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prayers; for fome time after, Mr. Hunter being fent into Scotland, came and preached at Kelfo feveral times, and at many other places. He met with great oppofition from every . quarter; nevertheless the Lord began to work: feveral were awakened, and a few juftified; fo that we got a fmall Society formed, and I got companions in the good way. This was great confolation to me, fo that I went on my way rejoicing; yet in the midst of all this I had many trials, ftorms without, and painful conflicts within, on account of the remains of fin in my nature.

I heard Mr. Hunter preach upon the subject of fanctification, and clearly underflood there was a liberty to be enjoyed in the grace of God, which I had not yet attained. Although I never loft the evidence of my juflification, yet I was at times mind was clouded. I ftill kept hold of my very low, and my bleffed Jefus, and often faid, "Though he flay me, yet will I truft in him." After I had gone on thus for more than four years, I began to have a more painful conviction for a deeper work of grace in my foul. I had no doubt of God's love to me, yet I felt myself very unlike him, and clearly underfood that nothing unholy could dwell with him. I likewife faw in the cleareft light all that provifion treasured up in Chrift for this great purpose; and that the end of his coming into the world was to fave his people from their fins.

My foul was greatly encouraged in the views I have of thefe things to look up and hope for the falvation of God. I found my foul all on fire for this: I fafted, prayed, and wept: I wrestled hard for the bleffing, till he in infinite mercy heard and answered my prayer. He came into my foul with such a difplay of his grace and love, as I never knew before. All my bands were loofed, and my spirit was fet perfectly free. I felt an entire deliverance from all the remains of fin in my nature; and my precious Jefus took full poffeffion of my heart. I found foul fink down into fuch a flate of near union and

my

fellowship with him, as I am not capable of defcribing. My

foul

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foul was all peace, love, heaven. O my precious Jefus, what haft thou done for me, the very chief of finners! Lord, not unto me, not unto me, but to thy name be all the praise ! This great change did the Lord work in my foul on the 11th of November 1786, about eleven o'clock in the forenoon, and I truft I fhall remember the fame for ever. Since that time, I have found an increase of all that he hath bleft me with. I find my foul fixed and rooted in Jefus, and I hang upon him as a helpless child upon its parent for all it wants.

I find I am in his bleffed hand as a piece of paffive clay, and can fay in all things, "Not my will, but thine be done." He gives me power to watch and pray, and guard that facred treasure which he hath bleft me with, till he fhall call me hence to fee his uniclouded face, and to live with him for ever and ever!

[What follows is added by Mr. Hunter.]

ABOUT two years ago, Mrs. Planche put the foregoing Narrative into my hands. If fhe hath written any more fince that time, I know nothing of it. The last time I saw het before death, was at Alnwick, when I found fhe had entered deep into the fpirit of pure religion. She feemed to be all light and devotion, and fpoke to me of the deep things of God, with furprising pleafure. She poffeffed a fimplicity not found in many, fo that fhe received good by every means. To this was joined fuch fweetnefs of temper and manners, as made her agreeable wherever fhe was; fo that they who had no tafte for religion, could not but be pleafed with her.

A little after her return to Kelfo, fhe caught a fever, and in a few days died. She had written to me fome time before, believing the would die foon, and begged if I was in the country, to attend her funeral, and preach a fermon on the occafion. A dear companion who attended her in her laf fickness, fays, the spoke of death with great pleasure, and expreffed a strong confidence in Jefus. Her foul was all light and happiness. "Not a cloud did arife, to darken her fkies;"

and

and after nine or ten days fickness, on Sunday morning about eight o'clock, the twenty-fecond of November 1789, her happy fpirit took its flight to Paradife, and to join the choirs above in finging praises to God and the Lamb for ever and ever. W. HUNTER,

A COMPARISON of Ancient FABLE, with the SACRED WRITINGS.

[By Mr. William De'Lavaur.]

[Continued from page 368.]

Of the HEROES and DEMI-GODS.

THO

HOSE who were called Heroes, or Demi-gods, according to the proper fignification of the word, as Cicero obferves, were those who sprung from Intrigues, which it was supposed . But how could gods had with women, and goddeffes with men. it be conceived, that the immortal gods could have fuch commerce with women, or the goddeffes with men? How could they be capable of conceiving the composition of half-god, and half-man, fpringing from these connections? How could fuch an extravagant imagination fpring up even in the brains of the Poets, and from thence be inserted in history?

It has indeed been hiffed at, and found ridiculous even in the Poets; and ferious and accurate Hiflorians have only propoled it as an exceffive flattery of the people for their Princes, or of great and renowned perfons; and thofe very perfons to whom it was attributed, only fuffered it because they found, that this popular opinion awed the minds of the people, and facilitated the fuccefs of their grand enterprizes; or sometimes to hide an obfcure or difhonourable birth. Thus Romulus found it advantageous to his designs to be esteemed the son of Mars; and Alexander readily permitted those who would to believe

that

that Jupiter was his father and the Romans, in order to pro cure themselves the greateft veneration by the opinion of a celeftial origin, adopted the fable fung by the Poets, that Æneas their founder was the fon of the goddess Venus and Anchifes.

The origin of this idea is taken from the text of Mofes, Gen. vi. where it is written, "The Sons of God faw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took them wives of all which they chofe. And there were giants in the earth in those days. And when the Sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, they bare children unto them, the fame became mighty men, which were of old, men of renown."

Jofephus in his hiftory puts Angels of God in place of Sons of God, and fo alfo does the Septuagint. The literal meaning of Benei haclokim, is, the Sons of the Gods, from which literal conftruction the Poets had the greater ground for their conjecture. St. Ambrofe in his expofition of this text fays, that the term Sons of God fignifies ordinarily in the file of Scripture, Sons of Princes, or of powerful or good men; but in this place it means the children of Seth, who continued attached to the law and worship of God, and who were thereby oppofed to the daughters of men, that is, to the curfed race of Cain, who had loft the fear of God, and followed thei nclinations of their corrupt nature.

Of HERCULES.

In order to form a Hero, who fhould be a prodigy of ftrength and valour, the Poets according to their cuftom compofed their Hercules on the foundation and model of facred hiftories. It is true they disfigured thefe by their fictions. Yet the holy Scripture was the common fource from which they derived all that could be called excellent in their writings.

Hercules was figured by the Poets as fupernatural both in his birth and actions, and was therefore received by the people as a god of the first order. They attributed to him the miracles

wrought

wrought by feveral illuftrious Chiefs among the people of God, which they found defcribed in the Sacred Oracles, more ancient than their most ancient accounts, or which they had learned by tradition, and their commerce with the Egyptians and Phenicians who were fpread through various countries, but particularly in Greece. It is alfo to the time of these Chiefs, and to the government of the Ifraelites by their judges, that the Heroes and grand events of Fable owe their origin; to which time they are indeed referred by the common consent of authors, facred and prophane.

Every ancient nation which had writers who had left monu. ments of their country's glory, had a Hercules of its own, forged on the fame plan. Varro reckons more than forty: and Cicero reckons fix, the second of whom was an Egyptian, sprung from the Nile; another a Phenician, and one a Greek, the fon of Jupiter; "not of the most ancient Jupiter (fays he) but of the third Jupiter and Alcmena :" and is much embarrassed to know which of these fix was honoured at Rome, in the lift of their gods.

Mr. Jaquelot in his treatife on the "Existence of God," believes that the Tyrian Hercules, who was the most ancient (according to Arrian, in his fecond book) was no other than Joshua. But St. Auguflin has made it appear, that it was after Sampfon, (because of his prodigious and incomparable strength) that they forged their Hercules first in Egypt, from thence in Phenicia, and laftly in Greece, each of whose writers has united in him (acknowledged in his own country) all the miraculous actions of the others.

In fact it appears, that Sampĵon judge of the Ifraelites, from about A. M. 2867, to 2887, celebrated in the book of Judges, and mentioned by Jofephus in his history, lib. 5. ch. 10. is the original and effentia! Hercules of Fable: and although the Poets have united thefe feveral particulars drawn from Mofes and Joshua, and have added their own inventions, yet the moftVOL. XIV. 3 G

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