SERM. with their Maker, and setting their preceding X. good Deed against their subsequent bad ones.

For, can God be made a Debtor by our best Actions, or can these merit an Acquittal for our Offences? The Almighty, it is true, is graciously pleased, out of his great Goodnefs and Compaffion to our Infirmities, to admit us, in cafe of our starting aside thro' Faintnefs and Irrefolution to Terms of Pardon and Reconciliation on our Repentance and Recovery, on our roufing up our Spirits and exerting our Strength; and to this must we quicken ourselves by his Help, in Proportion to the Degrees of our Tranfgreffion, and the Time and Ground we have loft, that we may be able to fatisfy both God and our own Hearts of our Sincerity, and to arrive at a juft Measure of Stedfaftnefs in the remaining Part of our Course, otherwife we are not permitted to hope, that we fhall conclude it with Joy; For he only that endureth to the End, the fame fhall be faved (i).

If we do not push vigorously onwards, and lengthen out our Progrefs in Religion with our Lives,---If we do not, when at at any time we fall, immediately rife again, mend

(i) St. Matth. xxiv. 13.

X.

mend our Pace, and look well to our go- SER M. ings, but rather cherish an idle lazy Humour, till we are perfectly indifpofed to fpiritual Motion, fancying, that we have already done enough to deferve God's Favour, and that our former good Work will carry us to Heaven; at our own Peril muft we entertain Sentiments fo ill grounded, and profecute fo airy a Scheme.

God's Declarations are point-blank against us, when, as he denounces by his Prophet, The Righteous turneth away from his Righteouf nefs and committeth Iniquity and doth according to all the Abominations that the Wicked Man doth, all his Righteousness that he hath done fhall not be mentioned, in his Trespass that he bath trefpaffed, and in his Sin that he hath finned, in the fhall be die (k). And by his Apoftle, If after they have escaped the Pollutions of the World, through Knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jefus Chrift, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the latter End is worse with them than the Beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the Way of Righteousness, than after they have known it, to turn from the boly Commandment delivered unto them (l).

Z3

THESE

(k) Ezek. xviii. 24.

(1) 2 St. Pet. ii. 20, 21.

SERM.

X.

THESE Paffages are too clear to be eluded, and too ftrong to be withstood. They abundantly discover the bad Confequences of being weary in well-doing, that we fhall not only fuffer for our Revolt from our Engagements, but fuffer the more feverely for it.---It is agreeable to the Divine Juftice to adapt Punishments to Crimes; and if a vifible Defection from the Ways of Holinefs be the greatest Crime we can be guilty of, abating downright Apoftacy, doth it not fairly call for the greatest Punishment ?--And what can be a more heinous Procedure than this? Is it not to refift the Holy Ghoft, who had conducted us fo far, and would have carried us through all the Difficulties which oppofed our Progrefs? Is it not to count the Blood of the Covenant an unholy or common Thing, which we will not be at the Pains to fecure a lafting Intereft in? Is it not to bring up an evil Report against the True Religion which we have discarded in Practice, though we may retain it in Profeffion? And is it not to bring our Neighbours, as well as our own Guilt upon our Heads, by throwing a Stumbling-block in their Way, by tempting the Weak and hardening the Wicked? Any one of these Circumstances

X.

Circumstances is a confiderable Aggravation SERM. of Sin; but with how great Force must their united Weight fall on the Deserter from his Duty ?----To be a Prefervative against the Evil which refults from our being weary in well-doing, the Exhortation of the Apoftle is urged upon us in the Text, and enforced by the most prevailing Motive, for in due Seafon we shall reap, if we faint not.

THE Certainty of Succefs is the chief Inducement to Labour, and where that is precarious, this is moft defervedly flackened. But though this Rule be very reasonable, it is yet not too conftantly followed; Men often throwing away their Time and Care on thofe Things in which it is very doubtful if ever they have their Pains rewarded.-It is an old and experienced Obfervation, that all Things in the Event of worldly Affairs happen alike to all, the Race is not to the Swift, nor the Battle to the Strong (m).---And this led many of the Antients who were unacquainted with the revealed Dif covery of a future State to conclude, though very abfurdly, that there was no fupreme Di-. rector watching over and ordering the temporal Concerns of Men. THESE

(m) Ecclef. ix. 11.

SERM.

X.

THESE fhort-fighted Perfons, confining their Views to prefent Occurrences, and not reflecting that what they faw was only a small Part of an exceeding large Scheme, but a few Links of a long extended Chain, could not difcern the Connection of this Life with another, where all its obvious Irregularities will be fully adjusted.

BUT we Chriftians have our Profpect ftretched out beyond the Bounds of Time. We have Life and Immortality brought to Light by the Gospel (n). We know affuredly, that there fhall be a State of Retribution; and that the Hour is coming, when a manifeft Difference fhall be made between him that ferveth God, and him that ferveth bim not (o),

THAT every one fhall hereafter fhare in Happiness or Mifery, as his Actions here have been good or Evil, is the fundamental Doctrine of Revelation; to imprint which deeply on our Minds, fo as to influence our Practice, is its grand and ultimate End: And if we believe infallibly the one to be true, we must as firmly believe the other to

be

(n) 2 Tim. i. 10.

(0) Mal. iii. 18.