him? If thou be rightecus, what givest thou him? or what receiveth he of thy hand? Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art, and thy righteousness may profit the son of man, as Eliḥu speaks to Job, chap. xxxv. 6, 7, 8. All the service and obe dience that is paid by his creatures add nothing to him; and all the sins and provocations that are amongst men detract nothing from him. His infinite perfect blessedness is incapa-. ble either of addition or diminution.-Our blessing of him is only acknowledging his blessedness. 2dly, It stands in wishing well to him; in wishing the exalting and glorifying that fulness that is in him. How excellently have we this expressed to us in Nehemiah! chap. ix. 5.: upon that solemn day of their fasting (and they spent the day very well) they read in the book of the law of the Lord their God one fourth part of the day; and another fourth part of the day they confessed their sins, and the iniquities of their fathers; another part of the day they spent in worshipping the Lord their God; and another part of the day in praising him but that which I refer to is their praising; they that were appointed for the work were set in their places, and the call was given unto them, Stand up, and bless the Lord your God for ever and ever: Blessed be thy glorious name, that is exalted above all blessing and praise. As if these blessed men should have said, "We know it to be our duty to bless the "Lord; but all our blessings fall short of what he is worthy "of: he is far above all our blessings and praises, and they "can never reach to an equal retribution or acknowledgment "of the greatness and goodness of God." 3dly, Our blessing of God stands in our commending him with praise and with thanksgiving, This word in my text is a form of praise; and praise and thanksgiving are two sundry things. Praise, relates to the person that engages us; thanksgiving relates to a person with respect to benefits that we receive from them. It is possible a man may praise God when he does not give thanks. We may praise God for what he is in himself; but thanksgiving is upon the account of his bounty extended to

us.

His people are appointed for this, to shew forth his praises, who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light, 1 Pet. ii. 9.

3dly, I shall speak farther concerning this great duty of giving praise and of giving thanks unto the Lord, as including one and the same thing. There are a great many duties that people commonly know, and commonly try, and as commonly spoil in the trying; and one great cause of their marring these works is, because they do not well know what their work is. I would therefore plainly and briefly show what this duty of praising and thanksgiving is; for this implies strongly, that there is cause for it. Mercy shewn and put forth, and bounty received, is the ground of praise and thanksgiving. There are three things about this, that if you would mind the work aright, you must think of, 1st, A meditation of your mercies; 2dly, Impression on the heart by it; 3dly, An expression of this. I name these things dis tinctly, not that they are really separable in themselves, but only for the better directing you to order your thoughts aright in this matter.

cvi. 7.

1st, The first thing in praising is, that the mercy we would praise for must fill the mind; there must be a serious thoughtfulness about it. Forgetting God's benefits is the moth of thankfulness, and mars it. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, saith the Psalmist, ciii. 2. And he acknowledges the unthankfulness of his predecessors; Our fathers remembered not the multitude of thy mercies, Psal. "They understood them not, they remembered them "not." Sirs, memory is a natural power that some people have a greater excellency in than others; this is known in all sorts of people, from their childhood to their old age. You would think it strange now that there should be any great sin in forgetfulness; but this is charged upon Israel, Deut. xxxii. 18. Of the rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten the God that formed thee. Is it a sin to have a bad memory? No, no more a sin than to have bad eyes or bad ears; for they are all natural infirmities; but yet there is a kind of forgetfulness that is a great sin. God's mercies and his goodness to us should be laid up in our memories, and treasured therein. God's mercies should have a great room in our memories. People will never do any great matters in godliness, till they learn to meditate thereon. The Psalmist,

speaking of his praising the Lord, saith, My meditation of him shall be sweet. It is impossible that we can remember all God's mercies; but it is a very sinful thing to forget his special mercies; they should be treasured up in our memories as the most precious jewels that we can lodge there. Our memory is a kind of room, in which we must lay up what we would keep safe; and a marvellous house our memory is. Now meditation is nothing else, if I may so say, but a man's going from one chamber to another in this house, and to compare together, and to examine all God's loving kindness towards us. When the Psalmist charges it on himself not to forget all his benefits, the man is far from meaning that he could remember them all; but he was desirous to charge himself with them as well as he could, and laboured to remember them as well as he could. This is the first thing that we should mind in praising the Lord; for unless the mind be well employed, fixedly and seriously employed, in thinking upon the Lord's mercies, we shall never pay the debt of thankfulness and praise honestly and heartily.

2dly, After this thinking and meditation follow impression. Meditation is the work of the understanding; impression is the feeling of the heart. As long as meditation only floats in the brain, it is no more but a notion; but when meditation hath its due effect, and reaches and stamps the heart, that is the impression of mercy: the want of this is that which people are quite spoiled for in the matter of praise. They know the cause of thankfulness to God, they remember the mercies that he hath shewn unto them; but they do not apply it by such a powerful meditation that may work their hearts to some sense of it. This impression of mercy is a most necessary thing in order to praise; and it is raised from some of these; 1st, By a serious viewing of the mercy all round, looking upon it every way, how great it is, how seasonable, how useful, how profitable to us. There was a good woman, and a happy woman, Elizabeth, see how she expresseth her thanksgiving, Luke i. 25. She hid herself five months after she had conceived, saying, Thus hath the Lord dealt with me. The case was this, she had been a long time without children, and the Lord by an angel intimated

that she should conceive with child, and that this child should be the harbinger and the forerunner of our Lord Jesus Christ; and when this was accomplished, it is said by the Holy Ghost, that she hid herself five months, and said, Thus hath the Lord dealt with me; as if the good woman should have said, “What * great kindness is here! I am with child, and this child is the forerunner of our Lord Jesus Christ" and an extraordinary one he was. 2dly, Impression is raised by the greatness of the giver. The majesty of God, who bestows the mercy, makes the smallest of his mercies to be great. who hath a low esteem of mercy, hath always a low esteem of the God that shews it. 3dly, This impression is raised from a deep sense of our own unworthiness; and therefore David's praise rises this way, 2 Sam. vii. 18. Who am I, O Lord God? and what is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto? All proud folks think little of great mercies; but a humble man will think much of a small mercy. I am less than the least of all thy mercies, saith Jacob, Gen. xxxii. 10. He had a great deal of mercy, but he counted that the smallest of his mercies were bigger than he. 4thly, This sense and impression of mercy is raised from the debt that is laid on the receiver; a great giver, and an unworthy receiver, and a great debt laid upon the receiver by the giver for his giving. What shall I render unto the Lord, saith the Psalmist, cxvi. 12. for all his benefits? They can never have a right sense of mercy, who do not know what mercy calls for. If it stood only in this," that it is the bounty of God that gives,

and we are happy in receiving," this would make our hearts light, vain, and frothy; but when this is added thereto, “ all "these givings of God, and all these receivings from him, "are but so many debts and burdens laid upon thee," this will make a man lie low indeed. What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits towards me? This is the second head -an impression raised upon the heart.

3dly and lastly, This impression will work in outward expressions. Meditation is the work of the mind; impression is the feeling of the heart; and expression lies in all the outworkings of praise that may be where the former are not, this cannot be; but where the former are, this will be,

whether men will or not. If the mercy be known, and be felt, the expression of praise for it will be unavoidable, one way or other. I shall name a few of these ways; 1st, The first expression of praise for mercy is in admiring and adoring the grace of the giver. This is the native expression of mercy, and of thankfulness for it, to be filled with a holy adoring and admiring the grace of the giver: this lies so near to the nature of praise, that it is inseparable from it. Thanksgiving, in the very first working of it, lies in an admiring the giver of the mercy. Thanksgiving is only an hearty expression of the goodness of him who hath given the mercy. Thanksgiving and mercy giving relate one to another: thanks are given by us, because mercy is given by God. 2dly, Beside this expression of praise by the adoration of the heart, praise will break forth in words and in deeds, according as a man is able to shew it. There will be a stirring up of himself, and all that is within him, to bless his holy name, Psal. ciii. 1, 2. There is a striving to praise, in which a great part of the nature of praise doth consist. There is a stirring up ourselves to praise the Lord; this is what is required by the Lord, and frequently practised by his people: they do what they can, and they would do more than they can. So David, in that place already named, 2 Sam. vii. 20. he looks upon his mercy every way: And this was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God; but thou hast also spoken of thy servant's house for a great while to come: and is this the manner of man, O Lord God? and what can David say more unto thee? for thou, Lord God, knowest thy servant. What can David say more! Strange words indeed! Will not any body, think you, wonder that the great Psalmist of Israel is so soon run aground? but David could not have praised better, he could not have praised more, than in that way of praising. What can David say more? "I have said what I thought, and I "have said what I can, and God knows I cannot say what I “would, and thou, Lord, knowest thy servant; for thy word's "sake, and according to thine own heart, thou hast done all "these great things." As if he had said, "I know that my "praise can never measure thy heart; according to thine own heart thou hast done these great thing." I say, praise