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This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and delivered him out of all his troubles.

GOD'S GRACIOUS CALLS AND INVITATIONS.

34....Ho, every one that thirfteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy,and eat ; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore do ye fpend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which fatisfieth not? Hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good. Incline your ear, and come unto me: hear, and your foul fhall live.

35....Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call ye upon Him while He is near : Le: the wicked forfake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God; for He will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, faith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, fo are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

36.... Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes: ceafe to do evil; learn to do well; feek judgment, relieve the op preffed; judge the fatherlefs; plead for the widow."

37.....Come now, and let us reafon together, faith the Lord though your fins be as fcarlet, they fhall be as white as fnow; though they be red like crimson, they fhall be as wool: If ye be willing and obedient, ye fhall eat the good of the land.

38....Look unto me, and be ye faved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else. Turn ye, turn ye; for why will ye die? Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked fhould die? Saith the

Lord God; and not that he fhould return from his ways, and live? I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, faith the Lord God: wherefore turn yourfelves, and live ye.

REMARKS.

The foregoing paragraphs are an epitome of the cha racter of God; and of the way of recovery, for fallen man, to his likeness and favor.

1....

CHAPTER VIII.

THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER.

KING

ING Hezekiah was fick unto death; and Ifaiah the prophet came unto him, and faid unto him, Thus faith the Lord, Set thine house in order: for thou shalt die, and not live. Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall, and prayed unto the Lord, and faid, Remember now, O Lord, I befeech thee, how I have walked before thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy fight. And Hezekiah wept fore.

2.... Then came the word of the Lord to Ifaiah, faying, Go, and fay to Hezekiah, thus faith the Lord, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold I will add unto thy days. filteen years.

3....Now thefe are the wards of Hezekiah, king of Judah, when he had been sick, and was recovered of his fickoefs." I faid in the cutting off of my days, I fhall go to the gates of the grave: I am deprived of the refidue of my years. I faid, I fhall not fee the Lord, even the Lord in the land of the living; He will cut

me off with pining fickness: I fhall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world.

4....Like a crane or a fwallow, fo did I chatter ; I : did mourn as a dove: mine eyes fail with looking upward: O Lord, I am oppreffed, undertake for me. What shall I fay? He hath both fpoken unto me, and himself hath done it. I fhall go foftly all my years, in the humility of my foul.

5....Thou shalt recover me, and make me to live. I had great bitternefs; but thou haft in love to my foul delivered it from the pit of corruption: for thou haft caft all my fins behind thy back. The grave cannot praise thee; death cannot celebrate thee: they who go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth. The living, the living, he fhall praise thee, as I do this day."

CHAPTER IX.

AN ABSTRACT OF SOLOMON'S PRAYER.

1....

IT

T came to pafs, when the priests were come out of the holy place, the cloud filled the house of the Lord, fo that the priests could not stand to minifter because of the cloud for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of the Lord.

2....Then fpake Solomon, The Lord faid that he would dwell in the thick darkness. I have furely built thee an house. And the king turned his face around, and bleffed all the congregation of Ifrael: (and all the congregation of Ifrael ftood up :)

3....And Solomon ftood before the altar of the Lord, in the prefence of all the congregation of Ifrael, and fpread forth his hands toward heaven and he faid,

:

Lord God of Ifrael, there is no God like Thee, in heaven above, or earth beneath, who keepest cove- ́ nant and mercy with thy fervants, that walk before Thee with all their hearts; who haft kept with thy fervant David my father what thou didft promife him; Thou fpakeft with thy mouth, and haft fulfilled it with thine hand, as it is this day. And now, O God of Ifrael, let thy word, I pray thee, be verified, which thou Ipakelt unto thy fervant David my father.

4....But will God indeed dwell on the earth Behold, the heaven, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain Thee: how much lefs this houfe that I have builded! Yet have Thou refpect unto the prayer of thy fervant, and to his fupplication, O Lord my God, to hearken unto the cry, and to the prayer which thy fervant prayeth before Thee to-day,

5....That thine eyes may be open toward this houfe night and day, even toward the place of which Thou hait faid, My Name fhall be there; that thou mayest hearken unto the prayer which thy fervant shall make toward this place. And hearken Thou to the fupplication of thy fervant, and of thy people Ifrael, when they fhall pray toward this place and hear they in heaven thy dwelling place; and when thou hearet, forgive.

6.... When thy people Ifrael be fmitten down before the enemy, becaufe they have finned against Thee, and fhall turn again to thee, and confefs thy name, and pray, and make fupplication unto Thee in this houfe : then hear Thou in heaven, and forgive the fin of thy people Ifrael, and bring them again unto the land which Thou gavest unto our fathers.

7....When heaven is fhut up, and there is no rain, because they have finned against Thee; if they pray toward this place, and confefs thy name, aud turn from

their fins; then hear thou in heaven, and forgive the fin of thy people Ifrael, and teach them the good way wherein they should walk, and give rain upon thy land.

8....If there be in the land famine, if there be peftileace, whatfoever plague, what foever ficknefs, there be; what prayer and fupplication foever be made by any man, or by all thy people Ifrael, which fhall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this houfe: then hear Thou in heaven thy dwelling-place, and forgive.

9....And it was fo, that, when Solomon had made an end of praying, he arose from before the altar of the Lord, from kneeling on his knees with his hands fpread up to heaven.

10....And he ftood, and bleffed all the congregation of Ifrael with a loud voice, faying, Bleffed be the Lord, who hath given reft to thy people Hrael, according to all that he had promiled: There hath not failed one word of all his good promife. The Lord our God be with us, as he was with our fathers : let him not leave us, nor forfake us; that He may incline our hearts unto him, to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments; that all the people of the earth may know that the Lord is God, and that there is none else.

REMARKS.

Reader, have you ever feen any people fo lifted up with the pride of wealth, or of office, that they practically declare it to be beneath their rank to do homage even to the Deity, or to acknowledge any dependance upon him? Have you ever feen any fashionable company with whom religion was the most unfashionable thing in the world; who never mentioned the Bible, the Church or the parfon, but with a fneer of contempt ?

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