SERMON IX.

LUKE xix. 41, 42.

And when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it, saying, If thou badft known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! But now they are hid from thine eyes.

WH

HEN men are invited to purfue SERM, pleasure, or warned to fly from pain, they attend with willingness, and follow, without hefitation or reluctance, the path which may lead them to enjoyment, or bear them from diftrefs.

Little

SERM. folicitation will induce the fenfualift to

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partake of the banquet; little entreaty will draw the diffipated into the haunts of public amusement; the force of genius need not be exerted when you would perfuade mankind to shun peftilential infection; nor is it requifite to ftudy the graces of elocution, when you exhort them to fly from the uplifted fword. Yet, when Reafon would urge us to act according to the dictates of truth and justice, and Religion require us to cleanse our hearts and amend our lives, though they speak with the tongue of men and angels, their admonitions are not only disobeyed, but even frequently defpifed-.In vain may virtue call, while none will liften; in vain may Wifdom appeal to the understanding, while Folly hath obfcured the faculties of the mind; in vain may the Sun of righteousness fhine forth, while men love darkness rather than light.

This

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This obftinate refufal to hear and to SERM. reform, which is fo vifible in the greater part of mankind, appears the more abfurd, when it is remembered that Religion offers the fame recompenfe which Pleasure promifes. Happiness is held out by both, as the prize to be gained by their respective votaries. In this indeed we find a striking distinction; Pleasure affords a momentary gratification, Religion, a lasting delight. The walks of the former feem fmooth and enchanting, but are usually found to terminate in gloom and disappointment: The paths of the latter, though less attractive in their appearance, ftill increase in beauty the further they are explored, and lead to full and perfect enjoyment: Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace *.

Nor is the mifery fhe teaches us to avoid, lefs formidable, than the reward

*Ecclef. iii. 17.

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SERM. which she confers is glorious. The flighteft fense of present pain, banishes every pleafing fenfation; the dread of approaching evil, prompts us to catch at every flender reed which may fave us from the tide of calamity: But when Religion holds up to our view the picture of unending woe and deftruction, we turn impatiently away, and lose the tremendous profpect in the levities of the hour.

There is a time when this depravity, in a nation, as well as among individuals, becomes too powerful to be subdued; when the laws and inftitutions of government are openly violated or fecretly evaded, and a general perversion of principles is diffeminated through the mass of a people. This hath been commonly occafioned by that influx of wealth which fwells the mind with infolence, and that long continuance of uninterrupted profperity, which leads men to forget the many afflictions to which

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they are exposed, and the many scourges SERM. with which the univerfal and all-powerful Governor hath been compelled to vifit a rebellious and abandoned community.

Jerufalem, the great capital of Judea, was apparently in such a state at the time of our SAVIOUR. Her degenerate children had filled themselves with the various productions of a moft fruitful country; they had become covetous and hypocritical, proud and luxurious; devoted to fenfuality, or engroffed by avarice, they had neglected the institutions of religion, and the common offices of kindness and humanity.

Their great, though neglected MESSIAH, fully fenfible of their enormities, as he approached this city of opulence and vice, wept over it; His imagination painted those scenes of diftrefs and terrour which afterwards were prefented to the wretched inhabitants, when the Romans