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he fay to you on the great day,

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"Come ye bleffed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the "foundation of the world. For I was an hungred, and

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ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink : "I was a stranger, and ye took me in; I was naked, and ye clothed me; I was fick, and ye vifited me: For in"asmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these "my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

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SERMON XII.

ON AFFLICTIONS.

MATTHEW ii. 6.

And bleed is he, whofoever fhall not be offended in me.

It is a bleffing, and a rare bleffing, then, not to be offend

T

ed in Jefus Chrift. But what was there, or what could there be in him, who is the wisdom itself, and the glory of the Father, the fubftantial image of all perfection, which could give fubject of scandal to men? His crofs, my deareft brethren, which was formerly the fhame of the jews, and is, and shall be, to the end of ages, the fhame of the greatest part of Chriftians. But when I fay that the cross of the Saviour is the fhame of moft of Chriftians, I mean not only the cross that he bore, I mean more especially that which we are obliged, from his example, to bear; without which he rejects us as his disciples, and denies us any participation of that glory into which he has entered, through the cross alone.

Behold what displeases us, and what we find to complain of in our divine Saviour. We would wifh, that fince he was to fuffer, his fufferings had been a title, as it were, of exemption, which had merited to us the privilege of not fuffering with him. Let us difpel this error, my dearest

brethren;

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brethren: the only thing which depends on us, is that of rendering our sufferings meritorious; but to fuffer, or not to suffer, is not left to our choice. Providence has fo 7 wifely dispensed the good and evil of this life, that each in his ftation, however happy his lot may appear, finds croffes and afflictions, which always counterbalance the pleafures of it. There is no perfect happiness on the earth, for it is not here the time of confolations, but the time of fufferance. Grandeur hath its subjections and its difquiets; obfcurity its humiliations and its fcorns; the world, its cares and its caprices; retirement, its fadness and weariness; marriage, its antipathies and its frenzies; friendship, its loffes or its perfidies; piety itfelf, its repugnances and its disgusts: in a word, by a destiny inevitable to the children of Adam, each one finds his own path ftrewed with brambles and thorns. The apparently happieft condition hath its fecret forrows, which empoifon all its felicity: the throne is the feat of chagrins equally as the lowest place; fuperb palaces conceal the cruelleft discontents, equally as the hut of the poor and of the humble labourer; and, left our place of exile fhould become endeared to us, we always feel, in a thousand different ways, that fomething is yet wanting to our happiness.

Nevertheless, deftined to fuffer, we cannot love the fufferances; continually ftricken with fome affliction, we are unable to make a merit of our pains; never happy, our croffes become neceffary, cannot at least become useful to us. We are ingenious in depriving ourselves of all the merit of our sufferances. One while we feek, in the weakness of our own heart, the excufe of our peevishness and of our murmurings; another in the excels or in the nature of our afflictions; and again, in the obstacles which they seem to us to caft in the way of our falvation; that is

to

to fay, one while we complain of being too weak to bear our fufferings with patience; another, that they are too exceffive; and laftly, that it is impoffible in that fituation to pay attention to falvation.

- Such are the three pretexts continually oppofed in the world to the Chriftian ufe of affliction: the pretext of felfweakness; the pretext of the excess or the nature of our afflictions; the pretext of the obftacles which they seem to place in the way of our falvation. Thefe are the pretexts we have now to overthrow, by oppofing to them the rules of faith. Attend then, be whom ye may, and learn that the cause of condemnation to moft men is not pleasures alone: Alas! they are so rare on the earth, and fo narrowly followed by difguft! it is likewife the unchrif tian use they make of afflictions.

: PART I. The language moft common to the souls afflicted by the Lord, is that of alledging their own weaknefs, in order to justify the unchriftian use they make of their afflictions. They complain that they are not endowed with a force of mind fufficient to preserve under them a fubmiffive and a patient heart; that nothing is more conducive to happiness than the want of feeling; that this character faves us endlefs vexations and chagrins inevitable in life; but that we cannot fashion to ourselves an heart according to our own wifhes; that religion doth not render unfeeling and ftoical thofe who are born with the tender feelings of humanity, and that the Lord is too just to make a crime to us even of our misfortunes.

But, to overthrow an allufion fo common and founworthy of piety, remark, in the firft place, that when Jefus Chrift hath commanded to all believers to bear with

fubmiffion

fubmiffion and with love the croffes propofed for us by his goodness, he hath not added, that an order fo juft, fo confoling, fo conformable to his examples, fhould concern only the unfeeling and impatient fouls. He hath not diftinguished among his difciples, those whom nature, pride, or reflection had rendered firmer and more conftant, from those whom tenderness and humanity had endowed with more feeling, in order to make a duty to the first of a patience and infenfibility which coft them almost nothing, and to excuse the others to whom they become more difficult.

On the contrary, his divine precepts are cures ; and the more we are inimical to them through the character of our heart, the more are they proper for, and become necessary to us. It is because you are weak, and that the least contradictions always excite you fo much against fufferances, that the Lord must purify you by tribulations and sorrows; for it is not the strong who have occafion to be tried, it is the weak,

In effect, what is it to be weak and repining? It is an exceffive felf-love; it is to give all to nature and nothing to faith; it is to give way to every impulfe of inclination, and to live folely for ease and self-enjoyment, as constituting the chief happiness of man. Now, in this fituation, and with this exceffive fund of love for the world and for yourself, if the Lord were not to provide afflictions for your weakness; if he did not strike your body with an habitual langour, which renders the world infipid to you, if he did not fend loffes and vexations, which force you, through decency, to regularity and retirement; if he did not overthrow certain projects, which, leaving your fortune more obfcure, remove you from the great dangers; it he did not place you in certain fituations, VOL. I. U u where

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