§ 13. (2.) The next affection to be exercised in heavenly contemplation, is desire. The object of it is goodness considered as absent, or not yet attained. If love be hot, desire will not be cold. Think with thyself, "What have I seen? O the incomprehensible glory! O the transcendant beauty! O blessed souls that now enjoy it! who see a thousand times more clearly, what I have seen at a distance, and through dark interposing clouds. What a difference between my state and theirs! I am sighing, and they are singing. I am offending, and they are pleasing God. I am a spectacle of pity, like a Job, or a Lazarus, but they are perfect, and without blemish. I am here entangled in the love of the world, while they are swallowed up in the love of God. They have none of my cares and fears; they weep not in secret; they languish not in sorrows; these _tears_ are _wiped away from their eyes_. O happy, a thousand times happy souls! Alas, that I must dwell in sinful flesh, when my brethren and companions dwell with God! How far out of sight and reach of their high enjoyments do I here live? What poor feeble thoughts have I of God? What cold affections toward him? How little have I of that life, that love, that joy, in which they continually live? How soon doth that little depart, and leave me in thicker darkness? Now and then a spark falls upon my heart, and while I gaze upon it, it dies, or rather my cold heart quenches it. But they have their _light in his light_, and drink continually at the spring of joys. Here we are vexing each other with quarrels, when they are of one heart and voice, and daily sound forth the hallelujahs of heaven with perfect harmony. O what a feast hath my faith beheld, and what a famine is yet in my spirit! O blessed souls! I may not, I dare not envy your happiness; I rather rejoice in my brethren's prosperity, and am glad to think of the day when I shall be admitted into your fellowship. I wish not to displace you, but to be so happy as to be with you. Why must I stay, and weep, and wait? My Lord is gone; He hath left this earth, and is entered into his glory; my brethren are gone; my friends are there; my house, my hope, my all is there. When I am so far distant from my God, wonder not _what aileth me_, if I now complain; an ignorant Micah will do so for his idol, and shall not my soul do so for the living God! Had I no hope of enjoyment, I would go hide myself in the deserts, and lie and howl in some obscure wilderness, and spend my days in fruitless wishes; but since it is the land of my promised rest, and the state I must myself be advanced to, and my soul draws near, and is almost at it, I will love and long, I will look and desire, I will be breathing, How long, Lord! how long wilt thou suffer this soul to pant and groan, and not open to him who waits, and longs to be with thee!" Thus, Christian Reader, let thy thoughts aspire, till thy soul longs, as David, _O that one would give me to