My God, my God, all that thou askest of me is my heart, _My Son, give me
thy heart_.[147] Am I thy Son as long as I have but my heart? Wilt thou
give me an inheritance, a filiation, any thing for my heart? O thou, who
saidst to Satan, _Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is
none like him upon the earth_,[148] shall my fear, shall my zeal, shall
my jealousy, have leave to say to thee, Hast thou considered my heart,
that there is not so perverse a heart upon earth; and wouldst thou have
that, and shall I be thy son, thy eternal Son's coheir, for giving that?
_The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who
can know it?_[149] He that asks that question makes the answer, I the
Lord search the heart. When didst thou search mine? Dost thou think to
find it, as thou madest it, in Adam? Thou hast searched since, and found
all these gradations in the ill of our hearts, _that every imagination
of the thoughts of our hearts is only evil continually_.[150] Dost thou
remember this, and wouldst thou have my heart? O God of all light, I
know thou knowest all, and it is thou[151] that declarest unto man what
is his heart. Without thee, O sovereign Goodness, I could not know how
ill my heart were. Thou hast declared unto me, in thy word, that for all
this deluge of evil that hath surrounded all hearts, yet thou soughtest
and foundest a man after thine own heart;[152] that thou couldst and
wouldst give thy people pastors according to thine own heart;[153] and I
can gather out of thy word so good testimony of the hearts of men as to
find single hearts, docile and apprehensive hearts; hearts that can,
hearts that have learned; wise hearts in one place, and in another in a
great degree wise, perfect hearts; straight hearts, no perverseness
without; and clean hearts, no foulness within: such hearts I can find in
thy word; and if my heart were such a heart, I would give thee my heart.
But I find stony hearts too,[154] and I have made mine such: I have
found hearts that are snares;[155] and I have conversed with such;
hearts that burn like ovens;[156] and the fuel of lust, and envy, and
ambition, hath inflamed mine; hearts in which their masters trust, and
_he that trusteth in his own heart is a fool_;[157] his confidence in
his own moral constancy and civil fortitude will betray him, when thou
shalt cast a spiritual damp, a heaviness and dejection of spirit upon
him. I have found these hearts, and a worse than these, a heart into the
which the devil himself is entered, Judas's heart.[158] The first kind
of heart, alas, my God, I have not; the last are not hearts to be given
to thee. What shall I do? Without that present I cannot be thy son, and
I have it not. To those of the first kind thou givest joyfulness of
heart,[159] and I have not that; to those of the other kind thou givest
faintness of heart;[160] and blessed be thou, O God, for that
forbearance, I have not that yet. There is then a middle kind of hearts,
not so perfect as to be given but that the very giving mends them; not
so desperate as not to be accepted but that the very accepting dignifies
them. This is a melting heart,[161] and a troubled heart, and a wounded
heart, and a broken heart, and a contrite heart; and by the powerful
working of thy piercing Spirit such a heart I have. Thy Samuel spake
unto all the house of thy Israel, and said, _If you return to the Lord
with all your hearts, prepare your hearts unto the Lord_.[162] If my
heart be prepared, it is a returning heart. And if thou see it upon the
way, thou wilt carry it home. Nay, the preparation is thine too; this
melting, this wounding, this breaking, this contrition, which I have
now, is thy way to thy end; and those discomforts are, for all that,
_the earnest of thy Spirit in my heart_;[163] and where thou givest
earnest, thou wilt perform the bargain. Nabal was confident upon his
wine, but _in the morning his heart died within him_.[164] Thou, O Lord,
hast given me wormwood, and I have had some diffidence upon that; and
thou hast cleared a morning to me again, and my heart is alive. David's
heart smote him when he cut off the skirt from Saul;[165] and his heart
smote him when he had numbered his people:[166] my heart hath struck me
when I come to number my sins; but that blow is not to death, because
those sins are not to death, but my heart lives in thee. But yet as long
as I remain in this great hospital, this sick, this diseaseful world, as
long as I remain in this leprous house, this flesh of mine, this heart,
though thus prepared for thee, prepared by thee, will still be subject
to the invasion of malign and pestilent vapours. But I have my cordials
in thy promise; _when I shall know the plague of my heart, and pray unto
thee in thy house_,[167] thou wilt preserve that heart from all mortal
force of that infection; _and the peace of God, which passeth all
understandings shall keep my heart and mind through Christ Jesus_.[168]