William Jay

“A dislike of death is no proof of the want of religion. The instincts of nature shrink from it, for no creature can like its own dissolution. But though death is not desired, the result of it may be, for dying to the Christian is the way to life eternal.”

“So necessary is it not only that we should be what we appear, but appear what we are.”

“God works by means; and it is by his people that he principally carries on his cause in the world. They are his witnesses. They are his servants. He first makes them the subjects of his grace, and then the mediums. He first turns them from rebels into friends, and then employs them to go and beseech others to be reconciled unto God. For they know the wretchedness of a state of alienation from him. They know the blessedness of a return. They have "tasted that the Lord is gracious." Their own experience gives them earnestness and confidence in saying to those around them, "O taste, and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.”

“Half the pleasure of solitude comes from having with us some friend to whom we can say how sweet solitude is.”