Feb 23: As often times before so on this day did I especially desire of god to discover and hint to my soul, what is the aim of the god of heaven more especially in this correction of his upon me; and when I had seriously considered my heart, and ways, and compared them with the affliction and sought unto god: my thoughts often fixed on these particulars:
Whereas I have given my mind to unseasonable playing at chess, now it run in my thoughts in my illness as if I had been at chess, I shall be very sparing in the use of that recreation and that at more convenient seasons
whereas I have walked with much vanity in my thoughts and resolved against it and had served divers lusts too much in thought, and in actions, whereas both body and soul should be the lords who has called me to holiness, god has taken away a son :
I hope the lord will keep my feet in uprightness that I may walk always with him, and I trust it shall be my endeavour more than ever
and also that I should be more careful of my family to instruct them in the theory of god, that they may live in his sight and be serviceable to his glory. This day was the fast, I was neither provided in meditations, nor does not well if I had, have ventured abroad, and so I preached not this day, the lord in mercy accept me, and pardon this in me, and not impute it to me, when Aarons sons died he forbore to offer sacrifice the next time, my strength I promise in thy service by thy grace, I endeavoured to spend the day religiously in my family wherein god was good and merciful to me.