Page images
PDF
EPUB

not, however, be disputed, that every man should be instructed according to his situation in life, and according to the capacity he has received from heaven. In a word, a Christian ought to be a Christian, not because he has been educated in the principles of Christianity transmitted by his fathers, but because those principles came from God.

To have contrary dispositions, to follow a religion from obstinacy or prejudice, is equally to renounce the dignity of a man, a Christian, and a Protestant:-The dignity of a man, who, endowed with intelligence, should never decide on important subjects without consulting his understanding, given to guide and conduct him:-The dignity of a Christian; for the gospel reveals a God who may be known, John iv. 22; it requires us to "prove all things, and to hold fast that which is good," 1 Thess. v. 21. The dignity of a Protestant; for it is the foundation and distinguishing article of the Reformation, that submission to human creeds is a bondage unworthy of him whom the "Son has made free." Inquiry, knowledge, and investigation, are the leading points of religion, and the first step, so to speak, by which we are to "seek the Lord."

The second disposition is sanctification. The truths proposed in Scripture for examination and belief, are not presented to excite vain speculations, or gratify curiosity. They are truths designed to produce a divine influence on the heart and life. "He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar. If you know these things, happy are you, if you do them. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father, is this, to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction," 1 John ii. 4; John xiii. 17; James i. 27. When we speak of Christian obedience, we do not mean some transient acts of devotion; we mean a submission proceeding from a source of holiness, which, however mixed with imperfection in its efforts, piety is always the predominant disposition of the heart, and virtue triumphant over vice.

These two points being so established, that no one can justly dispute them, we may prove, I am confident, from our own constitution, that a conversion deferred ought always to be suspected; and that, by deferring the work, we risk the forfeiture of the grace.-Follow us in these arguments.

This is true, first, with regard to the light essential to conversion. Here, my brethren, it were to have been wished, that each of you had studied the human constitution; that you had attentively considered the mode in which the soul and body are united, the close ties which subsist between the intelligence that thinks within, and the body to which it is united. We are not pure spirit; the soul is a lodger in matter, and on the temperature of this matter depends the success of our researches after truth, and consequently after religion.

Now, my brethren, every season and every period of life are not alike proper for disposing the body to the happy temperature, which leaves the soul at liberty for reflection and thought. The powers of the brain fail with years, the senses become dull, the spirits evaporate, the memory weakens, the blood chills

in the veins, and a cloud of darkness envelopes all the faculties. Hence the drowsiness of aged people: hence the difficulty of receiving new impressions; hence the return of ancient objects; hence the obstinacy in their sentiments; hence the almost universal defect of knowledge and comprehension; whereas people less advanced in age have usually an easy mind, a retentive memory, a happy conception, and a teachable temper. If we, therefore, defer the acquisition of religious knowledge till age has chilled the blood, obscured the understanding, enfeebled the memory, and confirmed prejudice and obstinacy, it is almost impossible to be in a situation to acquire that information without which our religion can neither be agreeable to God, afford us solid consolation in affliction, nor motives sufficient against temptation.

If this reflection do not strike you with sufficient force, follow man in the succeeding periods of life. The love of pleasure predominates in his early years, and the dissipations of the world allure him from the study of religion. The sentiments of conscience are heard, however, notwithstanding the tumult of a thousand passions: they suggest that, in order to peace of conscience, he must either be religious, or persuade himself that religion is altogether a phantom. What does a man do in this situation? He becomes either incredulous or superstitious. He believes without examination and discussion, that he has been educated in the bosom of truth; that the religion of his fathers is the only one which can be good; or rather, he regards religion only on the side of those difficulties which infidels oppose, and employs all his strength of intellect to augment those difficulties, and to evade their evidence. Thus he dismisses religion to escape his conscience, and becomes an obstinate Atheist, to be calm in crimes. Thus he wastes his youth, time flies, years accumulate, notions become strong, impressions fixed in the brain, and the brain gradually loses that suppleness of which we now spake.

A period arrives in which these passions seem to subside; and as they were the sole cause of rendering that man superstitious or incredulous, it seems that incredulity and su perstition should vanish with the passions. Let us profit by the circumstance; let us endeavour to dissipate the illusion; let us summons the man to go back to the first source of its errors; let us talk; let us prove; let us reason; but all is unavailing care; as it commonly happens that the aged talk of former times, and recollect the facts which struck them in their youth, while present occurrences leave no trace on the memory, so the old ideas continually run in their mind.

Let us farther remark, that the soul not only loses with time the facility of discerning error from truth, but after having for a considerable time habituated itself to converse solely with sensible objects, it is almost impossible to attach it to any other. See that man who has for a course of years been employed in auditing accounts, in examining the nature of trade, the prudence of his partners, the fidelity of his correspondents; propose to him, for instance, the solution of a problem; desire him to inves

This truth is susceptible of a much clearer demonstration, when we consider religion with regard to practice. And as the subject turns on principles to which we usually pay but slight attention, we are especially obliged to request, if you would edify by this discourse, that you would hear attentively. There are subjects less connected, which may be comprehended, notwithstanding a momentary absence of the mind; but this requires an unremitting attention, as we lose the whole by neglecting the smallest part.

tigate the cause of a phenomenon, the founda- truths before the world has engrossed its cation of a system, and you require an impossi-pacity. bility. The mind, however, of this man, who finds these subjects so difficult, and the mind of the philosopher who investigates them with ease, are formed much in the same way. All the difference between them is, that the latter has accustomed himself to the contemplation of mental objects, whereas the other has voluntarily debased himself to sordid pursuits, degraded his understanding, and enslaved it to sensible objects. After having passed our life in this sort of business, without allowing time for reflection, religion becomes an abyss; the clearest truth, mysterious; the slightest study, fatigue; and, when we would fix our thoughts, they are captivated with involuntary deviations. In a word, the final inconvenience which results from deferring the study of religion, is a distraction and dissipation proceeding from the objects which prepossess the mind. The various scenes of life, presented to the eye, make a strong impression on the soul; and the ideas will obtrude even when we would wish to divert the attention. Hence distinguished employments, eminent situations, and professions which require intense application, are not commonly the most compatible with salvation. Not only because they rob us, while actually employed, of the time we should devote to God, but because they pursue us in defiance of our efforts. We come to the Lord's house with our bullocks, with our doves, with our speculations, with our ships, with our bills of exchange, with our titles, with our equipage, as those profane Jews whom Jesus Christ once chased from the temple in Jerusalem. There is no need to be a philosopher to perceive the force of this truth; it requires no evidence but the history of your own life. How often, when retired to the closet to examine your conscience, have worldly speculations interrupted your duty! How often, when prostrated in the presence of God, has this heart which you came to offer him, robbed you of your devotion by pursuing earthly objects! How often, when engaged in sacrificing to the Lord a sacrifice of repentance, has a thousand flights of birds come to annoy the sacred service! Evident proof of the truth we advance! Every day we see new objects: these objects leave ideas; these ideas recur; and the contracted soul, unable to Recollect, my brethren, that we are agreed attend to the ideas it already possesses, and to upon this point; recollect in the subsequent those it would acquire, becomes incapable of parts of this discourse, that, in order to converreligious investigation. Happy is the man de- sion, we must have a radical and habitual love scended from enlightened parents, and instruct- to God. This principle being allowed, all that ed, like Timothy, in the Holy Scriptures from we have to say against the delay of conversion, his infancy! Having consecrated his early life becomes self-established. The whole question to the study of truth, he has only, in a dying is reduced to this; if in a dying hour, if at the and retired age, to collect the consolations of a extremity of life, if in a short and fleeting moreligion magnificent in its promises, and incon-ment, you can acquire this habit of divine love, testable in its proofs.

[blocks in formation]

Remember, in the first place, what we have already hinted, that in order to true conversion, it is not sufficient to evidence some partial acts of love to God: the principle must be so profound and permanent, that this love, though mixed with some defects, shall ever be the predominant disposition of the heart. We should not apprehend that any of you would dispute this assertion, if we should content ourselves with pressing it in a vague and general way; and if we had no design to draw conclusions directly opposite to the notions of many, and to the practice of most. But at the close of this discourse, unable to evade the consequences which follow the principle, we are strongly persuaded you will renew the attack on the principle itself, and deny that to which you have already assented. Hence we ought not to proceed before we are agreed what we ought to believe upon this head. We ask you, brethren, whether you believe it requisite to love God in order to salvation? We can scarcely think that any of our audience will answer in the negative; at least we should fear to speak with much more confidence on this point, and on the necessity of acquiring instruction in order to conversion, than to supersede the obligation of loving God, because it would derogate from the dignity of man, who is obliged to love his benefactor; from the dignity of a Christian, educated under a covenant which denounces anathemas against those who love not the Lord Jesus; from the dignity of a Protestant, who cannot be ignorant how all the divines of our communion have exclaimed against the doctrine of Rome on the subject of penance.

which we have all agreed is necessary to salvation; if it can be acquired in one moment, then we will preach no more against delay: you act with propriety. Put off, defer, procrastinate even to the last moment, and by an extraordinary precaution, never begin to seek the pleasures of piety till you are abandoned by the pleasures of the world, and satiated with its infamous delights. But if time, if labour, are required to form this genuine source of love to God, the necessity of which we have already

proved, you should frankly acknowledge the folly of postponing so important a work for a single moment; that it is the extreme of madness to defer the task to a dying hour; and that the prophet cannot too highly exalt his voice in crying to all who regard their salvation, "Seek ye the Lord while he may be found; call ye upon him while he is near.

This being allowed, we proceed to establish on two principles, all that we have to advance upon this subject. First, we cannot acquire any habit without performing the correspondent actions. Language, for instance, is a thing extremely complex. To speak, requires a thousand playful motions of the body, a thousand movements to form the elements, and a thousand sounds to perfect the articulation. All these at first are extremely difficult; they appear quite impossible. There is but one way to succeed, that is, to persevere in touching the keys, articulating the sounds, and producing the movements; then what seemed at first impossible becomes surmountable, and what becomes surmountable is made easy, and what is once easy becomes natural: we speak with a fluency which would be incredible were it not confirmed by experience. The spirits flow to the parts destined for these operations, the channels open, the difficulties recede, the volitions are accomplished; just as a stream, whose waters are turned by the strength of hand and aid of engines, falls by its own weight to places where it could not have been carried but with vast fatigue.

Secondly, when a habit is once rooted, it be comes difficult or impossible to correct it, in proportion as it is confirmed. We see in the human body, that a man, by distraction or indolence, may suffer his person to degenerate to a wretched situation; if he continue, his wretchedness increases; the body takes its mould; what was a negligence, becomes a necessity; what was a want of attention, becomes a natural and an insurmountable imperfection. Let us apply these principles to our subject, and avail ourselves of their force to dissipate, if possible, the mistakes of mankind concerning their conversation and their virtues. Habits of the mind are formed as habits of the body; the mental habits become as incorrigible as those of the latter.

First, then, as in the acquisition of a corporeal habit, we must perform the correspondent actions, so in forming the habits of religion, of love, humility, patience, charity, we must habituate ourselves to the duties of patience, humility, and love. We never acquire these virtues but by devotion to their influence: it is not sufficient to be sincere in wishes to attain them; it is not sufficient to form a sudden resolution; we must return to the charge, and by the continued recurrence of actions pursued and repeated, acquire such a source of holiness as may justify us in saying, that such a man is humble, patient, charitable, and full of divine love. Have you never attended those powerful and pathetic sermons, which forced conviction on the most obdurate hearts? Have you never seen those pale, trembling, and weeping assemblies? Have you never seen the hearers affected, alarmed, and resolved to reform their lives? And have you never been surprised to

see, after a short interval, each return to those vices he had regarded with horror, and neglect those virtues which had appeared to him so amiable? Whence proceeded so sudden a change? What occasioned a defection which apparently contradicts every notion we have formed of the human mind? It is here. This piety, this devotion, those tears proceeded from a transient cause, and not from a habit formed by a course of actions, and a fund acquired by labour and diligence. The cause ceasing, the effects subside! the preacher is silent, and the devotion is closed. Whereas the actions of life, proceeding from a source of worldly affections, incessantly return, just as a torrent, obstructed by the raising of a bank, takes an irregular course, and rushes forth with impetuosity whenever the bank is removed.

Farther, we must not only engage in the of fices of piety to form the habits, but they must be frequent; just as we repeat acts of vice to form a vicious habit. Can you be ignorant, my brethren, of the reason? Who does not feel it in his own breast? I carry it in my own wicked heart; I know it by the sad tests of sentiment and experience. The reason is obvious; habits of vice are found conformable to our natural propensity; they are found already formed within, in the germ of corruption which we bring into the world. "We are shapen in iniquity, and conceived in sin," Ps. li. 7. We make a rapid progress in the career of vice. We arrive, without difficulty, at perfection in the works of darkness. A short course suffices to become a master in the school of the world and of the devil; and it is not at all surprising, that a man should at once become luxurious, covetous, and implacable, because he carries in his own breast the principles of all these vices.

But the habits of holiness are directly opposed to our constitution. They obstruct all its propensities, and offer, if I may so speak, violence to nature. When we wish to become converts, we enter on a double task: we must demolish, we must build; we must demolish corruption, before we can erect the edifice of grace. We must level mortal blows at the old man, before the new can be revived. We must, like those Jews who raised the walls of Jerusalem, work with "the sword in one hand, and the tool in the other," Neh. iv. 17, equally assiduous to produce that which is not, as to destroy that which already exists.

Such is the way, and the only way, by which we can expect the establishment of grace in the heart; it is by unremitting labour, by perseverance in duty, by perpetual vigilance. Now, who is it; who is there among you that can enter into this thought, and not perceive the folly of those who delay their conversion? We imagine that a word from a minister, a prospect of death, a sudden revolution, will instantaneously produce a perfection of virtue? O wretched philosophy! extravagance of the sinner! idle reverie of self-love and imagination, that overturns the whole system of original corruption, and the mechanism of the human frame! I should as soon expect to find a man, who would play skilfully on an instrument without having acquired the art by practice and application; I should as soon expect to find a man who would speak a language without

which may perhaps convince those who know how to use their reason, and have some knowledge of human nature. It seems to me, that, since habits are formed by actions, when those habits are continued to an age in which the brain acquires a certain consistency, correction serves merely to interrupt the actions already established.

having studied the words, and surmounted the quence from these reflections, which may apfatigue and difficulty of pronunciation. The pear unheard of to those who are unaccustomspeech of the one would be a barbarous subjected to examine the result of a principle; but of derision, and unintelligible; and the notes of the other would be discords destitute of softness and harmony. Such is the folly of the man who would become pious, patient, humble, and charitable, in one moment, by a simple wish of the soul, without acquiring those virtues by assiduity and care. All the acts of piety you shall see him perform, are but emotions proceeding from a heart touched, indeed, but not converted. His devotion is a rash zeal, which would usurp the kingdom of heaven rather than take it by violence. His confession is an avowal extorted by anguish which the Almighty has suddenly inflicted, and by remorse of conscience, rather than sacred contrition of heart. His charity is extorted by the fears of death, and the horrors of hell. Dissipate these fears, calm that anguish, appease these terrors, and you will see no more zeal, no more charity, no more tears; his heart, habituated to vice, will resume its wonted course. This is the consequence of our first principle; we shall next examine the result of the second.

It would be sufficient in early life, while the brain is yet flexible, and induced by its own texture to lose impressions as readily as it acquired them; at this age, I say, to quit the action would be sufficient to reform the habit. But when the brain has acquired the degree of consistency already mentioned, the simple suspension of the act is not sufficient to eradicate the habit; because by its texture it is disposed to continue the same, and to retain the impressions already received.

Hence, when a man has grovelled a considerable time in vice, to quit it is not a sufficient reform; for him there is but one remedy, that is, to perform actions directly opposed to those We said, that when a habit is once rooted, which had formed the habit. Suppose, for init becomes difficult to surmount it, and alto- stance, that a man shall have lived in avarice gether insurmountable, when suffered to as- for twenty years, and been guilty of ten acts sume an absolute ascendancy. This principle of extortion every day. Suppose he shall afsuggests a new reflection on the sinner's con- terward have a desire to reform; that he shall duct who delays his conversion; a very impor- devote ten years to the work; that he shall tant reflection, which we would wish to impress every day do ten acts of charity opposite to on the mind of our audience. In the early those of his avarice; these ten years (considercourse of vice, we sin with a power by which ing the case here according to the course of we could abstain, were we to use violence; nature only, for we allow interior and superhence we flatter ourselves that we shall pre-natural aids in the conversion of a sinner, as serve that precious power, and be able to eradicate vice from the heart, whensoever we shall form the resolution. Wretched philosophy still; another illusion of self-attachment, a new charm of which the devil avails himself for our destruction. Because, when we have long continued in sin, when we are advanced in age, when reformation has been delayed for a long course of years, vice assumes the sovereignty, and we are no longer our own masters.

You intimate to us a wish to be converted; but when do you mean to enter on the work? To-morrow, without farther delay. And are you not very absurd in deferring till to-morrow? To-day, when you wished to undertake it, you shrunk on seeing what labour it would cost, what difficulties must be surmounted, what victories must be obtained over yourselves. From this change you divert your eyes: to-day you still wish to follow your course, to abandon your heart to sensible objects, to follow your passions, and gratify your concupiscence. But to-morrow you intimate a wish of recalling your thoughts, of citing your wicked propensities before the bar of God, and pronouncing their sentence. O sophism of selfesteem! carrying with it its own refutation. For if this wicked propensity, strengthened to a certain point, appears invincible to-day, how shall it be otherwise to-morrow, when to the actions of past days you shall have added those of this day! If this sole idea, if this mere thought of labour, induce you to defer to-day, what is to support you to-morrow under the real labour? Farther, there follows a conse

we shall prove in the subsequent discourses,) would those ten acts be sufficient perfectly to eradicate covetousness from this man? It seems contrary to the most received maxims. You have heard that habits confirmed to a certain degree, and continued to a certain age, are never reformed but by a number of opposite actions proportioned to those which had formed the habit. The character before us has lived twenty years in the practice of avarice, and but ten in the exercise of charity, doing only ten acts of benevolence daily during that period; he has then arrived at an age in which he has lost the facility of receiving new impressions. We cannot, therefore, I think, affirm that those ten years are adequate perfectly to eradicate the vice from his heart. After all, sinners, you still continue in those habits, aged in crimes, heaping one bad deed upon another, and flattering yourselves to reform, by a wish, by a glance, by a tear, without difficulty or conflict, habits the most inveterate. Such are the reflections suggested by a knowledge of the human frame with regard to the delay of conversion. To this you will oppose various objections which it is of importance to resolve.

You will say, that our principles are contradicted by experience; that we daily see persons who have long indulged a vicious habit, and who have renounced it at once without repeating the opposite acts of virtue. The fact is possible, it is indeed undeniable. It may hap pen in five cases, which, when fully examined, will be found not at all to invalidate what has already been established.

This difficulty naturally presents itself to the

1. A man possessing the free use of his facul- | not sufficient time to form a counterpoise to ties, may by an effort of reflection extricate the force of their criminal habits. himself from a vicious habit, I allow; but we have superseded the objection, by a case appa-mind; but the solution we give does not so rently applicable. We have cautiously antici- properly accord with this discourse; it shall be pated, and often assumed the solution. We better answered in the exercises which shall speak of those only, who have attained an ad- follow, when we shall draw our arguments vanced age, and have lost the facility of acquir- from the Scriptures, We shall then affirm ing new dispositions. Have you ever seen per- that when a sinner groans under the burden of sons of sixty or seventy years of age renounce his corruption, and sincerely desires conversion, their avarice, their pride; some favourite pas- God affords his aid, and gives him supernatural sion, or a family prejudice? power to vanquish his sinful propensities. But we shall prove, at the same time, that those aids are so very far from countenancing the delay of conversion, that no consideration can be more intimidating to him who presumes on so awful a course. For, my brethren, our divinity and morality give each other the hand, the one being established upon the other. There is a wise medium between heresy, and I know not what absurd and extravagant orthodoxy; and as it is a bad maxim so to establish the precepts, as to renounce the doctrines of Jesus Christ, it is equally pernicious to make a breach in his precepts, to confirm the doctrines.

2. A man placed in a hopeless situation, and under an extraordinary stroke of Providence, may instantly reform a habit, I grant; but that does not destroy our principles. We have not included in our reflections those extraordinary visitations which Providence may employ to subdue the sinner. When we said that the reformation of a vicious habit would require a number of acts which have some proportion to those which formed it, we supposed an equality of impressions in those actions, and that each action would be equal to that we wished to destroy.

3. A man may suddenly reform a habit on the reception of new ideas, and on hearing some truths of which he was ignorant before, I also acknowledge; but this proves nothing to the point. We spoke of a man born in the bosom of the church, educated in the principles of Christianity, and who has reflected a thousand and a thousand times on the truths of religion; and on whom we have pressed a thousand and a thousand times the motives of repentance and regeneration; but, being now hardened, he can hear nothing new on those subjects.

4. A man may, I allow, on the decay of his faculties, suddenly reform a bad habit; but what has this to do with the renovation which God requires? In this case, the effect of sin vanishes away, but the principle remains. A particular act of the bad habit yields to weakness and necessity, but the source still subsists, and wholly predominates in the man.

5. In fine, a man whose life has been a continued warfare between vice and virtue; but with whom vice for the most part has had the ascendancy over virtue, may obtain in his last sickness, the grace of real conversion. There is, however, something doubtful in the case; conversion on a death-bed being difficult or impossible; because between one unconverted man and another there is often a vast difference; the one, if I may so speak, is within a step of the grave, but the other has a vast course to run. The former has subdued his habits, has already made a progress, not indeed so far as to attain, but so far as to approach a state of regeneration: this man may, perhaps, be changed in a moment: but how can be, who has already wasted life in ignorance and vice, effectuate so great a change in a few days, or a few hours? We have therefore proved our point that the first objection is destitute of force.

The aids of the Holy Spirit, and a consciousness of our own weakness, are the most powerful motives which can prompt us to labour for conversion without delay. If conversion, after a life of vice, depended on yourselves, if your heart were in your power, if you had sufficient command to sanctify yourselves at pleasure, then you would have some reason for flattery in this delay. But your conversion cannot be effectuated without an extraneous cause, without the aids of the Spirit of God; aids he will probably withhold, after you shall have despised his grace, and insulted it with obstinacy and malice. On this head therefore, you can form no reasonable hope.

You will draw a third objection from what we have already allowed, that a severe affliction may suddenly transform the heart. To this principle, we shall grant that the prospect of approaching death may make an impression to undeceive the sinner; that the veil of corruption raised at the close of life, may induce a man to yield at once to the dictates of conscience, as one walking hastily towards a precipice, would start back on removing the fatal bandage which concealed the danger into which he was about to fall.

On this ground, I would await you, brethren. Is it then on a death-bed, that you found your hopes? We will pledge ourselves to prove, that so far from this being the most happy season, it is exactly the reverse. The reflections we shall make on this subject, are much more calculated to strike the mind than those already advanced, which require some penetration, but it suffices to have eyes to perceive the force of those which now follow.

We will not absolutely deny the possibility of the fact on which the objection is founded. We allow that a man, who with composure of You will, however, propose a second: you mind sees the decay of his earthly house, and will say, that this principle proves too much, regards death with attentive eyes, may enter that if we cannot be saved without a fund and into the requisite dispositions. Death being habit of holiness, and if this habit cannot be considered as near, enables him to know the acquired without perseverance in duty, we ex-world, to discover its vanity, emptiness, and toclude from salvation those deeply contrite sinners who having wasted life in vice, have now

tal insufficiency. A man who has but a few moments to live, and who sees that his honour,

« EelmineJätka »