"O Lord, my strength! I have since my youth met with Thee in all my ways, by Thy fatherly compassions, by Thy comfortable chastisements, and by Thy most visible providence. As Thy favours have increased upon me, so have Thy corrections; so as Thou hast been always near me, O Lord! And ever as my worldly blessings were exalted, so secret darts from Thee have pierced me; and when I have ascended before men, I have descended in humiliation before Thee. And now when I thought most of peace and honour, Thy hand is heavy upon me, and hath humbled me according to Thy former loving-kindness, keeping me still in Thy fatherly school, not as a bastard, but as a child. Just are Thy judgments upon me for my sins, which are more in number than the sands of the sea, but have no proportion to Thy mercies; for what are the sands of the sea? Earth, heavens, and all these are nothing to Thy mercies. Besides my innumerable sins, I confess before Thee, that I am debtor to Thee for the gracious talent of Thy gifts and graces, which I have neither put into a napkin, nor put it (as I ought) to exchangers, where it might have made best profit, but misspent it in things for which I was least fit: so I may truly say, my soul hath been a stranger in the course of my pilgrimage. Be merciful unto me, O Lord, for my Saviour's sake, and receive me unto Thy bosom, or guide me in Thy ways."
FOOTNOTES:
[270] Christmas.
[No. 268. [Steele.]
From Saturday, Dec. 23, to Tuesday, Dec. 26, 1710.
——"O te, Bolane, cerebri
Felicem!" Aiebam tacitus; quum quidlibet ille
Garriret.——
Hor., 1 Sat. ix. 11.
From my own Apartment.
At my coming home last night, I found upon my table the following petition or project, sent me from Lloyd's Coffee-house[271] in the city, with a present of port wine, which had been bought at a late auction held in that place: