SERM. through the restraints from finful courfes I. which providence had laid them under; for

thus the fcripture teacheth, and our own experience confirmeth it; they are then suffered to walk in their own counfels, which is the true meaning of the fcripture expreffions referred to concerning wicked men, who are permitted to go ftill further on in their evil ways, and abandoned to the hardnefs of their hearts. But for the general tenor of the divine administration towards men, it defignedly favoureth their escape from temptations, and directeth them to the paths of virtue, if they had wisdom to obferve it; and, especially, the fcripture affureth us, that the conduct of providence towards chriftians, is quite contrary to tempting them; it tendeth to fupport them against temptation, and to enable them to overcome it; 1 Cor. x. 13. There hath no temptation taken you but fuch as is common to men, and therefore refistible by human ftrength, so kind hath providence been; but depend always for the future on God's care, for he is. faithful, and will not fuffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; not only he will not tempt you himself, but not fuffer others to tempt you above your abilities; and will, with the temptation, which he permitteth,

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make a way for escape, fo that you may be SER M. able to bear it. I have now endeavoured to confirm the apostle's affertion in my text, that God, who is not himself tempted with evil, infinitely pure, perfectly averse to every kind and degree of moral turpitude, and above the poffibility of being drawn into it, doth not tempt any man; on the contrary, that the tendency of all his works and ways towards mankind, in the conftitution of the human nature, in the difpofitions of provi dence, and the gofpel grace, is to preserve them from evil, and to rescue them when fallen into it; to recover degenerate and corrupted mankind to integrity, to lead them in the way of righteousness and virtue, to the perfection of it, as the proper end of their being, and their highest happiness.

The next obfervation relateth to the ne ceffity and importance of this doctrine : The apostle delivereth it as a point he layeth great stress upon; Let no may fay, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; let every christian be always aware of the evil tendency of fuch a furmife, and take heed that he doth not entertain it. And having, to establish us in this belief, traced our fins and temptations to their true fpring, and given an account of them quite different VOL. IV.

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from

SERM. from their being originally from God, nameI. ly, that they take their rife from the lufts

of the heart, the conception whereof introduceth fin, which, when it is finished by the confent of the mind, endeth in death; the apostle, I fay, then repeateth an earnest caution against this error, fo folicitous he was to preferve chriftians from it, ver. 16. Do not err, my beloved brethren, that is, by imputing, in any manner or degree, your fins or temptations to God; in oppofition to which he declareth, ver. 17. every good and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variableness, neither Shadow of turning. All the moral capacities and affections of our nature, and all the gifts of grace, are from the eternal Father, the pure fountain of intellectual light and happiness, who cannot be fo inconfiftent with himself, as to be the author of darkness, fin, and mifery; for there is no fhadow of turning with him, there is really no poffibility, and we ought never to imagine an appearance of his turning from good to evil.

The neceffity and importance of this doctrine may be further illuftrated by confidering, on the one hand, the danger of men's falling into oppofite fentiments or prefump

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tions in their minds, which have a very bad SERM tendency; and on the other hand, the great advantage to the ends of religion which will arife from an inviolable adherence, and a careful attention to it. Some, indeed, to fhun the dangerous mistake of imputing fin and temptation to God as in any refpect its cause, have run into the oppofite equally abfurd extreme of withdrawing moral evil altogether from under God's government of the world, and deriving it from an original independent evil principle; which scheme, as it destroyeth the true notion of vice (consequently of virtue) reprefenting it not as the voluntary act of imperfect intelligent beings, but as flowing from an independent neces fity of nature; fo, under a pretence of respect to the goodness of God, which at the fame time it rendereth infufficient, it denieth his fupreme power and univerfal dominion. The generality of chriftians, owning the unity of God, do alfo acknowledge his perfect purity and goodness, and in words, at least, deny him to be the author of fin; but I am afraid the opinions received among some of them, are not perfectly confiftent with these true principles, and that in their confequences, at leaft, they tend to the errors against which the apoftle here warneth us. C 2

For

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SERM. For inftance, to reprefent the nature of mer as fo corrupted, without any perfonal fault of theirs (of which original depravity, therefore, fuppofed to be conveyed with our very being, a man's confcience cannot accufe him) that they are under a fatal neceffity of finning, and that it is utterly impoffible for them to do any thing which is good. What thoughts can a man have of this, but that it is the appointed condition of his being, to be refolved ultimately into the will of his maker, just like the fhortness of his underftanding, the imperfection of his fenfes, or even the frailty of his body? These latter fort of infirmities may very well be attributed to God as the author of them, without any dishonourable imputation, but criminal weakneffes, guilt imputed, to which men were no way confenting, and fin fo infeparably cleaving to their nature, as to be their very constitution, and utterly unavoidable; this, I doubt, cannot be accounted for without giving men fome handle to fay they are tempted of God; nor doth the difficulty feem to be folved, and the divine purity and goodness upon this principle vindicated by the hypothefis of an original offence, in which no man, who was not then in being, can think he had any participation.

The