I once thought the body was the old man of sin; and no heart can conceive the labour, toil, tears, fastings, fears, horrors, and pains I have experienced, in consequence of these mistakes, which is nothing but labour in vain; for this Ethiopian cannot change his skin, nor this leopard his spots. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and will remain so. The dear people of God are viewed complete in Christ, and their salvation is the joint work of the Most Holy Trinity: man has no hand in the business. We had no hand in the first creation, and we have none in the second. O, that I had known this at first; what bondage and distress it would have saved me from! It is also a glorious truth, that Christ has finished the work of salvation; that he has stood in our law-place; that he has fulfilled the law, and that we have nothing to do with it as a covenant of works. The Lord Jesus, as the surety of his church, has put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, and is gone to heaven to plead our cause before the Father. Had I known the everlasting virtue of his blood, or the glory of his obedience, O, what soul distresses should I have escaped! but when just wrought upon by the Spirit, sitting under a blind ministry, and reading legal blind authors, it is not to be wondered at that a soul should beheld in bondage. It was my case for some time; and even after I had heard, and, in a measure, received the truth, still the devil was permitted to deceive me with a sad snare, till the Lord led me to see the difference between the work of the Spirit and the moving of the natural passions; the difference between the love of God and those inordinate affections which led me into error. I would to God I possessed ability to point out to you these things clearly, that you and all God’s dear people might see the snare, and be delivered from it: for, truly in vain is the snare laid in the sight of any bird.