Your ever affectionate Friend, G. M. TO THE REV. J. ARMSTRONG. Wellington, July 6th, 1812. My dear Friend, AS it respects myself, I must say that I feel the comparatively trifling duties which I have to perform to be a burden, which at times seems insupportable; but it is the burden which God has placed upon me, and, therefore, I strive to go on and to press forward, notwithstanding all my difficulties. You would hardly conceive how much I dread any public exercise until the moment in which I am actually engaged in it; I am filled with the most dismal forebodings; but then, through mercy all my fears vanish; and I have reason to believe, that my feeble efforts are not altogether in vain. Nothing further has elapsed respecting any change in my situation. My Mary feels a good many apprehensions on the subject at present, and I believe I must leave matters till some circumstance or other makes my way clear and evident. _Our_ time is very seldom _God’s_. There is a haste—a precipitancy—in our proceedings, which is never to be discovered in those of God. The creation of the world—the calling of his peculiar people—the coming of the Messiah—all show that God is slow in operation. I feel, my dear friend, that I have daily and hourly need of learning a lesson on this subject. Whenever I feel hurry of spirits, and solicited to do something or other in haste, I invariably find that it turns out badly. It is the power of the enemy—God’s procedure is orderly—calm—deliberate: he leads us gently on, and, while he forcibly convinces the mind, he opens our providential path. * * * * * * * We live in troublesome times, in a troublesome world. But still we have much to be thankful for, notwithstanding all, and we have a blessed hope of things infinitely better in the world to come. I delight to think of those blessed scenes, and am persuaded that we all of us lose much for want of reverting to them more frequently. With heaven in our eye, how cheerfully are we enabled to march forward; how courageously do we charge through all opposing difficulties; how contemptuously do we look upon the things of time and sense! Here was the grand support of the Redeemer; “_For the joy which was set before him_ he endured the cross, and _despised_ the shame.”