The favour of God is abfolutely and divinely free. Yet the facred writers every where recommend the use of proper means, to those who defire to flee from the wrath to come. Enter ye in at the ftrait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to deftruction, and many there be which go in thereat. Becaufe ftrait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanfe your hands, ye finners; and purify your hearts ye double-minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning,

and

like the country-man mentioned by the poet, who, being unable to ford the river, took up a resolution to wait on the banks, till the ftream had all run by

At ille

Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis ævum.

Vain man, defift; fuch flatt'ring hopes forego:
It flows, and flows, and will for ever flow.

Ifrael, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteoufnefs. Wherefore? OTI ON EN TIGEWS, because they fought it not in the way of faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they ftumbled at that ftumbling ftone." Rom. ix. 31, 32.

and your joy to heavinefs. Humble yourselves in the fight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up."

Then proftrate fall

Before him reverent, and there confefs

Humbly your faults, and pardon beg, with tears
Watʼring the ground, and with your fighs the air
Frequenting, fent from hearts contrite, in fign
Of forrow' unfeign'd, and humiliation meek.

MILTON.

Let me, in the first place, recommend unto you felf-reflection, as neceffary, in order to come to a juft knowledge of your ftate. Seriously commune with your own heart, and think on your ways. To this exercisé finners in general are extremely reluctant, and therefore they go on in fecurity, without any prevailing concern about their eternal interefts. They are like a man in a ftate of intoxication, who fcarcely knows what he does, and who never reflects on the malignity of his actions, or the dangers to which he expofes himself. Without ferious confideration, there is, humanly fpeaking, no hope of a found converfion. “I thought on my ways, and turned my feet to thy teftimonies; I made hafte, and delayed not to keep thy commandments."** When the Pfalmift predicts the converfion of the Gentile nations, he fays, "All the ends of the earth fhall remember and turn unto

the Lord." They fhall recollect the actions of their past lives, they fhall call to mind their own evil ways; they shall confider their state, as finners against God, and ask themselves, what they are doing, whither their courfes tend, and what will become of them to all eternity. They have perhaps till this hour been wholly inattentive to these things. They have forgotten God their Maker, forgotten what ought to have been their principal business in this world, and for what purpose they were brought on the stage of existence. Before this period of reflection and ferious confideration, men in feeing fee not, in hearing they hear not, neither do they underftand, and therefore God's firft work upon their hearts is to awaken and rouse them from their fecurity; "Awake, thou that fleepeft, and arife from the dead, and Chrift fhall give thee light." The prodigal first came to himself, and then said, "I will arife, and go to my father." The Almighty's addrefs to our first parent after the fall was, Adam, where art thou?" This is the general method he is pleased to take with those whom he brings to repentance.

66

remember, and turn unto the Lord."

66

They fhall

Let me then entreat you to ask yourselves these ferious queftions, Am I in a flate of acceptance with God, or have I lived till this hour as one

alienated from him? The fpecial favour of the Maker of the univerfe is not enjoyed by every man. I myself, by nature, am a child of wrath; but have I experienced a change from nature to grace? Am I in a converted state? Do I bring forth fruits meet for repentance? What evidence can I produce of my being interested in God's pardoning love? I am commanded to examine myself, whether I be in the faith, and to prove my own felf, whether Jefus Chrift be in me, by the renewing operations of his Holy Spirit. To be at uncertainties in a matter of such moment is dangerous; and it would be still more awful to deceive myself, and to think myself something when I am nothing.

If I am not in a state of friendship with God, my condition is awfully dangerous, and should I continue in it, furely it had been better I had never been born. For if I fhould die in fuch a state, I must be miferable for ever; and how do I know but this night my foul may be required of me? Even in this life, if I am not reconciled to God, woe is me; for his righteous law condemns me, and his wrath abideth on me. The condition of the meanest brute, or of the vileft reptile, is preferable to mine, for they have never offended their Maker, or provoked him to anger; but he is "angry with the wicked every day." In such a cafe,

*pur 4.4.

how is it poffible for a man to be happy, either in this world or the next!

'But what is the procuring caufe of God's difpleasure? What are the grounds of the quarrel betwixt him and his creatures? Whence came this distance between him and my poor foul? Surely there must be a caufe. That God, whose creature I am, and with whom I have to do, is so holy, so juft and righteous, that he cannot but hate fin, that evil thing by which I am defiled. It belongs to the perfection of his nature to be displeased with it. I read in his facred word, that he is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and that he cannot look on iniquity. Let me confider this. When it is faid that he cannot look on iniquity, it must fignify the most inconceivable deteftation of it. He cannot connive at it, he cannot fpare it; because to do fo would be contrary to the holinefs of his nature. He can do every thing which is not contrary to himself, to the effential properties of his nature; but I may be fully affured, that he can do nothing which is contrary to his truth, his holiness, or his righteousness; nothing inconfiftent with these his adorable perfections.

Is it not on this ground, that the purity of God is sometimes expreffed by jealoufy? For the nature of jealousy is not to spare. Nothing but the executing of vengeance will fatisfy it. Is not this

what