Page:The Pilgrim's Progress, the Holy War, Grace Abounding Chunk3.djvu/8

vi I have sent you here enclosed a drop of that honey that I have taken out of the carcass of a lion. (Judges xiv. 8.) I have eaten thereof myself, and am refreshed thereby. Temptations, when we meet them at first, are as the lion that roared upon Samson; but if we overcome them, the next time we see them we shall ﬁnd a nest of honey within them. The Philistines understood me not. It is something—a relation of the work of God upon my soul, even from the very first till now, wherein you may perceive my castings down and risings up; for he woundeth, and his hands make whole. It is written in; the Scripture, "The father to the children shall make known the truth of God" (Isa. xxxviii. 19). Yea, it was for this reason I lay so long at Sinai to see the fire, and the cloud, and the darkness, that I might fear the Lord all the days of my life upon earth, and tell of his wondrous works to my (Deut. iv. 10; Ps. lxxviii. 4.).

Moses writ of the the journeyings, of the children of Israel from Egypt to the land of Canaan (Deut. vi.),and commended also that they did remember their forty years, travel in the Wilderness: "Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee; these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no" (Duet. viii. 2). Wherefore this I have endeavoured to do; and not only so, but to publish it also, that, if God will, others may be put in remembrance of what He hath done for their souls by reading his work upon me.

It is profitable for Christians to be often calling to mind the very beginnings of grace with their souls; "It is a night much observed of all the children of Israel in their generations"

(Ex. xii. 42.). "My God." said David (Ps. xlii. 6), "my soul is cast down within me: therefore I will remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill