I
refer to Jeremy Taylor's _Holy Living and Dying_. Take two or three of
Taylor's excellent rules with you as you go down from God's house
to-night. 'If you would really live a holy life and die a holy death,'
says Taylor, 'learn to reflect in your every action on your secret end in
it; consider with yourself why you do it, and what you propound to
yourself for your reward. Pray importunately that all your purposes and
all your motives may be sanctified. Renew and rekindle your purest
purposes by such ejaculations as these: "Not unto us, O God, not unto us,
but to Thy name be all the praise. I am in this Thy servant; let all the
gain be Thine." In great and eminent actions let there be a special and
peculiar act of resignation or oblation made to God; and in smaller and
more frequent actions fail not to secure a pious habitual intention.' And
so on. And above all, I will add, labour and pray till you feel in your
heart that you love God with a supreme and an ever-growing love. And,
far as that may be above you as yet, impress your heart with the
assurance that such a love is possible to you also, and that you can
never be safe or happy till you attain to that love.
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