Motion to Pride; Trust, void of all Fear; Obedience, without the most fecret Murmuring; Love, intire and unalloyed; while Holinefs, Righteousness, Truth and Goodness; while Quietnefs and Peace, all of them dwelt there together; while the Soul of Man was thus divinely arrayed, was it not lovely? Were we not glorious within? - But Sin hath effaced it all, fcarcely left any Ruins of fo glorious a Fabric. Sin hath propagated its ugly Breed upon us; hath made us proud and unbelieving, difobedient and unloving; hath ftamped us with the Likeness of the Prince of Darkness; hath drawn upon our Souls too near a Refemblance of his Envy and Hatred, his Bitterness and Malice and Revenge; hath turned us after earthly Loves and brutal Joy, with the whole Bent of our Inclinations. Sin hath done us this irreparable Hurt; hath ruined what we were, and made us what we are, earthly, fenfual, devilish, averfe from God, unfit for Him and Happiness; all that is within us, fince Sin entred, proclaims the melancholy Truth. Our Souls were as the Garden of Eden, before it: And lo, it hath left us a defolate Wilderness. And what, shall we ftand upon any Terms of Friendship with fuch an Enemy? Though it look pleafing, and flatter, and fmile upon us, and would betray us with Kiffes; fhall we not hate the Traitor, and hold it off with

Abhor

Abhorrence, as the very Bane of our Souls?

3. SIN brings Mifery with, and after it. You have heard how GOD threatens; you

may feel if you will how he now punishes

it. Confider, I pray you, if Sin hath not cursed the Ground under us, and turned the Heavens, one while into Brafs, and another into a Deluge over our Heads; if it hath not armed the Sky with Thunder, and the Bowels of the Earth with Convulfions; if it hath not murdered all Joy, and chased Happiness out of the World; if it hath not brought on us Vexation and Sickness, and Crofs and Care, making us very Slaves to keep ourselves alive, and then configning this lordly Body of ours to the Worms and Duft. I fpeak not of unknown Things: I fpeak what we feel and struggle with, till we can hold Life no longer, and depart to the Place appointed for all living (k). But after Death comes the Mifery indeed, known now only in Afprekenfion, but fo felt even in the Expectation, as to make all present Wo of no Account, when compared with it. Lanch your Thoughts into eternal Mifery, and you fhall think of Man's momentary Wretchedness, with that Littleness of Apprehenfion wherewith a Perfon failing upon the vaft Ocean reflects upon the River, which appeared great while he was paffing (k) Job xxx. 23.

out

out of it. And what is there that can be called Mifery, which you do not fee before you, as the eternal Iffue and Wages of Sin? To think of the Body's dwelling in Flames! Should you be invited, by ftrange Curiofity, to fee a Criminal burnt at a Stake, your Soul would be moved within you, though a few Minutes would put an End to his Tortures. But fhould you fee him burning, and not yet dead, after a whole Day: And -fhould that Day be lengthened to a Week, a Month, a Year, to a thousand Ages, to -for-ever! Intolerable even to think of it; how then to behold it, but how most intolerable to fuffer it! And this but the half, perhaps but the leffer half, of Man's eternal Mifery! For to think of the Sufferings of the Soul; confummate in all Wickednefs to the fulleft Measure, defperately hating GOD, and yet lying inftantly under the Frowns of his irreconcilably enraged Majefty; how fhall Confcience fting it, Rage gnaw it, and Revenge confume it! How fhall hopeless Grief, impotent Malice, and utter Despair, burst forth into strange Complainings, ditre Ting Groans, woful Curfes and blafphemous Infultations, the Language of Hell; making the Voice of the Damned terrible, and filling their dark Chambers with Horror! And all this with tormenting Devils, the Outcafts of Heaven, wreaking their infatiable Malice upon them! O what

a

a Society, Place, Punishment, is here! And yet all this the Wages of Sin. See then, what an Enemy this Sin is to us, here and for-ever !

To conclude; I fhall hope, that such Reflexions, upon the Dishonor Sin doth to GOD, upon the Defilement it brings upon the Soul, and the Mifery which comes with and after it, may, by the Divine Grace, engage your Heart to fome Dislike of it: So that while you are fearching after this moft important Concern, the Reality, the Confequences of your Sins, and your Infufficiency to fuccour yourself; you may be difengaged from that Bias, which the Convenience of Sin and Self-flattery are too apt to give to the Soul; and in the Iffue, may find yourself as earnest to be rid of Sin, as from the deplorable Events it hath produced. Thus difpofed, you will be ready to hear the good News of Salvation, in the Ability and Willingness the Redeemer hath to help you; and will discover a becoming Forwardness in laying hold of his moft gracious Offers. May GOD both prevent and affift you herein, for the fake of the fame Jefus Chrift our Lord and Saviour!

SERMON

SERMON III.

The Power and Love of CHRIST.

ISAIAH LXIII. 5.

-Therefore mine own Arm brought Salvation

unto me

WHEN a numerous Host of Angels

declared the Appearance of our Re

deemer, their Song was, Glory to God in the bigbeft, and on Earth Peace, Good-will towards Men (). But what Songs are those which we fend forth upon the Remembrance of that glorious Manifeftation? What fuitable Rejoicing do we fhew at this Seafon? Is the Voice heard among us of thofe, who rejoice for Hell fhut and Heaven opened, for Peace and Glory promulged to a loft World?

The Subftance of this Sermon was preached the Bunday before Christmas-day. (Luke ii. 14.

D

The