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to have done; and I have done those things which I ought not to have done; and there is no health in me. But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon me, miserable offender. Spare thou me, O God, confessing my faults. Restore thou me, that am penitent; according to thy promises declared unto mankind in Christ Jesu our Lord. And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake, that I may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life, to the glory of thy holy Name. Amen.

A Collect.

ALMIGHTY God, who madest thy blessed Son to be circumcised, and obedient to the law for man;

grant me the true Circumcision of the Spirit; that my heart, and all my members, being mortified from worldly and carnal lusts, may in all things obey thy blessed will; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Another Collect.

O ALMIGHTY Lord, and everlasting God, vouchsafe, I beseech thee, to direct, sanctify, and govern, both my heart and body in the ways of thy laws, and in the works of thy commandments; that through thy most mighty protection, both here and ever, I may be preserved in body and soul; through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

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FOURTH MEDITATION.

SINS OF HABIT.

"CAN the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots, then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil." (Jeremiah xiii. 23.)

But I, when I look back upon my past life, must at once acknowledge, not only as I before acknowledged, the infirmities of my nature, and the dreadful penalties of the law which attach to all men in their human condition generally, but I myself, in my own person, continually, habitually, day by day, have sinned against the Lord.

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"O Lord, mine iniquities testify against me; my backslidings are many; I have sinned against thee." (Jeremiah xiv. 7.)

"I am dead in trespasses and sins ;" (Eph. ii. 1); "I am a child of disobedience. I have eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; an heart, exercised with covetous practices; I have forsaken the right way, and am gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness." (2 Pet. ii. 14, 15.)

Let me commune with myself, and examine 1. My principles, what have they been? Of the world.

11. My rule of life, what has it been? The opinion of men.

III. My treasure, where has it been placed? On the earth.

They have taught me the world has taught me, even from my youth up until now, that the demands and precepts of my Saviour and my God are unnecessary, beyond man's power, and unjust; and I too willingly have listened.

They have taught me, "Why doth he yet find fault? for who has resisted his will? and

I, the thing formed, have said to him that formed me, why hast thou made me thus ?" (Rom. ix. 19, 20.)

They have taught me that the road which leadeth to Heaven is broad and easy, while my Saviour has told me to "enter the strait gate, for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction; but strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it." (Matt. vii. 13.)

They have taught me that the passions of my nature, and the lusts of the flesh, may be indulged without danger, and retained without offence; while I now find, that" if my right hand offend me, my duty is to cut it off and cast it from me, for it is profitable for me that one of my members should perish, and not that my whole body should be cast into hell.” (Matt. v. 30.)

They have taught me that I can make a compromise with God, and barter and exchange a little good for a little evil, and that

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