else you will make no sense of that which followeth. And I beseech all weak and troubled Christians to remember, also, that they are but children and scholars in the school of Christ; and therefore, when they cannot set the several parts together, let them not overvalue their inexperienced understandings, but, by the help of their skilful, faithful teachers, do that which of themselves they cannot do. Inquire what your former mercies signify: open them to your guides, and tell them how God hath dealt with you from the beginning, and tell them how it is with you now; and desire them to help you to perceive how one conduceth to the riht understanding of the other. And be not

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of froward, but of tractable, submissive minds: and thus your self-acquaintance may be maintained, at least to safety, and to some degree of peace, if not to the joys which you desire, which God reserveth for their proper season.

I should have added more on this necessary subject, but that I have said so much of it in other writings, especially in the “Saints’ Rest,” part iii. chap. 7. and in my “Treatise of Self-denial,” and in “The Right Method for Peace of Conscience.”

I must confess I have written on this subject as I did of Self-denial, namely, with expectation that all men should confess the truth of what I say; and yet so few be cured by it of their self-ignorance, as that still we must stand by, and see the world distracted by it, the church divided, the love of brethren interrupted, and the work of Satan carried on by error, violence, and pride; and the hearts of men so strangely stupified, as to goon incorrigibly in all this mischief, while the cause and cure are opened before them, and all in vain, while they confess the truth; so that they will leave us nothing to do, but exercise our compassion, by lamenting the delirium of frenetic men, while we are unable to serve the church, their brethren, or their own souls, from the lacerations and calamitous effects of their furious self-ignorance. But Christ that hath sent us with the light which may be resisted, and abused, and in part blown out, will speedily come with light irresistible, and will teach the proud, the scornful, the unmerciful, the self-conceited, the malicious, and the violent, so effectually to know themselves, as that no more exhortations shall be necessary for the reception of his convictions; nor will he or his servants any more beseech men to consider and know their sin and misery, nor be beholden to them to believe and confess it. (See Jude 14, 15.) And is there no remedy for a stupified, inconsiderate soul? Is there no prevention of so terrible a self-knowledge, as the light of judgment, and the fire of hell, will else procure? Yes, the remedy is certain, easy, and at hand: “Even to know themselves till they are driven to study, and seek, and know the Father, and his Son Jesus Christ;” and yet is the salvation of most as hopeless almost as if there were no remedy, because no persuasion can prevail with them to use it. Lord, what hath thus locked up the minds and hearts of sinners against thy truth and thee! What hath made reasonable man so unreasonable, and a selfloving nature so mortally to hate itself! O thou that openest, and no man shutteth, use the key that openeth hearts; come in with thy wisdom, and thy love, and all this blindness and obstinacy will be gone! At least, commit not the safety of thy flock to such as will not know themselves: but “gather thy remnant, and bring them to their folds, and let them be fruitful and increase; and setup shepherds over them, which shall feed thera, and let them fear no more, nor be dismayed, nor be lacking.” “Ordain a place for thera, plant them, and let them dwell therein unmoved; and let not the children of wickedness waste thera any more.” “As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered, so seek out thy sheep, and deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.” “Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance: feed them also, and lift thera up for ever.”