_Madam_, THERE is nothing more plain and simple than the way of religion. But piety makes little progress till it has no schemes of its own, no thoughts or contrivances to be any thing, but a _naked penitent_, left wholly and solely in _faith_ and _hope_ to the divine goodness. Nothing but the life of God, wrought by his Holy Spirit within us, can be the renewal of our souls, and we shall want this renewal no longer, than whilst we are seeking it in something that is not God. The faith that ascribes all to God, and expects all from him, cannot be disappointed. Nothing could hinder the Centurion from having that which he asked of Christ, because his heart could thus speak, _Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldst come under my roof, speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed_. He that has _this sense_ of himself, and _this faith_ in God, is in the truth of religion: if we knew the goodness of this state, we should be always content with the simplicity of it, and let every thing else come and go, as it would; all is well and safe so long as the heart rests all upon God alone. I do not wonder that the audience of Mr. ―――― is so much increased, since he has preached the doctrine of regeneration among them. All other preaching passes away as a tale that is told, and indeed is nothing better, till it enters into the things within man, brings him to a sensibility of the state of his heart, and its want of God’s Holy Spirit therein. * * * * * LETTER VI. To Mr. _J. T._ _My dear worthy Friend_, YOUR letter, though full of complaints about the state of your heart, was very much according to my mind, and gives me great hopes that God will carry on the good work he has begun in you, and lead you by his Holy Spirit through all those difficulties, under which you at present labour. The desire that you have to be better than you find yourself at present, is God’s call, and will make itself to be more heard within you, if you give but way to it, and reverence it as such, humbly believing that he that calls, will, and only can help you to pay right and full obedience to it. You seem to yourself to be all _infatuation and stupidity_, because your head and your heart are so contrary, the one delighting in heavenly notions, the other governed by earthly passions and pursuits. It is happy for you, that you know and acknowledge this: for only through this truth, through the full and deep perception of it, can you have any entrance, or so much as the beginning of an entrance into the liberty of the children of God. God is in this respect dealing with you, as he does with those, whose darkness is to be changed into light. Which can never be done, till you fully know 1. the real badness of your own heart, and 2. your utter inability to deliver yourself from it, by any sense or power of your own.