* LI BRARY OF CONGRES S. \ 
 
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 J UNITED STATED 
 
MANN A- CRUMBS 
 
 HUNGRY SOULS. 
 
 CONSISTING OF 
 
 EXCERPTS FROM THE LETTERS 
 
 OF, THE 
 
 Rev. SAMUEi/rUTHERFORD, 
 
 GATHERED BY THE 
 
 Rev. W. P. BREED, D.D. 
 
 / 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 
 
 No. 821 Chestnut Street. 
 
[the libra ry 
 
 | F cpNGRESSl 
 WASHINGTON 
 
 sb 
 
 $Ptf> 
 
 *f£ 
 
 Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by 
 
 THE TRUSTEES OF THE 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Eastern District 
 of Pennsylvania. 
 
 STEREOTYPED BY WESTCOTT & THOMSON*. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 "he giveth goodly words." — gen. xlix. 21. 
 
 The godly utterances of saintly men are the grace of 
 God translated from human experience into human lan- 
 guage. The Holy Grhost dwells in regenerated souls, to 
 mould them into Christ' s image and lead them into the deeper 
 mysteries of divine truth, and some of these souls he bears 
 upon his wings very far up the sides of Zion, and from its 
 sunny peaks shows them many bright things, of which it 
 is for the joy and edification of those who linger on the 
 lower slopes to hear them speak. 
 
 The sacred writers speak to us from the mount of In- 
 spiration, and simply pass into our possession the truths 
 which Glod imparts to them. Or if any ingredients of 
 their own experience are commingled in their writings 
 with these divinely imparted truths, we are always at a loss 
 as to the dividing line between the divine and the human. 
 We never can tell just how much their experimental piety 
 owes to their peculiar relation to Gk>d as inspired men. In- 
 spiration is not necessarily indeed associated with a gracious 
 state. Balaam was, no doubt, the subject of inspiration: 
 But actual good in the heart can hardly fail to catch new 
 hues, and be kindled into fuller glow, by the presence in 
 the mind of divinely imparted truth, or by that peculiar 
 
controlling influence which always accompanies its expres- 
 sion. Even in such writings as the fifty-first psalm, that 
 matchless song of the contrite soul, we cannot with cer- 
 tainty distinguish between the emotional currents caused 
 by the presence and agency of the Spirit as inspirer, and 
 his influences simply as sanctifier. 
 
 Hence the experience of those highly favoured of the 
 Holy Ghost, yet uninspired, comes more fully and certainly 
 within the range of piety as possible to all men of all ages, 
 and puts its subjects more undeniably upon the common 
 level of the regenerated. And for this reason such expe- 
 rience must have a peculiar attraction for all stragglers 
 up the steeps of sanctification. And the eminences to 
 which these godly ones have been enabled to climb, instead 
 of discouraging us feebler ones, ought to fill us with joy 
 and hope. 
 
 When the child of genius gazes upon some miracle 
 of art, a statue, or painting, or follows the flight of a 
 master-poet as he soars and shakes the glories of poesy 
 from his wings, it gladdens his heart to see how much is 
 possible to man, and inspirits him to the higher aims of 
 a lofty ambition. So we, as we lift our half-fledged wings 
 to struggle along in our humble, intermittent flights, ought 
 to find fresh encouragement in the attainments of others, 
 who we know were by nature just the same weak, imper- 
 fect, sin-laden creatures as ourselves. For if the indwell- 
 ing Spirit taught them to fly so high, who shall limit his 
 gracious power and say that he cannot do for even our poor 
 selves what he has done for others ? If he can fit eagle- 
 wings to one block of stone, why not to another? What- 
 
ever our expectations may be, it is something that our 
 desires are strong, and that any degree of advance is at 
 least possible. 
 
 Among those who, since apostolic times, have towered 
 high in devotional nights, or gone deep into the mines of 
 spiritual wealth, the Rev. Samuel Rutherford of Scotland 
 will always be named with affectionate reverence by those 
 familiar with his writings. 
 
 Born in the year 1600, and sinking to sleep in 1661, his 
 life was passed amidst political and ecclesiastical agitations 
 well calculated to develope a masculine piety, and polish it 
 to a lustre of more than ordinary glow. 
 
 This memorable parenthesis of British history, saw James 
 the First put on the English crown, and transfer it to 
 Charles the First. It saw this Charles sink under the 
 wrath of an indignant nation into a grave of blood. It em- 
 bosomed the memorable period of the Commonwealth under 
 Cromwell. And a year before the death of Rutherford, it 
 saw the triumphant march of Charles the Second from 
 Dover to London, and the inauguration of those Bacchanalian 
 revelries in which all virtue and decency were well nigh 
 drowned. 
 
 This period was marked by unusual violence, in that 
 long war which the heroic, bleeding church of Scotland 
 had to wage against the profane, persistent, and merci- 
 less encroachments of the civil power. Into this war 
 Rutherford threw himself with all the energy of a high 
 and heroic nature, and more than once found himself in the 
 relentless clutches of persecution. 
 
 In 1636 he was torn from his flock at Anwoth and ban- 
 1* 
 
6 PREFACE. 
 
 ished to Aberdeen, a large deputation of his people accom- 
 panying him to his place of confinement. At this place he 
 wrote about two hundred and twenty of those Letters, so 
 replete with the life of an exalted godliness. Many of 
 these he dates from " Christ's palace in Aberdeen," and in 
 one of them he writes of the better land as — "A land 
 that has more than four summers in the year ! What a 
 singing life is there ! There is not a dumb bird in all that 
 large field, but all sing and breathe out heaven, joy, glory, 
 dominion to the High Prince of that new found land ! 
 And verily the land is sweeter that He is the glory of that 
 land!" 
 
 In 1638 another blow from the hand of the tyrant on the 
 throne roused the whole nation. The Covenant was revised, 
 and, amidst fasting and prayer and tears, signed by the 
 flower of the nation, and in some instances with blood 
 drawn from the arms of the signers ! Rutherford now 
 hastened back to Anwoth. In 1643 he went to London as 
 Commissioner to the great Westminster Assembly of 
 Divines, and had an important share in framing its memor- 
 able Confession and Catechisms. 
 
 But freedom ebbed again, and Rutherford, for his noble 
 work " Lex Rex," "Law is King," was deposed from all 
 his offices and summoned to answer before Parliament the 
 charge of High Treason. But sickness had laid its hand 
 upon him, which, with his many trials, domestic and other, 
 ripened him for a better world. To the summons of his 
 persecutors, which reached him upon his death-bed, he 
 answered — " I have got another summons before a Supreme 
 Judge and Judicatory, and I behoove to answer my first 
 
summons, and ere your day arrive I will be where few 
 kings and great folks come. ' ' 
 
 His Letters, making a volume numbering some three 
 hundred and fifty, have been published again and again, 
 and are highly prized by the devout. We are told that 
 Baxter said of them, "Hold off the Bible — such a book the 
 world never saw !" Richard Cecil wrote, " He is one of 
 my classics. ' ' The size of the book, however, as well as 
 some peculiarities of expression, have greatly limited its 
 circulation. For years, in reading these letters, we have 
 been in the habit of marking passages remarkable for their 
 pith or spiritual brilliancy, and at length determined to 
 copy them for publication in a little volume by themselves 
 under appropriate headings. We trust the work will not 
 be unacceptable to Christians into whose hands it may come. 
 
 It was at first our intention to attempt some classifica- 
 tion of these gracious utterances, but aside from the 
 difficulty of the task, it occurred to us as better to let 
 them run in a chronological order. For in this suc- 
 cession we discover the ebbs and flows of his devotional 
 feeling, and are often struck with the abruptness and mag- 
 nitude of spiritual vicissitude in his heart. To-day we find 
 him in the Slough of Despond, and to-morrow on the Delect- 
 able Mountains ; here struggling up the Hill Difficulty, 
 and there reposing in the palace Beautiful ; at one time 
 filled with exultation, at another groaning under deadness of 
 heart or filled with discomfort by the revival of "old 
 challenges," the startling echoes of past transgressions and 
 shortcomings, in all which the spiritually-minded reader 
 will see the lineaments of his own countenance. 
 
8 PREFACE. 
 
 Of these extracts may we not say as the Rev. A. A. 
 Bonar says of the Letters themselves, in the preface of an 
 edition of them, republished in this country by the Messrs. 
 Robert Carter and Brothers, New York, that they cannot 
 fail to be precious to "all who are sensible of their own 
 and the cburch's decay and corruptions— all who delight 
 in the Surety's imputed righteousness— all who rejoice in 
 the gospel of free grace, all who seek to grow in holiness, 
 all afflicted persons— all who love the person of Christ— 
 and all who love that blessed hope and glorious appearing 
 of the great God our Saviour." 
 
 We can only add that if the perusal of these excerpts 
 shall convey to any considerable number of God's people 
 even a portion of the instruction and delight experienced 
 by the compiler in preparing them, this little volume will 
 prove no mere cumberer of the book-shelves. 
 
 Philadelphia, 1864. W. P. B. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS 
 
 The Pastor's Tiove of his People. 
 
 I would lay ray dearest joys in the gap between 
 you and eternal destruction. 
 
 My witness is in heaven, your heaven would be 
 two heavens to me, and your salvation two salva- 
 tions. 
 
 My day thoughts and my night thoughts are of 
 you. 
 
 Spiritual Darkness. 
 
 The wound of a wounded conscience is a most 
 inexpressible terror ; none can describe it but he 
 who has tried and tasted the same. It impaireth 
 the health, drieth up the blood, wasteth away the 
 marrow, pineth away the flesh, consumeth away 
 the bones, maketh pleasure painful, and shorteneth 
 life. No wisdom can counsel it, no counsel can 
 advise it, no advice can persuade it, no assuage- 
 ment can cure it, no eloquence can move it, no 
 power can overcome it, no spectre affray it, no 
 enchanter charm it. 
 
10 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Christ Steadfast. 
 
 Your heart is not the compass that Christ sail- 
 eth by. 
 
 Faith. 
 
 Faith may dance because Christ singeth. Faith 
 apprehendeth pardon, but never payeth a penny 
 for it. 
 
 Sickness a Bless in y. 
 
 I hear Christ has been so kind as to visit you 
 with sickness, and to bring you to the door of the 
 grave : but ye found the door shut, blessed be his 
 glorious name, till ye be riper for eternity. 
 
 Holy Confidence. 
 
 I never knew before what his love was in such a 
 measure. If he leave me, he leaveth me in pain 
 and sick of love ; and yet my sickness is my life 
 and health. I have a fire within me and I defy 
 all the devils in hell to cast water on it ! 
 
 Holy Longings. 
 
 The Lord knoweth that, if I could, I would sell 
 myself without reversion to Christ. sweet Lord 
 Jesus, make a market and overbid all my buyers ! 
 I dare swear that there is a mystery in Christ 
 which I never saw— a mystery of love ! Oh, if he 
 would lay by the lap of the covering that is over 
 it, and let my greedily longing soul see it, I would 
 break the door and be in upon him to get my fill 
 of love; for I am an hungered and famished 
 soul. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 11 
 
 The 3I\nifttvij. 
 
 Pray for me that the Lord would give me house- 
 room again to hold a candle to this dark world. 
 
 Christ a Physician. 
 
 A soul bleeding to death, till Christ were sent 
 for, and cried for in all haste, to come and stem 
 the blood and close up the hole in the wound, were 
 a very good disease when many are dying of a 
 whole heart. 
 
 Contest with, Sin. 
 
 Alas ! how often play I fast and loose with 
 Christ ! He bindeth, I loose ; he buildeth, I cast 
 down ; he trimmeth up a salvation for me, and I 
 mar it. I fall out with Christ, and he agreeth 
 with me again twenty times a day. I forfeit my 
 kingdom and heritage ; I lose what I had, but 
 Christ is at my back, and following on to stoop and 
 take up what falleth from me. Were I in heaven, 
 and had the crown on my head, if Free-Will were 
 my tutor, I should lose heaven. Seeing I lose my- 
 self, what wonder I should let go and lose Jesus 
 my Lord. 
 
 Our IAglit Affliction. 
 
 Men do lop the branches off their trees round 
 about, to the end that they may grow up high and 
 tall. The Lord hath in this way lopped your 
 branch, in taking from you many children, to the 
 end ye should grow upward, like one of the Lord's 
 cedars, setting your heart above, where Christ is at 
 the right hand of the Father, 2 Cor. iv. 17, 
 
12 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Dig Deeper. 
 
 I dare avouch the saints know not the length and 
 largeness of the sweet earnest and of the sweet 
 green sheaves before the harvest, that might be 
 had on this side of the water, if we would take more 
 pains. 
 
 Inbred Sin. 
 
 I am every way in your case, as hard hearted 
 and dead as any man, but yet speak to Christ 
 through my sleep. Sol. Song, v. 2. 
 
 Christ our Helper. 
 
 I do persuade myself that ye know that the 
 weightiest end of the cross of Christ which is laid 
 upon you, lieth upon your strong Saviour. Cour- 
 age ! Up your heart ! When ye do tire, he will 
 bear both you and your burden ! 
 
 Clirist Enough. 
 
 They lose nothing who gain Christ. 
 
 God's Might to His Own. 
 
 Ye can no more justly quarrel with your great 
 Superior for taking his own at his just term-day, 
 than a poor farmer can complain that his master 
 taketh a portion of his own land to himself when 
 the lease is expired. Indeed, that long loan of 
 such a good daughter, an heir of grace, a member 
 of Christ, deserveth more thanks at your creditor's 
 hands than that ye should gloom and murmur when 
 he craveth but his own. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 13 
 
 CemetHem (Uoom. 
 
 Ye are like Jacob mourning at the supposed 
 death of Joseph, when Joseph was living. The 
 new creature, the image of the second Adam, is 
 living in you, and yet ye are mourning at the sup- 
 posed death of the life of Christ in you. 
 
 Christ Jesus, whom your soul through forests 
 and mountains is seeking, is within you. 
 
 Christ Unchanging. 
 
 There be many Christians most like unto young 
 sailors, who think the shore and the whole land do 
 move, when the ship and they themselves are 
 moved ; just so not a few do imagine that God 
 moveth, and saileth and changeth places because 
 their giddy souls are under sail, and subject to al- 
 teration, to ebbing and flowing — but the foundation 
 of the Lord abideth sure. 
 
 JLove of Christ. 
 
 I doubt not that if hell were betwixt you and 
 Christ as a river, which ye behooved to cross ere 
 ye could come at him, but ye would willingly put 
 in your foot and make through to be at him upon 
 hope that he would come in himself into the deep- 
 est of the river and lend you his hand. 
 
 Above the World. 
 
 My Lord hath brought me to this, that I would 
 not give a drink of cold, water for this world's 
 kindness. 
 
 2 
 
14 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Consolation. 
 
 Ye have one with you in the furnace whose vifc- 
 age is like unto the Son of God. If your health 
 did not require so much of him, he would not spend 
 so much physic upon you. All the brethren and 
 sisters of Christ must be conformed to his image 
 and copy in suffering, and some do more vively re- 
 semble the copy than others. 
 
 Behold your forerunner, going out of the world 
 all in a lake of blood, and it is not ill to die as he 
 did. 
 
 Be Patient. 
 
 Do not -weary, neither think that death walketh 
 toward you with a slow pace. Ye must be riper 
 ere ye be shaken ; your days are no longer than 
 Job's that were swifter than a post — as the eagle 
 that hasteth for the prey. There is less sand in 
 your glass now than there was yesterday. 
 
 Persuade yourself that the King is coming. 
 Read his letter sent before him — " Behold, I come 
 quickly." Wait with the weary night-watch for the 
 breaking of the eastern sky, and think that ye 
 have not a morrow. Show yourself a Christian by 
 suffering without murmuring, for which sin four- 
 teen thousand and seven hundred were slain. Num. 
 xvi. 49. 
 
 Tlie Legacy. 
 
 Hold you here. Here is your Father's testament. 
 Read it. In it he hath left you remission of sins 
 and life everlasting. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 15 
 
 JLooh Above. 
 
 Build your nest upon no tree here ; for ye see 
 God has sold the forest to Death, and every tree 
 wherever ye would rest, is ready to be cut down to 
 the end that ye might flee and mount up and build 
 upon the rock. 
 
 IjOoJc Al i cad. 
 
 I bless my God that there is a death and heaven. 
 
 Sorroiv Keeps from Sin. 
 
 The hedge of thorns and the wall which God 
 buildeth in your way to hinder you from this brier, 
 (the world) is the thorny hedge of daily grief, loss 
 of children, weakness of body, brevity of the time, 
 uncertainty of estate, lack of worldly comfort, and 
 fear of God's anger for old unrepented of sins. 
 What lose ye, if God twist and plait the hedge 
 daily thicker ! 
 
 Watch. 
 
 Ye know not how soon your marriage day will 
 come. Nay, is not eternity hard upon you ? It 
 were time then that ye had your wedding garments 
 in readiness. Be not sleeping at your Lord's 
 coming. I pray God that ye may be upon your 
 feet standing when he knocketh. «• 
 
 Pray for Zion. 
 
 Pray for poor friendless Zion ! Alas ! no man 
 will speak for her now, although in her own coun- 
 try she hath good friends, her husband Christ, and 
 his Father, her father-in-law. 
 
16 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Pest in Christ. 
 
 Jesus, Jesus be your shadow and your covering. 
 It is a sweet soul-sleep to lie in the arms of Christ. 
 
 The Pastor's Sorrows. 
 
 I have received many and divers dashes and 
 heavy strokes since the Lord called me to the min- 
 istry, hut indeed I esteem your departure from 
 among us the weightiest. But I perceive that God 
 will have us to be deprived of whatsoever we idol- 
 ize, that he may have his own room. I see exceed- 
 ingly small fruit of my ministry, and would be 
 glad to know of one soul to be my crown and re- 
 joicing in the day of Christ. 
 
 Pray for TTs. 
 
 If ever you would pleasure me, entreat the Lord 
 for me now when I am so comfortless, and so full 
 of heaviness that I am not able to stand under the 
 burden any longer. 
 
 Communion. 
 
 sweet communion ! when Christ and we are 
 through one another, and are no longer two ! 
 
 Pray for Zion. 
 
 Zion is the ship wherein ye are carried to Canaan. 
 If she suffer wreck, ye will be casten overboard 
 upon death and life to swim to land upon broken 
 boards. It were time for us by prayer to put upon 
 our master pilot Jesus, and to cry — " Master, save 
 us, we perish !" 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 17 
 
 Like Christ . 
 
 Ye cannot, ye must not have a more pleasant 
 condition here than he had who through afflictions 
 was made perfect. 
 
 Hetter as it Is. 
 
 When ye are come to the other side of the water 
 and have se,t down your foot on the shore of glo- 
 rious eternity and look back again to the waters, 
 and your wearisome journey, and shall see in 
 that' clear glass of endless glory, nearer to the 
 bottom of God's wisdom, ye shall then be found to 
 say — " If God had done otherwise with me than he 
 hath done, I had never come to the enjoying of this 
 crown of glory." 
 
 Christ All. 
 
 Welcome, welcome Jesus, whatsoever way thou 
 comest, if we can get a sight of thee. And sure 
 I am that it is better to be sick, providing Christ 
 come to the bedside and draw the curtains and say 
 — " Courage ! I am thy salvation !" than to enjoy 
 health and never to be visited of God. 
 
 G-oocl Company. 
 
 Ye are now alone, but ye may have for the seek- 
 ing, three always in your company, the Father, the 
 Son, and the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Spiritual Decline. 
 
 The glory of the Lord is departing from Israel, 
 and the Lord is looking back over his shoulder to 
 see if any will say — " Lord, tarry !" 
 
18 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 The Lord's Supper. 
 
 You have been of late in the king's wine-cellar, 
 where you were welcomed by the Lord of the inn, 
 upon condition that you would walk in love. 
 
 Submission. 
 
 I find not in the whole book of God a greater 
 note of the child of God than to fall down and 
 kiss the feet of an angry God. 
 
 Like C twist. 
 
 Since our Lord and Redeemer, with patience, re- 
 ceives many a black-stroke on his glorious body, 
 and many a buffet of the unbelieving world, follow 
 him and think it not hard that you receive a blow 
 with your Lord. Take part with Jesus of his suf- 
 ferings and glory in the marks of Christ. 
 
 Foes Feeble. 
 
 When the sea is full, it will ebb again, and as 
 soon as the wicked are come to the top of their 
 pride and are waxed high and mighty, then is their 
 change approaching. 
 
 Communion Day. 
 
 One of our feast days, wherein our well beloved 
 Jesus rejoiceth, and is merry with his friends. 
 
 ■Testis. 
 
 A running-over fountain, at which I and others 
 may come with thirsty souls and fill our vessels. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 19 
 
 Nothing New. 
 
 You are in the beaten and common way to 
 heaven when you are under our Lord's crosses. Ye 
 have reason to rejoice in it more than in a crown 
 of gold, and to rejoice and be glad to bear the 
 reproaches of Christ. ' 
 
 Zion Safe. 
 
 I am sorry for our desolate kirk. Yet I dare 
 not but trust that so long as there be any of God's 
 lost money here he will not blow out the candle. 
 
 Patience. 
 
 Be patient for the Lord's sake, under the wrongs 
 you suffer of the wicked. It proveth you to be 
 the Lord's wheat. Christ went to heaven with 
 many a wrong. 
 
 To the Roch. 
 
 Dearly beloved, be not casten down, but let us, 
 as the Lord's doves, take us to our wings, for other 
 armour we have none, and flee into the hole of the 
 Rock! 
 
 Weaning. 
 
 It is God's mercy that he giveth you your fill 
 even to loathing of this bitter worlcf, that ye may 
 willingly leave it, and like a full and satisfied ban- 
 queter, long for the drawing of the table. 
 
 Ask Much. 
 
 The more greedy ye are in suiting, the more 
 willing he is to give, delighting to be called open- 
 handed. 
 
20 MANNA-CRUMBS, 
 
 tfesus tvith You. 
 
 Be content to wade through the waters betwixt 
 you and glory, with him, holding his right hand 
 fast, for he knoweth all the fords. Be not afraid, 
 therefore, even when ye come to the black and 
 swelling river of Death, to put in your foot and 
 wade after him. The current, however strong, 
 cannot carry you down the water to hell. ' 
 
 * Heaven. 
 
 Four-and-twenty hours in that place is worth 
 threescore and ten years sorrow on earth. 
 
 iTemis the Same. 
 
 Jesus, who upon earth ate and drank with pub- 
 licans and sinners, and spake and conferred with 
 harlots, and put out his holy hand and touched the 
 leper's filthy skin, and came evermore nigh .sin- 
 ners, even now in glory is yet that same Lord. 
 Take him for the old Christ, and claim still kind- 
 ness of him, and say, " Oh ! it is so ! He is not 
 changed, but I am changed." 
 
 All for the Taking. 
 
 This is an easy market ; ye but look on with 
 faith; for Christ suffered all and paid all. 
 
 The Deep Things of Godliness. 
 
 Come near to the Godhead and look down to the 
 bottom of the well. There is much in him, and 
 sweet were that death to drown in such a well. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 21 
 
 Look Upward. 
 
 Have still your face up the mountain. 
 
 God's wheat must go through Satan's sieve, but 
 their faith shall not fail. 
 
 CJirist-ICisses. 
 
 Your faith kisseth Christ and he kisseth the soul. 
 
 Sanctified Sorrow. 
 
 The thorn is one of the most cursed and angry 
 and crabbed weeds that the earth yieldeth, and yet 
 out of it springeth the rose, one of the most 
 sweetly smelled flowers and most delightful to the 
 eye that the earth hath. 
 
 A. Mark of Faith. 
 
 Among many marks that we are on this journey 
 and under sail toward heaven, this is one, when the 
 love of (xod so filleth our hearts that we forget to 
 love and care too much for the having or wanting 
 of other things : as one extreme heat burneth out 
 another. 
 
 .Be Heady. 
 
 Think that your one foot is here and your other 
 foot in the life to come, and to leave off' loving, de- 
 siring or grieving for the wants that shall be made 
 up when your Lord and ye shall meet, and when 
 ye shall give in your bill that day of all your wants 
 here. 
 
22 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Clirist's Workmanship. 
 
 Let our Lord's sweet hand square us, and ham- 
 mer us, and strike off the knots of pride, self-love, 
 and world-worship, and infidelity, that he may make 
 us stones and pillars in his Father's house. 
 
 True Soppiness. 
 
 It is not long days but good days that make the 
 life glorious and happy. 
 
 Zoving Constancy. 
 
 It is the crooked love of some, that they love 
 bracelets, ear-rings, and rings, better than the lover 
 that sendeth them. But God will not be so loved. 
 For that were to behave not as the chaste spouse to 
 abate our love when these things are pulled away. 
 
 Poor Pay. 
 
 We have cause to pity those poor creatures that 
 stand out against Christ and the building of his 
 house. Silly men, they have but a despicable and 
 silly heaven, nothing but meat and clothes, and 
 they laugh a day or two in the world, and then in 
 a moment go down to the grave. 
 
 Hope. 
 
 Ye will get no more than this, until ye come up 
 to the well-head ; where ye shall put up your hand 
 and take down the apples of the Tree of Life, and 
 eat under the shadow of that Tree. These apples 
 are sweeter up beside the Tree, than they are down 
 here in this piece of a clay prison-house. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 23 
 
 Be I'aticnt. 
 
 Bide his harvest. Wait upon his Whit-Sunday. 
 His day is better than your day. He putteth not 
 the hook into the corn until it be ripe and full- 
 eared. 
 
 Bet Go. 
 
 As to what are your fears anent the life and 
 health of your dear children, lay it upon Christ's 
 shoulders. Let him bear all. Loose your grips 
 of them all; and when your dear Lord pulleth, 
 let them go with faith and joy. It is a tried faith, 
 to kiss a Lord that is taking from you. 
 
 Heaven Nearer. 
 
 Our dear Lord is gracious to us, who shorteneth 
 this life, and hath made the way to glory shorter 
 than it was, so that the crown that Noah did fight 
 for five hundred years, children may now obtain in 
 fifteen years. 
 
 Kot Yet. 
 
 Your life hath been near the grave, and ye were 
 at the door, and ye found the door shut fast ; your 
 dear Christ thinking it not time to open these gates 
 to you till ye have fought some longer in his camp. 
 
 Benediction. 
 
 Now I take my leave of you, praying my Christ 
 and your Christ to fulfil our joy, and more graces 
 and blessings from our sweet Lord Jesus to your 
 soul, your husband's, and children's, than ever I 
 wrote of letters A, B, C, to you. 
 
24 
 
 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Look for crosses ; and while it is fair weather 
 mend the sails of the ship. 
 
 Too JLate. 
 
 Take no truce with the devil or this present 
 world. Ye are little obliged to any of the two. 
 Tell them, "Ye are too long a-coming; I have 
 many a year since promised my soul to another, 
 even to my dearest Lord Jesus, to whom I must 
 be true." 
 
 The Recompense. 
 
 When I shall see you clothed in white raiment, 
 washed in the blood of the Lamb, and shall see 
 you even at the elbow of your dearest Lord and 
 Redeemer, and a crown upon your head, and fol- 
 lowing our Lamb and lovely Lord whithersoever 
 he goeth, ye will think nothing of all these days. 
 
 Supper Preparing. 
 
 joy of joys ! that our souls knew there is such 
 a great supper preparing for us, even howbeit we 
 be but half-hungered of Christ here, and many a 
 time dining behind noon, yet the supper of the 
 Lamb shall come in time. 
 
 It were good that we should knock and rap at 
 the Lord's door ; we may not tire to knock oftener 
 than twice or thrice. He knoweth the knock of 
 his friends. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 25 
 
 ('la! m Your Own. 
 
 To you who are in trouble there are some chap- 
 ters, some particular promises in the word of God, 
 made in a most especial manner, which should 
 never have been yours so as they now are, if ye 
 had had your portion in this life as others have ; 
 and therefore all the comforts, promises, and mer- 
 cies which God offereth to the afflicted are as so 
 many love letters written to you. Take them to 
 you. Claim your right, and be not robbed. 
 
 Tarry Not. 
 
 This world is to you a strange inn, and ye are 
 like a traveller who hath his bundle upon his back, 
 and his staff in his hand, and his foot upon the 
 door threshold. Go forward in the strength of 
 your Lord, with your face toward him who longeth 
 more for a sight of you than ye can do for him. 
 
 If ye knew the welcome that abideth ye when 
 ye come home, ye would hasten your pace ; for ye 
 shall see your Lord put up his own holy hand to 
 your face, and wipe all tears from your eyes, and 
 I trow that then ye shall have some joy of heart. 
 
 A. Divine Treasure-Chest. 
 
 Our Lord handleth us as fathers do their young 
 children. They lay up jewels above the reach of 
 the short arms of bairns. The bairns would put 
 up their hands and take them down, and lose them 
 sooner. Jesus Christ is the high coffer in which 
 our Lord hath hid our life. 
 3 
 
26 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Fears. 
 
 Remember me, and that honourable feast, to our 
 Lord Jesus. He was with us before. I hope he 
 will not change upon us, but I fear that I have 
 changed upon him ; but, Lord ! let old kindness 
 stand. 
 
 Healthful Sickness. 
 
 My prayer to our Lord is, that ye may be sick 
 of love for Him who died of love for you. Oh ! 
 sweet were that sickness to be soul-sick for him. 
 A living death it were to die in the fire of the love 
 of that soul-lover, Jesus ! 
 
 In, but not of the World. 
 
 Be like to the fresh river that keepeth its own 
 fresh taste in the salt sea. This world is not wor- 
 thy of your soul ; give it a good-day when Christ 
 cometh into competition with it. 
 
 Safe Custody. 
 
 Happy are they that can, with the apostle, lay 
 their soul in pawn in the hand of Jesus. (2 Tim. 
 
 i. 12.) 
 
 Hope. 
 
 Kings have some persons in their courts who 
 will receive not present wages in their hand, but 
 live upon their hopes. The King of kings also 
 hath servants in his court, that for the present get 
 little or nothing but the heavy cross of Christ, 
 troubles without, and terrors within ; but they live 
 upon hope. 
 
MANNA-CIIUMBS. 27 
 
 Go ivith Him,. 
 
 Jesus is saying in the gospel, " Come and see ;" 
 and he is come down in the chariot of truth, and is 
 now in the world, saying, " Who will go with me ? 
 Will ye go ? My Father will make you welcome, 
 and give you house-room ; for in my Father's house 
 are many dwelling-places." Consent to go with 
 him. 
 
 The lovely One. 
 
 I know and am persuaded that that lovely One, 
 Jesus, is dearer to you than many kingdoms, and 
 that ye esteem him your well-beloved, and the 
 standard-bearer among ten thousand. 
 
 A. Strong Tliread. 
 
 The church hath been, since the world began, 
 ever hanging by a small thread, and all the hands 
 of hell and of the wicked have been drawing at the 
 thread ; but, God be thanked, they only break 
 their arms by pulling, but the thread is not broken, 
 for the sweet fingers of Christ our Lord have spun 
 and twisted it. Lord, hold the thread whole. 
 
 Pray for XTs. 
 
 I must have you praying for me. I am black- 
 shamed for evermore with Christ's goodness ; 
 and in private I got a full answer of my 
 Lord to, be a graced minister, and a chosen arrow 
 hidden in his own quiver. But know that this 
 assurance is not kept but by watching and prayer, 
 and therefore, dear Lord, help me. 
 
28 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 WhinonUiy. 
 
 A trial is like to come on, but I am sure that 
 our husbandman Christ shall lose chaff, but no corn 
 at all. Happy are they who are not thrown away 
 with the chaff: for we shall but suffer temptation 
 for ten days, but those who are faithful to the 
 death shall receive the crown of life. 
 
 Conscience. 
 
 If there be a hole in it, so that it shall take in 
 water at a leak, it will with difficulty mend again. 
 It is a dainty, delicate creature, and a rare piece 
 of the workmanship of your Maker. Therefore 
 deal gently with it, and keep it entire, that amidst 
 this world's glory you may learn to entertain 
 Christ. 
 
 Hungry. 
 
 To my grief, our communion is delayed till Sab- 
 bath come eight days. I pray you advertise the 
 people, that they be not disappointed in coming 
 hither. Show such of them as you love in Christ, 
 from me, that Jesus Christ will be welcomer when 
 he cometh, in that he has sharpened their desire 
 for eight days' space. 
 
 Tliv Furnace, 
 
 I am confident that Zion shall be well. The 
 bush shall burn out, not consume, for the good will 
 of him that dwelleth in the bush. But the Lord is 
 making a fire in Jerusalem, and purposeth to blow 
 the bellows, and to melt the tin and bra^s. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 29 
 
 Home ! and stay not, for the sun is fallen low, 
 and nigh the tops of the mountains, and the sha- 
 dows are stretched out in great length. Linger 
 not by the way. The world and sin would train 
 you on and make you turn aside. Leave not the 
 way for them, and the Lord Jesus be at the voy- 
 age ! 
 
 Xallc of it by Vie. Way. 
 
 Madam, it is a part of the truth of your profes- 
 sion to drop words into the ear of your husband 
 continually of eternity, judgment, death, hell, and 
 heaven. 
 
 Tlie City on a Hill. 
 
 Man,y eyes are upon you, and many would be 
 glad that you spoil a Christian, and mar a good 
 professor. Lord Jesus, mar their godless desires ! 
 
 Satan's JPacJcJiorses. 
 
 Satan layeth upon men a burden of cares above 
 a load, and maketh a packhorse of men's souls 
 when they are wholly set upon this world. We 
 owe the devil no service. It were wisdom to throw 
 off that load into the mire, and cast all our cares 
 over upon God. 
 
 Crown Him! 
 
 Glory ! glory to our King ! Long may he wear 
 his crown ! Lord, let us never see another 
 king ! Oh, let him come down like rain upon the 
 
'" MAMA-CBUMBS* 
 
 Ills. 
 
 We fall by promise and law to Christ. lie won 
 as by the sweat of his brows. 
 
 lietter in Store. 
 
 Ye have gotten little in this life, it is true indeed. 
 Ye have then the more to crave. 
 
 The Advocate. 
 
 Yet a little while, and He that shall come will 
 come, and will not tarry. I know that ere it be 
 long the Lord will come and settle all disputes 
 betwixt us and his enemies. Now, welcome, Lord 
 Jesus ! 
 
 Forbid Them ,\«(. 
 
 Send me word about your daughter, whom I re- 
 member in Christ ; and desire her to cast herself 
 into his arms, who was born of a woman, and, being 
 the Ancient of days, was made a creeping child. 
 It was not for nothing that our brother Jesus was 
 an infant. It was that he might pity infant be- 
 lievers who were to come into the world. 
 
 Cling Together. 
 
 It is time now that the lambs of Jesus should 
 all run together when the wolf is barking at them. 
 
 JJeatli Unrvnhss. 
 
 Death, which brings to the Lord, the woman's 
 seed, Jesus, only a bloody heel and not a broken 
 head, cannot be ill to his friends, who get far less 
 of death than himself. 
 
MANNA-CltUMBS. 31 
 
 Ilia Will be Done. 
 
 Faith will teach you to kiss a striking Lord, 
 and thus to acknowledge the sovereignty of God, 
 in the death of a child, to be above the power of 
 us mortal men, who may pluck up a flower in the 
 bud, and not be blamed by him for it. 
 
 Repining Useless. 
 
 It is easier to complain of the decree than to 
 change it. 
 
 Pruning. 
 
 Your Husbandman and Lord hath lopped off 
 some branches already ; the tree itself is to be 
 transplanted to the high garden. In a good time 
 be it. All these crosses are to make you white 
 and ripe for the Lord's harvest-hook. 
 
 A Frowning World. 
 
 This world never looked like a friend upon you. 
 Ye owe it little love. It looked ever sour-like 
 upon you : howbeit ye should woo it ; it will not 
 match with you ; and therefore never seek warm 
 fire under cold ice. This is not a field where your 
 happiness groweth. It is up above. 
 
 Weeping Wanderers. 
 
 Seeing that our world is not hereaway, we poor 
 children, far from home, must steal through many 
 waters, weeping as we go, and withal believing that 
 we do the Lord's faithfulness no wrong, seeing he 
 hath said, "I, even I, am he that comforteth you." 
 
32 
 
 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 I know that your heart is cast down, but send 
 heavy heart up to Christ — it will be welcome. 
 
 Oh, but acquaintance with the Son of God ! 
 "My Beloved is mine, and I am his," is a sweet 
 and glorious course of life, that none know but 
 those who are sealed and marked in the forehead 
 with Christ's mark, and the new name that Christ 
 writeth upon his own ! 
 
 Chastening JLove. 
 
 I know that the sweetest of it is bitter to you. 
 But your Lord will not give you painted crosses. 
 He pareth not all the bitterness from the cross, 
 neither taketh he the sharp edge quite from it. 
 Then it should be of your selecting, and not of his, 
 which would have as little reason in it as it would 
 have profit for us. 
 
 Suffer ititJi Him. 
 
 I desire not to go on the lee side, or sunny side 
 of religion, to put truth betwixt me and a storm — 
 my Saviour did not do so for me, who in his suffer- 
 ing took the windy side of the hill. 
 
 Come Quickly! 
 
 The Son of God will come with a start upon his 
 weeping bairns, and take them on his knee, and 
 lay their heads in his bosom, and dry their watery 
 eyes. And this day is fast coming. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 33 
 
 Be Beady. 
 
 Seeing that ye know not but that the journey is 
 ended, and ye be come to the water's side, in God's 
 wisdom look over all your papers and your counts, 
 and whether ye be ready to receive the kingdom 
 of heaven as a little child, in whom there is little 
 haughtiness and much humility. There is an ab- 
 solute necessity, that, near eternity, we look ere 
 we leap, seeing no man runneth back again to 
 mend his leap. 
 
 Christ on the Defensive. 
 
 Christ has ever been thus in the world, he hath 
 always the defender's part, and hath been still in 
 the camp, lighting the church's battles. 
 
 Suffer for Mini. 
 
 They are not worthy of Jesus who will not take 
 a blow for their Master's sake. 
 
 Tliy Will be Bone. 
 
 It hath pleased the Lord to let me see, by all 
 appearance, my labours in God's house here are 
 at an end, and I must now learn to suffer, in the 
 which I am a dull scholar. I was willing to do 
 him more service, but seeing he will have no more 
 of my labours, and this land will thrust me out, I 
 pray for grace to learn to be acquainted with 
 misery. 
 
 Not of the World. 
 
 If ye were not strangers here, the dogs of the 
 world would not bark at you. 
 
34 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Poor Pay. 
 
 Esau's portion is not worth his hunting. 
 
 Pruning no Harm. 
 
 The Antichrist and the great Red Dragon will 
 lop Christ's branches, and bring his vine to a low 
 stump, under the feet of those who carry the mark 
 of the beast. But the Plant of Renown, the Man, 
 whose name is the Branch, shall bud forth again 
 and blossom as the rose, and there shall be fair 
 white nourishes again, and with most pleasant 
 fruits upon that Tree of Life. 
 
 Cheer l T p. 
 
 Ye break your heart and grow heavy, and forget 
 that Christ has your name engraven on the palms 
 of his hands in great letters. In the name of the 
 Son of God, believe that buried Scotland, dead 
 and buried in her dear Bridegroom, shall rise the 
 third day again, and there shall be a new growth 
 after the old timber is cut down. 
 
 Israel Peturithtr/. 
 
 Oh, to see the sight, next to Christ's coming in 
 the clouds, the most joyful ! Our elder brethren, 
 the Jews and Christ, fall upon one another's necks 
 and kiss each other ! They have been long asun- 
 der. They will be kind to one another when they 
 meet. Oh, day ! oh, longed for and lovely day, 
 dawn ! sweet Jesus, let me sec that sight, that 
 will be as life from the dead ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 35 
 
 Even so, Come, Lord Jesus. 
 
 The day is near the dawning. The sky is riv- 
 ing. Our Beloved will be on us ere we be aware. 
 
 A.n Absent Lord. 
 
 Because our Beloved was not let in by his spouse 
 when he stood at the d«pr with his wet, frozen 
 head, therefore he will have us seek him a while ; 
 and while we are seeking, the watchmen that go 
 about on the walls have stricken the poor woman, 
 and taken away her veil from her ; but yet a little 
 while, and our Lord will come again. 
 
 Christ's Corn. 
 
 In God's name let Christ take his barn-floor and 
 all that is in it, to a hill, and winnow it ; let him 
 sift his corn, and sweep his house, and seek his 
 gold. 
 
 The Tempter Bajflcd. 
 
 I thank my God in Christ that I find the force 
 of my temptation abated, and its edge blunted, 
 since I spoke to you last. I know not if the 
 tempter be hovering until he find the dam gather 
 again, and we more secure ; but it hath been my 
 burden, and I am yet more confident that the Lord 
 will succour and deliver. 
 
 Love. 
 
 Love hath broad shoulders, and will bear many 
 things, and yet neither sweat, nor faint, nor fall 
 under the burden. 
 
36 MAftfr A- CRUMBS. 
 
 Communion. 
 
 Our Lord, that great Master of the feast, send 
 us one hearty and heartsome supper, for I look 
 that it shall be the last. 
 
 The Furnace. 
 
 For the sins of this land and our breach of the 
 covenant, contempt of the gospel, and our defection 
 from the truth, he hath set up a burning furnace 
 in Mount Zion ; but I say it, and will abide by it, 
 " The grass shall yet grow green on Mount Zion. 
 There shall be dew all the night upon the lilies, 
 and the moth shall eat up the enemies of Christ." 
 
 Sifting. 
 
 It is a benefit to you that the wicked are God's 
 fan to purge you, and I hope that they will blow 
 away no corn, or spiritual graces, but only chaff. 
 
 Gold may be gold, and have the king's stamp on 
 it, when it is trampled on by men. Happy are ye 
 if, when the world trampleth upon your credit and 
 good name, yet ye are the Lord's gold, stamped 
 with the King of heaven's image, and sealed by 
 his Spirit unto the day of redemption. 
 
 Zion Safe, 
 
 The floods may swell and roar, but our ark shall 
 swim above the water. It cannot sink, because a 
 Saviour is in it. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 37 
 
 Hie Great Master Gardener. 
 
 The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a won- 
 derful providence, with his own hand, planted me 
 here, and here I will abide till the great Master 
 of the vineyard think fit to transplant me. 
 
 God Victor. 
 
 When the Lord is going west, the devil and the 
 world go east ; and do you not know that it hath 
 been ever this way betwixt God and the world, 
 God driving, and they holding, God "yea," and 
 the world " nay ?" But they fall on their back, 
 and are frustrated, and our Lord holdcth his grip. 
 
 Rally. 
 
 Our Jesus is setting up himself as his Father's 
 ensign, as God's fair white colours, that his soldiers 
 may flock about him. Long, long may these 
 colours stand ! 
 
 One rrith Christ. 
 
 Howbeit that Prince of renown, precious Jesus, 
 be now weeping and bleeding in his members, yet 
 Christ will laugh again ; and it is time enough for 
 us to laugh when our Lord Christ laugheth — and 
 that will be shortly. 
 
 TJi'e Old Fath. 
 
 An afflicted life looketh very like the way that 
 leadeth to the kingdom. For the apostle (Acts 
 xiv. 22) hath drawn the line and the King's mar- 
 ket-way, through much tribulation, to the kingdom. 
 4 
 
38 MANNA-CBUMBS. 
 
 JBasy Victory. 
 
 The world is one of the enemies that we have to 
 fight with, but a vanquished and overcome enemy, 
 and like a beaten and forlorn soldier, for our Jesus 
 hath taken the armour from it. 
 
 The Guarded Fold. 
 
 If the beast should get leave to ride through the 
 land, and to seal such as are his, he will not get 
 one lamb with him, for these are secured and sealed 
 as the servants of God. 
 
 God's Stepping -stones. 
 
 If the work be of God, he can make of the devil 
 himself a stepping-stone for setting forward the 
 work. 
 
 Good Pay. 
 
 If ye knew the mind of the glorified in heaven, 
 they think heaven came to their hand at an easy 
 market, where they have got it for threescore or 
 fourscore years wrestling with God. 
 
 On! 
 
 For the love of the Prince of your salvation, who 
 is standing at the end of your way, holding up in 
 his hand the prize and the garland to the race-run- 
 ners, forward ! forward ! faint not ! 
 
 Don't rjo Alone. 
 
 Take as many to heaven with you as ye are able 
 to draw. The more ye draw with you, ye shall be 
 the welcomer yourself. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 39 
 
 Cod the Builder. 
 
 If the Lord furnish not new timber from Leba- 
 non to build the house, the work will cease. I look 
 to Him who hath begun well with me. I have his 
 hand-writ that he will not change. 
 
 Christ our Avenger. 
 
 If he suffer his servant to get a broken head in 
 his own kingly service, and not either help or re- 
 venge the wrong, I never saw the like of it. 
 
 The Old Feud. 
 
 It is an old feud that the rulers of the earth, 
 the dragon and his angels, have carried to the 
 Lamb and his followers. But the followers of the 
 Lamb shall overcome, by the word of God. 
 
 Wormwood. 
 
 God hath filled me with gall and wormwood ; 
 but I believe, which holdeth my head above the 
 water. 
 
 Cross and Crown. 
 
 " Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give 
 thee a crown of life." That lovely one, Jesus, 
 who also became the Son of man, that he might 
 take strokes for you, write the cross-sustaining, 
 soul-supporting strength of these words in your 
 heart. 
 
 Tliorns goad us on. 
 
 If contentment were here, heaven were not 
 heaven. 
 
40 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Love and Chastening. 
 
 Thank God that Christ came to your house in 
 your absence, and took with him some of your chil- 
 dren. He presumed that much on your love that 
 ye would not be offended. And howbeit he should 
 take the rest, he cannot come upon your wrong 
 side. I question not if they were children of gold, 
 but ye would think them well bestowed upon him. 
 
 A Two-fold JOord. 
 
 Christ and truth are strong enough. 
 
 A Strong Thread. 
 
 I hang by a thread, but it is (if I may so speak) 
 of Christ's spinning. 
 
 A Welcome " Worst." 
 
 Your faith may be boldly charitable of Christ, 
 that, however matters go, the worst shall be a tired 
 traveller, and a joyful and sweet welcome home. 
 
 Tlie Day Breaheth. 
 
 The back of your winter night is broken. Look 
 to the east, the day sky is breaking. Think not 
 that Christ loseth time or lingereth unsuitably. 
 Oh, fair, fair, sweet morning ! 
 
 Supper Preparing. 
 
 Ye have reason to take in good part, a lean din- 
 ner and spare diet in this life, seeing your large 
 supper of the Lamb's preparing will recompense 
 all. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 41 
 
 The Mud Near. 
 
 Our Redeemer is fast coming to take this old, 
 worm-eaten world, like an old moth-eaten garment, 
 in his two hands, and to roll it up and lay it by 
 him. 
 
 TJie WJieat Safe. 
 
 The Son of God's wheat shall not be blown away. 
 
 A. Good Fight. 
 
 We have Jesus at our side, and they are not 
 worthy of such a Captain who will not take a blow 
 at his back. We are in sight of his colours ; his 
 banner over us is love. Look up to that white 
 banner, and stand. I persuade you in the Lord 
 of victory. 
 
 DrinJi of Christ's Cup. 
 
 In the great work of our redemption, your lovely, 
 beautiful, and glorious Friend and well-beloved 
 Jesus was brought to tears and strong cries, so as 
 his face was wet with tears and blood, arising from 
 a holy fear and the weight of the curse. Take a 
 drink of the Son of God's cup, and love it the 
 better that he drank of it before you. There is 
 no poison in it. 
 
 A. Good Grip. 
 
 " Why art thou cast down, my soul ? Why 
 art thou disquieted within me?" That was the 
 word of a man who was at the very overgoing of 
 the precipice and mountain, but God held a grip 
 of him. 
 
42 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Sold on to the Branches. 
 
 In your temptations, run to the promises. They 
 be our Lord's branches hanging over the water, 
 that our Lord's silly, half-drowned children may 
 take a grip of them. If you let that grip go, you 
 will go to the ground. 
 
 As Ever. 
 
 Ye never knew one in God's book who put his 
 hand to the Lord's work for his kirk, but the world 
 and Satan did bark against them, and bite also, 
 when they had the power. Ye will not lay one 
 stone on Zion's wall, but they will labour to cast it 
 down again. 
 
 A Sweet Cross. 
 
 I am filled with joy in my sufferings, and I find 
 Christ's cross sweet. 
 
 A Clouded Christ. 
 
 The sun is gone down on the prophets, and our 
 gold is become dim, and the Lord feedeth his people 
 with the waters of gall and wormwood. Yet Christ 
 standeth but behind the wall. His bowels are 
 moved : he waiteth that he may show mercy. 
 
 Hope to the End. 
 
 When all these strokes are over, what will you 
 say to see your well-beloved Christ's white and 
 ruddy face, even his face who is worthy to bear 
 the colours among ten thousand? Hope and believe 
 to the end. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 43 
 
 True Glory. 
 
 This is your glory that Christ hath put you into 
 the roll with himself, and the rest of the witnesses 
 who are come out of great tribulation, and have 
 washed their garments, and made them white in 
 the blood of the Lamb. 
 
 A. Sweet Charge. 
 
 My charge to you is, to believe, rejoice, sing, 
 and triumph. Christ has said to me, " Merry, 
 merry; grace and peace for Marion Macnaught." 
 
 Advancement. 
 
 That honour that I have prayed for these sixteen 
 years, with submission to my Lord's will, my kind 
 Lord hath now bestowed upon me ; even to suffer 
 for my royal and princely King Jesus, and for his 
 kingly crown, and the freedom of his kingdom that 
 his Father hath given him. The forbidden lords 
 have sentenced me with deprivation and confine- 
 ment. 
 
 A. HffJit Jjoad. 
 
 Howbeit Christ's green cross newly laid upon 
 me be somewhat heavy, while I call to mind the 
 fair days sweet and comfortable to my soul, and 
 to the souls of many others, and how young ones 
 in Christ are plucked from the breast, and the in- 
 heritance of God laid waste, yet that sweet-smelled 
 and perfumed cross of Christ is accompanied with 
 sweet refreshment, with the kisses- of a King, with 
 the joy of the Holy Ghost. 
 
44 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Tisgah. 
 
 I am well, and my soul prospereth. I find 
 Christ with me. I burden no man. I want noth- 
 ing. No face looketh on me but it laugheth on 
 me. Sweet, sweet is the Lord's cross. I over- 
 come my heaviness. My Bridegroom's love-clinks 
 fasten my weary soul. 
 
 Sick Regrets. 
 
 All would be well if I were free of old challenges 
 for guiltiness, and for neglect in my calling, and 
 for speaking too little for my well-beloved's crown, 
 honour, and kingdom. Oh ! for a day in the as- 
 sembly of the saints to advocate for King Jesus ! 
 
 Heaviness. 
 
 If I were free from challenges and a. high com- 
 mission within my soul, I would not give a straw 
 to go to my Father's house, through ten deaths for 
 the truth and cause of my lovely, lovely one, Jesus ! 
 But I walk in heaviness now. 
 
 Flowers among Ttiorns. 
 
 Oh, what a sweet steep it were up to my Father's 
 house through ten deaths for the truth and cause 
 of that Unknown, and so not half well-loved Plant 
 of Renown, the man called The Branch, the Chief 
 among ten thousand, the Fairest among the sons of 
 men ! Oh, what unseen joys, how many hidden 
 heart-burnings of love are in the remnants of the 
 sufferings of Christ ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 45 
 
 Sugar in the Gulf. 
 
 Yet for all iny complaints, lie was never sweeter 
 than he is now. One kiss now is sweeter than ten 
 long since. Sweet, sweet is his cross ; light, light 
 and easy is his yoke.- 
 
 Benediction. 
 
 Commending your ladyship and the sweet child 
 to the tender mercies of mine own Lord Jesus, and 
 the good will of him who dwelt in the bush. 
 
 Sad Memories. 
 
 I am sentenced with deprivation and confinement 
 within the town of Aberdeen — but oh ! my guilti- 
 ness, the follies of my youth, the neglects in my 
 calling, and especially in not speaking more for 
 the kingdom, crown, and sceptre of my royal and 
 princely king, Jesus, do so stare me in the face, 
 that I apprehend danger in that which is a crown 
 of rejoicing to the dear saints of God. 
 
 Christ JEnmigh. 
 
 My well-beloved is some kinder and more warmly 
 than ordinary, and cometh and visiteth my soul. 
 My chains are over-gilded with gold. Only the 
 remembrance of my fair days with Christ, and of 
 my dear flock, whose case is my heart's sorrow, is 
 vinegar to my sugared wine ; yet both sweet and 
 sour feed my soul. No pen, no words, no genius 
 can express to you the loveliness of my only, only 
 Lord Jesus. 
 
46 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Sweet Cross! 
 
 Welcome, welcome sweet cross of Christ ! wel- 
 come, welcome fair, fair lovely royal king with 
 thine own cross ! 
 
 Indwelling Sin. 
 
 Alas ! it is no cause of wondering that I am thus 
 borne down with challenges ; for the world hath 
 mistaken me, and no man knoweth what guiltiness 
 is in me so well as these two, (who keep my eyes 
 now waking and my heart heavy,) I mean my heart 
 and conscience, and my Lord who is greater than 
 my heart. 
 
 A Well-fitting Cross. 
 
 Christ hath so handsomely fitted for my shoul- 
 ders this rough tree of the cross, that it hurteth 
 me no wise. My treasure is up in Christ's coffers. 
 My comforts are greater than ye can believe. My 
 pen shall lie still for penury of words to write 
 them. God knoweth that I am filled with the joy 
 of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Self-satisfaetion. 
 
 Our nature contenteth itself with little in godli- 
 ness. Our "Lord, Lord" seemeth to us ten 
 " Lords, Lords." Little holiness in our balance 
 is much, because it is our holiness ; and we love to 
 lay small burdens on our soft natures, and to make 
 a fair court-way to heaven ; and I know it were 
 necessary to take more pains than we do, and not 
 to make heaven a city more easily taken than God 
 hath made it. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 47 
 
 Old Sores. 
 
 My challenges are revived again, and I find old 
 sores are bleeding anew. So dangerous and pain- 
 ful is an undercoated conscience. Yet I have an 
 eye to the blood that is physic for such sores. 
 
 A. Pastor's Love. 
 
 Ye are in my prayers night and day. I cannot 
 forget you. I do not eat, I do not drink, but I 
 pray for you all. 
 
 Memories Sweet and Sad. 
 
 The memory of the fair feast-days which Christ 
 and I had in his banqueting house-of-wine, and of 
 the scattered flock once committed to me, and now 
 taken off my hand by himself, because I was not 
 so faithful in the end as I was in the first two years 
 of my entry, when sleep departed from my eyes 
 because my soul was taken up with a care for 
 Christ's lambs, even these add sorrow to my sor- 
 row. 
 
 IAght through the Clouds. 
 
 Albeit this honest cross gained some ground on 
 me by my heaviness, and my inward challenges of 
 conscience for a time were sharp, yet now, for the 
 encouragement of you all, I dare say it, and write 
 it under my hand, "Welcome, welcome sweet, sweet 
 cross of Christ." I verily think that the chains 
 of my Lord Jesus are all overlaid with pure gold, 
 and that his cross is perfumed, and that it smelleth 
 of Christ. 
 
48 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Spiritual Sluggishness. 
 
 Oh, how easy is it to deceive ourselves, and to 
 sleep and wish that heaven may fall down into our 
 laps ! 
 
 Talcing Strokes with Christ. 
 
 Blessed are they who are content to take strokes 
 with their weeping Christ. 
 
 Taking Strokes from ClirisVs Kami. 
 
 Strokes with the sweet Mediator's hand are very 
 sweet. He has always been sweet to my soul, but 
 since I suffered for him his breath has a sweeter 
 smell than before. 
 
 Strength in Hope. 
 
 When I look over beyond the line, and beyond 
 death to the laughing side of the world, I triumph 
 and ride upon the high places of Jacob, howbeit I 
 am otherwise a faint, dead-hearted, cowardly man, 
 often borne down and hungry in waiting for the 
 marriage-supper of the Lamb. 
 
 An Easy Cross. 
 
 No king is better provided than I am. Sweet, 
 sweet and easy is the cross of my Lord. 
 
 Note. — The following written during confinement at Aberdeen. 
 Christ's Gold Safe. 
 
 I believe that the devil and the persecuting 
 world shall reap no fruit of me, but burned ashes. 
 For he will see to his own gold. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 49 
 
 Help Christ. 
 
 Is not Christ now crying — " Who will help me ? 
 Who will come out with me to take part with me, 
 and share in the honour of my victory over these 
 mine enemies ?" 
 
 Xfie only Want. 
 
 I am every way in good case, both soul and body, 
 all honour and glory to my Lord. I want nothing but 
 a further revelation of the beauty of the unknown 
 Son of God. 
 
 A. Happy Prisoner. 
 
 This prison is my banqueting-house. I am han- 
 dled as softly and delicately as a fondled child. I 
 am nothing behind I see with Christ. He can in 
 a month make up a year's losses. 
 
 JMCore Gold deeper down. 
 
 I profess that I have never yet taken pains to 
 find out Him whom my soul loveth. There is a 
 gate yet of finding out Christ that I have never 
 lighted on. It were good to be beginning in sad 
 earnest to find out God, and to seek the right tread 
 of Christ. Oh, if we could know the power of 
 godliness ! 
 
 Hoping Troubles Down. 
 
 I defy crosses to embark me in such a plea 
 against Christ as I was troubled with of late. I 
 hope to over-hope and over-believe my troubles. 
 I have cause now to trust Christ's promise more 
 than his gloom. 
 5 
 
50 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Christ more than Heaven. 
 
 My own mind is, that if comparison were made 
 betwixt Christ and heaven, I would sell heaven 
 with my blessing to buy Christ. 
 
 Spiritual Forget fa Incus. 
 
 I find in myself that water runneth not faster 
 through a sieve, than our warnings slip from us. 
 
 Withering Jtiehes. 
 
 Christ is more worth to you and your posterity 
 than this world's May-flowers, and withering riches, 
 and honour, that shall go away as smoke, and 
 evanish in a night-vision, and shall, in one half 
 hour after the blast of the archangel's trumpet, 
 lie in white ashes. 
 
 JLoolt Ahead. 
 
 Draw by the lap of time's curtain, and look in 
 through the window to great and endless eternity, 
 and consider if a worldly price can be given for 
 one smile of Christ's godlike ravishing counte- 
 nance, in that day when so many joints and knees 
 of thousand thousands wailing shall stand before 
 Christ, trembling, shouting, and making their 
 prayers to hills and mountains to fall upon them 
 and hide them from the face of the Lamb ! 
 
 Crown Him. 
 
 Oh blessed hands for evermore that shall help 
 to put the crown upon the head of Christ again in 
 Scotland ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 51 
 
 Salute no Man by the Way. 
 
 Ye have need to make all haste, because the 
 inch of your day that remaineth will quickly slip 
 away. For whether we wake or sleep, our glass 
 runneth. 
 
 Talce Meed! 
 
 Beware of a beguile in the matter of your salva- 
 tion. Wo, wo, for evermore to them that lose that 
 prize ! At length they lie down in sorrow, and 
 are clothed with everlasting shame. 
 
 Hun ! 
 
 The greatest part of this world runs to the place 
 of that torment, rejoicing, and dancing, eating, 
 drinking, and sleeping. My counsel to you is, 
 that ye start in time to be after Christ ; for if ye 
 go quickly, Christ is not far before you — ye shall 
 overtake him. Lord God, what is so needful as 
 this — " salvation ! salvation !" 
 
 Oh, if there were a free market for salvation 
 proclaimed in that day when the trumpet of Grod 
 shall awake the dead, how many buyers would be 
 then! 
 
 An ill-made Bed. 
 
 " This shall ye have at my hand, ye shall lie 
 down in sorrow." (Isa. 1. 11.) And truly this is 
 as ill made a bed to lie upon as one could wish, for 
 he cannot sleep soundly nor rest sweetly who hath 
 sorrow for his pillow. 
 
52 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Fear God. 
 
 Fear not worms of clay — the moth shall eat them 
 as a garment. Let the Lord be your fear. He is 
 with you, and shall fight for you. 
 
 Crown Him I 
 
 I protest, before men and angels, that Christ 
 cannot be exchanged, that Christ cannot be sold, 
 that Christ cannot be weighed. Where would 
 angels or all the world find a balance to weigh him 
 in ? All lovers blush when ye stand beside Christ ! 
 Wo upon all love but the love of Christ. Hunger, 
 hunger for evermore be upon all heaven but Christ ! 
 Shame, shame for evermore be upon all glory but 
 Christ's glory ! I cry death, death upon all lives 
 but the life of Christ ! 
 
 Engrafted. 
 
 If I had been in Christ by adhesion only, as 
 many branches are, I should have been burnt to 
 ashes, and this world would have seen a suffering 
 minister of Christ (of something once in show) 
 turned into unsavoury salt. But my Lord Jesus 
 had a good eye that the tempter should not play 
 foul play and blow out Christ's candle. 
 
 TJie File and Hammer. 
 
 Oh, what owe I to the file and the hammer, to 
 the furnace of my Lord Jesus ! Grace tried is 
 better than grace, and it is more than grace, it is 
 glory in its infancy ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMr.S. 53 
 
 Speaking Crosses. 
 
 How soon would faith freeze without a cross ! 
 How many dumb crosses have been laid upon my 
 back that had never a tongue to speak the sweet- 
 ness of Christ as this hath ! When Christ blesses 
 his own crosses with a tongue, they breathe out 
 Christ's love, wisdom, kindness, and care of us. 
 
 Mich Recompense. 
 
 Verily he hath not put me to a loss by what I 
 suffer. He oweth me nothing. For in my bonds 
 how sweet and comfortable have the thoughts of 
 him been to me, wherein I find sufficient recom- 
 pense of reward ! 
 
 Feasts in Exile. 
 
 How blind are my adversaries who sent me to a 
 banqueting-house, to a house of wine, to the lovely 
 feasts of my lovely Lord Jesus, and not to a prison 
 or place of exile ! 
 
 Mrotherly Iiove. 
 
 Dear brother, ye are in my heart to live and die 
 with you. Visit me with a letter. Pray for me. 
 Grace, grace be with you, and God who heareth 
 prayer visit you, and let it be unto you according 
 to the prayers of your own brother and Christ's 
 prisoner. 
 
 Clirist True. 
 
 My prison is a palace to me, and Christ's ban- 
 queting-house. My Lord Jesus is as kind as they 
 call him. 
 
 5 * 
 
54 MANNA-CKOIL.v. 
 
 TJie more Crosses the better. 
 
 I bless His great name who is no niggard in 
 holding crosses upon me, but spendeth largely his 
 rods that he may save me from this perishing world. 
 Christ's cross is neither a cruel nor an unkind 
 mercy, but the love-token of a father. 
 
 Good Stock. 
 
 All my stock of Christ is some hunger for him, 
 (and yet I cannot say but that I am rich in that). 
 My faith, and hope, and holy practice of new obe- 
 dience are scarce worth speaking of; but blessed 
 be my Lord who taketh me light, and clipped, and 
 naughty, and worthless as I am. 
 
 Patient Hope. 
 
 Oh, that I could feed upon His breathing, and 
 kissing, and embracing, and upon the hopes of my 
 meeting and his, when love-letters shall not go 
 betwixt us, but he will be messenger himself! 
 But there is required patience on our part till the 
 summer fruit in heaven be ripe for us. 
 
 To the Aged. 
 
 When ye are drinking the grounds of your cup, 
 and ye are upon the utmost end of the last link of 
 time, and old age, like death's long shadow, is 
 casting a covering upon your days, it is no time to 
 court this vain life, and to set love and heart upon 
 it. It is near after supper. Seek rest and ease 
 for your soul in God through Christ. 
 
MANNA-CltUMBS. 55 
 
 Passing Knowledge. 
 
 I dare say that angels' pens, angels' tongues, 
 nay, as many worlds of angels as there are drops 
 of water in all the seas and fountains and rivers 
 of the earth, cannot paint him out to you. I think 
 his sweetness since I was a prisoner hath swelled 
 upon me to the greatness of two heavens. Oh, for 
 a soul as wide as the utmost circle of the highest 
 heaven that containeth all to contain his love ! 
 
 TJtinJc of the JEnd. 
 
 Remember when the race is ended, and the play 
 is either won or lost, and ye are in the utmost 
 circle and border of time, and shall put your foot 
 within the march of eternity, and all your good 
 things of this short, night-dream shall seem to you 
 like the ashes of a blaze of thorns or straw, and 
 your poor soul shall be crying " Lodging, lodging, 
 for God's sake !" then shall your soul be more glad 
 at one of your Lord's lovely and homely smiles, 
 than if ye had the charters of three worlds for all 
 eternity. 
 
 Still Believe. 
 
 To pray and believe now when Christ seemeth 
 to give you a nay, nay, is more than it was before. 
 Die believing. Die with Christ's promise in your 
 hand. 
 
 Only one Voyage. 
 
 It is good to look to your compass, and all ye 
 have need of ere you take shipping, for no wind can 
 blow you back again. 
 
56 MANNA-CRUMB?. 
 
 Heart Work, Hard Work, 
 
 Believe me that I find it to be hard wrestling to 
 play fair with Christ, and to keep good quarters 
 with him, and to love him in integrity and life, and 
 to keep a constant course of sound, solid, daily 
 communion with Christ. Temptations are daily 
 breaking the thread of that course. 
 
 Sudden Destruction. 
 
 Oh, how fairly have many ships been flying 
 before the wind, that in an hour's space have been 
 lying in the sea-bottom ! 
 
 Take Bleed. 
 
 How many professors cast a golden lustre as if 
 they were pure gold, and yet are under that skin 
 and cover but base and reprobate metal ! And 
 how many keep breath in their race many miles, 
 and yet come short of -the prize and the garland ! 
 
 Sickness before Health 
 
 Those who never had sick nights or days in con- 
 science for sin, cannot have but such a peace with 
 God as will undercoat and break the flesh again, 
 and end in a sad war at death. 
 
 Be humbled: walk softly; down, down, for God's 
 sake, my dear and worthy brother, with your top- 
 sail. Stoop, stoop ! It is a low entry to go in at 
 heaven's gate. 
 
MANNA-CKUMBS. 57 
 
 The New Paradise. 
 
 Oh, what a sight to be up in heaven in that fair 
 orchard of the New Paradise ; and to see and smell 
 and touch and kiss that fair Field-flower, that ever- 
 green tree of life ! His bare shadow were enough 
 for me ; a sight of him would be the earnest of 
 heaven to me. 
 
 The Panting Hart. 
 
 Christ, Christ, nothing but Christ can cool our 
 love's burning languor. Oh, thirsty love ! wilt 
 thou set Christ, the well of life, to thy head, and 
 drink thy fill ? Drink, and spare not ; drink, love, 
 and be drunken with Christ ! Oh, if we were 
 clasped in each other's arms ! 
 
 Fair-tveather Christians. 
 
 The way to heaven is knotty, rough, stormy, 
 and full of thorns. Many would follow Christ, 
 but with reservation that, by open proclamation, 
 Christ would cry down crosses, and cry up fair 
 weather, and a summer sky, and sun, till we were 
 all fairly landed at heaven. 
 
 Temptations. 
 
 If we knew ourselves well, to want temptation 
 is the greatest temptation of all. 
 
 Weeping Joys. 
 
 Life is a post that standeth not still, and our 
 joys here are born weeping, rather than laughing, 
 and they die weeping. 
 
58 MANNA-CRUMB,';. 
 
 One Heaven enough. 
 
 We love to carry a heaven to heaven with us, 
 and would have two summers in one year, and no 
 less than two heavens. But this will not do for 
 us. One — and such a one ! — may suffice us well 
 enough. The Man Christ got but one only, and 
 shall we have two ? 
 
 Still too Little. 
 
 Oh, if this world knew the excellency, sweetness, 
 and beauty of that high and lofty One, that Fairest 
 among the Sons of men, verily they would see that 
 if their love were bigger than ten heavens, all in 
 circles beyond each other, it were all too little for 
 Christ our Lord. 
 
 Blossoming Chains. 
 
 I dare lay in pawn my hope of heaven that this 
 reproached way is the only way of peace, and I 
 verily esteem and find chains and fetters for that 
 lovely one Christ to be watered over with sweet 
 consolations, and the love-smiles of that lovely 
 Bridegroom for whose coming we wait. 
 
 A Strong Support. 
 
 How can it be but that such weak eyes as ours 
 cast water in a great smoke, or that a weak head 
 should not turn giddy when the water runneth deep 
 and strong ! But God be thanked that Christ, in 
 his children, can endure a stress and a storm, how- 
 beit soft nature would fall down in pieces. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 59 
 
 Come in. 
 
 Come in, come in . to Christ, and see what you 
 want, and find it in him. He is the short cut (as 
 we used to say), and the nearest way to an outgate 
 of all your burdens. 
 
 Gall in the Cup. 
 
 Sin, sin, this body of sin and corruption imbit- 
 tereth and poisoneth all our enjoyments. Oh, that 
 I were where I shall sin no more ! Lord, loose 
 the sad prisoner ! 
 
 TJttle Enough. 
 
 Who of the children of God have not cause to 
 say that they have their fill of this vain life, and 
 like a full and sick stomach, to wish at mid-supper 
 that the supper were ended and the table drawn, 
 that the sick man might run to bed and enjoy rest. 
 
 Safe Over. 
 
 Glad may their souls be that are safe over the 
 firth, Christ having paid the freight. Happy are 
 they who have passed their hard and wearisome 
 time of apprenticeship, and are now freemen and 
 citizens in that joyful high city, New Jerusalem ! 
 
 JSeavenly-mindediiess. 
 
 Our crosses would not bite us if we were hea- 
 venly-minded. I know of no obligation which the 
 saints have to this world, seeing we fare but upon 
 the smoke of it ; and if there be any smoke in the 
 house, it bloweth upon our eyes. 
 
60 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Cross-Fruit. 
 
 I am sure that this is the best fruit of the cross 
 when we, from the hard fare of the dear inn, cry 
 the more that God would send a fair wind to land 
 us, hungered and oppressed strangers, at the door 
 of our Father's house. 
 
 .Anything for Christ's saJce. 
 
 Let him make of me what he pleaseth, providing 
 he make glory to himself out of me. I care not. 
 
 Bring Mini Baclt. 
 
 Oh, how sweet a sight were it to see all the 
 tribes of the Lord in this land fetching home again 
 our banished King Christ to his own palace, his 
 sanctuary, and his throne ! 
 
 Full Assurance. 
 
 Oh, that I had but a promise made from the 
 mouth* of Christ of his love to me! And then, 
 howbeit my faith were as tender as paper, I think 
 longing, and pining, and greening of sick desires 
 would cause it to bide out the siege till the Lord 
 come to fill the soul with his love. 
 
 Oh, the Depths ! 
 
 Who knoweth how far it is to the bottom of our 
 Christ's fulness ? Who ever weighed Christ in a 
 pair of balances ? Who hath seen the foldings and 
 plies, and the heights and depths of that glory 
 which is in him and kept for us ? 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 01 
 
 A. Huge Debt. 
 
 I owe as many praises and thanks to free grace 
 as would lie betwixt me and the utmost border of 
 the highest heaven, suppose ten thousand heavens 
 were all laid above other. 
 
 A. Strong Knot. 
 
 I am sure Christ hath by his death and blood 
 casten the knots so fast that the fingers of the 
 devils and hell-fulls of sins cannot loose it, and 
 that bond of Christ standeth surer than heaven, or 
 the days of heaven as that sweet pillar of the cove- 
 nant whereon we all hang. 
 
 Under His Wings. 
 
 Christ, with all his little ones under his two 
 wings, and in the compass or circle of his arms, is 
 so sure, that cast him and them into the ground 
 of the sea, he shall come up again and not lose one. 
 
 JOove is Happiness. 
 
 They are happy for evermore who are over head 
 and ears in the love of Christ, and know no sick- 
 ness but love-sickness for Christ, and feel no pain 
 but the pain of an absent and hidden well-Beloved. 
 
 A. Vain Cliase. 
 
 We run our souls out of breath, and tire them 
 in coursing and galloping after our night-dreams, 
 to get some created good thing in this life and on 
 this side of death. 
 G 
 
62 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Consider to what point of the compass your soul 
 setteth its face. For all come not home at night 
 who suppose that they have set their face heaven- 
 ward. It is a woful thing to die and miss heaven, 
 and to lose houseroom with Christ at night. 
 
 Fragrant from afar. 
 
 Oh, but heaven casteth a sweet smell from afar 
 off to those who have spiritual smelling ! God hath 
 made many fair flowers, but the fairest of them all 
 is heaven, and the Flower of all flowers is Christ. 
 
 Misjilaced Affection. 
 
 Fie, fie upon us who love fair things, as fair gold, 
 fair houses, fair lands, fair pleasures, fair honours, 
 and fair persons, and do not pine and melt away 
 with love to Christ ! Oh, would to God I had more 
 love for his sake ! Oh, for as much as would go 
 round about the earth, and over the heaven, yea, 
 the heaven of heavens, and ten thousand worlds, 
 that I might let all out upon fair, fair, only fair 
 Christ ! 
 
 Bottomless I>ove. 
 
 If those frothy, fluctuating, and restless hearts 
 of ours would come all about Christ and look into 
 his love, to bottomless love, to the depth of mercy, 
 to the unsearchable riches of his grace, to inquire 
 after and search into the beauty of God in Christ, 
 they would be swallowed up in the depth and height, 
 length and breadth of his goodness. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 63 
 
 Siveet Longings. 
 
 Oli, how sweet and dear are these thoughts that 
 are still upon the things which are above ! And 
 how happy are they who are longing to have little 
 sand in their glass, and to have time's thread cut, 
 and can cry to Christ, " Lord Jesus, have over — 
 come and fetch the dreary passenger !" 
 
 Draw tJie Curtains. 
 
 Oh, if men would draw the curtains and look 
 into the inner side of the ark, and behold how the 
 fulness of God dwelleth in him bodily ! Oh, who 
 would not say, " Let me die, let me die ten times 
 to see a sight of him !" Ten thousand deaths were 
 no great price to give for him. 
 
 Pantings. 
 
 Oh, for a sight of eternity's glory, and a little 
 tasting of the Lamb's marriage-supper ! Half a 
 draught, or a drop of the wine of consolation that 
 is up at our banquetting-house,-out of Christ's own 
 hand, would make our stomachs loathe the brown 
 bread and the sour drink of a miserable life. 
 
 FigJit On! 
 
 It is not possible to keep Christ peaceably, hav- 
 ing once gotten him, except the devil were dead. 
 It must be your resolution to set your face against 
 Satan's northern temptations and storms for sal- 
 vation. Nature would have heaven come to us 
 while sleeping in our beds. 
 
(34 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Itich Compensation. 
 
 When we shall come home and enter to the pos- 
 session of our Brother's fair kingdom, and when 
 our heads shall feel the weight of the eternal crown 
 of glory, and when we shall look back to pains and 
 sufferings, then shall we see life and sorrow to be 
 less than one step or stride from a prison to glory, 
 and that our little inch of time-suffering is not 
 worthy of our first night's welcome home to heaven. 
 
 Perverted Senses. 
 
 Oh, that our eyes and our soul's smelling should 
 go after a blasted and sunburnt flower, even this 
 plaistered and fair outsided world, and then we 
 have neither eye nor smell for the Flower of Jesse, 
 for that Plant of Renown, for Christ, the choicest, 
 the fairest, the sweetest Rose that ever God planted ! 
 
 None like Htm. 
 
 Suppose that our Lord would manifest his art, 
 and make ten thousand heavens of good and glo- 
 rious things, and of new joys, devised out of the 
 deep of infinite wisdom, he could not make the like 
 of Christ. For Christ is God, and God cannot be 
 made. 
 
 Well Heavened! 
 
 Oh, how happy are they who get Christ for no- 
 thing ! God send me no more for my part of para- 
 dise than Christ ! And surely I were rich enough, 
 and as well-heavened as the best of them, if Christ 
 were my heaven. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 65 
 
 A. Leaking Cup. 
 
 Alas, my riven dish and running-out vessel can 
 hold little of Christ Jesus ! 
 
 Room for You. 
 
 There are many heads lying in Christ's bosom, 
 but there is room for yours among the rest, and 
 therefore go on and let hope go before you. 
 
 Conscience a Shield. 
 
 I am* sure that conscience, standing in awe of 
 the Almighty, and fearing to make a little hole in 
 the bottom for fear of under-water, is a strong 
 medium to hold off an erroneous conclusion in the 
 least wing or lith of sweet sweet truth that con- 
 cerneth the royal prerogative of our kingly and 
 highest Lord Jesus. 
 
 "That Malicious Murderer." 
 
 I heard with grief of your great danger of per- 
 ishing by sea, and of your merciful deliverance 
 with joy. Satan will leave no stone unrolled, as 
 the proverb is, to roll you off your Rock, or at 
 least to shake and unsettle you ; for at that same 
 time the mouths of wicked men were opened in 
 hard speeches against you by land, the prince of 
 the power of the air was angry with you by sea. 
 See, then, how much ye are obliged to that mali- 
 cious murderer who would beat you with two rods 
 at one time ! 
 
Ob MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Preaching. 
 
 The Lord knoweth that I preferred preaching 
 of Christ, and still do, to anything next to Christ 
 himself. 
 
 OCIie Gracious Key-Holder. 
 
 Thank your God who saith, " I have the keys 
 of Hell and of Death." 
 
 If Satan were jailor, and had the keys of death 
 and the grave, they were stored with more prisoners. 
 Ye were knocking at those black gates and ye 
 found the doors shut, and we do all welcome you 
 back again. 
 
 He Ready. 
 
 Have all in readiness against the time that ye 
 must sail through that black and impetuous Jordan, 
 and Jesus, Jesus who knoweth both those depths 
 and the rocks and all the coasts be your pilot ! 
 
 No Itemed i/. 
 
 What ye do amiss in your life to-day ye may 
 amend it to-morrow ; for as many suns as God 
 maketh to arise upon you, ye have as many new 
 lives. But ye can die but once, and if ye mar or 
 spill that business, ye cannot come back to mend 
 that piece of work again. 
 
 Cling to the Truth. 
 
 Hold fast the truth. For the world sell not one 
 dram's weight of God's truth, especially now when 
 most men measure truth by time like young seamen 
 setting their compass by a cloud. 
 

 MANNA-CRUMBS. 67 
 
 Night Cometh. 
 
 Ye see how the number of your months is writ- 
 ten in God's book, and as one of the Lord's hire- 
 lings ye must work till the shadow of the evening 
 come upon you, and ye shall run your glass even 
 to the last pickle of sand. 
 
 Keep to Your Bargain. 
 
 Y.e contracted with Christ, I hope, when first you 
 began to follow him, that ye would bear his cross. 
 Fulfil your part of the contract with patience and 
 break not to Jesus Christ ! Be honest in your 
 bargaining with him ! 
 
 No Escape. 
 
 Suffer we must — ere we were born God decreed 
 it. 
 
 An Experienced Father. 
 
 He has been practised in bringing up his heirs 
 these five thousand years, and his bairns are well 
 brought up, and many of them are honest men 
 now at home, up in their own house in heaven, 
 and are entered heirs to their Father's inheritance. 
 Now the form of his bringing-up was by chastise- 
 ments, scourging, correcting, nurturing ; and see 
 if he make exception of any of his bairns. No, 
 his eldest Son, and his Heir, Jesus, is not excepted. 
 
 Iiove- Coals. 
 
 He knoweth how one of Christ's love-coals hath 
 burnt my soul with a desire to have my bonds to 
 preach his glory whose cross I now bear. 
 
68 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Cliained with Ziove. 
 
 h ow, if we would ever so fain escape out of 
 Christ's hands, yet love hath so bound us that we 
 cannot get our hands free again ; he hath so ravished 
 our hearts that there is no loosening of his grips ; 
 the chains of his soul-ravishing love are so strong 
 that the grave nor death will break them. 
 
 Particular Providences of God do not contain Mis General 
 Decree, 
 
 God's directing and commanding will can, by no 
 good logic be discerned from the events of provi- 
 dence. The Lord sent Paul on many errands for 
 the spread of his gospel where he found lions in 
 the way. 
 
 TTie Will for the Deed. 
 
 Seeing that He knoweth our willing mind to 
 serve him our wages and stipend is running to the 
 fore with our God, even as some sick soldiers get 
 pay when they are bed-fast and not able to go to 
 the field with others. 
 
 False Accusations. 
 
 I. gave in a bill of quarrels and complaints of 
 unkindness against Christ who seemed to have cast 
 me over the dyke of the vineyard as a dry tree, 
 and separated me from my Lord's inheritance. But 
 high and loud praises be to our royal crowned 
 King in Zion, that he hath not burnt the dry 
 branch. 
 
MANNA-CUUMI5S. 69 
 
 Through Much Tribulation. 
 
 We would be content that our king, Jesus, should 
 make an open proclamation and cry down crosses, 
 and cry up joy, gladness, ease, honour, and peace. 
 But it must not be so. Through many afflictions 
 we must enter into the kingdom of God. 
 
 Gilded Chains. 
 
 It is but our soft flesh that has raised a slander 
 on the cross of Christ. I see now the white side 
 of it. My Lord's chains are all over gilded. 
 
 Courage! Joy! 
 
 Courage, courage, joy, joy for evermore ! oh 
 joy unspeakable and glorious ! Oh for help to set 
 my crowned King on high ! Oh for love to him who 
 is altogether lovely ! 
 
 Honeycombs in the Desert. 
 
 My Lord Jesus has taken the withered, dry 
 stranger and his prisoner broken in heart into his 
 house of wine. Oh, if all ye, and all Scotland, and 
 all our brethren with you knew how I am feasted ! 
 Christ's honey-combs drop comforts. He dineth 
 with his prisoner, and the King's spikenard casteth 
 a smell. 
 
 The Devil to be Preferred. 
 
 I love a rumbling or raging devil in the kirk, 
 (since the church militant cannot or may not want 
 a devil to trouble her,) rather than a subtle or 
 sleeping devil. 
 
70 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 A. Welcome Visitor. 
 
 I cannot show you how matters go betwixt Christ 
 and me. I find my Lord coming and going seven 
 times a day. His visits are short, but they are 
 both frequent and sweet. 
 
 Prison Visions. 
 
 Since I came to Aberdeen, I have been taken 
 up to see the New Land, the fair palace of the 
 Lamb. And will Christ let me see heaven to break 
 my heart and never give it to me? 
 
 Struggles. 
 
 Hunger in me runneth to fair and sweet pro- 
 mises. But when I come I am like a hungry man 
 that wanteth teeth, or a weak stomach, having a 
 sharp appetite that is filled with the very sight of 
 meat, or like one stupified with cold under the 
 water that would fain come to the land, but cannot 
 grip anything casten to him. 
 
 I can let Christ grip me, but I cannot grip him. 
 
 Jjimping Faith. 
 
 All I am able to do is to hold out a lame faith 
 to Christ, like a beggar holding out a stump instead 
 of an arm or leg, and crying, " Lord Jesus, work 
 a miracle." 
 
 Joy Above. 
 
 Joy groweth up in heaven, and is above our 
 short arm. Christ will be steward and dispenser 
 himself, and none else but he. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 71 
 
 Dead to the World. 
 
 Mortification and to be crucified to the world is 
 not so highly accounted of by us as it should be. 
 Oh, how heavenly a thing it is to be dead, and 
 dumb, and deaf to this world's sweet music ! 
 
 FeatJicr- Chasing. 
 
 We but chase feathers flying in the air, and tire 
 our own spirits for the froth and over-gilded clay 
 of a dying life. One sight of what my Lord hath 
 let me see within this short time is worth a world 
 of worlds. 
 
 TJie Half not Told. 
 
 There is more to be had of Christ in this life 
 than I had believed. 
 
 Christ Alone. 
 
 Christ is so good that I will have no other tutor, 
 suppose I could have the choice of ten thousand 
 beside. I think now five hundred heavy hearts 
 for him too little. 
 
 The Sioeetest Way. 
 
 I know no sweeter way to heaven than through 
 free grace and hard trials together, and one of 
 these cannot well want another. 
 
 Panting. 
 
 Oh, that the day would favour us, and come and 
 put Christ and us into each other's arms ! I am 
 sure that a few years will do our turn, and the 
 soldier's hour-glass will soon run out ! 
 
72 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Providence — Us White Side. 
 
 Providence is not rolled upon unequal and crooked 
 wheels. All things work together for the good of 
 those who love God and are called according to his 
 purpose. Ere it be long, we shall see the white 
 side of God's Providence. 
 
 All for Christ. 
 
 I am either suffering for Christ, and this is either 
 the sure and good way, or I have done with heaven 
 and shall never see God's face, which I bless him 
 cannot be. 
 
 A Loan, 
 
 I write my blessing to that sweet child that ye 
 have borrowed from God. He is no heritage to 
 you, but a loan : love him as folks do borrowed 
 
 things. 
 
 Daft Mopes. 
 
 It speaketh somewhat Avhen our Lord bloweth 
 the bloom off our daft hopes in this life, and lop- 
 peth the branches off our worldly joys well nigh 
 the root on purpose, that they should not thrive. 
 Lord, spoil my fool's heaven in this life, that I 
 may be saved for ever ! 
 
 Christ and the World. 
 
 I wonder that any man living can laugh upon 
 the world, or give it a hearty good-day. The Lord 
 Jesus hath handled me so that as I am now dis- 
 posed, I think, never to be in this world's obliga- 
 tion for a night's lodgings. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 73 
 
 A new Nick. 
 
 I verily think now that Christ hath led me up 
 to a nick in Christianity that I was never at before. 
 
 Ebb and Flow. 
 
 I have been up after deep down-castings and 
 sorrows, before the Lamb's white throne in my 
 Father's inner court, the great King's dining-hall. 
 
 Tlie best Wish. 
 
 More I cannot wish nor pray nor desire for your 
 ladyship than Christ singled and chosen out from 
 all created good things, or Christ howbeit wet in 
 his own blood and wearing a crown of thorns. 
 
 Barteriny Crosses. 
 
 God forbid it come to bartering or exchanging 
 crosses! For I think my cross so sweet that I 
 know not where I would get the like of it. Christ's 
 honey-combs drop so abundantly that they sweeten 
 my gall. Nothing breaketh my heart but that I 
 cannot get at the daughters of Jerusalem to tell them 
 of my bridegroom's glory. 
 
 Let him make of me what he pleases, if he make 
 salvation out of it to me. 
 
 A. Christian in Sad Earnest. 
 
 I was a child before ; all bygones are but bairns' 
 play. I would I could begin to be a Christian in 
 sad earnest. 
 
 7 
 
74 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Moving Z T pw(trd. 
 
 None is so kind as my only royal King and 
 Master. The King dineth with his prisoner, and 
 his spikenard casteth a smell. He hath led me up 
 to such a nick and pitch of communion with him- 
 self as I never knew before. When I look back 
 to bygones I judge myself to have been a child at 
 A. B. C. with Christ. 
 
 Fruit of Suffering. 
 
 This is the fruit of my sufferings, that I desire 
 Christ's name may be spread abroad in this king- 
 dom in my behalf. 
 
 A. Z,ost Will. 
 
 We can in our prosperity sport ourselves, and 
 be too bold with Christ ; yea, be that insolent as 
 to chide with him : but under water we dare not 
 speak. I wonder now at my sometimes boldness 
 to chide and quarrel Christ, to nickname Provi- 
 dence when it stroked me against the hair. But 
 now swimming in the waters, I think my will is 
 fallen to the ground of the water. I have lost it. 
 
 I was once that I would not eat, except I ly,d care- 
 fully chosen meat ; now I dare not complain of the 
 crumbs and parings under his table. I was once 
 that I would make the house ado, if I saw not the 
 world carved and set in order to my liking ; now 
 I am silent when I see God hath set servants on 
 horseback, and is fattening and feeding the chil- 
 dren of perdition. I pray God I may never find 
 my will again. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 75 
 
 A New tTesiis. 
 
 ng, it was no 
 meet with. He smileth more cheerfully, his kisses 
 are more sweet and soul-refreshing than the kisses 
 of Christ I saw before were. 
 
 Or rather the King hath led me up to a measure 
 of joy and communion with my Bridegroom that I 
 never attained to before. 
 
 A Heartful of Jesus. 
 
 I will not strike sail to crosses, nor flatter them 
 to be quit of them as I have done. Come, all 
 crosses, welcome, welcome, so that I may get my 
 heartful of my Lord Jesus. 
 
 A Mistake* 
 
 I took Christ's glooms to be as good as Scripture 
 speaking wrath ; but I have seen the other side of 
 Christ, and the white side of his cross now. 
 
 Christ's Prisoner. 
 
 I am as well as a prisoner of Christ can be, 
 feasted and made fat with the comforts of God. 
 Christ's kisses are made sweeter to my soul than 
 ever they were. 
 
 Burning, yet not Consumed. 
 
 I said I was cast over the dyke of the Lord's 
 vineyard as a dry tree ; but I see now, that if I 
 had been a withered branch, the fire would have 
 burned me long ere now. Blessed be his high 
 name who hath kept sap in a dry tree ! 
 
76 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Heaven Necessary. 
 
 There is a great necessity of heaven ; ye must 
 needs have it. All other things— as houses, lands, 
 children, husband, friends, country, credit, health, 
 wealth, honour— may be wanted, but heaven is 
 your one thing necessary. 
 
 Beggarly Elements. 
 
 My Lord hath brought me to this, that I will 
 not flatter the world for a drink of water. I am 
 no debtor to clay— Christ hath made me dead to 
 that. I now wonder that I ever was such a child, 
 long since, as to beg at such beggars. 
 
 T/ie Storehouse. 
 
 Oh, what I want ! ' I want so many things that 
 I am almost asking if I have anything at all. 
 Every man thinketh he is rich enough in grace till 
 he take out his purse and tell his money, and then 
 he findeth his pack but poor and light in the day 
 of a heavy trial. I found that I had not to bear 
 my expenses, and I should have fainted, if want 
 and penury had not chased me to the Storehouse 
 of all. 
 
 Keep the Head above Water. 
 
 Ye must learn to swim and hold up your head 
 above the water, even when the sense of his pre- 
 sence is not with you to hold up your chin. I 
 trust in God that he will bring your ship safe to 
 land. 
 
MANNA-CllUMliS. 77 
 
 JAglit in Darkness. 
 
 He was always kind to my soul, but never so 
 kind as now, in my greatest extremities. I dine 
 and sup with Christ. He visiteth my soul with 
 visitations of love in the night-watches. 
 
 A Timely Feast. 
 
 Oh, how sweet and comfortable will the feast of 
 a good conscience be to you when your eyestrings 
 shall break, your face wax pale, and the breath 
 turn cold, and your poor soul come sighing to the 
 windows of the house of clay of your dying body, 
 and shall long to be out, and to have the jailor 
 open the door, that the prisoner may be set at 
 liberty ! 
 
 Greedy of Grace. 
 
 Be greedy of grace : study above anything, my 
 dear brother, to mortify your lusts. Oh, but pride 
 of youth, vanity, lust, idolizing of the world, and 
 charming pleasures take long time to root them 
 out! 
 
 A. motJi-eaten Coat. 
 
 Verily I have seen the best of this world, a moth- 
 eaten, thread-bare coat. I purpose to lay it aside, 
 being now old and full of holes. Oh, for my house 
 
 Tlie Danger. 
 
 The only danger is that we give grace more to 
 do than God giveth it ; that is, by turning his grace 
 into wantonness. 
 7 * 
 
78 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Enthrone Hi in! 
 
 Oh, if my hairs, all my members, and all my 
 bones were well-tuned tongues to sing the high 
 praises of my great and glorious King ! Help me 
 to lift Christ up upon his throne ! 
 
 Room for Christ! 
 
 Had I but the smallest sum to give my Lord 
 Jesus, it would ease my pain. But alas ! I have 
 nothing to pay. He will get nothing of poor me. 
 But I am now that I have not room in my heart 
 for such a stranger. 
 
 Duty of a Christian Wife. 
 
 Counsel your husband to fulfil my joy, and to 
 seek the Lord's face. Show him, from me, that 
 my joy and desire is to hear that he is in the Lord. 
 God casteth him often in my mind — I cannot for- 
 get him. 
 
 A many-plied Jjove. 
 
 There are curtains to be drawn by in Christ that 
 we never saw, and new foldings of love in him. I 
 despair that ever I shall win to the far end of that 
 love, there are so many plies in it. 
 
 A. Surrounding, Burdening love. 
 
 I know not what to do with Christ. His love 
 surroundeth and surchargeth me. I am burdened 
 with it ; but oh, how sweet and lovely is that bur- 
 den ! I am so in love with his love, that if his love 
 were not in heaven, I should be unwilling to go 
 thither. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 79 
 
 Keep Watch. 
 
 Ye draw nigh to the water side ; look to your ac- 
 counts : ask your Guide to take you to the other 
 side. 
 
 Tips and Downs • 
 
 I thought it had been an easy thing to be a 
 Christian, and that to seek God had been at the 
 next door. But oh, the windings and turnings, 
 the ups and the downs that he hath led me through ! 
 
 Tlie Sure Kail. 
 
 I counsel you, madam, from a little experience, 
 let Christ keep the great seal, and entrust him so 
 as to hang your vessels, great and small, and pin 
 burdens upon the Nail fastened in David's house. 
 
 Short Summons. 
 
 It has pleased the Lord to remove your husband 
 soon to rest. But shall we be sorry that our loss 
 is his gain, seeing the Lord would want his com- 
 pany no longer ? Think not much of short sum- 
 mons, for, seeing he walked with his Lord in his 
 life, and desired that Christ should be magnified 
 in him at his death, ye ought to be silent and 
 satisfied. 
 
 A Higher " Nick." 
 
 I rejoice exceedingly that the Father of Lights 
 hath made you see that there is a nick in Chris- 
 tianity which ye contend to be at, and that is to 
 quit the right eye and the right hand, and to keep 
 the Son of God. 
 
80 MANNA-CRUMBb. 
 
 Joy in Clirist Above. 
 
 What joy have I out of heaven's gates but that 
 my Lord Jesus be glorified in my bonds ? 
 
 Nicknaming Christ. 
 
 There is some pining and mismannered hunger 
 that maketh me miserable and nicknameth Christ as 
 a changed Lord. I cannot believe without a pledge. 
 I cannot take God's word without surety, as if 
 Christ had lost or sold his credit, and were not in 
 my books responsible and law-abiding. 
 
 A Jealous Jesus. 
 
 Give him heart and chair, house and all. He 
 will not be made companion with any other. Love 
 is full of jealousies. He will have all your love, 
 and who should get it but he ? I know that ye 
 allow it upon him. There are comforts both sweet 
 and satisfying laid up for you. Wait on. Trust 
 Christ. He is an honest debtor. 
 
 Christ before All. 
 
 I love Christ's worst reproaches, his glooms, his 
 cross, better than all the world's plastered glory. 
 My heart is not longing to be back again from 
 Christ's country. It is a sweet soil I am come to. 
 I (if any in the world) have good cause to speak 
 much good of him. Oh, hell were a good, cheap 
 price to buy him at ! Oh, if all the three kingdoms 
 were witnesses to my pained, pained soul, overcome 
 with Christ's love ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 81 
 
 Lavish. Kindness. 
 
 I have no scarcity of Christ's love. He hath 
 wasted more comforts upon his poor, banished ser- 
 vant than would have refreshed many souls. My 
 burden was once so heavy that one ounce weight 
 would have casten the balance and broken my back, 
 but Christ said, " Hold ! hold !" 
 
 I am JBlaek, but Comely. 
 
 Oh, that I should lay my black mouth to such a 
 fair, fair, fair face as Christ's ! But I dare not 
 refuse to be loved. The cause is not in me. 
 
 A. Fatal Mistake. 
 
 I doubt not but more would fetch heaven if they 
 believed not heaven to be at the next door. The 
 world's negative holiness, no adulterer, no murderer, 
 no thief, no cozener, maketh men believe that they 
 are already glorified saints ; but the sixth chapter 
 of Hebrews may affright us all when we hear that 
 men may take of the gifts and common graces of 
 the Holy Spirit and a taste of the powers of the 
 life to come to hell with them. Here is reprobate 
 silver which yet seemeth to have the king's image 
 and superscription upon it. 
 
 A. Painful Path, 
 
 His bairns must often have the frosty cold side 
 of the hill, and set down both their bare feet among 
 thorns. His love hath eyes, and in the meantime 
 is looking on. 
 
82 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 A Garden Planted in Huins. 
 
 Our spoiled works, losses, deadness, coldness, 
 •wretchedness, are the ground upon which the Good 
 Husbandman laboureth. 
 
 Be not Discouraged. 
 
 Many a whole soul is in heaven that was sicker 
 than ye are. 
 
 Struggling for Clear Vision. 
 
 It is not desertion ; I know not what it is, but I 
 was never so sick for him as now. 
 
 Oh, for instruments in God's name that this is 
 he, and that I may make use of it when, it may be, 
 a near friend within me will say, and when it will 
 be said by a challenging devil — "Where is thy 
 God?" 
 
 An Easy YoTte. 
 
 I am in this house of pilgrimage every way in 
 good case. Christ is most kind and loving to my 
 soul. It pleaseth him to feast with his unseen con- 
 solations a stranger and an exiled prisoner, and I 
 would not exchange my Lord Jesus for all the com- 
 fort out of heaven. His yoke is easy, and his bur- 
 den is light. 
 
 A Patient Guide. 
 
 Salvation is supposed to be at the door, and 
 Christianity is thought an easy task ; but I find it 
 hard, and the way strait and narrow, were it not 
 that my Guide is content to wait on me, and to 
 care for a tired traveller. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 83 
 
 Seek Lasting Olory. 
 
 Set your heart upon heaven, and trouble not 
 your spirit with this clay idol of the world, which 
 is but vanity, and hath but the lustre of the rain- 
 bow in the air, which cometh and goeth with a fly- 
 ing March shower. 
 
 At God's Charges. 
 
 My Lord hath been pleased to make unknown 
 faces laugh upon me, and hath made me well con- 
 tent of a borrowed fireside and a borrowed bed. 
 I am feasted with the joys of the Holy Ghost, and 
 my royal King beareth my charges honourably. 
 
 a Work in Faith. 
 
 Duties are ours, and events are God's. 
 
 Another Upward Step. 
 
 I never before came to that nick or pitch of 
 communion with Christ that I have now attained 
 to. For my confirmation I have been these two 
 Sabbaths or three in private, taking instruments in 
 the name of God, that my Lord Jesus and I have 
 kissed each other in Aberdeen, the house of my 
 pilgrimage. 
 
 In the Carriage with Christ. 
 
 Who can blame Christ to take me on behind 
 him, if I may so say, on his white horse, or in his 
 chariot paved with love, through a little water ? 
 Will not a father take his little fondled boy in his 
 arms and carry him over a ditch or a mire ? 
 
84 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Sweet Kisses. 
 
 Oh, who knoweth how sweet Christ's kisses are ! 
 "Who hath been more kindly embraced and kissed 
 than I, his banished prisoner ? 
 
 Supping tvith Christ. 
 
 It hath pleased him to make a sinner the like 
 of me an ordinary banqueter in his house of wine 
 with that royal, princely one, Christ Jesus. 
 
 Hie Builder's Work. 
 
 The lintel stone and pillars of the New Jerusa- 
 lem suffer more knocks of God's hammer and tool 
 than the common side-wall stones : and if twenty 
 crosses be written for you in God's book, t*hey will 
 come to nineteen, and then, at last, to one, and 
 after that to nothing. 
 
 Hungering Still. 
 
 If he would cool my love-fever for himself with 
 real presence and possession, I would be rich ; but 
 I dare not be mislearned, and seek more in that 
 kind, howbeit it be no shame to beg at Christ's 
 door. 
 
 A.n Unquenchable Coal. 
 
 I am astonished and confounded at the greatness 
 of Christ's love for such a sinner. I know that 
 Christ and I shall never be even. I shall die in 
 his debt. He has left an arrow in my heart that 
 paineth me for want of real possession, and hell 
 cannot quench this coal of God's kindling. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 85 
 
 Stepping in Glory. 
 
 Oh, what telling is in Christ ! Oh, how weighty 
 is my fair garland, my crown, my fair supping-hall 
 in glory ! 
 
 Not no Had as it Seems. 
 
 The din and gloom of our Lord's cross is more 
 fearful and hard than the cross itself. He taketh 
 the bairns in his arms when he cometh to deep 
 water, at least when they lose ground and are put 
 to swim, then his hand is under their chin. 
 
 Winged Chains. 
 
 I cannot but rejoice in his salvation who hath 
 made my chains my wings, and hath made me a 
 king over my crosses and over my adversaries. 
 Glory, glory, glory to his high and holy name ! 
 
 Strength as the Day. 
 
 Not one ounce, not one grain weight more is 
 laid on me than he hath enabled me to bear. 
 
 A. Strange Whetstone. 
 
 " The devil is but a whetstone to sharpen the 
 faith and patience of the saints." I know that he 
 but heweth and polisheth stones all this time for 
 the New Jerusalem. 
 
 Old Challenges. 
 
 Old challenges now and then revive and cast all 
 down. I go halting and sighing, fearing there be 
 an unseen process yet coming out, and that heavier 
 than I can answer. 
 
86 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Fear and Hope. 
 
 I hope the pardon is now obtained, but the peace 
 is not so sure to me as I would wish. Yet one 
 thing I know, there is not a way to heaven but the 
 way which he hath graced me to profess and suffer 
 for. 
 
 Anything for Christ. 
 
 I protest to you, (my witness is in heaven,) that 
 I could wish many pound-weight added to my cross 
 to know that by my sufferings Christ were set for- 
 ward in his kingly office in this land ! 
 
 Complain of Self, not of God. 
 
 It is not a good course to complain that we can- 
 not get a providence of gold, when our laziness, 
 cold zeal, temporising, and faithless fearfulness 
 spoileth a good providence. 
 
 Zet God have his Way. 
 
 When our faith goeth to meddle with events, and 
 to hold a court (if I may so speak) upon God's pro- 
 vidence, and beginneth to say, " How wilt thou do 
 this and that ?" we lose ground. We have nothing 
 to do there. It is our part to let the Almighty 
 exercise his own office and steer his own helm. 
 
 Light at Eventide. 
 
 I cannot, I dare not, but speak to others what 
 God hath done to the soul of his poor, afflicted, 
 exile prisoner. His comfort is more than I ever 
 knew before. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 87 
 
 Joy-perfumed Cross. 
 
 How sweet must he be when that black and bur- 
 densome tree, his own cross, is so perfumed with 
 joy and gladness ! Oh, for help to lift him up by- 
 praises on his royal throne ! 
 
 Prove Him. 
 
 Put Christ's love to the trial, and put upon it 
 our burdens, and then it will appear love indeed. 
 We employ not his love, and therefore we know it 
 not. 
 
 A. Sweet Exchange. 
 
 I dare not say but my Lord Jesus hath fully 
 recompensed my sadness with his joys, my losses 
 with his own presence. I find it a sweet and rich 
 thing to exchange my sorrows with Christ's joys, 
 my afflictions with that sweet peace I have within 
 myself. 
 
 Times of Refreshing. 
 
 He is come down as rain upon the mown grass ; 
 he hath revived my withered root, and he is the dew 
 of herbs. 
 
 TJie Modi Heady. 
 
 I hope when a change cometh to cast anchor at 
 midnight upon the Rock which he hath taught me 
 to know in this daylight, whither I may run when 
 I must say my lesson without book, and believe in 
 the dark. 
 
 A. Goodly Prison. 
 
 I am most secure in this prison. Salvation is 
 for walls in it ; and what think ye of these walls ? 
 
88 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 A. New Lesson. 
 
 No preaching, no book, no learning could give 
 me that which it behooved me to come and get in 
 this town. But what of all this if I were not misted 
 and confounded and astonished how to be thankful 
 and how to get him praised for evermore ? 
 
 Joying in the Cross. 
 
 Some have written to me that I am possibly too 
 joyful of the cross ; but my joy overleapeth 
 the cross — it is bounded and terminated upon 
 Christ. I know that the sun will overcloud and 
 eclipse, and that I shall again be put to walk in 
 the shadow ; but Christ must be welcome to come 
 and go as he thinketh meet. 
 
 A Favoured Sj^y. 
 
 It was not my flattering of Christ that drew a 
 kiss from his mouth, but he would send me as a 
 spy into this wilderness of suifering to see the land 
 and try the ford, and I cannot make a lie of Christ's 
 cross. I can report nothing but good both of him 
 and it. 
 
 Be not Deceived. 
 
 It would be no art (as I noAV see) to spin small, 
 and make hypocrisy seem a goodly web, and go 
 through the market as a saint among men, and yet 
 steal quietly to hell without observation. So easy 
 is it to deceive men. I have disputed whether I 
 ever knew anything of Christianity except the 
 letters of that name. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 89 
 
 The Well- Beloved's Shoulder. 
 
 If he bear me on his back, or carry me in his 
 arms over this water, I hope for grace to set down 
 my feet" upon dry ground when the way is better. 
 But this is slippery ground ; my Lord thought it 
 good I should go by a hold, and lean on my well- 
 Beloved's shoulder. 
 
 Painful Memories. 
 
 My neglects while I had a pulpit and other things 
 whereof I am ashamed to speak, meet me now so 
 as God maketh an honest cross my daily sorrow. 
 
 Oh, for Assurance! 
 
 If certainty of salvation were to be bought, God 
 knoweth that if I had ten earths I would not chaffer 
 with God. 
 
 A. Great Mistake. 
 
 Like a fool I believed, under sufferings for Christ, 
 that I should keep the key of Christ's treasures, 
 and take out comforts when I listed, and eat and 
 be fat ; but I see now that a sufferer for Christ 
 shall be made to know himself, and shall be holden 
 at the door as well as another poor sinner, and will 
 be fain to eat with the bairns and take the by- 
 board, and glad to do so. 
 
 Song in the Kight. 
 
 The black crabbed tree of my Lord's cross hath 
 made Christ and my soul very entire. He is my 
 song in the night. 
 
90 MASNA-CRUMB8. 
 
 A. Ziffle J'iety goes <t Good Way. 
 
 Oh, if we could take pains for the kingdom of 
 heaven ! But we sit down upon some ordinary 
 marks of God's children, thinking we have as much 
 as will separate us from a reprobate, and thereupon 
 we take the play and cry " Holiday !" And thus 
 the devil casteth water on our care, and blunteth 
 our zeal and love. 
 
 Oh, for Possession! 
 
 Half a kiss is sweet, but our doting love will not 
 be content with a right to Christ unless we get 
 possession. Like the man who will not be content 
 with rights to bought land, except he get also the 
 ridges and acres laid upon his back to carry home 
 with him. 
 
 The Furnace. 
 
 I hope in God to leave some of my rust and 
 superfluities in Aberdeen. 
 
 Good Credit. 
 
 I would not wish a better stock, while heaven be 
 my stock, than to live upon credit at Christ's hands, 
 daily borrowing. 
 
 Losing Business. 
 
 I have not lighted upon the rich gate of putting 
 Christ to the bank, and making myself rich with 
 him. My misguiding and childish trafficking with 
 that matchless Pearl, that heaven's Jewel, the 
 Jewel of the Father's delights, hath put me to a 
 great loss. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 91 
 
 A. Full Fountain, but a Poor Receptacle. 
 
 Christ, all the seasons of the year, is dropping 
 sweetness. If I had vessels I might fill them, but 
 my old riven, running-out dish, even when I am at 
 the well, can bring little away. 
 
 How little of the sea can a child carry in his 
 hand ! As little can I take away of my great 
 Sea, my boundless and running-over Christ Jesus. 
 
 The Safe Surety. 
 
 I would spoil my own heaven yet if I had not 
 burdened Christ with all. I but lend my bare 
 name to the sweet covenant. Christ behind and 
 before and on either side maketh all sure. 
 
 Unspeakable Excellence. 
 
 Oh, would to my Lord that I could cause paper 
 and ink to speak the worth and excellency, the 
 high and loud praises of a Brother-ransomer ! 
 The Ransomer needeth not my report, but oh, if 
 he would take it and make use of it ! 
 
 I should be happy if I had an errand to this 
 world but for some few years to spread proclama- 
 tions and outcries and love-letters of the highness, 
 the highness for evermore, the glory, the glory for 
 evermore, of the Ransomer, whose clothes were 
 wet and dyed with blood. 
 
 CTirist and the World. 
 
 Put a low price upon the world's clay — put 
 a high price upon Christ. 
 
92 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Hold On! 
 
 Hold on ! Christ never yet slew a sighing, groan- 
 ing child. More of that would make you won 
 goods and a meet prey for Christ. 
 
 A. Poicerful Magnet. 
 
 Oh, well to my poor soul for evermore that my 
 Lord called Grace to the Council and put Christ 
 Jesus with free merits, and the blood of God fore- 
 most in the chase to draw sinners after a Redeemer! 
 
 Draw on Christ. 
 
 I am no better yet, but Faith liveth and spendeth 
 upon our Captain's charges, who is able to pay all. 
 We need not pity him. He is rich enough. 
 
 Ziove Still. 
 
 Christ's love under a veil is love. 
 
 Spiritual Trifling. 
 
 I am like a child that hath a gilded book, that 
 playeth with the ribbons, and the gilding, and the 
 picture on the first page, but readeth not the con- 
 tents of it. Certainly, if by my desires to my well- 
 Beloved I could provoke devils, and crosses, and 
 the world, and temptations, to the field, but oh ! 
 my poor weakness maketh me lie behind the bush 
 and hide me. 
 
 Tlie Most Doleful Tiling in the World. 
 
 Mistaken grace and somewhat like conversion is 
 the saddest and most doleful thing in the world. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS?. 93 
 
 Be jealous over yourself and your own heart, 
 and keep faith with God. Let him not have a 
 faint and feeble soldier of you. Fear not to back 
 Christ, for he will conquer and overcome. 
 
 A weaJt-eyed Mope. 
 
 Short, and silly, and sand-blind were our hope, 
 if it could not look over the water to our best heri- 
 tage, and if it stayed only at home and about the 
 doors of our clay house. 
 
 Coming Joy. 
 
 How ye will rejoice when Christ layeth down 
 your head under his chin, and drieth your face, 
 and welcometh you to glory and happiness. 
 
 He that would reckon and tell all the stones in 
 his way, in a journey of three or foun hundred 
 miles, and write up in his count-book all the herbs 
 and flowers growing in his way, might come short 
 of his journey. You cannot stay in your inch of 
 time to lose your day — in setting your heart on 
 this vain world. 
 
 A Jealous God. 
 
 In that our Lord took your husband to himself, 
 I know it was that he might make room for him- 
 self. He cutteth off your love to the creature, that 
 ye might learn that God only is the right owner 
 of your love. 
 
94 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Chracious Spinning. 
 
 You must learn to make your evils your great 
 good ; and to spin comforts, peace, joy, communion 
 with Christ out of your troubles, that are Christ's 
 wooers sent to speak for you to himself. 
 
 CtHtsses Welcome. 
 
 Thanks to God for crosses ! 
 
 Joy in Trials. 
 
 Seeing Christ has fastened heaven to the far end 
 of the cross, and he will not loose the knot himself, 
 and none else can, let us then count it exceeding 
 joy when we fall into divers temptations. 
 
 There is sand in your glass yet. Consider what 
 peace and joy are in Christ's service. Think what 
 advantage it will be to have angels, the world, life 
 and death, crosses, yea, and devils, all for you as 
 the King's sergeants and servants, to do your 
 business. To have mercy on your seed and a bless- 
 ing on your house. To have true honour and a 
 name on earth that casteth a sweet smell. What 
 dignity it is to be a son of God ! Dominion and 
 mastery over temptations, over the world and sin. 
 
 Be not Deceived. 
 
 We would all keep both Christ and our right 
 eye, our right hand and foot ; but it will not do 
 with us. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 95 
 
 Jiexv Drops. 
 
 Truly I think Christ's misty dew a welcome 
 message from heaven till my Lord's rain fall. 
 
 A Headstrong love. 
 
 I know he will not want you, and that there is a 
 sweet wilfulness in his love, and ye have as good 
 cause on the other part to be headstrong and per- 
 emptory in your love to Christ, and not to part 
 nor divide your love between him and the world. 
 If it were more it is little enough, yea, too little 
 for Christ. 
 
 A Lauglihtg Cross. 
 
 I am now every way in good terms with Christ. 
 He hath set a banished prisoner as a seal on his 
 heart, and as a bracelet on his arm. That crabbed 
 and black tree of the cross laugheth upon me now. 
 The alarming noise of the cross is worse than itself. 
 
 Oh, if all the kingdom were as I am except these 
 bonds ! My los^s is gain, my sadness joyful, my 
 bonds liberty, my tears comfortable. This world 
 is not worth a drink of cold water. 
 
 No matter Sow. 
 
 If ye get Christ, howbeit not the sweet, pleasant 
 way ye would have him, it is enough. 
 
 Give CUirist All. 
 
 Your only errand to the world is to woo Christ. 
 Therefore put other lovers from about his house, 
 and let Christ have all your love. 
 
96 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Good Guests. 
 
 He and his cross are two good guests, and worth 
 the lodging. 
 
 The Bead on Jesus's Bosom. 
 
 My sky shall clear, for Christ layeth my head 
 in his bosom, and admitteth me to lean there. I 
 never knew before what his love was in such a 
 measure. 
 
 A Soft Couch. 
 
 Go where you will, your soul shall not sleep 
 sound but in Christ's bosom. Come in to him and 
 lie down, and rest you on the slain Son of God. 
 
 I sought him, and now a fig for all the worm- 
 eaten and moth-eaten glory out of heaven since I 
 have found him, and in him all I can want or wish. 
 
 Christ hath given me the marriage kiss, and he 
 hath my marriage love. 
 
 A Poor Return. 
 
 I have gotten much love from Christ, but I give 
 him little or none again. My white side cometh 
 out on paper to men, but at home and within I find 
 much black work, and great cause of low sail and 
 of little boasting. 
 
 Christ's Ornaments. 
 
 He will make a diadem, a garland, a seal upon 
 his heart, and a ring upon his finger, of those who 
 have avouched him before this faithless generation. 
 
• MANNA-CRUMBS. 97 
 
 Grace the Deliverer. 
 
 I was the law's man, and under the law and 
 under a curse. But grace brought me from under 
 that hard lord, and I rejoice that I am grace's 
 freeholder. 
 
 An Undesirable Calm. 
 
 I have not now of a long time found such high 
 spring tides as formerly. The sea is out and the 
 wind of his Spirit calm, and I cannot buy a wind, 
 or, by requesting the sea, cause it to flow again, 
 only I wait on, upon the banks or shore side till 
 the Lord send a full sea, that with up-sails I may 
 lift up Christ. 
 
 Sweet Longings. 
 
 Sorrow for his absence is sweet, and sighs with 
 "Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?" have their 
 own delights. Oh, that I may gather hunger 
 against his long-looked-for return ! 
 
 Even to dream of him is sweet. To build a 
 house of pining wishes for his return, to spin out a 
 web of sorrow, and care, and languishing and sighs, 
 either dry or wet, as the case may be, because he 
 hath no leisure, if I may speak so, to make a visit, 
 or to see a poor friend, sweeteneth and refresheth 
 the thoughts of the heart. 
 
 Soft Wax. 
 
 Christ's stamp and seal would go far down* in a 
 young soul if he would receive the thrust of Christ's 
 stamp. 
 
98 MANNA-CRUMBS. ' 
 
 Is tliere not a Cause? 
 
 Who hath more cause to boast in the Lord than 
 such a sinner as I am, who am feasted with the 
 consolations of Christ, and have no pain in my 
 sufferings but the pain of soul-sickness, of love for 
 Christ, and sorrow that I cannot sound aloud the 
 praises of him who hath heard the sighing of the 
 prisoner, and is content to lay the head of his op- 
 pressed servant in his bosom under his chin, and 
 let him feel the smell of his garments ! 
 
 Three Strange Things. 
 
 This love would keep all created tongues of men 
 and angels busy night and day to speak of it. 
 Alas ! I can speak nothing of it but wonder at 
 three things in his love. First, freedom. Oh, 
 that lumps of sin should get such love for nothing ! 
 Secondly, the sweetness of his love. I give over 
 either to speak or write of it. Thirdly, what power 
 and strength are in his love ! I am persuaded it 
 can climb a steep hill with hell upon its back ; and 
 swim through water and not drown ; and sing in 
 the fire and find no pain ; and triumph in losses, 
 prisons, sorrows, disgrace, exile, and laugh and re- 
 joice in death ! 
 
 Persistent Kindness. 
 
 Whether I will or not, he will be kind to me. 
 As if he had defied my guiltiness to make him un- 
 kind, he so breathes his love in on me. Here I 
 die with wondering that justice hindereth not love. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 99 
 
 A. Wondrous Escape. 
 
 Heaven and angels may wonder that we have 
 got such a gate of sin and hell. Such a back-entry 
 out of hell as Christ made and brought out the 
 captives by is more than my poor shallow thoughts 
 can comprehend. 
 
 " Be found me in a Desert JLand." 
 
 I was in his eyes like a young orphan, wanting 
 known parents, casten out in the open fields: either 
 Christ behooved to take me up and to bring me 
 home to his house and fireside, else I should have 
 died in the fields. 
 
 Ziove Expulsive. 
 
 Let Christ's love bear most court in your soul, 
 and that love will bear down the love of other 
 things. 
 
 Cloudless Ziove. 
 
 Oh, for a year's lease of the sense of his love 
 without a cloud, to try what Christ is ! 
 
 Tardy Time. 
 
 Oh, time ! time ! how dost thou torment the 
 souls of those that would be swallowed up of Christ's 
 love because thou movest so slowly ! 
 
 What would I not give to have time that lieth 
 betwixt Christ and me taken out of the way, that 
 we might at once meet ! I cannot but think but 
 that at the first sight I shall see of that most lovely 
 and fairest face, love will come out of his two eyes 
 and fill me with astonishment. 
 
100 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 The Feast Day. 
 
 I know it is far after noon, and nigh the mar- 
 riage supper of the Lamb. The table is covered 
 already. well-Beloved, run, run fast ! Oh, 
 fair day, when wilt thou dawn ! Oh, shadows, flee 
 away ! 
 
 A Good Darter. 
 
 It were good to sell other things for him. For 
 when all these days are over, we shall find it our 
 advantage that we have taken part with Christ. 
 
 Be Patient. 
 
 Our sand-glass is not so long as we need to 
 weary. Time will eat away and root out our woe 
 and sorrow. Our heaven is in the bud and growing 
 up to a harvest. Why, then, should we not follow 
 on, seeing our span-length of time will come to an 
 inch ? 
 
 The Vessel Safe 
 
 Think not much of a storm on the ship that 
 Christ saileth in. There shall no passenger fall 
 overboard, but the crazed ship and the sea-sick 
 passengers shall come safe to land. 
 
 The Indwelling Pope. 
 
 I find one thing which I saw not well before, 
 that when the saints are under trials and well 
 humbled, little sins raise great cries and war-shouts 
 in the conscience ; and in prosperity, conscience is 
 a Pope to give dispensations, and let out and in, 
 and give latitude and elbow-room to our heart. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 101 
 
 Stvcet Communion, 
 
 I am in as sweet communion with Christ as a 
 poor sinner can be, and am only pained that he 
 hath much beauty and fairness, and I little love. 
 
 If you but saw Sim! 
 
 Oh, if ye saw the beauty of Jesus, and smelled 
 the fragrance of his love, you would run through 
 fire and water to be at him ! 
 
 Idols Fall before a Cross, 
 
 All is but bairns' play till a cross without begets 
 a heavier cross within, and then we play no longer 
 with our idols. 
 
 Salvation in a look. 
 
 Oh, but Christ hath a saving eye ! Salvation is 
 in his eye-lids. When he first looked on me I was 
 saved. It cost him but a look to make hell quit of 
 me. 
 
 Wondrous Partnership. 
 
 That Christ and a sinner should be one, and 
 have heaven betwixt them, and be halvers of salva- 
 tion is the wonder of salvation. 
 
 A. Light in the Dark. Sour. 
 
 When the time shall come that your eye-strings 
 shall break, your face wax pale, your breath grow 
 cold, and this house of clay shall totter, and your 
 one foot shall be over the limit in eternity, it will 
 be your comfort and joy that ye gave your name 
 to Christ. 
 
102 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Look out for a Refuge. 
 
 It were good that we prisoners of hope know of 
 our stronghold to run to before the storm come on. 
 
 Short-lived Pleasures. 
 
 May flowers and morning vapor and summer- 
 mist hasteth not so fast away as these worm-eaten 
 pleasures which we follow. 
 
 Laughing Faces. 
 
 I would not exchange my prisons and sad nights 
 with the court honour and ease of my adversaries. 
 My Lord is pleased to make many unknown faces 
 to laugh upon me and to provide a lodging for me. 
 
 A. Great and Hopeless Loss. t 
 
 No loss is comparable to the loss of the soul ; 
 there is no hope of regaining that loss. 
 
 Onward ! 
 
 Go on through your waters without wearying ; 
 your Guide knoweth the way ; follow him, and 
 cast your cares and temptations upon him, and let 
 not worms, the sons of men, affright you. 
 
 The Ever- Living God. 
 
 Ye have heard of the patience of Job. When 
 he lay in the ashes God was with him. 
 
 That God is not dead yet, he will stoop and take 
 up the fallen bairns. Many broken legs since 
 Adam's days hath he bound up, and many weary 
 hearts hath he refreshed. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 103 
 
 A. Sure Supply. 
 
 None cometh dry from David's Well. 
 
 Mis Will. 
 
 I dare not say one word ; he hath done it, and 
 I will lay my hand upon my mouth. If any other 
 had done it to me I could not have borne it. 
 
 Soundless JOove. 
 
 Oh, the depths of Christ's love ! It hath neither 
 brim nor bottom. Oh, if this blind world saw his 
 beauty ! When I count with him for his mercies 
 to me I must stand still and wonder, and go away 
 as a poor bankrupt who hath nothing to pay. 
 
 Pray without Ceasing. 
 
 Give hours of the day to prayer. 
 
 Safe in the Seas. 
 
 I have been casten down and heavy with fears, 
 and hunted with challenges. I was swimming in 
 the depths, but Christ had his hand under my chin 
 all the time, and took good heed that I should not 
 lose breath ; and now I have gotten my feet again, 
 and there are love-feasts of joy and spring-tides of 
 consolation betwixt Christ and me. We agree well. 
 
 Sad Mistake. 
 
 Oh, this world thinketh heaven but at the next 
 door, and that godliness may sleep in a bed of 
 down till it come to heaven. But that will not do 
 it. 
 
104 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Youth's Perils. 
 
 Missive letters go between the devil and young 
 blood. Satan hath a friend at court in the heart 
 of youth ; and there pride, luxury, lust, revenge, 
 forgetfulness of God, are hired as his agents. 
 Happy is your soul if Christ man the house. 
 
 The Good Goldsmith. 
 
 The dross of my cross gathered a scum of fears 
 in the fire, doubtings, impatience, unbelief, chal- 
 lenging of Providence as sleeping and as not re- 
 garding my sorrow ; but my Goldsmith, Christ, 
 was pleased to take off the scum and burn it in the 
 fire. And, blessed be my Refiner, he hath made 
 the metal better, and furnished new supply of 
 grace to cause me to hold out weight ; and I hope 
 that he hath not lost one grain-weight by burning 
 his servant. 
 
 Oh, for his Presence! 
 
 Nothing paineth me now but want of presence. 
 I think it long till day. I challenge time as too 
 slow in its pace, that holdeth my only, only fair 
 One, my Love, my well-Beloved from me. 
 
 A Crazed Ship. 
 
 I am like an old crazed ship that hath endured 
 many storms, and that would fain be in the lee of 
 the shore, and feareth new storms. I would be 
 that nigh heaven that the shadow of it might break 
 the force of the storm, and the crazed ship might 
 win to the land 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 105 
 
 Tlie right sort of a Devil. 
 
 Since we must have a devil to trouble us, I like 
 a raging devil best. Our Lord knoweth what sort 
 of a devil we have need of. It is best that Satan 
 be in his own skin and look like himself. 
 
 Second Tlioughts. 
 
 Since my spirit, was settled and the clay has 
 fallen to the bottom of the well, I see better what 
 Christ was doing. 
 
 Three Troubles. 
 
 I want little of half a heaven, and I find Christ 
 every day so sweet, comfortable, lovely, and kind, 
 that three things only trouble me. 1. I see not 
 how to be thankful, or how to get help to praise 
 that royal King who raiseth up those that are 
 bowed down. 2. His love paineth me and Avound- 
 eth my soul, so that I am in a fever for want of 
 real presence. 3. An excessive desire to take in- 
 struments, in God's name, that this is Christ and 
 his truth which I now suffer for. 
 
 Sold Fast. 
 
 Give not an hair-breadth of truth away, for it is 
 not yours, but God's. 
 
 Christ's Word and Man's 
 
 His "Well done !" is worth a shipful of " Good 
 days" and earthly honours. I have cause to say 
 this, because I find him Truth itself. 
 
106 
 
 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Panting, 
 
 My love to him hath casten my soul into a fever, 
 and there is no cooling of my fever till I get real 
 possession of Christ. Oh, strong, strong love of 
 Jesus, thou hast wounded my heart with thine ar- 
 rows ! Oh, pain ! Oh, pain of love for Christ ! 
 Who will help me to praise ? 
 
 Make Haste. 
 
 Your afternoon's sun is wearing low. Time will 
 eat up your frail life, like a worm gnawing at the 
 root of a May-flower. Lend Christ your heart. 
 
 Only Christ. 
 
 He hath come to my prison and run away with 
 my heart and all my love. Well may he enjoy it ! 
 I wish that my love get never an owner but Christ. 
 Fie, fie upon old lovers that kept us so long asun- 
 der ! We shall not part now. 
 
 2fo Tarrying. 
 
 Death, as fast as time fleeth, chaseth you out of 
 this life. 
 
 Embracing the Cross. 
 
 I take his cross in my arms with joy. I bless 
 it, I rejoice in it ; suffering for Christ is my gar- 
 land. I would not exchange Christ for ten thou- 
 sand worlds. 
 
 Cheer in Sadness. 
 
 In my sad days Christ laugheth cheerfully, and 
 saith, "All will be well." 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 107 
 
 Ood alone Meads the Heart. 
 
 I thought myself in a hard case. Some said I 
 had cause to rejoice that Christ had honoured me 
 to be a witness for him. And I said in my heart, 
 " These are the words of men who see but mine 
 outside, and cannot tell if I be a false witness or 
 not." 
 
 A. Many-plied Xiove. 
 
 . There are infinite plies in his love, that the 
 saints will never win to unfold. I would it were 
 better known, and that Christ got more of his own 
 due than he doth. 
 
 Why does he Tarry ? 
 
 Oh, time, be not slow ! Oh, run more speedily 
 and hasten our banquet ! Oh, Bridegroom, be like 
 a roe or a young hart upon the mountains ! Oh, 
 well-beloved, run fast, that we may once meet ! 
 
 Silver Joinings. 
 
 At my first coming hither I was in great heavi- 
 ness, wrestling with challenges, being burdened in 
 heart (as I am yet) for my silent Sabbaths and for 
 a bereaved people, young ones new-born plucked 
 from the breasts, and the children's table drawn. 
 I thought I was a dry tree cast over the dyke of 
 the vineyard. 
 
 Now, now he is pleased to feast a poor prisoner, 
 and to refresh me with joy unspeakable and glo- 
 rious. 
 
108 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Unfathomable. 
 
 I must give over all attempts to fathom the 
 depth of his love. All I can do is to stand beside 
 his great love, and look and wonder. 
 
 If I had as many angel-tongues as there have 
 fallen drops of rain since the creation, or as there 
 are leaves of trees in all -the forests of the earth, 
 or of stars in the heaven, to praise, yet my Lord 
 Jesus would ever be behind with me. 
 
 Trim, your Zamp. 
 
 When the eye-strings break, and the breath 
 groweth cold, and the imprisoned soul looketh out 
 of the windows of the clay, house ready to leap out 
 into eternity, what would you then give for a lamp- 
 full of oil ? Oh, seek it now ! 
 
 The Bush TJnbumed. 
 
 Blessed be his great name, the dry tree was in 
 the fire and was not burnt ; his dew came down 
 and quickened the dew of a withered plant, and 
 now he is come again with joy, and hath been 
 pleased to feast his exiled and afflicted prisoner 
 with the joy of his consolations. 
 
 I weep, but I am not sad ; I am chastened, but 
 I die not ; I have loss, but I want nothing ; this 
 water cannot drown me, this fire cannot burn me, 
 because of the good will of him that dwelt in the 
 bush. The worst things of Christy his reproaches, 
 his cross, are better than Egypt's treasures. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 109 
 
 Be Careful. 
 
 Let truth and Christ get no wrong in your hand. 
 It is your gain if Christ be glorified, and your glory 
 to be Christ's witness. 
 
 A. Christian Directory. 
 
 1. That hours of the day for the word and prayer 
 be given to God. 
 
 2. In the midst of worldly employments there 
 should be some thoughts of sin, death, judgment, 
 and eternity, with at least a word or two of ejacu- 
 latory prayer to God. 
 
 3. Beware of a wandering heart in private 
 prayers. * 
 
 4. Not to grudge, howbeit ye come from prayer 
 without a sense of joy. Downcasting, sense of 
 guiltiness, and hunger, are often best for us. 
 
 5. That the Lord's day, from morning till night, 
 be spent either in private or public worship. 
 
 6. That the word be observed, wandering and 
 idle thoughts be avoided, sudden anger, and desire 
 of revenge. 
 
 7. That known, discovered, and revealed sins be 
 eschewed as most dangerous preparatives to hard- 
 ness of heart. 
 
 8. That we deal with all men in sincerity. 
 
 Borne JOongings. 
 
 I think that the sparrows and swallows that build 
 their nests in the kirk of Anwoth are blessed birds. 
 10 • 
 
110 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 " Cmne and See," 
 
 There is nothing that will make you a Christian 
 indeed but a taste of the sweetness of Christ. 
 
 Challenges. 
 
 I have been much challenged : 
 
 1. For not referring all things to God as the 
 last end. 
 
 2. That I have not benefited by good company, 
 and that I have not left some word of conviction 
 even upon natural and wicked men by reproving 
 swearing in them, or because of being a silent wit- 
 ness of their loose carriage. 
 
 3. That the woes and calamities of the kirk have 
 not moved me. 
 
 4. That unrepented sins of youth were not looked 
 to and lamented for. 
 
 5. That sudden stirring of pride, lust, revenge, 
 love of honours, were not resisted and repented 
 of. 
 
 6. That death hath not often been meditated 
 upon. 
 
 7. That I have not been careful of gaining others 
 to Christ. 
 
 8. That my grace and gift bring forth so little 
 or no thankfulness. 
 
 Tlie Half not Told. 
 
 All was but bairns' play between Christ and me 
 till now. If one would have sworn to me I would 
 not have believed what may be found in Christ. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. Ill 
 
 Christ at Least. 
 
 Whatever I be, the chief of sinners, a devil, and 
 a most guilty devil, yet it is the apple of Christ's 
 eye, his honour and glory as the Head of the 
 Church, that I suffer for now, and that I will go 
 to eternity with. . 
 
 "Abominable and Filthy." 
 
 I have seen my abominable vileness. If I were 
 well known, there would none in this kingdom ask 
 how I do. Many take my ten to be a hundred, 
 but I am a deeper hypocrite and shallower pro- 
 fessor than every one believeth. God knoweth I 
 feign not. 
 
 If I could get my finger ends upon a full assur- 
 ance, I trow that I would grip fast. But my cup 
 wanteth not gall. And upon my part despair might 
 almost be excused if every one in this land saw 
 my inner side. 
 
 Come and See! 
 
 Brother, I may now, from my new experience, 
 speak of Christ to you. Oh, if ye saw in him what 
 I see ! A river of God's unseen joys has flowed 
 from bank to brae over my soul since I parted with 
 you. 
 
 Duties. 
 
 Thoughts of atheism should be watched over, 
 growth in grace should be cared for above all 
 things, and falling from our first love mourned for ; 
 conscience made of praying for enemies who are 
 blinded. 
 
112 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Painful Compliments. 
 
 I fear that ye have never known me well. If 
 ye saw my inner side, it is possible that ye would 
 pity me, but ye would hardly give me either love 
 or respect. Men mistake me the whole length of 
 the heavens. My sins prevail over me, and the 
 terrors of their guiltiness. I am put often to ask 
 if Christ and I ever did shake hands together in 
 earnest. 
 
 Admirable Mercy. 
 
 My sins against light working in me in the very 
 act of sinning have been met with admirable mercy. 
 But alas, he will get nothing back again but wretched 
 unthankfulness ! 
 
 Strange Tips and Downs. 
 
 I am in strange ups and downs, and seven times 
 a clay I lose ground. I am put often to swimming, 
 and again my feet are set on the Rock that is higher 
 than myself. 
 
 Idolizing Comfort. 
 
 I am pained, pained that I have not more to 
 give my sweet Bridegroom. His comforts to me 
 are not dealt with a niggard's hand, but I would 
 fain learn not to idolize comfort, sense, joy, and 
 sweet, felt presence. All these are but creatures, 
 and nothing but the kingly robe, the gold ring, 
 and the bracelets of the Bridegroom. The Bride- 
 groom himself is better than all the ornaments that 
 are about him. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 113 
 
 Which? 
 
 I have now made a new question whether Christ 
 be more to be loved for giving sanctification or free 
 justification ? And I hold that he is more and 
 most to be loved for sanctification. It is in some 
 respects greater love in him to sanctify than to 
 justify ; for he maketh us most like himself in his 
 own essential portraiture and image in sanctifying 
 us. Justification doth but just make us happy, 
 which is to be like angels only ; neither is it such 
 misery to be a condemned man and under unfor- 
 given guiltiness, as to serve sin and work the works 
 of the devil. 
 
 God be thanked for ever that Christ was a told- 
 down price for sanctification ! 
 
 Enough in the Fountain. 
 
 Oh, how little were it for that infinite fountain 
 of love and joy to fill as many thousand thousands 
 of little vessels the like of me as there are minutes 
 of hours since the creation ! 
 
 Oh, that we little ones were in at the greatest 
 Lord Jesus ! Our wants should soon be swallowed 
 up with his fulness. 
 
 Brightest of Days. 
 
 Oh, how sweet and glorious shall our case be 
 when that fairest among the sons of men will lay 
 his fair face to our sinful faces and wipe all tears 
 from our eyes ! Oh, time ! time ! run swiftly and 
 hasten this day ! 
 10 * 
 
114 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Waiting. 
 
 I am for the present hanging by hope, waiting 
 what nry Lord will do with me. 
 
 A Miracle of O-race. 
 
 When I look to my guiltiness I see that my sal- 
 vation is one of our Saviour's greatest miracles, 
 either in heaven or earth. I am sure I may defy 
 any man to show me a greater wonder. But seeing 
 I have no wares, no hire, no money for Christ, he 
 must either take me with want, misery, corruption, 
 or then want me. 
 
 Spiritual Laziness. 
 
 The lazy professor hath put heaven, as it were, 
 at the very next door, and thinketh to fly up to 
 heaven in his bed, and in a night-dream. But 
 truly that is not so easy a thing as most men be- 
 lieve. Christ himself did sweat ere he won this 
 city, howbeit he was the free-born heir. 
 
 Poor, poor Praises. 
 
 If I could set him as far above the heaven as 
 thousand thousands of heights devised by men and 
 angels, I should think him but too low. I pray 
 you, for God's sake, my dear sister, to help me to 
 praise. 
 
 True Love. 
 
 He is content to kiss my black mouth, to put 
 his hand into mine, and to feed me with as many 
 consolations as would feed ten hungry souls ! 
 
MANNA-CKUMBS. 115 
 
 CJirist's Compass. 
 
 Your heart is not the compass that Christ saileth 
 
 by. 
 
 Kedar's Tents. 
 
 I see that providence runneth not on broken 
 wheels ; but I, like a fool, carved a providence for 
 mine own eyes, to die in my nest, and to sleep till 
 my gray hairs, and to lie on the sunny side of the 
 mountain in my ministry at Anwoth, but now I 
 have nothing to say against a borrowed fireside, 
 and another man's house, nor Kedar's tents, where 
 I live, being removed far from my acquaintance, 
 my lovers, and my friends. 
 
 Good Fare. 
 
 My Lord hath filled me with such dainties that 
 I am like to a full banqueter who is not for com- 
 mon cheer. 
 
 Temptations. 
 
 The greatest temptation out of hell is to live 
 without temptations. 
 
 Ziove Invincible. 
 
 A heart of iron and iron doors will not hold 
 Christ out. 
 
 Helps. 
 
 I have benefited by riding alone in a long jour- 
 ney in giving that time to prayer. 2. By absti- 
 nence and giving days to Grod. 3. By praying 
 for others. For by making an errand to God for 
 them, I have gotten something for myself. 
 
116 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Marhs. 
 
 Ye may put a difference between you and repro- 
 bates if ye have these marks — 
 
 1. If ye prize Christ and his truth, so as ye will 
 sell all and buy him and suffer for it. 
 
 2. If the love of Christ keepeth you back from 
 sinning more than the law or fear of hell. 
 
 3. If ye be humble and deny your own will, wit, 
 credit, ease, honour, the world, and the vanity and 
 glory of it. 
 
 4. Your profession must not be barren and void 
 of good works. 
 
 5. You must in all things aim at God's honour. 
 Ye must eat,, drink, sleep, buy, sell, sit, stand, 
 speak, pray, read, and hear the word with a heart 
 purpose that God may be honoured. 
 
 6. Ye must show yourself an enemy to sin, and 
 reprove the works of darkness — such as drunken- 
 ness, swearing, and lying — albeit the company 
 should hate you for so doing. 
 
 7. Keep in mind the truth of God. 
 
 8. Make conscience of your calling in covenants, 
 buying, and selling. 
 
 9. Acquaint yourself with daily praying. Com- 
 mit all your ways and actions to God by prayer, 
 supplication, and thanksgiving, and count not much 
 in being mocked, for Christ Jesus was mocked be- 
 fore you. 
 
 Frowns Smile. 
 
 Dry wells send us to the Fountain. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 117 
 
 Try Me. 
 
 Lord, bear me witness if my soul thirsteth for 
 anything out of heaven more than for your salva- 
 tion. Let God lay me in an even balance and try 
 me in this. 
 
 View the Xand. 
 
 Love heaven. Let your heart be on it. Up, 
 up and visit the new land, and view the fair city, 
 and the white throne, and the Lamb, the bride's 
 Husband, in the Bridegroom's clothes, sitting on it. 
 
 Prison Tuition. 
 
 1 never knew by my nine years' preaching so 
 much of Christ's love as he hath taught me in 
 Aberdeen by six months' imprisonment. 
 
 Cross-Slanderers. 
 
 The world hath raised a slander upon the cross 
 of Christ because they love to go to heaven by dry 
 land, and love not sea-storms. But I write it 
 under my hand (and would say more, if possibly a 
 reader would not deem it hypocrisy) that my obli- 
 gation to Christ for*a smell of his garments, for 
 his love-kisses these thirty weeks, standeth so great 
 that I should, and I desire also to choose to sus- 
 pend my salvation to have many tongues loosed in 
 my behalf to praise him ; and suppose in person I 
 never entered within the gates of the New Jerusa- 
 lem, yet so being Christ may be set on high, and 
 I had the liberty to cast my love and praises for 
 ever over the wall to Christ, I would be content. 
 
118 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Preachiiifj-Jionds. 
 
 If my Lord would bring edification to one soul 
 by my bonds I am satisfied. 
 
 Oh, for One look! 
 
 Ob, tbat I could bave leave to look in through 
 the hole of the door to see his face and sing his 
 praises, or could break up one of his chamber win- 
 dows to look in upon his delighting beauty till my 
 Lord send more ! Any little communion with him, 
 one of his love-looks, should be my begun heaven. 
 
 Young Heaven. 
 
 Christ's love is young glory and young heaven. 
 It would soften hell's pain to be filled with it. 
 
 Infinite Beauty. 
 
 If ten thousand thousand worlds of angels were 
 created, they might all tire themselves wondering 
 at his beauty, and begin again to wonder of new. • 
 
 Christ Best. 
 
 I vouch that Christ, and Sweating and sighing 
 under his cross, is sweeter to me by far than all 
 the kingdoms in the world could possibly be. 
 
 Half-Kisses. 
 
 My Lord giveth me but hungry half-kisses, which 
 serve to feed pain and increase hunger, but do not 
 satisfy my desires. His dieting of my soul for 
 this race maketh me lean. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 119 
 
 The Good of Bad Weather. 
 
 Faith is the better of the free air and of the sharp 
 winter storm in its face. Grace wither eth without 
 adversity. 
 
 Christ the Same. 
 
 If Christ had such changeable and new thoughts 
 of salvation as I have of it, I think I should then 
 be at a sad loss. 
 
 Crumbs. 
 
 His broken meat is sweet unto me. I thank my 
 Lord for borrowed crumbs, no less than when I 
 was feasted at the communion table at Anwoth. 
 
 Though he Slay me. 
 
 Let him even say out of his own mouth, " There 
 is no hope," yet I will die in that sweet beguile — 
 "It is not so." I shall see the salvation of God. 
 Let me be deceived really and never win to dry 
 land, it is my joy to believe under the water, and 
 to die with faith in my hand gripping Christ. 
 
 I tmist Praise Him,. 
 
 I must tell you what lovely Jesus, fair Jesus, 
 King Jesus has done to my soul. Sometimes he 
 sendeth me out a standing drink, and whispereth a 
 word through the wall ; and I am well content of 
 kindness at the second hand ; hi* bid is ever wel- 
 come to me, be what it will. But at other times 
 he will be the messenger himself, and I get the 
 cup of salvation out of his own hand, and we can- 
 not rest till we be in other's arms. 
 
120 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Mead'/, 
 
 I am most ready at the good pleasure of my 
 Lord in the strength of his grace for anything he 
 may be pleased to call me to. Neither shall the 
 last black-faced messenger Death be holden at the 
 door when it shall knock. 
 
 Tlie Devil in the Prison. 
 
 I see that the devil can insinuate himself, and 
 ride his errands upon the thoughts of his poor dis- 
 tressed prisoner. 
 
 A Strong Foundation. 
 
 I would that I could build as much on this — my 
 Christ is God — as it would bear. I might lay all 
 the world upon it. 
 
 Only Knock. 
 
 We might beg ourselves rich (if we were wise) 
 if we could hold out our withered hands to Christ, 
 and learn to suit, seek, ask, and knock. 
 
 A Good Whetstone. 
 
 I find that my extremity hath sharpened the 
 edge of his love and kindness, so that he seemeth 
 to devise new ways of expressing the sweetness of 
 his love to my soul. 
 
 A New Opinion. 
 
 Since I came to this prison I have conceived a 
 new and extraordinary opinion of Christ which I 
 had not before. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 121 
 
 The Well's Head. 
 
 I know that Christ's kisses will cast a more 
 strong and refreshful smell of incomparable glory 
 and joy in heaven than they do here ; because a 
 drink at the Well of Life, up at the Well's Head, 
 is more sweet and fresh by far than that which we 
 get in our borrowed, old, running-out vessels and 
 our wooden dishes here ; yet I am persuaded that 
 it is our folly to postpone all till term-day. 
 
 liove of Souls. 
 
 Let me be weighed of my Lord in a just balance 
 if your souls lie not weighty upon me. Ye go to 
 bed and ye rise with .me. Thoughts of your soul 
 (my Dearest in our Lord) depart not from me in 
 my sleep ; ye have a great part in my tears, sighs, 
 supplications and prayers. Oh, if I could buy 
 your soul's salvation with any sufferings whatever, 
 and that ye and I might meet with joy up in the 
 rainbow when ye shall stand before our Judge ! 
 
 •' Wretched man that I am !" 
 
 I am not the man I go for in this nation. Men 
 have not just weights to weigh me in. 
 
 If Christ should refer the matter to me, (in his 
 presence I speak it,) I might think shame to rate 
 my own salvation. I think Christ might say, 
 " Thinkest thou not shame to claim heaven who 
 dost so little for it ?" I am very often so that I 
 know not whether I sink or swim in the water. 
 11 
 
122 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 'Delightsome Torments, 
 
 Oh, what would I give to have a bed made to 
 my wearied soul in his bosom ! I would postpone 
 heaven for many years to have my fill of Jesus in 
 this life, and to have occasion to offer Christ to my 
 people, and to woo many people to Christ. I can- 
 not tell you what sweet pain and delightsome tor- 
 ments are in Christ's love. 
 
 A Glimpse. 
 
 In my race he. hath come near me and let me 
 see the gold and crown. 
 
 'Living on Credit. 
 
 My faith is richer to live upon credit and Christ's 
 borrowed money than to have much on hand. 
 
 Make All Sure. 
 
 Examine yourself if ye be in good earnest in 
 Christ. 
 
 Many think they believe, but never tremble. 
 The devils are further on than these. (James ii. 
 19.) Make sure to yourself that ye are above 
 ordinary professors. 
 
 Let them- do their Worst. 
 
 No created powers in hell or out of hell can mar 
 the music of our Lord Jesus, or spoil our song of 
 
 j°y- 
 
 A Lost Heart. 
 
 Since he looked on me my heart is not mine 
 own ; he hath run away to heaven with it. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 123 
 
 Water for Satan's Coal. 
 
 Sanctified thoughts, thoughts made conscience 
 of, and called in and kept in one, are green fuel 
 that burns not, and are a water for Satan's coal. 
 
 Doubt-Drugs. 
 
 Doubtings are your sins, but they are Christ's 
 drugs, and ingredients that the Physician maketh 
 use of for the curing of your pride. 
 
 A. Slippery Way. 
 
 There is not such a glassy, icy, slippery piece 
 of way betwixt you and heaven as youth ; and I 
 have experience to say with me here, and to seal 
 what I assert. The old ashes of the sins of my 
 youth are now fire of sorrow to me. I have seen 
 the devil, as it were, dead and buried, and yet rise 
 again and be a worse devil than ever he was. 
 Therefore, my brother, beware of a green young 
 devil that hath never been buried. 
 
 Why Mourn? 
 
 We see God's fed oxen prepared for the day of 
 slaughter go dancing and singing down to the black 
 chamber of hell, and why should we go to heaven 
 weeping ? 
 
 Bad Metal. 
 
 If this world and the lusts thereof be your de- 
 light, I know not what Christ can make of you. 
 Ye cannot be metal to be a vessel of glory and 
 mercy. 
 
124 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 In the Book. 
 
 I cannot indeed see through my cross to the far 
 end, yet I believe I am in Christ's books, and in 
 his decree (not yet unfolded to me), a man triumph- 
 ing, dancing, and singing on the other side of the 
 Red Sea, and laughing and praising the Lamb. 
 
 The Sweets of Faith. 
 
 Sweet, sweet for evermore would my life be if 
 I could keep faith in exercise ! But I see that 
 my fire cannot always Cast light. 
 
 Hopelessly in Debt. 
 
 I am just like a man who hath nothing to pay 
 his thousands of debt ; all that can be gotten of 
 him is to seize his person. Except Christ would 
 seize upon myself and make the readiest payment 
 that can be of my heart and love to himself, I 
 have no other thing to give him. 
 
 Suddenly. 
 
 Our Master will be on us all in a clap, ere ever 
 we wit. 
 
 The Lord's Fan. 
 
 That day will discover all our whites and our 
 blacks. 
 
 Let us make our part of it good, that it may be 
 able to abide the fire when hay and stubble shall 
 be burned to ashes. Nothing, nothing,I say noth- 
 ing but sound sanctification can abide the Lord's 
 fan. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 125 
 
 Perfumes will Rise. 
 
 I cannot but speak what I have felt ; seeing my 
 Lord Jesus hath broken a box of spikenard upon 
 the head of his poor prisoner, and it is hard to 
 hide a sweet smell. It is pain to smother Christ's 
 love. It will out, whether we will or not. 
 
 The Sappiest Sard Tree. 
 
 A cross, especially when he cometh with his 
 arms full of joys, is the happiest hard tree that 
 was ever laid upon my weak shoulder. Christ and 
 his cross together are sweet company and a blessed 
 couple. 
 
 Cast Doivn, but not Destroyed. 
 
 I dare not say that the Lord hath put out my 
 candle, and casten water upon my poor coal, and 
 broken the stakes of my tabernacle : but I have 
 tasted bitterness and eaten gall and wormwood 
 since the day when my Lord laid bonds upon me 
 to speak no more. 
 
 Satan's Advantage. 
 
 I find that the devil hath the advantage of the 
 ground in this battle ; for he fighteth on known 
 ground in our corrupt nature. 
 
 Down tvitli Idols. 
 
 Oh, if every one ,would put away himself, his 
 own self, his own ease, his own pleasure, his own 
 credit, his own twenty things, his own hundred 
 things, which he setteth up as idols above Christ ! 
 11 * 
 
126 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 1. That salvation is one of Christ's dainties 
 which he giveth to but few. 
 
 2. That it is violent sweating and striving that 
 taketh heaven. 
 
 3. That it cost Christ's blood to purchase that 
 house to sinners. 
 
 4. That many make a start towards heaven who 
 fall back and win not to the top of the mount. 
 
 5. Many go far on and reform many things, and 
 can find tears as Esau did ; and suffer hunger for 
 truth as Judas did ; and wish and desire the end 
 of the righteous as Balaam did ; and profess fair, 
 and fight for the Lord as Saul did ; and desire the 
 saints to pray for them as Pharaoh and Simon 
 Magus did ; and prophesy and speak for Christ as 
 Caiaphas did ; and walk softly and mourn for fear 
 of judgments as Ahab did ; and put away gross 
 sins and idolatry as Jehu did ; and hear the word 
 of God gladly, and reform their life in many things 
 according to the word, as Herod did; and say 
 " Master " to Christ, "I will follow thee whither 
 thou goest," as the man who offered to be Christ's 
 servant, (Matt. viii. 19) ; and may taste of the 
 virtues of the life to come, and be partaker of the 
 wonderful gifts of the Holy Spirit, and taste of 
 the good word of God, as the apostates, who sin 
 against the Holy Ghost, (Heb. vi.); — and yet all 
 these are but like gold in chink and colour, and 
 are plaited brass and base metal. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 127 
 
 A Narrotv, TJiorny Way. 
 
 Go on in your journey to heaven, and be content 
 with such fare by the way as Christ and his fol- 
 lowers have had before you. For they had always 
 the wind on their faces ; and our Lord hath not 
 changed the way to us for our ease, but will have 
 us following our sweet Guide. 
 
 TJie jLncJwr- Cable Strong. 
 
 Our hope is not hung upon such an untwisted! 
 thread as "I imagine so," or "It is likely;" but 
 the cable, the strong hawser of our fastened anchor, 
 is the oath and promise of Him who is eternal verity. 
 
 TJie Mace set before us. 
 
 Seeing a piece of suffering is carved to every 
 one of us, less or more, as Infinite Wisdom has 
 thought good, our part js to harden and habituate 
 our soft and thin-skinned nature to endure fire and 
 water, devils, lions, men, losses, wo hearts as these 
 that are looked upon by God, angels, men, and 
 devils. 
 
 Ziittle by Little. 
 
 Put off a sin, or a piece of it, as of anger, wrath, 
 lust, or intemperance, every day, that ye may more 
 easily master the remnant of your corruption. 
 
 Be Quite Heady. 
 
 Sleep not sound till ye find yourself in that case 
 that ye dare look death in the face, and durst haz- 
 ard your soul upon eternity. 
 
128 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Rich 'Return, 
 
 Oh, that we could breathe out new hope and new 
 submission every day into Christ's lap ! For cer- 
 tainly a weight of glory well weighed, yea increas- 
 ing to a far more exceeding and eternal weight, 
 shall recompense both weight and length of light, 
 and clipped, and short-dated crosses. 
 
 Self-Helplessness, 
 
 Oh, if it be hard to win one foot or half an inch 
 out of our own will, our own wit, out of our own 
 ease and worldly lusts, and so to deny oarself and 
 to say, " It is not I, but Christ ; not I, but grace ; 
 not I, but God's glory ; not I, but God's love con- 
 straining me ; not I, but the Lord's word ; not I, 
 but the Lord's commanding power in me ;" — oh, 
 what pains, and what a death it is to nature to 
 turn me, myself, my lust,' my ease, my credit, over 
 unto my Lord, my Saviour, my King, and my God, 
 my Lord's will, my Lord's grace ! 
 
 Patience brings Perfection. 
 
 Submissive on-waiting for the Lord will at length 
 ripen the joy and deliverance of his own. 
 
 Pull tlie Soul Round, 
 
 Pull at your soul, and draw it aside from the 
 company that it is with, and sound and whisper 
 into it news of eternity, death, judgment, heaven, 
 and hell. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 120 
 
 lll-Kaveleil Work. 
 
 Twenty times a day I ravel my heaven, and then 
 I must come with my ill-raveled work to Christ, to 
 cumber him, as it were, to right it. 
 
 God be thanked for many spoiled salvations, and 
 many ill-raveled heaps hath Christ mended since 
 first he entered Tutor to lost mankind. 
 
 Bard Climbing. 
 
 It cost Christ and all his followers sharp showers 
 and hot sweats, ere they won to the top of the 
 mountain, but our soft nature would still have 
 heaven coming down to our bed-side when we are 
 sleeping, and lying down with us, that we might 
 go to heaven in warm clothes. 
 
 A. Hoot out of a J>ry Ch'ound. 
 
 Alas, the wrong side of Christ, to speak so, his 
 black side, his suffering side, his wounds, his bare 
 coat, his want, his wrongs, the oppressions of men 
 done to him, are turned toward men's eyes, and 
 they see not the best and fairest side of Christ, 
 nor see they his amiable face and his beauty, that 
 men and angels wonder at. 
 
 Oh, for even a XooTz! 
 
 I were happy for evermore to get leave to stand 
 but beside Christ and his love, and look in, sup- 
 pose I were interdicted of God to come near hand, 
 touch, or embrace, kiss, or set to my sinful head 
 and drink myself drunk with that lovely thing. 
 
130 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 A Strong Tiord. 
 
 Lay all your loads and your weights by faith 
 upon Christ ; take ease to yourself and let him bear 
 all ; he can — he is able — he will bear you, howbeit 
 hell were upon your back. 
 
 A Good Start. 
 
 Ye have gotten a great advantage in the way to 
 heaven, that ye have started to the gate in the 
 morning. Like a fool as I was, I suffered my sun 
 to be high in the heaven, and near afternoon, be- 
 fore ever I took the gate by the end. I pray you 
 now keep the advantage ye have. 
 
 Make Sure Work. 
 
 Cast the earth deep, and down, down with the 
 old work, the building of confusion that was there 
 before ; and let Christ lay new work and make a 
 new creation within you. 
 
 I thought not the hundredth part of Christ long 
 since that I do now ; though alas ! my thoughts 
 are still infinitely below his worth. 
 
 A Treacherous Profession. 
 
 If ye love but Christ's sunny side, and would 
 have only summer weather and a land-gate, not a 
 sea-way to heaven, your profession will play you a 
 slip, and the winter-well will go dry again in sum- 
 mer. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 131 
 
 Surrender to Christ. 
 
 Oh, blessed soul that could sacrifice his will, and 
 go to heaven having lost his will, and made resig- 
 nation of it to Christ ! I would seek no more than 
 that Christ were absolute king over my will, and 
 that my will were a sufferer in all crosses without 
 meeting Christ with such a word — " Why is it 
 thus ?" 
 
 Precious Cross. 
 
 For Christ's cross, especially the garland and 
 flower of all crosses, to suffer for his name, I es- 
 teem it more than I can write or speak to you. 
 
 A Strong Helper. 
 
 Christ (whoever be one) is still at the heavy end 
 of this black tree, and so it is but as a feather to 
 me. 
 
 ZiOoJc Iiong and Often. 
 
 Would to God that all cold-blooded, faint-hearted 
 soldiers of Christ would look again and again to 
 his love ; and when they look, I would have them 
 look again and again, and fill themselves with be- 
 holding of Christ's beauty. 
 
 Oh, for an Unveiled Saviour ! 
 
 I wish still that my love had but leave to stand 
 beside beautiful Jesus, and to get the mercy of 
 looking to him, and burning for him, suppose that 
 possession of him were suspended and postponed 
 till my Lord fold together the leaves and the sides 
 of this, of the little shepherd's tent of clay. 
 
132 MANNA-CRUMES. 
 
 What can mere Creatures do? 
 
 Set ten thousand thousand new-made worlds of 
 angels, and elect men, and double them in number 
 ten thousand thousand thousand times. Let their 
 heart and tongues be ten thousand thousand times 
 more agile and large than the heart and tongues 
 of seraphims that stand with six wings before him, 
 when they have said all for the glorifying and 
 praising of the Lord Jesus, they have but spoken 
 little or nothing. 
 
 God's Long-suffering our Salvation. 
 
 If he had not been God, and if long-suffering in 
 Christ were not like Christ himself, we should long 
 ago have broken Christ's mercies into ten pieces, 
 and put an iron bar on our salvation that mercy 
 should not have been able to break or overleap. 
 
 Oh, sweet stability of sure-bottomed salvation ! 
 Who could win heaven if this were not so ? Who 
 could be saved if God were not God, and if he were 
 not such a God as he is ? 
 
 Doubting and Trying. 
 
 There is great odds between doubting that we 
 have grace and trying if we have grace. The for- 
 mer may be sin — the latter is good. 
 
 Fighting— Victory. 
 
 The want of fighting were a mark of no grace, 
 but I shall not think the want of victory is such a 
 mark. 
 

 MANNA-CRUMBS. 133 
 
 A IAfeless II curt. 
 
 Alas, the pity ! Christ hath beauty for me, but 
 I have not love for him. Oh, what pain is it to 
 see Christ in his beauty, and then want a heart 
 and love for him ! But I see that want we must 
 till Christ lend us never to be paid again. 
 
 A. Precious Sorrow. 
 
 It is my daily-growing sorrow that I am con- 
 founded with his incomparable love, and that he 
 doeth so great things for my soul, and hath got 
 never yet anything of me worth speaking of. 
 
 Tlie Crust and tlie Core. 
 
 If ye look both to the laughing side and the 
 weeping side of this world, and if ye look not only 
 to the skin and colour of things, but into their in- 
 wards, and the heart of their excellency, ye shall 
 see that one look of Christ's lovely eye, one kiss 
 of his fairest face, is worth ten thousand worlds of 
 such rotten stuff as the foolish sons of men set their 
 hearts upon. 
 
 " Vp tvith Christ." 
 
 Look into those depths (without a bottom) of 
 loveliness, sweetness, beauty, excellency, glory, 
 goodness, grace, and mercy that are in Christ, and 
 ye shall then cry down the whole world and all the 
 glory of it even when it is come to the summer 
 bloom ; and ye shall cry, " Up with Christ !" " Up 
 with Christ's Father!" "Up with eternity of 
 glory!" 
 12 
 
134 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Fair Words for ChuJings. 
 
 I know it is my faithless jealousy in this my 
 dark night to take a friend for a foe, yet hath not 
 my Lord made any plea with me. I chide with 
 him, but he giveth me fair words. 
 
 Incomparable Lover. 
 
 I avouch, before God, man, and angel, that I 
 have not seen nor can imagine a lover to be com- 
 parable to lovely Jesus. I would not exchange or 
 barter him with ten heavens. 
 
 Tills and Tliat. 
 
 Oh, happy soul for evermore who can rightly 
 compare this life with that long-tasting life to come, 
 and can balance the weighty glory of the one with 
 the light golden vanity of the other ! 
 
 Harmony in Heaven. 
 
 There shall be no complaints on either side in 
 heaven. There shall be none there but he and we, 
 the Bridegroom and the bride ; devils, temptations, 
 trials, desertions, losses, sad hearts, pain and death, 
 shall all be put out of the play, and the devil must 
 give up his office of tempting. 
 
 Suffering Sweet, if CJirist be Glorified. 
 
 It is my aim and hearty desire that my furnace, 
 which is of the Lord's kindling, may sparkle fire 
 upon standers by, to the warming of their hearts 
 with God's love. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 135 
 
 A. Golden Mod. 
 
 Oh, what am I, such a lump, a rotten mass of 
 sin, to be counted a bairn worthy to be nurtured, 
 and stricken with the best and most honoured rod 
 in my Father's house, the golden rod wherewith 
 my eldest brother, the Lord heir of the inheritance 
 and his faithful witnesses were stricken withal. 
 
 A Fair Testimonial. 
 
 The very dust that falleth from Christ's feet, 
 his old ragged clothes, his knotty and black cross 
 are sweeter to me than kings' golden crowns and 
 their time-eaten pleasures. I should be a liar and 
 a false witness if I would not give my Lord Jesus 
 a fair testimonial with my whole soul. 
 
 Mark of Grace. 
 
 Ye complain that ye want a mark of the sound 
 work of grace and love in your soul. For answer, 
 consider for your satisfaction (till God send more.) 
 1 John iii. 14. And as to your complaints of dead- 
 ness and doubtings, Christ will, I hope, take your 
 deadness and you together. 
 
 Holy Fear. 
 
 Holy fear is a searching of the camp, that there 
 be no enemy within to betray us, and a seeing that 
 all be fast and sure. For I see many leaky vessels 
 sail before the wind, and professors who take their 
 conversion upon trust, and they go on securely and 
 see not the under-water till a storm sink them. 
 
136 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Strait is the Gate. 
 
 I verily think that the world hath too soft • an 
 opinion of the gate to heaven, and that many shall 
 get a blind and sad beguile for heaven. For there 
 is more ado than a cold frozen "Lord ! Lord !" 
 
 The Crucified Sweeter than the Cross. 
 
 I know that he must be sweet himself when his 
 cross is so sweet. And it is the part of us all, if 
 we marry himself, to marry the crosses, losses, and 
 reproaches also, that follow him, for mercy fol- 
 loweth Christ's cross. 
 
 Come and take me. 
 
 I find now under his cross that I would fain give 
 more than I have to give him, if giving were in my 
 power. But I rather wish him my heart than give 
 him it. Except he take it and put himself in pos- 
 session of it (for I hope he hath a market right to 
 me since he hath ransomed me,) I see not how 
 Christ can have me. 
 
 The Sighing of the Prisoner. 
 
 The Lord hath brought me safe to Aberdeen. 
 I have gotten lodging in the hearts of all people I 
 meet with. No face that hath not smiled upon me ; 
 only the indwellers in this town are dry, cold, and 
 general. 
 
 It is counted no wisdom here to countenance 
 a silenced minister; but the shame of Christ's cross 
 shall not be my shame. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 137 
 
 Happiness Enough. 
 
 I would seek no more to make me happy for 
 evermore but a thorough and clear sight of the 
 beauty of Jesus my Lord. 
 
 A. Poor Medium,. 
 
 I fear that his fair glory be but soiled in coming 
 through such a foul creature as I am. 
 
 " My Sin is ever before me." 
 
 I find my old challenges raising again, and my 
 love often jealous of Christ's love, when I look 
 upon my own guiltiness. 
 
 Poor Sold Joseph. 
 
 I find often much joy and unspeakable comfort 
 in His sweet presence who sent me hither, and I 
 trust this house of my pilgrimage shall be my 
 palace, my garden of delights, and that Christ will 
 be kind to poor sold Joseph who is separated from 
 his brethren. 
 
 Sitter in the Cup. 
 
 I would be sometimes too hot and too joyful, if 
 the heart-breaks at the remembrance of sin and 
 fair, fair feast-days with King Jesus did not cool 
 me and sour my sweet joys. 
 
 Home-Sick. 
 
 I am at present thinking of the sparrows and 
 swallows that build their nests in Anwoth, blessed 
 birds ! 
 
 12 * 
 
138 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 The Gracious Hunter. 
 
 I verily think that Christ hath said, " I must 
 needs-force have Jean Campbell for myself, and 
 he hath laid many oars in the water to fish and 
 hunt homewards your heart to heaven. Let him 
 have his prey." 
 
 A^ King's Life, 
 
 Except that I have some cloudy days, for the 
 most part I have a king's life with Christ. He is 
 all perfumed with the powders of the merchant. 
 He hath a king's face and a king's smell. His 
 chariot wherein he carrieth his poor prisoner is of 
 the wood of Lebanon — it is paved with love. 
 
 A. Blessed Conquest. 
 
 Oh, blessed conquest to lose all things and to 
 gain Christ ! I know not what ye have if ye want 
 Christ. Alas ! how poor is your gain if the earth 
 were all yours in free heritage, holding it of no 
 man of clay if Christ be not yours ! 
 
 The Will without the Way. 
 
 I am not able to honour Christ myself, but I 
 wish all others to make sail to Christ's house. 
 
 Since I must have chains, he would put golden 
 chains on me, watered over with many consola- 
 tions. Seeing I must have sorrow (for I have 
 sinned, Preserver of mankind !) he hath selected 
 out for me a joyful sorrow, honest, spiritual, and 
 glorious sorrow. 
 

 MANNA-CRUMBS. 139 
 
 07i, to resign Self for God! 
 
 I would I had grace and strength of my Lord to 
 be joyful and contentedly glad and cheerful, that 
 God's glory might ride and openly triumph before 
 the view of men, angels, devils, earth, heaven, hell, 
 sun, moon, and all God's creatures upon my pain 
 and sufferings, providing always that I felt not the 
 Lord's hatred and displeasure. 
 
 "Its Own Bitterness," 
 
 My hidden wounds still bleeding within me are 
 before the eyes of no man ; but if my sweetest 
 Lord Jesus were not still bathing, washing, balm- 
 ing, healing, and binding them up, they should rot 
 and break out to my shame. 
 
 Fairest Lord Jesus, 
 
 Oh, fair sun, and fair moon, and fair stars, and 
 fair flowers, and fair roses, and fair lilies, and fair 
 creatures ! But oh ! ten thousand thousand times 
 fairest Lord Jesus ! 
 
 Bow Few ! 
 
 Few are saved. Men go to heaven in ones and 
 twos, and the whole world lieth in sin. 
 
 The One Eye. 
 
 I had one joy out of heaven next to Christ my 
 Lord, and that was .to preach him to this faithless 
 generation ; and they have taken that from me. 
 It was to me as the poor man's one eye, and they 
 have put out that eye. 
 
1-40 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Well Paid. 
 
 I am richly paid for suffering for him. Oh, if 
 all Scotland were as I am except my bonds. 
 
 Crown Sim! 
 
 I rejoice that my Lord hath any to back him. 
 Thick, thick may my royal King's court be. Oh, 
 that his kingdom might grow ! It were my joy to 
 have his house full of guests. 
 
 T7ic Half not told. 
 
 I never write to any of him so much as I have 
 felt. Oh, if I could write a book of Christ and of 
 his love ! 
 
 Hungering. 
 
 I know a poor soul that would lay all oars in the 
 water for a banquet or feast of Christ's love. I 
 cannot think but that it must be up-taking and 
 sweet to see the white and red of Christ's fair face. 
 
 t( Neitlier count I my Life dear." 
 
 If the Lord should ask of me my blood and life 
 for his cause, I would gladly in his strength pay 
 due debt to Christ's honour and glory in that kind. 
 
 TJie Braveries of Christ's Love. 
 
 Oh, let my part of heaven go for it, so being he 
 would take my tongue to be his instrument, to set 
 out Christ in his whole braveries of love, virtue, 
 grace, sweetness, and matchless glory to the eyes 
 and hearts of Jews and Gentiles ! 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 141 
 
 Draw the Curtain, 
 
 We but stand beside Christ ; we go not in to 
 him to take our fill of him. But if he would do 
 two things : 1. Draw the curtain and make bare 
 his holy face ; and then, 2. Clear our dim and 
 bleared eyes to see his beauty and glory he should 
 find many lovers. , 
 
 Wait. 
 
 Wait on God for a seasonable salvation; ask not 
 when or how long. 
 
 Xet J~esus set his Price. 
 
 If my Lord Jesus would come to bargaining for 
 his love, I think he might make the price himself. 
 I should not refuse ten thousand years in hell to 
 have a wide soul enlarged and made wider, that I 
 might be exceedingly, even to the running over, 
 filled with his love. 
 
 CJirist better than Joy. 
 
 I would set heaven's joy aside, and live upon 
 Christ's love alone. 
 
 If this love were taken from me, the bottom is 
 fallen out of all my happiness and joy. And 
 therefore I believe that Christ will never do me 
 that much harm as to bereave a poor prisoner of 
 his love. 
 
 A. Terrible Harvest. 
 
 Alas ! what a crop will that be when the Lord 
 shall put in his hook to reap this world that is ripe 
 and white for judgment ! 
 
142 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Seek a Home. 
 
 You have a soul that cannot die ; seek for a 
 lodging for your poor soul, for that house of clay 
 will fall. 
 
 Up with Clirist! 
 
 I cry, " Down with men, down with all the ex- 
 cellency of this world, and up, up with Christ !" 
 Long may that fair one, that holy one be on high ! 
 
 Ml Safe. 
 
 What further trials are before me I know not, 
 but I know that Christ will have a saved soul of 
 me, over on the other side of the water, on the 
 yonder side of crosses and beyond men's wrongs. 
 
 Less Fearful tJian it appears. 
 
 A sight of his cross is more awsome than the 
 weight of it. 
 
 "Zook not upon me, for I am Black." 
 
 I would fain have that which ye and others be- 
 lieve I have, but ye are only witnesses to my outer 
 side and to some words on paper. Oh, that he 
 would give me more than paper-grace or tongue- 
 grace. 
 
 Gracious Transformations. 
 
 I wish for no other heaven on this side of the 
 last sea that I must cross than this service of 
 Christ, to make my blackness beauty, my deadness 
 life, my guiltiness sanctification. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 143 
 
 Godly Sins. 
 
 I see that the best thing I have hath as much 
 dross beside it as might curse me and it both. 
 And if it were for no more, we have need of a 
 Saviour to pardon the very faults, and diseases, 
 and weaknesses of the new man, and to take away 
 (to say so) our godly sins, or the sins of our sanc- 
 tification, and the dross and scum of spiritual love. 
 
 Paper Christians. 
 
 I know that it is our sin that would have sancti- 
 fication on the sunny side of the hill, and holiness 
 with nothing but summer, and crosses not at all. 
 Sin hath made us as tender as if we were made of 
 paper or glass. 
 
 Tribulation worketh Patience. 
 
 It is a blessed fever that fetcheth Christ to the 
 bedside. I think Christ's " How doest thou with 
 it, sick body?" is worth all my pained nights. 
 
 Desires on Wheels. 
 
 I would that I could be humble, and go with a 
 low sail. I would that I had desires on wings and 
 running on wheels, swift and active, and speedy in 
 longing for Christ's honour. 
 
 The Rock on the Shore. 
 
 It is neither shame nor pride for a drowning 
 man to swim to a rock, nor for a ship-broken soul 
 to run himselftashore on Christ. 
 
144 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 The only Garland* 
 
 Grace is the only garland that is worn in heaven 
 on the heads of the glorified. 
 
 Christ's Man. 
 
 Seeing that Christ singeth my welcome home, 
 and taketh me in and maketh short accounts and 
 short work of reckoning betwixt me and my Judge, 
 I must be Christ's man, and his tenant, and subject 
 to his court. 
 
 Christ's Work and the Sinner's. 
 
 Sinners can do nothing but make wounds that 
 Christ may heal them ; and make debts that he 
 may pay them ; and make falls that he may raise 
 them ; and make deaths that he may quicken them. 
 
 Pray and Wait. 
 
 As for your son, who is your grief, your Lord 
 waited on you and me till we were ripe and brought 
 us in. It is your part to pray and wait upon him. 
 When he is ripe he will be spoken for. Who can 
 command our Lord's wind to blow ? 
 
 Heligion no Sleeping -couch. 
 
 Many are carried over sea and land to a far 
 country in a ship, while as they sleep much of the 
 way. But men are not landed at heaven sleeping. 
 The righteous are scarcely saved, and many run 
 as fast as either you or I who miss the prize and 
 the crown. ^ 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 145 
 
 A Gate of His Own. 
 
 I find my Lord Jesus coineth not in that precise 
 way that I lay wait for him. He hath a gate of 
 his own. Oh, how high are his ways above my 
 
 ways ! 
 
 Struggle On .' 
 
 Be content to sigh and pant up the mountain 
 with Christ's cross on your back. 
 
 JViu Cross in Heaven. 
 
 Crosses will but convoy you to heaven's gates — 
 in they cannot go. 
 
 Noonday Faith. 
 
 Every man is a believer in daylight. 
 
 But to keep gold perfectly yellow amidst the 
 flames, and to be turned from vessel to vessel, and 
 yet to cause our furnace to sound, and speak, and 
 cry the praises of our Lord is another matter. 
 
 A Hanged World. 
 
 Since the apostle saith that the world is crucified 
 to him, we may put this world to the hangman's 
 doom and to the gallows ; and who will give much 
 for a hanged man ? And as little should we give 
 for a hanged and crucified world. 
 
 Sad Mistake. 
 
 Alas ! that men should think that ever they met 
 with Christ, who had never a sick night through 
 the terrors of God in their souls or a sore heart 
 for sin. 
 13 
 
146 • MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Longing for the Harvest. 
 
 Oh, that the corn were ripe and this world pre- 
 pared for his hook ! 
 
 The Trial Near. 
 
 Some few years will bring us all out in our blacks 
 and whites before our Judge. Eternity is nearer 
 to you than ye are aware of. To go on in a course 
 of defection, when an enlightened conscience is 
 stirring and looking you in the face, and crying 
 within you " that ye are going in an evil way," is 
 a step to the sin against the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Calm after Storm. 
 
 I dare pawn my soul and life for it, that if 
 ye take this storm with borne-down Christ, your 
 sky shall quickly clear, and your fair morning 
 dawn. 
 
 A Sweet Fellowship. 
 
 His glory is his end ; oh, that I could join with 
 him to make it my end ! I would think that fel- 
 lowship with him sweet and glorious. 
 
 Fair Wind. 
 
 Out of whatever quarter the wind blow, it will 
 blow us on our Lord. 
 
 A Safe Venture. 
 
 Venture upon Christ's " Come !" and I dare 
 swear ye will say (as it is in Ps. xvi. 7.), " I bless 
 the Lord who gave me counsel." 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 147 
 
 Itoyal TAfe. 
 
 Since I find furniture, armour, and strength from 
 the consecrated Captain, the Prince of our salva- 
 tion, who was perfected through suffering, I esteem 
 suffering for Christ a king's life. 
 
 Perfect Trust. 
 
 Subscribe a blank submission and put it into 
 Christ's hands. 
 
 Idfe Insurance. 
 
 No wind can blow our sails overboard ; because 
 Christ's skill and honour of his wisdom are em- 
 pawned and laid down at the stake for the sea- 
 passengers, that he shall put them safe off his hand 
 on the shore. 
 
 Tlie Marksman. 
 
 Ye are an arrow of his own making ; let him 
 shoot you against a wall of brass, your point shall 
 keep whole. 
 
 The Devil's Service. 
 
 Paul had need of the devil's service to buffet 
 him, and much more we. 
 
 Esteemed Vanities. 
 
 Bits of lordships are little to him who hath many 
 crowns on his head, and the kingdoms of the world 
 in the hollow of his hand. Court, honour, glory, 
 riches, stability of houses, favour of princes, are 
 all on his fingers' ends. Oh, what glory were it 
 to lend your honour to Christ, and to his Jerusa- 
 lem ! 
 
148 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Desolation tvithout Christ. 
 
 When Christ and his gospel are out of Scotland, 
 dream not that your houses shall thrive, and that 
 it will go well with the nobles of the land. As 
 the Lord liveth, the streams of your waters shall 
 become pitch, and the dust of your land brimstone, 
 and your land shall become burning pitch, and the 
 owl and the raven shall dwell in your houses ! 
 
 Better OS it is. 
 
 How should we have complained if the Lord had 
 turned the same providence that we now stomach 
 at upside down, and had ordered matters thus, that 
 first, the saints should have enjoyed heaven, glory, 
 and ease, and then Methusaleh's days of sorrow 
 and daily miseries. 
 
 Xiarge Saviour-mercy. 
 
 Grace, grace, free grace, the merits of Christ 
 for nothing, white, and fair, and large Saviour- 
 mercy, (which is another sort of thing than crea- 
 ture-mercy, or love-mercy, yea, a thousand degrees 
 above angel-mercy,) have been, and must be, the 
 Rock that we drowned souls must swim to. 
 
 A. Young Neiv Jerusalem. 
 
 I think it is possible on earth to build a young 
 New Jerusalem, a little new heaven of this sur- 
 passing love. God, either send me more of this 
 love, or take me quickly over the water where I 
 may be filled with his love. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 149 
 
 Aim at Christ With your Xovr. 
 
 It is easy to master an arrow and set it right 
 ere the string be drawn, but when once it is shot 
 and in the air, and the flight begun, then ye have 
 no more power at all to command it. 
 
 Summer Hereafter. 
 
 It is but folly to measure the gospel by summer 
 and winter weather. The summer sun of saints 
 shineth not on them in this life. 
 
 A Happy Absence. 
 
 Oh, if I could creep but one foot or half a foot 
 nearer in to Jesus, in such a dismal night as that 
 in which he is away, I should think it an happy 
 absence. 
 
 Value of Clouds. 
 
 I know that as the night and shadows are good 
 for flowers, and moonlight and dews are better than 
 a continual sun, so is Christ's absence of special 
 use ; and that it hath some nourishing virtue in it, 
 and giveth sap to humility, and putteth an edge 
 on hunger, and furnisheth a fair field to faith to 
 put forth itself and to exercise its fingers in grip- 
 ping it seeth not what. 
 
 Near Neiglibours. 
 
 Faith is ever neighbour to a contrite spirit, and 
 it is impossible that faith can be where there is not 
 a cast down and contrite heart in some measure for 
 sin. 
 
 13 * 
 
150 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Penitence, 
 
 I am laid low when I remember what I am, and 
 that my outside casteth such a lustre when I find 
 so little within. 
 
 Conscience on WJieels. 
 
 Alas, that so many in these days are carried 
 with the times, as if their conscience rolled upon 
 oiled wheels, so do they go any way the wind 
 bloweth them. 
 
 A. Way of Crosses. 
 
 Take what way we can to heaven, the way is 
 hedged up with crosses. There is no way but to 
 break through them. 
 
 Faith in Darkness. 
 
 Oh, if we could wait on for a time and believe 
 in the dark the salvation of God ! 
 
 TJie Badge. 
 
 Suffering is the badge that Christ hath put upon 
 his followers. 
 
 Let God have his oivn. 
 
 Take no heavier lift of your children than your 
 Lord alloweth. If your Lord take any of them 
 home to his house before the storm come on, take 
 it well. The owner of the orchard may take down 
 two or three apples of his own trees before mid- 
 summer and ere they get the harvest sun. 
 
 They are not lost to you ; they are laid up so 
 well as that they are coffered in heaven where our 
 Lord's best jewels lie. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 151 
 
 A. Panting Iiord. 
 
 Your Lord Jesus did sweat and pant ere he got 
 up that mount. He was at "Father, save me!" 
 with it. 
 
 The Hardest Part. 
 
 Sanctification and mortification of our lusts are 
 the hardest part of Christianity. 
 
 Courage ! 
 
 Pluck up your heart ; heaven is yours, and that 
 is a word few can say. 
 
 If only He be Glorified. 
 
 I would take all well at my Lord's hands that 
 he hath done if I knew that I could do my Lord 
 any service in my sufferings. 
 
 Oh, for the Humblest Office! 
 
 Oh, that I might but stand in Christ's outhouse, 
 or hold a candle in any low vault of his house ! 
 
 Poor Material. 
 
 Oh, I am made of unbelief, and cannot swim but 
 where my feet may touch the ground ! 
 
 Only Good. 
 
 As for Christ's cross, I never received evil of it 
 but what was of mine own making. Eor since it 
 was on the back of Christ, it hath always a sweet 
 smell, and these 1600 years it keepeth the smell 
 of Christ. 
 
152 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Distortions. 
 
 Temptations represent Christ ever unlike him- 
 self, and we in our folly listen to the tempter. 
 
 Will Up— Wisdom Down. 
 
 I wonder at the enemies of Christ (in whom 
 malice hath run away with wisdom, and will is up 
 and wisdom down) that they would essay to lift up 
 the Stone laid in Zion. Surely it is not laid in 
 such sinking ground as that they can raise it or 
 remove it. 
 
 Ever the Same. 
 
 I never knew Christ to ebb or flow, wax or wane ; 
 his winds turn not ; when he seemeth to change, it 
 is but we who turn our wrong side to him. 
 
 On Good Terms. 
 
 I am still in good terms with Christ ; however 
 my Lord's wind blow, I have the advantage of the 
 cabin and sunny side of Christ. 
 
 Up Hill. 
 
 I find it hard to fetch heaven. Oh, that we 
 would take pains on our lamps for the Bridegroom's 
 coming ! 
 
 Make Sure. 
 
 Make now sure work, and see that the old house 
 be casten down and razed from the foundation, and 
 the new building of your soul be of Christ's own 
 laying. For then wind nor storm shall neither 
 loose it nor shake it asunder. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 153 
 
 Miskenniny Christ. 
 
 Many miskcn Christ because he hath the cross 
 on his back ; but he will cause us all to laugh yet. 
 
 He may not part with hi* Cross. 
 
 Christ and his cross are not separable in this 
 life, howbeit Christ and his cross part at heaven's 
 door. For there is no house-room for crosses in 
 heaven. 
 
 •' Half Mine ."> 
 
 I find that his sweet presence eateth out the bit- 
 terness of sorrow and suffering. I think it a sweet 
 thing that Christ saith of my cross — "Half mine!" 
 
 My only Joy. 
 
 They have put out my one poor eye, my only 
 joy, to preach Christ, and to go errands betwixt- 
 him and his bride. 
 
 Christ at the Marriage. 
 
 I have heard of your daughter's marriage. I 
 pray the Lord Jesus to subscribe the contract, and 
 to be at the banquet as he was at the marriage of 
 Cana of Galilee. Let her give Christ the love of 
 her virginity and espousals, and choose him first 
 as her husband, and that match shall biess the other. 
 
 Quit of Superfluities. 
 
 It is a great business to make quit of superflui- 
 ties, and of those things which Christ cannot dwell 
 with. 
 
154 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 His works have no shorter date than to stand 
 for evermore. 
 
 Wo is me — a Man of Unclean Idps ! 
 
 I have been somewhat nearer the Bridegroom. 
 But when I draw nigh and see my vileness, for 
 shame I would be out of his presence again. Oh, 
 what am I, so loathsome a burden of sin, to stand 
 beside such a holy and beautiful Lord ! 
 
 A. Velvet Cross. 
 
 I know that no man hath a velvet cross, but the 
 cross is made of that which God will have it. 
 
 Sere and Tliere, 
 
 When we are over the water, Christ shall cry 
 down crosses and up heaven for evermore. 
 
 There and Here, 
 
 I marvel not that winter is without heaven, for 
 there is no winter within it ; all the saints, there- 
 fore, have their own winter before their eternal 
 summer. Oh, for the long day, and the high sun, 
 and the fair garden, and the King's great city up 
 above these visible heavens ! 
 • 
 
 Sis Will. 
 
 What God layeth on me let me suffer ; for some 
 have one cross, some seven, some ten, some half a 
 cross, yet all the saints have whole and full joy, 
 and seven crosses have seven joys. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 155 
 
 JVo Neiv Thing. 
 
 Ere ye were born, crosses in number, measure, 
 and weight were written for you, and your Lord 
 will lead you through them. 
 
 Pride's Madness. 
 
 "If he will not be friends, let him go," saith 
 Pride. Beware of this thief when Christ offereth 
 himself. 
 
 A. Great Crime. 
 
 Ye wrong Christ by doubting and misbelief; for 
 this is to nickname Christ and term him a liar ; 
 which being spoken to our prince would be hanging 
 or beheading. But Christ hangeth not always for 
 treason. 
 
 Never Mind How. 
 
 I grant that many are blinded in rejoicing in a 
 good cheap conversion that never cost them a sick 
 night. Christ's physic wrought in a day-dream 
 upon them. But for that I would say, if other 
 marks be found that Christ is indeed come in, 
 never make plea with him, because he will not an- 
 swer, " Lord Jesus, how comest thou in ?' ' Whether 
 in at door or window, make him welcome ; he is 
 come in. 
 
 Jfot merely for His Gifts. 
 
 A son loveth his mother because she is his mother, 
 howbeit she be poor, and he loveth her for an apple 
 also. I hope ye will not say that benefits are the 
 only reason and bottom of your love. It seemeth 
 there is a better foundation for it. 
 
156 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 CJtrist Works as he will. 
 
 Christ beginneth young with many, and stealeth 
 into their hearts ere they wit of themselves, and 
 becometh homely with them with little din and 
 noise. 
 
 Upward ! 
 
 Up, up after your lover that ye may be together ! 
 
 A. Sweet Law. 
 
 It is a sweet law of the New Covenant, and a 
 privilege of the new burgh, that citizens pay ac- 
 cording to their means. For the New Covenant 
 saith not so much obedience by ounce-weights, and 
 no less under pain of damnation : Christ taketh 
 as poor men give. 
 
 The Kiss and the Cross. 
 
 lovely, lovely Jesus, how sweet must thy kisses 
 be when thy cross smelleth so sweetly ! 
 
 Meat in Hunger. 
 
 Hunger on, for there is meat in hunger for Christ. 
 
 Public and Private. 
 
 Ye question when ye win to more fervency some- 
 times with your neighbour in prayer than when 
 you are alone whether hypocrisy be in it or not. 
 I answer, if this be always, no question there is a 
 spice of hypocrisy in it, which should be taken 
 heed to. But possibly desertion may be in pri- 
 vate and presence in public, and then the case is 
 clear. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 157 
 
 Desertion. 
 
 Sometimes Christ hath an errand elsewhere for 
 mere trial, and then, though ye give him king's 
 cheer, he will away. 
 
 What could be better? 
 
 Let God make of you what he will, he will end 
 all with consolation, and will make glory out of 
 your sufferings ; and would you wish better work ? 
 
 God's Workmen. 
 
 Losses, disappointments, ill-tongues, loss of 
 friends, houses, or country, are God's workmen, 
 set on work to work out good to you out of every 
 thing that befalleth you. 
 
 A Smitten Faith. 
 
 My closed mouth, my dumb Sabbaths, the mem- 
 ory of my communion with Christ in many fair, 
 fair days in Anwoth, hath almost broken my faith 
 in two halves. 
 
 The Tree and the Apples. 
 
 I fear that I adore his comforts more than him- 
 self, and that I love the apples of life more than 
 the Tree of Life. 
 
 The Chariot and the Cold Bed. 
 
 We would all be glad to divide the spoil with 
 Christ, and to ride in triumph with him ; but oh, 
 how few will take a cold bed of straw in the camp 
 with him ! 
 14 
 
158 MAXXA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Cross-Fruit. 
 
 I know no tree that heareth sweeter fruit than 
 Christ's cross. 
 
 Only let me not Injure Mim! 
 
 If my Lord get no wrong of me, verily I desire 
 grace not to cure what become of me. 
 
 My Damp in the Darkness. 
 
 In my sad days he has become the flower of my 
 
 joys. 
 
 Be hot Dismayed. 
 
 If your Lord call you to suffering, be not dis- 
 mayed. There shall be a new allowance of the 
 king for you when you come to it. One of the 
 softest pillows Christ hath is laid under his wit- 
 nesses' head, though often they must set down 
 their bare feet among thorns. 
 
 Christ the Gainer. 
 
 My trials are heavy because of my sad Sabbaths, 
 but I know that they are less than my high provo- 
 cations. I seek no more than that Christ may be the 
 gainer and I the loser, that he may be raised and 
 heightened, and I cried down, and my worth be 
 made dust before his glory. 
 
 A. Bright Prospect. 
 
 How will ye rejoice in that day to have Christ, 
 angels, heaven, and your own conscience to smile 
 upon you. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 159 
 
 Self and, Heaven. 
 
 Ye are as near heaven as far from yourself. 
 
 Well in Christ. 
 
 If any ask how I do, I answer, None can be but 
 well who are in Christ, and if it were not so, my 
 sufferings had melted me' away in ashes and smoke. 
 
 A. Smoky Mouse. 
 
 It is a good country which we are going to, and 
 there is ill lodging in this smoky house of the world 
 in which we are yet living. Oh, that we should 
 love smoke so well, and clay that holdeth our feet 
 fast! 
 
 Moll your Cares on tlie great Burden-Bearer. 
 
 Let Christ know how heavy and how many a 
 stone-weight you and your cares, burdens, crosses, 
 and sins are. Let him bear all. 
 
 I owe to this stormy world, whose kindness and 
 heart to me have been made of iron, not a look ; 
 I owe it no love, no hope : and therefore, oh, if 
 my love were dead to it and my soul dead to it ! 
 
 Too late. 
 
 I am sure that many kings, princes, and nobles, 
 in the day of Christ's second coming, would be glad 
 to run errands for Christ, even barefooted, through 
 fire and water ; but in that day he will have none 
 of their service. 
 
160 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 A. Painted Providence. 
 
 I painted a providence of my own, and wrote 
 ease for myself, and a peaceable ministry, and the 
 sun shining on me, till I should be in at heaven's 
 gates. Such green and raw thoughts had I of 
 God! 
 
 The lop and Hoot of my Joys. 
 
 Seeing I am not this world's debtor, I desire 
 that I may be stripped of all confidence in anything 
 but my Lord ; that he may be the morning and 
 evening tide ; the top and root of my joys, and 
 the heart, and flower and yolk of all my delights. 
 Oh, let me never lodge any creature in my heart 
 and confidence ! Let the house be for him. 
 
 Ease in Zion. 
 
 Verily for myself, I am so well pleased with 
 Christ, and his noble and honest born cross, this 
 cross that is come of Christ's house, and is of kin 
 to himself, that I Avould weep if it should come to 
 exchanging and bartering of lots and conditions 
 with those that are at " ease in Zion." 
 
 Mercy tvithout Brim or Bottom. 
 
 I know that thou thyself art mercy without brim 
 or bottom. I know that thou art a God bank-full 
 of mercy and love. But oh, alas, little of it Com- 
 eth my way. I die to look afar off to that love, 
 because I can get but little of it. But Hope saith, 
 " This providence shall ere long look more favoura- 
 bly upon poor bodies, and on me^also." 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 161 
 
 Hungered of Hunger. 
 
 I think myself also hungered of hunger. The 
 rich Lord Jesus satisfy a famished man ! 
 
 Glorious Terms. 
 
 I cannot but write to your ladyship of the sweet 
 and glorious terms I am in with the most joyful 
 King that ever was under this well-thriving and 
 prosperous cross. 
 
 The Safest Course. 
 
 Certainly the sweetest, safest course is for this 
 short time of the afternoon of this old and declin- 
 ing world to stand for Jesus. 
 
 Gone wJiile I Sleep. 
 
 Sometimes, while I have Christ in my arms, I 
 fall asleep in the sweetness of his presence, and 
 he, in my sleep, stealeth away out of my arms, and 
 when I wake I miss him. 
 
 Sing of All. 
 
 Christ is king of crosses, and king of devils, and 
 king over hell, and king over malice. When he 
 was in his grave, he came out and brought the keys 
 with him. He is Lord Jailor. Nay, what say I ? 
 He is Captain of the Castle, and has the keys of 
 Hell and of Death. 
 
 Happiness Enough. 
 
 God send me no more happiness in heaven or 
 out of heaven than Christ. 
 14 * 
 
162 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 An Art Hard to Z,eam. 
 
 Oh, what art is it to learn to endure hardness, 
 and to learn to go barefooted, either through the 
 devil's fiery coals or his frozen waters ! 
 
 Sell all for Christ. 
 
 I can say more of Christ now by experience, 
 (though he be infinitely above all that can be said 
 of hhn) than when I saw you. I am drowned over 
 head and ears in his love. Sell, sell, sell all things 
 for Christ ! 
 
 Unceasing Prayer. 
 
 I never eat but I pray for you all. Pray for 
 me. Ye and I shall see one another up in our 
 Father's house. 
 
 Winds Favouring, tliouyh Cold. 
 
 Devils and men and crosses are our debtors, 
 death and all storms are our debtors, to blow our 
 poor tossed bark over the water freight-free, and 
 to set the travellers on their own known ground. 
 
 JLose no Time. 
 
 I know that ye see your thread wearing short, 
 and that there are not many inches to the thread's 
 end. And therefore lose not time. 
 
 The Keys with CJirist. 
 
 How sad a prisoner should I be if I" knew not 
 that my Lord Jesus had the keys of my prison him- 
 self, and that his death and blood have brought a 
 prison to our crosses as well as to ourselves. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 163 
 
 A. Mistalce Corrected. 
 
 I imagined that a sufferer for Christ kept the 
 keys of Christ's treasure, and might take out his 
 heartful of comfort whenever he pleased. But I 
 see a sufferer and a witness shall be holden at the 
 door, as well as another poor sinner, and glad to 
 eat with the bairns, and to take the by-board. 
 
 An ill Second. 
 
 This is that which presseth me down and paineth 
 me, Jesus Christ in his saints, sitteth neighbour 
 with an ill second, corruption, deadness, coldness, 
 pride, lust, worldliness, self-love, security, false- 
 hood, and a world more the like which I find in 
 me, that are daily doing violence to the New Man. 
 
 Clirist in Court with the Prisoner. 
 
 I have been before a court set up within me of 
 terrors and challenges. But my sweet Lord Jesus 
 hath taken the mask off his face, and said, " Kiss 
 thy fill." 
 
 BanJe-Full. 
 
 I am bank and brim-full. A great, high spring- 
 tide of the consolations of Christ hath overflowed 
 me. 
 
 Ijove for the Flock. 
 
 Pray for my poor flock. I would take a penance 
 on my soul for their salvation. There I wrestled 
 with the angel and prevailed. Woods, trees, 
 meadows, and hills are my witnesses that I drew 
 on a fair meeting betwixt Christ and Anwoth. 
 
164 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Good Cause- to Fight. 
 
 "We have the sunny side of the world, and our 
 paradise is far above theirs, yea, our weeping is 
 above their laughing, and therefore we have good 
 cause to fight it out, or the day of our laureation 
 is approaching. I find my prison the sweetest 
 place that ever I was in. 
 
 A Safe Tfiread. 
 
 Howbeit my faith hang by a small stitch and 
 thread, I hope that the stitch shall not break ; and 
 howbeit my Lord get no service of me but broken 
 wishes, yet I trust that those services will be ac- 
 cepted upon Christ's account. 
 
 Winnowing. 
 
 Who knoweth how needful winnowing is to us, 
 and what dross must be taken away ere we enter 
 into the kingdom of God ? 
 
 A. Good Foundation- Stone. 
 
 I find it the most sweet and heavenly life to 
 take up house and dwelling at Christ's fireside, 
 and set down my tent upon Christ, that Founda- 
 tion-Stone, which is sure and faithful ground. 
 
 A.ny Conditions he pleases. 
 
 I should be content that Christ and I met, sup- 
 pose he should stand on the other side of hell's 
 lake, and cry to me, " Either put in your foot and 
 come through, else ye shall not have me at all." 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. 165 
 
 My Pension. 
 
 What hold I of this world ? A borrowed lodg- 
 ing, and some years' house-room, and bread, and 
 water, and fire, and bed, and candle, etc., are all 
 a part of the pension of my King and Lord, to 
 whom I owe thanks, and not to a creature. 
 
 Impatient Patience. 
 
 I see that there is a sort of impatient patience 
 required in the want of Christ as to his manifesta- 
 tions and waiting on. 
 
 Do thy will on ns. 
 
 Lord cut, Lord carve, Lord wound, Lord do any- 
 thing that may perfect the Father's image in us 
 and make us meet for glory. 
 
 Plead for Christ. 
 
 Plead for borne-down Christ and his weeping 
 
 Help CJirist. 
 
 Oh, what glory and true honour it is to lend 
 Christ your hand and service, and to be amongst 
 the repairers of the breaches of Zion's walls, and 
 to help to build the old waste places ! 
 
 Sure Pay, 
 
 No man. dare say who did ever thus hazard for 
 Christ, that Christ paid him not his hundredfold 
 in this life duly, and in the life to come life ever- 
 lasting. 
 
166 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 My Joy. 
 
 I always, but now most of all in my bonds, (most 
 sweet bonds for Christ my Lord,) rejoice to hear 
 of your faith and love, and to hear that our King, 
 our well-Beloved, our Bridegroom, without tiring, 
 stayeth still to woo you as his wife, and that per- 
 secutions and mocking sinners have not chased 
 away the wooer from the house. 
 
 The Best Half of Heaven. 
 
 Sure I am that he is the far best half of heaven, 
 yea, he is all of heaven, and more than all heaven. 
 
 All for Clu-ist. 
 
 Oh, that I could sell my laughter, joy, ease, and 
 all for him, and be content with a straw bed and 
 bread by weight, and water by measure, in the 
 camp of our weeping Christ ! 
 
 Take a Good Grip. 
 
 Many take but half a grip of Christ, and the 
 wind bloweth them and Christ asunder. 
 
 All or None. 
 
 Christ and his truth will not divide, and his 
 truth hath not latitude and breadth that ye may 
 take some of it and leave other some of it. 
 
 Martyr Sin. 
 
 Except men martyr and slay the body of sin in 
 sanctified self-denial, they shall never be Christ's 
 martyrs and faithful witnesses. 
 
MANNA-CRUMBS. ■ 167 
 
 Empty Lumps. 
 
 Try and make sure of your profession, that ye 
 carry not empty lamps. 
 
 TJie Crook in the Zot. 
 
 If ye mind to walk to heaven without a cramp 
 or a crook, I fear that ye must go your lone. 
 
 A. Timeous Word. 
 
 Your timeous word " not to delight in the cross, 
 but in Him who sweeteneth it," came to me in due 
 time. I find the consolations and off-fallings that 
 follow the cross of Christ so sweet that I almost 
 forgot myself. My desire and purpose is, when 
 Christ's honey-combs drop, neither to refuse to 
 receive and feed upon his comforts, nor to make 
 joy — my new-found heaven. 
 
 Unwelcome Joys. 
 
 If joy and comforts come single and alone, with- 
 out Christ himself, I think I would send them back 
 again the gate they came, and not make them wel- 
 come. 
 
 I would be further m upon Christ than at his 
 joys. They stand upon the outer side of Christ. 
 I wish to be in as a seal upon his heart, in where 
 his love and mercy lodgeth beside his heart. 
 
 More than we Jinow. 
 
 We are like the young heir who knoweth not 
 the whole bounds of his lordship. 
 
168 MANNA-CRUMBS. 
 
 Self a Sacrifice if Christ be Crowned. 
 
 Let never dew lie on my branches, and let my 
 poor flower wither at the root, so that Christ were 
 enthroned and his glory advanced in all the world. 
 
 Tlvou art Fair, my Zove. 
 
 all flesh, dust and ashes, angels, glori- 
 fied spirits, all the shields of the world, be silent 
 before him; come hither and behold our Bride- 
 groom ; stand still and wonder for ever at him. 
 
 Content outside the Walls. 
 
 1 would rest content, with a heart submissive 
 and dying of love for him. And howbeit I never 
 win personally in at the gates of heaven, oh, would 
 to God I could send in my praises to my incom- 
 parable well-Beloved, or cast my love-songs of that 
 matchless Lord Jesus over the walls, that they 
 might light in his lap before men and angels ! 
 
 THE END. 
 

HHBHH