Page:The Pilgrim's Progress, the Holy War, Grace Abounding Chunk3.djvu/118

 THE CONCLUSION.

1. OF all the temptations that ever I met with in my life, to question the being of God and the truth of his gospel is the worst, and the worst to be borne. When this temptation comes, it takes away my girdle from me, and removeth the foundation from under me. Oh, I have often thought of that word, "having your loins girt about with truth;" and of that, "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" (Eph. vi. 14; Ps. Xi. 3.)

2. Sometimes when, after sin committed, I have looked for sore chastisement from the hand of God, the very next that I have had from him hath been the discovery of his grace. Sometimes, when I have been comforted I have called myself a fool "for my so sinking under trouble. And then again, when I have been cast down, I thought I was not wise to give such way to comfort—with such strength and weight have both these been upon me.

3. I have wondered much at this one thing, that though God doth visit my soul with never so blessed a discovery of himself, yet I have found again that such hours have attended me afterwards that I have been in my spirits so filled with darkness that I could not so much as once conceive what that God and that comfort was with which I have been refreshed.

4. I have sometimes seen more in a line of the Bible than I could well tell how to stand under; and yet at another time