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tive blandishments. The furer motive, I SERMON apprehend, will be found in the gofpel doctrine of a state of future retribution. "He that cometh to God, muft believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him *." As it applies to men, how beautiful a connection is here formed between motives and actions! As it applies to God, how fatisfactorily is he justified as the moral Governor of the univerfe! Convinced of this doctrine, and dreading the terrors of future vengeance, the bad man dares not draw forth the latent wickednefs of his heart. Confident that God is juft, and encouraged by invaluable rewards which he has in moft affured reverfion, the man of low degree unweariedly performs the fevereft duties of his ftation. Refting on this

SERMON faith, as on an anchor which never faileth,

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we behold on one hand the unmerited fuccefs of fome, and on the other we feel our own mifcarriages with the calm dignity of men whofe beft hopes are still unfhaken by the agitations and convulfions of this tranfitory scene. While Heaven opens to our view, and angels beckon us to its bright abodes, misfortune patiently reclines on the bofom of contentment, with eyes directed to that pure felicity, where tears no longer flow, and the forrows of the heart no longer throb. On this principle only, that the life of man ends not here, but that when he has thrown off the mortal hufk he shall stand an accountable creature at the bar of his Maker; on this principle only, that human things are to be confidered fimply as they. bear a relation to another state of just retribution, can we reconcile the innumera

ble

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ble moral difficulties with which we are SERMON furrounded in the world. Were the prefent ftate to be our "continuing city;" were this our only concern, how hard would it be for the pious mind to assure itself that God is wife, and holy, and just, and good! But confidering ourselves as probationary beings; confidering our connection with eternity; confidering God as never lofing fight of us in any period of our existence, and conducting us to an end which is concealed only by the veil of mortality, every difficulty arifing from the untoward events of this world vanishes before us; and we acknowledge, in the full confidence of faith and hope, this truth, fo often quoted and fo little understood, "Whatever is, is right."

Poffeffed of thefe ineftimable truths, let

us not, my brethren, narrow the grand

and glorious scope of the evangelical difpenfation

G4

SERMON penfation into an humble fyftem of human

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ethics; but let us receive it as the treasure of life and immortality, revealed to us" in Chrift Jefus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and fanctification, and redemption."

It has often been objected against this scheme of the Gofpel, as I have described it, that, in general, the lives of Chriftians, and the lives of unbelievers and sceptics, have no difcriminating features. We cannot but admit the fact in a very confiderable degree. We fee men who profefs not to think at all about religion, and men who profefs themselves to be Chriftians, equally engaged in the common concerns of life. They pay the fame attention to bufinefs; they are alike engaged in the hurry of pleasure and diffipation. Their Chriftianity is merely a profeffion of the lips; the Bible cannot be

faid

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faid to be the strict rule of their practice; SERMON they are conformed to this world; and they pursue its interests to the utmoft, as if they had no expectations of any thing hereafter.

It is certainly a misfortune that this is the cafe, and contrary to the fpirit of our religion; whofe power should pervade every action and every concern in this world, and fhould feparate us in our lives and converfations, as a peculiar people, from every unbeliever; from every scoffer at the Gospel, and every careless disciple of a faith, whofe energy he does not feel. This is an evil, however, derived from our confidering Chriftianity in its inferior view; merely as a moral law. If we embraced it in all its parts, like men in earneft, our lives must be holy and fpiritual. There is not a doctrine of the Gospel which does not apply to common

life.