pleased to dwell by his holy Spirit. Ye are the Temple of the Living God, as God hath said I will dewll in them, and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my People, 2. Cor. 6.16. Was not this Christs Prayer in our behalf? I pray not for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be one, as thou Father art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me, I in them, and thou in me, that they may be per∣fect in one, and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me. By reason of this hypostatical union of Christ, the Spirit of Christ is given to us in the very moment of our regeneration. And because ye are Sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying Abba Father; and hereby we know that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit. As the members of the Body howsoever distinct amongst themselves, and all differing from the head, yet by reason of one soul informing both the head and members, they all make one compositum, or man; so all believers in Christ, howsoever distinct Persons amongst themselves, and all distinct from the Person of Christ, and especially from the Godhead which is incommunicable, yet by one and the same spirit abiding in Christ, and all his Members, they become one, there is one body, and one spirit: he that is joyned to the Lord, is one Spirit. O my Soul, consider of this; and in considering, believe thy part in this, and the rather, because the means of this union on thy part is a true and lively faith; faith is the first effect and instrument of the Spirit of Christ, disposing and enabling thy soul to cleave unto Christ, and for this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ —that Christ may dwell in your hearts by Faith.
6. Consider the birth of Christ, this man-God, God-man, who in his divine gene∣ration was the Son of God, in his humane generation was born in a stable, for the saving of the Children of men, who were as the oxe and mule having no understanding. It were a fruitful meditation to consider over and over that sweet resemblance of Christ being a Vine; me-thinks I hear the Voice of my beloved, rise up my love—the fig-tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vine with the tender grapes gives a good smell; arise my love, my fair one, and come away; if Christ knocks at the door, who will not awake, and arise? if Christ comes in view, who will not look unto Jesus? if Christ the Vine calls us to come see the vine with the tender grape, who will not taste the good∣ness, smell the sweetness? and after a little taste of that goodness, and sweetness that is in him, who would not long after more, till we come from the first fruits to the last-fruits of the Spirit, even to those visions and fruitions of Christ in Glory? Con∣sider, O my soul, of this Vine, till thou hast brought Christ near and close unto thy self. Suppose thy heart, the Garden wherein this Vine was planted, wherein it budded, blossomed, and bare fruit, suppose the holy Ghost to come upon thee, and to form and fashion in thee Jesus Christ; (thus Paul bespeaks the Galathians, my little Children, of whom I travel in Birth again untill Christ be formed in you,) would not this affect? would not the whole soul be taken up with this? come, receive Christ into thy soul, or if that work be done, if Christ be formed in thee, O Cherish him! (I speak of the Spiritual birth) O keep him in thy heart! let him there bud, and blossome, and bear fruit; let him fill thy soul, with his Divine Graces; O that thou couldst say it feelingly, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: O that this were the Issue of thy meditation on Christs Birth! even whiles thou art going with the shepherds to Bethelem, and there findest thy Saviour lying in a Cratch, that thou wouldst bring him thence, and make thy heart to be his Cradle! I would not give a farthing for a meditation meerly on the History of Christ's Birth; either draw vertue from him, by feeling him within, or thy meditation will be fruitless.—
7. Consider those few consequents after Christs Birth; every action of Christ is our instruction; here are many particulars, but none in vain; Christ is considered under much variety of notion, but he is still sweet under all. Is it possible, O my soul, that thou shouldst tyre thy self in the contemplations of Jesus Christ? if one flower yield thee not pleasure, or delight, go to a second, a third; observe how the Bees gather honey, after a while that they have sucked one flower, they go to another; so for a while observe the circumcision of Jesus Christ, and suck there, and gather some honey out of that flower; Christ had never been, Circumcised but that the same might be done to our souls, that was done to his Body, O that the same Christ would do that in us, that was done to him for us. Again, observe Christs presentation in the Temple, this was the Law of those that first opened the womb; now Christ was the first∣born