_To the beloved people, the inhabitants of |Taunton|, grace and peace._ _Most dear friends_, MY chief joy is, that my beloved is mine and I am his. But next to that I have no joy so great as that you are mine and I am yours, and you are Christ’s. My relation to Christ is above all: he is my life and my peace, my riches and my righteousness: he is my hope and my strength, and mine inheritance, and my rejoicing: in him will I please myself for ever, and in him will I glory. I esteem myself most happy and rich, and safe in him, though of myself I am nothing. In him I may boast without pride, and glory without vanity. Here is no danger of being over-much _pleased_; neither can the Christian exceed his bounds in valuing his own riches and happiness in Christ. The Lord hath dealt bountifully with me, and none shall stop this my confidence of boasting in Christ. But as my lot in him is above all, so it is no small content to me, that my lot is fallen with you. And though I have broken my health, and lost my liberty once and again for your sakes, yet none of these things move me. I wish nothing more than to spend and to be spent upon the service of your faith. I bless the Lord for it is an invaluable mercy, that ever he called me to be an embassador of the Lord Jesus Christ to you-wards. In this station I desire to approve myself to him, and that I am withdrawn from my work for a season, it is but that I may return to you refreshed, and more enabled for my work among you. I am tender of preserving the little strength God doth add to me, entirely for your sakes. I bless the Lord I am in great tranquility here in this town, and walk up and down without any questioning me. I do by this return you my hearty thanks for your earnest prayers in my behalf, for it is God that must do the cure. I seem to be retired to this place, as a vessel rent and shattered and torn in the service, that is come to recruit in the _harbour_: And here I am as it were repairing and victualling to put forth again in the service: which I shall do as soon as I am ready. What is my life unless I am serviceable? And though I must for the present forbear my wonted labour, yet I shall not cease to exhort you while I am absent from you, to stand fast, and to grow up in your holy faith. Be warned, my beloved, that you fall not upon those rocks on which so many have been split. There are three things which I beseech you carefully to beware of.