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affectation of praise, and their behaviour SER M. when it is bestowed on them; for, as Solo- X. mon justly obferveth, Prov. xxvii. 21. As the fining pot for filver, and the furnace for gold, fo is a man to his praife: His eagerness in pursuing, and manner of receiving it, plainly enough discover the complexion of his fpirit; and an infolent behaviour towards others, endeavouring to leffen their characters, to derogate from their worth, and aggravate their failings, infulting their misfortunes and apprehended weakness, and an impatience of contradiction; these and the like obvious symptoms, inftances of felf-fufficiency and contempt of their fellows, clearly fhew the pride. of mens hearts; and contentions, animofities, wranglings, and disturbing the of focipeace eties for trifles, or matters of small moment, and merely selfish and perfonal; these are effects which must be attributed to the fame cause, for, as our author faith, Prov. xxi. 24. Proud and haughty fcorner is his name, who dealeth in proud wrath.

This pride is the first ingredient in the character of the fcorner: Another comprehensive one, which, I may fay, finisheth it, is contempt of religion and virtue. Sometimes it is the unhappy cafe of finners, but only of those who have gone on in a course

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SERM. of fin, and been long accustomed to do

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rid of thofe principles which were troublefome when believed, by reproaching their wicked practices. This they do not arrive to fuddenly; not till having often baffled confcience, and by indulging them, given fuch a power to corrupt lufts and vicious habits, that they overcome all refiftance. But it is the greatest height of impiety, and an infolent defiance of almighty God, when religion and all that is facred, even the eternal moral differences of good and evil, are made the fubjects of ridicule. There is ob

ferved, in the 1ft Pfalm, a gradation in evil. Bleed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor ftandeth in the way of finners, nor fitteth in the feat of the fcornful. It is our unhappiness to tread at all in these destructive paths; but it is still worse to be fixed and obftinate in them; and worst of all is the ftate of that Sinner, who is established in the fociety of those who have cast off all restraint, and openly deride all goodness. They are fools, Solomon faith, who make a mock at fin, divert themfelves with it as only a trifling amusement, and laugh at the evil of it, and the tremend

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ons confequences which grave and ferious SER M. perfons talk of; this is, as he elsewhere fpeaketh, Sporting with firebrands, arrows, and death. The prophet Isaiah, chap. xxviii. 22. adviseth the Jews, not to be mockers, left their bands be made ftrong, left they be abandoned, in the righteous judgment of God, to the incorrigible hardness of their impenitent hearts, without any further means of being reclaimed, and fo their ill condition being remedilefs, they treasure up wrath to themselves against the day of wrath.

One of the plainest descriptions we meet with of these scorners is in the 2d epistle of St. Peter chap. iii. 3, 4. Knowing this, that there shall come in the last days fcoffers, walking after their own lufts, and faying, where is the promife of his coming? For fince the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. They support themselves in their impiety, and found their contempt of religion, upon fome fort of reasoning, whereby they imagine they prove that the great motives to godliness are merely chimerical, and but idle dreams; as in the inftance before us, the scoffers are reprefented as alledging that there is nothing at all in the promise of God's coming to judge the world, to reward

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SERM. his faithful fervants, and to punish the dif X. obedient; that the hopes formed upon that promise are merely visionary, and that the threatenings of punishment are empty fcarecrows; and the argument to confirm this is taken from fact, and the experience of many ages; for the promife was made very long ago, yet we fee no effect of it, nor any fenfible fign of its accomplishment; the world goeth on in its old course, and things continue on the fame foot fince the fathers fell afleep; they feem to be forgotten, and none of these great things come to pass, in the expectation of which they died; one generation fucceedeth another in the fame track, and it is like to be fo ftill, without any evidence of God's interpofing in the manner his promises import. But fuch fond imaginations under the colour and appearance of reasoning, in which the fcoffers flatter themselves they fhew an uncommon ftrength and genius, courage and freedom of thought, the apoftle imputeth to wilful ignorance, ver. 5. a ftupid inattention to the plaineft and most obvious truths concerning the power and wisdom of God in making the world, and difpofing its feveral parts, and of his having actually interposed in the government of it, fo directing events in the inanimate

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inanimate creation as to answer the ends of SERM. moral government, by diftributing rewards X. and punishments to men. Whatever the particular topic be, whether that of a future ftate, the effential difference of good and evil, a wife, juft, and good providence ruling the world, or whatever other important principle, the fpirit and manner of the fcorners is the fame; entering on fubjects of the greatest moment with abundance of selffufficiency, and it may be, a vivacity of imagination instead of a penetrating judgment, they think by halves, and take up with a bare unexamined probability on the fide in favour of which they are prejudiced by their corrupt affections, or, perhaps, with a bold jeft instead of a folid argument.

Indeed, their moral character, that is, the temper of their minds and their conduct, is of effential confideration to give us a juft notion of the fcorners. St. Peter faith in the place already mentioned, they walk after their own lufts. And St. Jude, fpeaking of the fame perfons, whom he calls mockers, and the apostles of Chrift foretold they should come in the laft time, he defcribeth them thus, they walk after their own ungodly lufts, they are fenfual, not having the Spirit. It is certain mens affections have a great

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