you. Give them timely instructions and warnings. Moderate your natural affection for them as children; but increase your religious concern for them as immortal beings, who are to exist in another world, and who, while they are here, must be trained up for a happy existence. Commend them to the providence and grace of God in your daily prayers, encourage every virtuous appearance, check every evil propensity, and animate them in the religious life by exhibiting the amiableness of it in your own.

Let us all stand prepared for the changes of this mortal state. The most of us can say, "Our houses are in peace, our children are about us, the candle of the Lord shines on our heads, and there is no rod of God on our dwelling." But soon the scene may be shifted; we cannot tell what shall be on the morrow; what tidings the next hour may bring. Death may now stand unseen at our door, with a warrant to arrest some of our number. Soon our pleasure may be turned into anguish, our joy into mourning. Let our hearts be fixed, trusting in the Lord, that we may not be afraid of evil tidings.

To conclude; Awakened by the late loud and solemn admonition, let us immediately prepare for our departure hence, and for the changes, which await us while we are here. For this purpose we must make religion our employment, heaven our object, and God's word our rule of conduct. We must walk by faith in unseen things, secure an interest in the promises, cast our cares on the providence of God, and commit our souls to him in well-doing, as to a faithful Creator. Keeping heaven in our eye, let us move on toward it with a steady pace, accounting all the sufferings of the present time unworthy to be compared with the glory, which shall be revealed. And let us esteem nothing dear to us, that so we may finish our course with joy, and lay hold on eternal life.^

SERMON XXXII.

Unworthy Guests excluded from the Marriage
Feast.

A COMMUNION SERMON.

LUKE, xiv. 24.

that none of those men, which were bidden, shall taste of my supper.

THESE

HESE words are the conclusion of the well known parable of the marriage feast. It is thus introduced, "A certain man made a great supper and bade many." The introduction in St. Matthew's relation of it, is a little varied; "The king. dom of heaven is like unto a certain king, who made a marriage for his son."

It was common among the Jews, and other ancient nations, for rich and great men to make feasts for the entertainment of such as they chose to honThe guests invited were usually their friends and favorites. At these feasts were provided all accommodations, which were necessary to render the conviviality delightful. There were garments to ar

our.

ray the attendants in a manner suitable to the occasion; water to wash their hands and feet; food to regale the appetite and please the taste; wine to exhilarate the spirits; musick to charm the ear; and subjects of discourse to amuse or instruct the mind. Hence the Jews were accustomed to contemplate the felicities of good men in a future state, under the notion of a sumptuous entertainment. In conformity to their usages and language, our Saviour illustrates his heavenly dispensation by the allegory of a feast, which a king made on occasion of his son's marriage. The great supper in the parable represents the blessings of the gospel; such as the forgiveness of sins, the influences of the holy Spirit, communion with God, and the joys and glories of heaven.

Under the Jewish dispensation, there were several annual festivities divinely instituted for moral and religious purposes. The gospel dispensation, which is more plain and simple, conveys religious sentiments less by emblems and figures, and more by direct instructions. It contains only one festivity, and this, like the gospel itself, simple in its form, obvious in its design, and easy in its application In this we eat bread and drink wine in remembrance of Christ: Thus we shew forth his death, and recognize his resurrection, with the glorious benefits resulting from them. It is not our coming to, and partaking of this ordinance; but it is the faith, repentance, love and obedience professed in the outward action, which entitle us to the spiritual blessings.

The supper mentioned in the parable is not the ordinance now called the Lord's supper; for this was not then instituted. The metaphorical supper, however, has much the same intention as the literal supper. Both denote the blessings of divine grace, and the manner in which we may become interested in them. We are to come to the literal supper with the same views and tempers, with

which the guests in the parable were to come to the marriage feast. We are to come with prompt obedience and cordial affection to the king, and with friendly and charitable dispositions to our fellow guests.

The king says to his servant in the text, "None of those men, who were bidden, shall taste of my supper." To understand this denunciation, we must recur to the parable. The king had already sent his invitation to a number of wealthy people to come and sup with him; and at supper time, he ordered a servant to go and tell them who were bidden, that the supper was prepared, and they must come immediately. But they all with one consent made excuse, alledging, that their worldy engagements and domestic connexions were such, that they could not attend on the feast without great inconvenience. On one pretext and another, they rejected the invitation. The king, being informed, how his liberality had been treated, sent his servant among a different class of people; among the poor, maimed and blind in the streets and lanes of the city, in the hedges of the fields, and in the highways of the country, with positive instructions to call as many as he could find, and compel them to come in, that his house might be filled; "for," said he, "None of those men, who have been bidden," who have heard and refused the former invi tation, "shall taste of my supper." This declaration respects not the poor and maimed, who were next to be bidden, but the rich worldlings who had before been bidden, once and again, and bidden in vain.

They who symbolize with the characters described in the former part of the parable, are the men, who will be excluded from the blessings of the gospel, represented in the great supper. It is important, then, that we attend to our own characters,

"

and examine our claim to these inestimable bless ings.

One said to the messenger, who called him, "I have bought a piece of ground, and I must needs go and see it; I pray thee have me excused." A. nother said, "I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to prove them; I pray thee have me excused." A third said, "I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come." Is it a fault, then, to buy a farm, and to see it after it is bought? Or to purchase oxen for one's husbandry, and to prove whether they will answer the design? Or to form family relations, and attend to the duties of those relations? By no means. But the fault of these men lay in placing their affections so entirely on earthly objects, as to neglect their future and eternal interest, and despise the means of securing it. The interests of the present and the future world are so diverse, that without a heart weaned from the former, we are not capable of possessing and enjoying the latter. "We cannot serve God and mammon; if we hold to the one, we shall despise the other.”

Weanedness from this world consists not in total indifference, but in rational moderation. While we dwell in the body, we ought to regard the things needful for the body, and to seek them with prudent and honest industry. But to the blessings, with which our future and eternal felicity is connected, we must give a preference in some measure proportionable to their superior importance. In order to our giving them this decided preference, our minds must be assimilated to them. We must not only appreciate them in our judgment and commend them in our language, but also love and relish them in our hearts. If we have this holy and heavenly temper formed in us, we shall not neglect our spiritual in order to advance our secu lar interest; but we shall seek first the kingdom of