Elias himself fainted under that apprehension, _Lo, I am left alone_;[63] and Martha murmured at that, said to Christ, _Lord, dost not thou care that my sister hath left me to serve alone?_[64] Neither could Jeremiah enter into his lamentations from a higher ground than to say, _How doth the city sit solitary that was full of people_.[65] O my God, it is the leper that thou hast condemned to live alone;[66] have I such a leprosy in my soul that I must die alone; alone without thee? Shall this come to such a leprosy in my body that I must die alone; alone without them that should assist, that should comfort me? But comes not this expostulation too near a murmuring? Must I be concluded with that, that Moses _was commanded to come near the Lord alone_;[67] that solitariness, and dereliction, and abandoning of others, disposes us best for God, who accompanies us most alone? May I not remember, and apply too, that though God came not to Jacob till he found him alone, yet when he found him alone, he wrestled with him, and lamed him;[68] that when, in the dereliction and forsaking of friends and physicians, a man is left alone to God, God may so wrestle with this Jacob, with this conscience, as to put it out of joint, and so appear to him as that he dares not look upon him face to face, when as by way of reflection, in the consolation of his temporal or spiritual servants, and ordinances he durst, if they were there? But a _faithful friend is the physic of life, and they that fear the Lord shall find him_.[69] Therefore hath the Lord afforded me both in one person, that physician who is my faithful friend. V. PRAYER.