could not touch his body without a farther SER M. permiffion. But what can we fuppofe our II. gracious heavenly Father fuffereth his and our enemy to do? Not furely to tempt irrefiftibly: an irrefiftible power he doth not himself exert upon the human mind, because he will preserve that liberty which is effential to its nature; and he will not permit an envious being to exert a refistless power to our deftruction; if that being had such a power, which he certainly hath not. We may well conclude, that God's not permitting the devil to tempt us above our ftrength to refift, is imported in this, that God tempteth no man; for that, indeed, would be the fame thing to all the intents and purposes of mens inevitable destruction, and vindicating themfelves from being the causes of it. But the apoftle exhortéth us chap. iv. of this epiftle and 7th verfe, refift the devil, and he will flee from you. Be not in a pannic on the account of his attempts, which will give him an advantage against you instead of being any fecurity; but arm yourselves with ftrong virtuous refolutions; his temptations then will be ineffectual, and they will foon ceafe even to vex you. The truth is, they are all grafted upon your own lufts, without which his folicitations will

SERM. be in vain; and by them you are chiefly in II. danger of being drawn away. And there

fore, Thirdly, If we would maintain our integrity, let us keep the ftrictest watch over our own appetites and paffions, and here place our strongest, for it will be the most effectual defence. To this end, it will be neceffary to use a severe difcipline, that carnal affections may be brought under the government of reason and confcience: The more they are indulged, the more impetuous and exorbitant they will grow; but if we accuftom ourselves to restrain them, not only to deny their most licentious demands, but even to check their first rifings, and to retrench the gratifications which may be ftrictly called lawful; and on the other hand, industriously cherish virtuous difpofitions; if I fay, we accuftom ourselves to this, the mind will, by degrees, grow up to liberty and an established self-dominion, which will yield it the trueft enjoyment. Nor let us imagine this to be a needless severity; fo great an example of virtue as St. Paul, and fo eminent a fervant of Chrift, whose attainments in religion, and service to its cause, were unequaled even by his brethren the other apostles, thought it neceffary for himself; he faith, 1 Cor. ix. 27.

I keep under my body and bring it into fub- SER M. jection, left that by any means when I have II. preached to others, I myself should be a caftaway, or disapproved and rejected of God. It is true, I have faid before, that when the motions of carnal affection are only proposed to the mind, and are under its confideration but not confented to, they are only temptations, not fins: But as we naturally have fome power over our own deliberations, a power to transfer our thoughts from one object to another, and there is a danger that the longer temptations are entertained in our thoughts, they will acquire the greater ftrength, and even fome degree of evil may be contracted before a full and peremptory determination to comply with them, the mind ought to exert its utmost force that they may not reft in it, left it should at last be enticed by them into finished tranfgref fions.

[54]

SERMON III.

Of NATURAL, MORAL, and CIVIL
LIBERTY.

SERM.

III.

GALATIANS V. 1.

Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith
Chrift hath made us free,

EV

VERY man is confcious of a felf determining power in his own mind, a power of choofing or refufing, of acting or forbearing to act, within a certain fphere; which feemeth to be infeparable from our conftitution and condition of being, and abfolutely neceffary to our purfuing its true ends; without it we could not be moral agents, which is our higheft character, whereby we are diftinguished from inferior animals, nor enjoy a rational happiness. I fhall not enter into any perplexing debates concerning the nature and extent of human liberty, wherein it confifteth, whether we are neceffarily determined in our elections by motives, and by the last judgment of the

under

4

understanding, or if the will in determining SER M. itself be poffeffed of an abfolute indifference III. chufing independantly of any motives, or any judgment formed upon them; but only observe, that as every man is confcious to himself of volition and choice, fo freedom is plainly implied in the ideas which are expreffed by thefe words; a freedom which is equally the privilege of all mankind, as being effential to the conftitution of human nature; this freedom or liberty, for diftinction fake, I call natural. But ther higheft privilege of mankind, under the notion of liberty, is, a power of chufing and acting according to the direction of understanding, and the original sense of good and evil; of doing what to themselves appeareth to be best, most becoming their na ture, and moft conducive to their perfection and happinefs: And this liberty may be termed moral. To act fpontaneously, but indeliberately, belongeth to the brutal kinds; in following their inftincts and appetites, without any fcruple or hesitation, they fol low their nature, and fatisfy all its demands: But their is a fuperior capacity in man, to confider, to examine, to compare together, and judge upon a variety of motives, preferring fome to others; efpecially, it is to