MEMOIR MARTHA C. THOMAS, LATE OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND. N PHILADELPHIA: JOSEPH & WILLIAM KITE, PRINTERS. C8348.282.10 HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY GIFT OF FRIENDS HISTORICAL LIBRARY E ་ INTRODUCTION. THE following brief Memoir is published in the hope that it may prove the means of awakening, in the minds of its readers, availing desires after that blessedness, of which, through the mercy of God in Christ Jesus, the subject of it was happily made a partaker. It adds another to the multitude of instances already furnished, that "it is not by works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy, he saveth us, by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly, through Jesus Christ, our Saviour; that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life." If an amiable and lovely disposition, joined to a circumspect and innocent life, could afford hope on a dying bed, our beloved friend, more than most others, might have realized it. But as if to prove to all that nothing short of an interest in the crucified and risen Saviour, and that conversion of heart, through the power of the Holy Spirit, which is compared to "becoming as a little child," can stand us in stead at that trying moment, it pleased her heavenly Father to give her very humbling views of the depravity of the unregenerate heart, and of the purity and holiness necessary to be experienced before she could hope for an admittance into that celestial city, where all is light and peace, and love; and where nothing that is in the least degree defiled, can ever enter. Great was the conflict of mind which ensued. Sensible that she was not prepared for the blessed society of saints and angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect, in the presence of God and the Lamb, the language of her agonized spirit was, "What must I do to be saved?" Seeing nothing in herself but sin and imperfection, without the ability to come out of this lost and undone condition, or even to preserve herself from still greater degrees of alienation from the perfection of the gospel, she was through mercy led to cast herself as a penitent sinner on Jesus, "the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world." Earnestly did she strive and pray to feel the pardoning efficacy of his precious blood, for past transgressions, and the renewings of his grace, that through the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire, the power of sin might be subdued its pollution thoroughly washed away, and all things become new and all things of God. Nor was the struggle in vain. He who gave himself for his church, and for every member of it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that it should be holy and without blemish, was graciously pleased to hear and answer her prayer. That blessed Spirit of Truth, which Christ declared should not only "convince the world of sin," but "lead his disciples into all truth," and be their teacher and comforter, was pleased to work in her heart the change she longed for; to give her a living faith, and an abiding interest in the blood of Jesus, to set her free from the law of sin and death, and translate her into the glorious liberty of the children of God. The dawning of this new creation was a |