Christians, put on, press towards the mark, be adding to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge. See that you grow extensively, being abundant in all sorts of good works. Be pitiful, be courteous, gentle, easy to be intreated. Be slow to anger, soon reconciled. Be patient, be temperate, be chearful. Study not every one only his own things, but also the good of his neighbour. Think it not enough to look to your own souls but watch for the souls of others. Pray for them, warn them, be kind to them, study to oblige them, that by any means you may win them, and gain your souls. Labour to grow intensively, to do better the things that you did before, to be more fervent in prayer, more free and willing in all the ways of the Lord, to hear with more profit, to examine yourselves more thoroughly, to mind heaven more frequently. I commend myself to your prayers, and you to the grace of God, remaining _Your’s in the Lord Jesus_, JOS. ALLEINE. _Dorchester_, July 7, 1663. LETTER XIX. [The character and privileges of true believers.] _To the most beloved people, the servants of God in |Taunton|, grace and peace._ _Most dearly beloved_, I REJOICE to hear of God’s continual goodness towards you; he is your shepherd, and therefore it is that you do not want. Me you have not always, but he is ever with you; his rod and his staff shall comfort you. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow you all your days, and you shall dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. In this my dear brethren, rejoice, that God is engaged in so near and so sweet a relation to you. Doubtless your souls shall lodge in goodness, and be provided for carefully, that have the Almighty for your shepherd. Blessed are the flock of his hands, and the sheep of his pasture; happy are the people that are in such a case. But who are Christ’s sheep? Not all professors. I beseech you to take heed how you rest in profession. It is not _profession_, but _conversion_ that turns a man from a swine to a sheep. Let none of you flatter yourselves, that because you have escaped the gross pollutions of the world, therefore you are among the number of Christ’s sheep. All this you may attain to, and yet be but washed swine; there must be an inward, deep, thorough, universal change upon your natures, dispositions, inclinations, or else you are not Christ’s sheep.