may nick us with a convenient temptation; and that which gives their temptations a vast advantage over us is, that we know not how to distinguish them from the motions of our own hearts: for could we see the Devil at our elbows, or hear him whispering at our ears, every time he insinuates his wicked suggestions into our minds, we should doubtless reject them with an unspeakable horror; but because when they are conveyed into us, we know not how to distinguish them from the natural births of our own minds; therefore we do make no scruple to hug and dandle them in our thoughts, and entertain them with an actual complaisance. And when the Devil can convey his poison into us in such an invisible manner, without discovering his devil's face; when he can thus prompt us behind the curtain, and so disguise his whispers, that we cannot discern them from the secret lustings of our own hearts; how can we be safe, without great care and watchfulness, from the malice of such a formidable enemy? But,

6thly, We are also liable to fall into a sinful state, and from thence into eternal misery, from the plausible pretences we are furnished with to excuse and justify our compliance with them. When by our own folly and the Devil's malice we are actually betrayed into any wilful sin, a speedy repentance would recover us immediately, and heal the wound as soon as it is made; but instead of that, we have a thousand plausible excuses to palliate and skin it over: but, alas! in the mean time it rots inwardly, and is festering apace into an incurable gangrene. For when our conscience begins to fly in our faces, we have no other way but either presently to repent of, or to ex

cuse and cloke our wickedness; the latter of which is usually pitched on, as being both the most easy and the most agreeable with our corrupt inclinations. And indeed there are so many coverts which men have found out for their lusts, to shelter them from the persecutions of their consciences, that this way there are no men can be long to seek; for either they may blanch them over with an innocent name, and call their intemperances good-fellowship, their knaveries ingenious fetches, and their incontinencies tricks of wit; or else they may extenuate and mince them into peccadillos, and smoothe over their grossest rebellions with the softer name of human failings and infirmities; or else they may furnish themselves with some show of argument to vindicate their vices, and assert them lawful, as some of late have done in the case of fornication and uncleanness; or else they may set up for philosophical sinners, and quote texts out of their gospel, the Leviathan, against the eternal differences of good and evil. But if their consciences will not be put off with such poor pretences as these, there are religious pretences enough in the world to protect and give countenance to all their impieties; and they may either fly to the Romish doctrines of confession and penance, of venial sins, and of probable opinions, with any one of which they may easily reconcile their lusts and consciences: or if they chance to have an antipathy to the name of Roman catholic, they may furnish themselves with such doctrines out of some of our modern enthusiasts, as will be as favourable to their lusts as they need, or wish, or desire; that will consecrate their irregular passions into signs of grace, and dwindle their grossest crimes into the sports of God's people;

that will exalt a mechanic train of fancies and passions into a sincere conversion, and improve an hysterical fit into a spiritual experience. By these and such like ways may men easily excuse their vices to their consciences; and when they are furnished with so many expedients, whereby to enable themselves to sin on quietly, in how much danger are they of falling fast asleep in the midst of their guilts, and never waking again, till they flame out about their ears into everlasting burnings! For whereas this faculty of conscience was implanted within us by the Author of our natures, to be a guard to our innocence and a scourge to our lusts, the generality of men have invented so many tricks to shift and evade it, that it is become almost totally useless to them. And when they have thus disabled their consciences from defending them against the importunities of their lusts, in what unspeakable danger must they be, not only of falling into, but continuing in them, till they have utterly ruined and destroyed them!

7thly, and lastly, We are also liable to fall into a sinful state, and from thence into eternal misery, from the extreme difficulty, which this our compliance with those temptations brings us. under, to reject and vanquish them for the future. For every new compliance with temptations to evil foments and enrages our evil inclinations, and when once these evil inclinations are by our customary compliances educated into sinful habits, it will be impossible for us, without a mighty assistance of divine grace, to vanquish and subdue them. So that as upon the former accounts we are in extreme danger of falling into sinful courses, upon this account we are in no less danger of continuing in them. For by complying with

this temptation, I shall very much disable myself from withstanding the next; and if I yield to that too, the third will find me much more ready and tractable; and so on, till at last the temptation grows first familiar, and then natural to me, and then it will be hard, and then harder, and then almost impossible to reject or deny it. And when things are reduced to this issue, that my sin is naturalized to me, and grown into an inveterate habit, the Lord have mercy upon me! for now I am in the suburbs of hell, but one remove from the state of the damned, and am so far gone in a confirmed state of impiety, that I have almost lost my liberty of returning; and unless I am speedily rescued by some miracle of grace, it is morally impossible I should ever escape. Thus

as we go on from one degree of wickedness to another, we do as it were break down the bridge behind us, and do what in us lies to disappoint ourselves of all hopes of any future retreat. For every step forwards in our sinful progress renders our return more difficult; and when once we have proceeded into a custom and habit of sin, we shall find repentance so irksome to us, and so much against the grain of our nature, that it is a thousand to one but that the difficulty of it will utterly dishearten us from attempting it; and so, rather than take so much pains, as we must necessarily do in swimming against the impetuous stream of our natures, we shall tamely yield to it, and suffer ourselves to be borne down by it into the dead sea of endless misery. When therefore there are so many causes conspiring together to betray us into sinful courses, and when there are so many difficulties, when once we are in, to oppose and hinder our retreat, what eminent danger are we in

of falling into and persevering in sin to our everlasting ruin! And thus you see how extremely liable we are upon all these accounts to be lost for ever; that is, to plunge ourselves into all those endless miseries which the loss of our souls implies.

What then remains, but that being seriously affected with the sense of our danger, we presently awake out of our security, and, with the deepest concern for our immortal souls, cry out with St. Peter's auditors, Men and brethren, what shall we do to be saved? Verily, when I reflect upon the strange unconcernedness of men about their future condition, I am tempted to think, either that they do not believe that they have an immortal soul in them, or that if they do, they believe it is impossible it should for ever miscarry. For how is it conceivable, that men, who in other matters are so solicitous when their interest is at stake, and exposed to the least hazard, should believe that they have souls in danger of perishing for ever, and yet take no more care or regard of them, but (like the forgetful mother, who, when her house was on fire, to save her goods forgot her child) lay out all their thoughts upon the little concerns of this frail and mortal life, and in the mean time forget their precious souls, and leave them perishing in the flames of perdition? O stupid creature! what art thou made of, that canst consider that thou hast an immortal soul surrounded with so many dangers of being lost for ever, and yet be no more concerned for its preservation! Methinks if thou hadst any sense in thee, having a prospect of such endless miseries before thee, the remotest possibility of falling into them should be enough to startle and awake thee; but when thou art so near the