Page:The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A., late of Pembroke-College, Oxford, and Chaplain to the Rt. Hon. the Countess of Huntingdon (1771 Volume 2).djvu/104

 It is dreadful to have winter all the year round. May your heart, my dear Sir, and the heart of your dear wife, and the hearts of all my dear friends, be kept close to, and continually flaming with love! I know you will readily say Amen. For the present, adieu. I must go to my delightful work,. Pray remember me to all. Let me have a line, and tell me whether the stirs up any to lend an helping hand to, very dear Mr. S,  Yours most affectionately in, G. W.     LETTER DXC. To the Reverend Mr. M, junior.

Dover in Pensylvania, May 9, 1747.

Reverend and very dear Sir,

EVER since I have known and heard of you, the hath made you peculiarly dear to my soul. Your troubles and soul distresses have in some measure been my own. I have looked and learned from your case, that we are indeed but clay in the hands of the heavenly potter, and that a sovereign may deal with us as it seemeth good in his sight. "His ways are in the deep waters, and his footsteps are not known." What he does to us now, we know not, but we shall know hereafter. How will you be surprized, dear Sir, in a very short time, to see that, whom your soul loves, and who has many a time shed abroad his love in your heart; how will you be surprized to see him receive you into glory, and turning your late or present Egyptian darkness into celestial and eternal day? May the compassionate high priest till then support your sinking spirits, and enable you to cope with and overcome all those difficulties and temptations, which either the prevalency of an inveterate melancholy, or the malice of evil spirits, may make you the subject of! Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat; but surely prays for you, though as it were behind the curtain. Excuse this freedom, reverend Sir; redeeming love constrains me to write thus. I hope you will receive it, as it is written, in much love. If you enquire after me, I would inform you that I am travelling about, and preaching from time to time among poor sinners the unsearchable riches of