What good it does me to clear up my ideas on prayer! but there is a limit beyond which intellect cannot go. No one can fully explain the admission of evil into the heart. We say "it is because I listen to temptation;" but why do I listen, to temptation? Because I did not watch unto prayer. The Calvinist would say, perhaps, "Because I am without the covenant;" but he allows that a person may sin who is in it. Suppose I am one of these? The origin of evil must ever be hidden, but not of evil only; the _moral nature of man must ever be a mystery to his intellectual nature, for it is above it._ There is a _natural testimony_ to the supremacy of the _moral_ in man above the intellectual. _10th Mo. 8th_. The charm of book and pen has been beguiling me of my reward; but now my soul craves to be offered a living sacrifice. _10th Mo. 19th_. The world was fearfully my snare yesterday,--I mean worldly objects, innocent, in themselves. These things only show the depth of unrenewed nature within. Though it slumbered, it could not be dead. My "wilderness wanderings," oh, I fear they must be exceedingly protracted ere the hosts that have come out of Egypt with me fall; ere I can find _in myself_ that blessed possession of the promised inheritance, which, I believe, _in this life_ is the portion of the _thorough_ Christian: "they that believe _do_ enter into rest." Why, then, do not I? Oh, it is for want of believing; for want of faith; I fear to trust the Lord to give me my inheritance and conquer my foes, and will not "go up and possess the land." Then, again, in self-confidence, I _will_ go up, whether the Lord be with me or not; and so I fall. But surely, surely it _need_ be so no longer. I _might_ devote myself to Christ, and He would lead me safely through all. The shining of the fire and the shading of the cloud are yet in the ordering of the Captain of Salvation. _20th_. Exceeding poor; and yet I rejoice in what I trust is somewhat of the poverty of spirit which is blessed. "Nothing in my hand I bring; Simply to Thy cross I cling; To the cleansing fount I fly: Wash me, Saviour, or I die." _21st_. I feel myself in much danger of falling,--manifold temptations all round to love the world, and how little _stay_ within! _22d._ Yet the Lord was kind, most kind, to me in the evening, constraining me to say within my heart, "Surely I am united to Christ my Saviour." Oh, the joy of feeling that we are in any measure _His!_ May I by no means withdraw myself from His hands, that He may do for me all that His mercy designs, and which I am well assured is but _begun._ This morning a crumb of bread was given me, in the shape of a sense that Christ is yet mine, but that He will be _waited on_ in simplicity of heart to do His _own work._ Oh, the comfort of having a fountain to flee to _set open_ for sin! hourly have I need of it.