PREFACE.

IT is acknowledged on all hands that one

method of conveying religious and moral instruction is by example. This is a medium of diffeminating truth, and extending the influence of virtue, which is accommodated to every capacity, and adapted in a peculiar manner to meet the feelings of mankir Examples, drawn justly, exhibit the deformity of vice, and the beauty of virtue; not with the languor of mere fpeculation, but with the energy of ftriking fact, in which the legitimate effect of fentiment is feen. The example furnished in the following pages is that of ftrict and almoft unvarying piety. The christian life of Mr. Brainerd, though fhort, was lovely. It was such as has ftrikingly adorned the doctrine of God our Saviour, and, as delineated in this volume, prefents the most falutary inftruction to all defcriptions of men. It is removed from oftentatious seeming zeal on the one hand, and a stupid inaction on the other; from enthusiasm, and formality. Here we

may fee the leading fentiments of the gofpel, having their genuine influence on the heart, and reduced to a uniform practice; the real spirit of christianity ftripped of all difguife, and forming an obvious contraft to the barren indevout lives of thoufands of profeffors. Mr. Brainerd was a christian, not in name only; but in reality, in life, in the progreffive ardour of true godliness. His religion was fupernatural, and experimental; founded in holy love, conftituting a bond of union to God, embracing all the interests of his government, and refembling his pure nature. It was not the mere decency of a reformed life, the popular goodness of the present day. It reached the heart, and formed the character of the whole man. It did not confift in a being profelyted to one party or the other, but in a cordial, unconditional, perfevering devotedness to God through the grace which is by Jefus Chrift. Since inftances of equal piety are rare, especially at the prefent day, it is happy for the cause of religion that fuch a life has been preserved from oblivion, and that, through the medium of the prefs, it may be fpread abroad, as an object of refreshing contemplation to God's people, and as a fource of restraint and conviction to finners. The Life of Mr.

Brainerd, prefented to the public by Prefident Edwards, of which the following, excepting fome few retrenchments, is an exact copy, has always been read with pleasure and improvement by the friends of pure christianity. And the editor can. not but flatter himself, that, under the bleffing of God, the prefent edition may have its utility, in the fecurity of the fame great objects, the conviction of finners, and the edification and confolation of fome, at least, of the children of Zion. The authenticity of what is exhibited in the Life and Journal of Mr. Brainerd, can admit of no doubt; fince the former was published by a gentleman whose reputation for learning, integrity, and universal piety, is established even beyond the cavils of impiety itself, and was compiled by him chiefly from Mr. Brainerd's own Diary; and fince the latter was written by Mr. Brainerd's own hand, was attested by several reputable minifters of the gospel, and was published under the fanction and patronage of the Society for propagating, Christian Knowledge in Scotland. With respect to the retrenchments which have been made the editor has exercised his best judgment. Nothing, in fact, has been fuppreffed which was of importance to an impartial difplay of Mr. Brainerd's

character; nothing but what had either been repeatedly faid before, or was local, or referred to circumftances in which the reader cannot be interested. The object of the retrenchments was merely to exclude what was fuperfluous, without concealing a fingle trait of character, or a fingle fentiment; to reduce, in fhort, all that was confiderably valuable within a fmaller compass. Whatever opinion the critical reader may have of this alteration; whether he may think it an amendment or differvice, the editor is confident, that the volume, as it is now prefented, will be deemed by all the friends of experimental religion as a valuable poffefhion. If we have a tafte for moral beauty, if we love what conftitutes the glory of God himself, we fhall find fatisfaction in perufing the following pages. May we find fpiritual improvement alfo. May we be prompted, in imitation of this eminent fervant of God, to gird up the loins of our minds, to make an habitual confecration of ourselves to the will and fervice of God, and like him find, in our own progreffive experience, that the ways of wisdom are ways of pleafantnefs, and that all her paths are peace. The ferious reader will unavoidably make an estimate of his own fpiritual flate, in a comparison