RESOLUTION I.

I am resolved, by the grace of God, to walk by rule, and therefore think it necessary to resolve upon the rules to walk by.

AND this rather, because I perceive the want of such rules has been the occasion of all, or most of my miscarriages. For, what other reason can I assign to myself; for having trifled and slimed away so much time, as I have done in my younger years, but because I did not thoroughly resolve to spend it better? What is the reason I have hitherto lived so unserviceably to God, so unprofitably to others, and so sinfully against my own soul, but because I did not apply myself with that sincerity of resolution, diligence, and circumspection, as a wise man ought to have done, to discharge my duty in these particulars? I have, indeed, often resolved to bid adieu to my sins and follies, and to enter upon a new course of life; but these resolutions being not rightly formed upon steady principles, the first temptation made way for a relapse, and the same bait that first allured me, has no sooner been thrown in my way, but I have been as ready to catch at it again, and as greedy to swallow it, as ever. At other times again, I have acted without any thought or resolution at all; and then, though some of my actions might be good in themselves, yet being done by chance, and without any true design or intention, they could not be imputed to me as good, but rather the quite contrary: so that, in this respect, the want of resolution has not only been the occasion of my sinful actions, but 116the corruption of my good ones too. And shall I still go on in this loose and careless manner, as I have formerly done? No, I now resolve with myself, in the presence of the most high and eternal God, not only in general, to walk by rule, but to fix the rule I design to walk by; so that, in all my thoughts, and words, and actions, in all places. companies, relations, and conditions, I may still have a sure guide at hand to direct me, such a one as I can safely depend upon without any danger of being deceived or misled; that is, the holy Scripture. And therefore,