Esteem and earnestly seek salvation

You must believe with a full persuasion that you are a child of wrath by nature,
as well as others,
fallen from God by the sin of the first Adam;

dead in trespasses and sins,
subject to the curse of the law of God,
and to the power of Satan, and to insupportable misery to all eternity;

and that you cannot possibly procure your reconciliation with God,
or any spiritual life and strength to do any good work,
by any endeavouring to get salvation according to the terms of the legal covenant;

and that you cannot find any way to escape out of this sinful and miserable condition by your own reason and understanding,
without supernatural revelation,
nor be freed from it,
except by that infinite power that raises the dead.

We must not be afraid, as some are, to know our own vileness and sinfulness,
neither must we be willing to think ourselves better than we are,
but must be heartily desirous and glad to know the worst of our own condition;

yea, when we have found out the worst that we can of ourselves,
we must be willing to believe that our hearts are deceitful,
and desperately wicked,
beyond all that we can know and find out (Jer. 17:9).

This is all necessary to work in us true humiliation,
self-despair and self-loathing,
that we may highly esteem,
and earnestly seek the salvation of Christ as the one thing necessary.

It makes us sick of sin,
and sensible of our need of the great Physician,
and willing to be ordered according to any of His prescriptions,
whatever we suffer,
rather than to follow our own wisdom (Matt. 9:12).

Walter Marshall, The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification
(line breaks mine)