XCV.--_To the Right Honourable and Christian Lady, the_ VISCOUNTESS OF
KENMURE.
(_CHRIST'S CROSS SWEET--HIS COMING TO BE DESIRED--JEALOUS OF ANY
RIVAL._)
MADAM,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to your Ladyship. I would not omit
to write a line with this Christian bearer; one in your Ladyship's own
case, driven near to Christ, in and by her affliction. I wish that my
friends in Galloway forget me not. However it be, Christ is so good, I
will have no other tutor, suppose I could have wale and choice of ten
thousand beside. I think now five hundred heavy hearts for Him too
little. I wish that Christ, now weeping, suffering, and contemned of
men, were more dear and desirable to many souls than He is. I am sure
that if the saints wanted Christ's cross, so profitable, and so sweet,
they might, for the gain and glory of it, wish it were lawful either
to buy or borrow His cross. But it is a mercy that the saints have it
laid to their hand for nothing; for I know no sweeter way to heaven
than through free grace and hard trials together; and one of these
cannot well want another.
O that time would post faster, and hasten our looked-for communion
with that fairest, fairest among the sons of men! O that the day would
favour us and come, and put Christ and us into each other's arms! I am
sure that a few years will do our turn, and the soldier's hour-glass
will soon run out. Madam, look to your lamp, and look for your Lord's
Coming, and let your heart dwell aloof from that sweet child. Christ's
jealousy will not admit of two equal loves in your Ladyship's heart.
He must have one, and that the greatest; a little one to a creature
may and must suffice a soul married to Him. "Thy Maker is thine
Husband" (Isa. liv. 5). I would wish you well, and my obligations
these many years byegone speak no less to me; but more I can neither
wish, nor pray, nor desire for your Ladyship, than Christ singled and
waled out from all created good things, or Christ howbeit wet in His
own blood, and wearing a crown of thorns. I am sure that the saints,
at their best, are but strangers to the weight and worth of the
incomparable sweetness of Christ. He is so new, so fresh in excellency
every day of new, to those that search more and more in Him, as if
heaven could furnish us as many new Christs (if I may so speak) as
there are days betwixt Him and us; and yet He one and the same. Oh, we
love an unknown lover when we love Christ!
Let me hear how the child is every way. The prayers of a prisoner of
Christ be upon him. Grace for evermore, even whill glory perfect it,
be with your Ladyship.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,