An Essay on the Importance of Considering the Subject of Religion: Addressed Particularly to Men of Education |
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admonition Almighty ance animated apply apprehension assurance attention aversion believe cation cere cern character circumstances concern condition confess conjecture conscience consider conviction course creature death delight disposition divine effect emotions ence ergy estranged eternal evanescence evil exemplifications existence experience faith favour feel felicity fluence gion grand gratified grave habits happy heaven honours hour ideas images imagine importance indulge inspec instances interest irreligion judgment less ligion live look manner melancholy ment mind moral nature never object observe passing perceive perhaps piety pleasure possession present principle Progress of Religion question reason recollect reflection religious rendered Rise and Progress satis scheme sciousness sense sentiment serious sider solemn sometimes soul spirit superstition suppose surd surrendered temper thing thought thoughtless tically tion train of thought truth turn vivacity whole wish worldly young person yourselves youth
Popular passages
Page 155 - Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing, and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked...
Page 57 - The question comes to you, whether you can deliberately judge it better to carry forward a corrupt nature, uncorrected, untransformed, unreclaimed to God, into the future state, WHERE IT MUST BE MISERABLE, than to undergo whatever severity is indispensable in the process of true religion, which would prepare you for a happy eternity. Reflect that you are every day practically answering the question. Can it be that you are answering it in the affirmative ? Do I really see before me the rational being...
Page 124 - A few minutes of time would be sufficient for the annunciation of what, if it could be received by them in its simple, unexaggerated importance, would stop that one man's gay career, as if a great serpent had raised its head in his path ; would confound that other's calculation for emolument ; would bring a sudden dark eclipse on that third man's visions of fame ; — would tear them all from their inveterate and almost desperate combination with what is to perish, and amidst their surprise and terror...
Page 22 - ... memorials of the past ! Imagine by what a strange diversity of persons, as to disposition, mental endowment, conduct, age ; in what a variety of situations, under how many peculiar conjunctures of occurrence ; and with what dissimilar impressions and results, the book has been perused or noticed ! It is striking, to a degree even awful, to reflect what such a book must have done ; to how many it may have imparted thoughts new and affecting, and which nothing could expel ; how many it may have...
Page 23 - ... and with what dissimilar impressions and results, the book has been perused or noticed ! It is striking, to a degree even awful, to reflect what such a book must have done ; to how many it may have imparted thoughts new and affecting, and which nothing could expel; how many it may have been made the means of leading into a happy life and...
Page 90 - ... at a time when there would be less questioning of its nature, less suspicion of its truth ! If it came as an element of Foster's instruction in his early days, it reminds us of his own warning " that whatever entwines itself with the youthful feelings, maintains a strange tenacity, and seems to insinuate into the vitality of the being. How important to watch lest what is thus combining with its life, should contain a principle of moral death !" And it may be considered the master policy of the...
Page 154 - ... the precariousness of such a dependence." He tells man that his corrupt nature, if untransformed in this world, must be miserable in the next. He tells him that the subject is one which he cannot let go, " without abandoning himself to the dominion of death." And he arrays the melancholy spectacle of a " crowd of human beings in prodigious, ceaseless stir to keep the dust of the earth in motion, and then to sink into it, while all beyond is darkness and desolation !" Now what is the meaning of...
Page 93 - trust in their own heart," that they would ultimately apply themselves to the indispensable business, fixed that determination on or about some given point or period in their future life, they can pass, or perhaps have passed that period, with the same facility of neglect as any former one, finding nothing to stop them there with the peremptory exaction to perform their vow. The lying spirit which had promised to meet them at the assigned spot, to conduct them thenceforward toward heaven, appears...
Page 167 - ... deliberate self-consignment to destruction, and of the monstrous enormity of taking a kind of comfort in his approach to the pit, from the circumstance that a principle in his nature leads him to it ; just as if, because there is that in him which impels him to perdition, it would therefore not be he that will perish. Till some awful blast smite on his fears, his reason and conscience -will be unavailing.
Page 38 - ... matter all the confident assurance which you pretend. I suspect there are times, when you dare not look out over that field, for fear of seeing the portentous shapes there again ; and even that they sometimes come close to present a ghastly visage to you through the very windows of your stronghold. I have observed in men of your class, that they often appear to regard the arrayed evidences of revealed religion, not with the simple aversion which may be felt for error and deception, but with that...