97. - To Miss Hatton.
97. - TO MISS HATTON.
YOU seem, madam, not to have a clear idea of the happiness of the love of Jesus, or at least of your privilege of loving him again. Your dulness in private prayer arises from the want of familiar friendship with Jesus. To obviate it, go to your closet, as if you were going to meet the dearest friend you ever had. Cast yourself immediately at his feet; bemoan your coldness before him; extol his love to you, till your heart breaks with a desire to love him; yea, till it actually melts with his love. Be you, if not the importunate widow, at least the importunate virgin, and get your Lord to avenge you of your adversary - I mean your cold heart.
You ask from me some directions to get a mortified spirit. To get this get recollection. Recollection is a dwelling within ourselves; being abstracted from the creature, and turned toward God. It is both outward and inward. Outward recollection consists in Hence from all idle and superfluous words, and a wise disentanglement from the world; keeping to our own business, observing and following the order of God for ourselves, and shutting the ear against all curious and unprofitable matters. Inward recollection consists in shutting the door of the senses; in a deep attention to the presence of God, and in continual care of entertaining holy thoughts for fear of spiritual idleness. Through the power of the Spirit, let this recollection be steady, even in the midst of hurrying business: let it be calm and peaceable, and let it be lasting. Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. To maintain this recollection, beware of entering too deeply, and beyond what is necessary, into outward things; beware of suffering your affections to be entangled by worldly vanities, your imagination to amuse itself with unprofitable objects, and of indulging yourself in the commission of what are called small faults. For want of continuing in a recollected frame all the day, our times of prayer are frequently dry and useless; imagination prevails, and the heart wanders; whereas we easily pass from recollection to delightful prayer. Without this spirit, there can be no useful self denial, nor can we know ourselves; but where it dwells, it makes the soul all eye, all ear; traces and discovers sin, repels its first assaults, or crushes it in its earliest risings. But take care here to be more taken up with thoughts of God than of yourself; and consider how hardly recollection is sometimes obtained, and how easily it is lost. Use no forced labour to raise a particular frame; nor tire, fret, nor grow impatient if you have no comfort; but meekly acquiesce, and confess yourself unworthy of it; lie prostrate in humble submission before God, and patiently wait for the smiles of Jesus. May the following motives stir you up to the pursuit of recollection.
(1.) Without it, God’s voice cannot be heard in the soul.
(2.) It is the altar on which we must offer up our Isaacs.
(3.) It is instrumentally a ladder, (if I may be allowed the expression,) to ascend to God.
(4.) By it the soul gets to its centre, out of which it cannot rest.
(5.) Man’s soul is the temple of God; recollection the holy of holies.
(6.) As the wicked by recollection find hell in their hearts, so faithful souls find heaven.
(7.) With out recollection, all means of grace are useless, or make but a light and transitory impression.
If we would be recollected, we must expect to suffer. Sometimes God does not speak immediately to the heart; we must then continue to listen with a more humble silence. Sometimes assaults of the heart, or of the temper, may follow, together with a weariness, and a desire to turn the mind to something else: here we must be patient. By patience unwearied we inherit the promises. Dissipated souls are severely punished. If any man abide not in Christ, he is cast out as a branch; - cast out of the light of God’s countenance, and barrenness follows in the use of the means. The world and Satan gather and use him for their service. He is cast into the fire of the passions, of guilt, of temptation, and perhaps of hell. As dissipation always meets its punishment, so recollection never fails of its reward. After a patient waiting, comes communion with God, and the sweet sense of his peace and love. Recollection is a castle, an inviolable fortress against the world and the devil: it renders all times and places alike, and it is the habitation where Christ and his bride dwell.
I give you these hints, not to set Christ aside, but that you may, according to the light and power given to you, take these stones, and place them upon the chief corner stone, and cement them with the blood of Jesus until the superstructure, in some measure, answers to the excellence of the foundation. I beg an interest in your prayers for myself and those committed to my charge; and am, with sincerity, madam, your servant for Christ’s sake,
J. FLETCHER.