make subjects believe that their governor means only to frighten them with his penalties, will easily make his laws of no effect, and set offenders loose from every restraint. The belief of the execution is therefore absolutely necessary to the efficacy of the law, which otherwise could only be an engine to work upon fools. And if it be necessary in all cases that subjects should believe that the law will be executed, then it follows, in the present case, that the threatenings of God shall certainly be executed at last. For God cannot lie, nor make it the duty of mankind to believe a lie. He has no need of such base means to keep the world in order. If the penalties, as they are described in the law, be consistent with the goodness of God, the inflicting of them at last cannot in reason be sustained as an objection against it. Say then, O sinner, what farther hast thou to allege against God? The appeal is made to you in the text, and a challenge given to you to bring forth all your objections against his laws and government. Do you blame him, in the

4th place, For the temptations you meet with in the world, and those circumstances of danger with which you are surrounded? Let us consider a little the justice of this complaint. The strongest temptations, you must allow, have no compulsive efficacy; all that they can do, is to solicit and entice us: And are there not addressed to us far more weighty arguments and solicitations to forsake sin, and to walk in the paths of wisdom? If we cannot resist the devil and the flesh, how can we refuse what God demands, who pleadeth with us by infinitely stronger motives than they can present to us? for he sets before us the endless joys, or the endless torments, of a future state of existence. Doth not the undefiled inheritance of the saints in light infinitely transcend all that

earth or sense can promise us? and yet, shall we pretend to justify ourselves, when, contrary to all reason, we prefer the pleasures of sin, which are but for a moment, to the eternal happiness and glory of the world to come? Once more, in the

5th place, Do you object, that you cannot reclaim or convert yourselves? that man can do nothing towards his conversion, unless he shall receive power from on high? that therefore you are excusable until God shall impart his assistance? and that if you perish, it is not your fault?

My brethren, we must not speak falsely even for God; nor suppress or disguise the doctrines of his word, however they may be abused by carnal and obstinate sin

ners.

It is true that man in his natural state cannot do any thing that is spiritually good; for "they that are in the flesh cannot please God." It is equally true, that God is a debtor to no man, but is the free disposer of his own grace, giving it when and to whomsoever he pleaseth. But it is no less true, that there are certain means of his appointment, in the use of which alone we have reason to expect his aid; and he who doth not improve these faithfully, complains with a very bad grace, at least, and is justly chargeable with his own damnation.

You cannot convert yourselves ;-but cannot you forbear to curse and blaspheme the name of God? Cannot you restrain yourselves when your nature is duly refreshed with meat and drink? Cannot you keep at a distance from evil company, and avoid many occasions of sinning, and temptations to sin? It is certainly in your power to perform many of the external acts of religious worship. You can go to church, if you are so disposed, as easily as you can stay at home, or ride about for

amusement. You can go to your closet as easily as to the tavern. What hinders you to read your Bible as well as any other book? to meditate on what it contains, and on its vast importance to your everlasting interest?

Have you then done these things, or have you not done them? Have you avoided the tempting occasions of evil; Have you used the means of used the means of grace, and attended seriously upon the ordinances of God's worship? If you have neglected to employ the powers you possess, whom can you blame for it, that you have not obtained more extensive powers? God will make you one day to know, that it was not he who carried you to the haunts of riot, intemperance, and lewdness; that it was not he who tempted you to swear profanely, or to rail at goodness, or to quarrel with the Word that should have saved you; but that all this was owing to the voluntary and obstinate wickedness of your own corrupt hearts. And, whatever excuses sinners may now feign to themselves, they must all stand speechless at last. None shall be able to plead, Lord, I applied to thee for converting grace, but it was refused me.' No, God will be clear when he judgeth; and every mouth shall be stopped in that day when he passeth sentence on an assembled world.

Thus have I examined and endeavoured to refute some of the most plausible objections which are commonly alleged against the mildness and equity of the divine administration; and from all that has been said, I hope it now appears, that nothing can be more unreasonable and blasphemous than to lay the blame of the sinuer's destruction upon God. "The foolishness of man," saith Solomon, "perverteth his way; and his heart fretteth against the Lord." Prov. xix. 3. This is the true account of the matter. The sinner destroys him

self by his own wilful and obstinate folly, and then he accuses God, as if he were the cause of his misery ; although God hath done every thing to save him, which could have been done by the righteous Lawgiver and Governor of the world.

The lying lips shall ere long be put to silence. The workers of iniquity shall stand self-condemned before the awful tribunal; and all their vain and impious pretexts and excuses, instead of availing them in that day, will only serve to increase their shame and confusion. With what inconceivable remorse and anguish will the sinner then review his past conduct? How contemptible will those temptations then appear to him, which he once magnified so much, when he shall compare them with the powerful motives and encouragements to a holy life, which were in vain so often and so plainly set before him? when he shall recollect the various means and instruments which were employed to save him from ruin; the full and free offers which were made to him of pardoning mercy and of sanctifying grace; the earnest calls and invitations which he received to turn from his evil way and live? when he shall view that precious fountain, in which thousands, as guilty as himself, have been washed and made clean; and shall reflect that all these advantages are for ever lost; how shall he then hang down his head, and smite his guilty and despairing breast? saying, in the bitterness of his soul, "How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof? and have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me? Prov. v. 12, 13. Then shall all his complaints be turned against himself; and, instead of resting on his wonted excuses, he shall then call, but call in vain, "on the mountains and on the rocks to fall on him, and to hide him from the face

of him who sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb." O that men were wise, and would consider these things, so as to prevent, by a timely repentance, the horrors of that awful day which is hastening fast to surprise a sleeping world.

My brethren, I have represented your danger to you as plainly as I could. I have endeavoured to expose the weakness of those pitiful evasions by which many of you endeavour to support a vain hope, or at least to lessen the awful apprehensions of a judgment to come. I have spoken to your ears: God alone can speak to your hearts; and to his mercy and grace I commend you.Allow me, before I conclude, to beg your attention to the following considerations.

. Consider, that to be your own destroyers is to counteract the very strongest principle of your natures, the principle of self-preservation. Every creature naturally desireth its own felicity; and will you obstinately rush upon manifest ruin through all the obstacles that are placed in your way? Assistants you may find in accomplishing this desperate purpose; but without your own consent and active concurrence, it never can be accomplished, even though the whole world, and all the host of apostate spirits, were combined against you. Will you be worse than devils to yourselves? What pity can you expect to meet with, who have no pity for your own souls? The unfortunate are objects of compassion; but wilful self-destroyers neither deserve compassion, nor can expect it. Consider what an aggravation this will be of your misery in a future state? How terrible will it be to recollect, in the regions of everlasting wo, that ye have brought all your misery on yourselves? that you were forewarned repeatedly, and awfully forewarned, of the fatal issue of your conduct, but without ef