We are born children of wrath; and continue fo, until we be born again. Nay, as foon as we were children of Adam, we were children of wrath.

I fhall usher in what I am to fay on this point, with a few obferves touching the univerfality of this ftate of wrath; which may ferve to prepare the way of the word into your confciences. Wrath has gone as wide as ever fin went. When angels finned, the wrath of God brake in upon them as a flood: "God fpared not the angels that finned, but caft them down to hell," 2 Pet. ii. 4. And thereby it was demonstrated, that no natural excellency in the creature will fhield it from the wrath of God, if once it becomes a finful creature. The finest and the nicest piece of the workmanship of heaven, if once the Creator's image upon it be defaced by fin, God can and will dafh it in pieces, in his wrath; unless fatisfaction be made to juftice, and that image be repaired neither of which the finner himself can do. Adam finned, and the whole lump of mankind, was leavened, and bound over to the fiery oven of God's wrath. And from the text ye may learn, (1.) That ignorance of that ftate cannot free men from it: the Gentiles that knew not God, were by nature children of wrath, even as others. A man's house may be on fire, his wife and children perifhing in the flames, while he knows nothing of it, and therefore is not concerned about it. Such is your cafe, O ye that are ignorant of these things! wrath is filently finking into your fouls, while you are bleffing yourfelves, faying, Ye fhall have peace. Ye need not a more certain token, that ye are children of wrath, than that ye never yet saw yourfelves fuch. Ye cannot be the children of God, that never yet faw yourfelves children of the devil. Ye cannot be in the

way to heaven, that never faw yourselves by nature in the high road to hell. Ye are grossly ignorant of your fate by nature; and fo ignorant of God, and of Christ, and your need of him : and tho' ye look on your ignorance as a covert from wrath; yet take it out of the mouth of God himself, that it will ruin you, if it be not removed, Ifa. xxvii. 11. "It is a people of no understanding; therefore he that made them, will not have mercy on them." See 2 Theff. i. 8. Hof, iv. 6. (2.) No outward privileges can exempt men from this ftate of wrath: for the Jews, the children of the kingdom, God's peculiar people, were children of wrath even as others. Tho' ye be churchmembers, partakers of all church-privileges; tho' you be defcended of godly parents, of great and honourable families; be what ye will, ye are, by nature, heirs of hell, children of wrath.

(3) No profeffion, nor attainments in a profeffion of religions do, or can, exempt a man from this ftate of wrath. Paul was one of the straiteft fect of the Jewith religion, Acts xxvi. 5. yet a child of wrath, even as others, till he was converted. The clofe hypocrite, and the profine, are alike as to their state. however different their converfations be and they will be alike in their fatal end, Pfal. exxv. 5. As for fuch as turn alde unto their crooked ways, the Lord fhall lead them forth with the workers of iniquity." (4.) Young ones that are yet but Tetting out into the world, have not that to do, to make them felves children of wrath, by following the graceless multitude. They are children of wrath by nature; fo it is done already r they were born heirs of hell; they will indeed make themfelves more fo, if they do not, while they are young, flee from that wrath they were born to, by fleeing to Jefus Chrift. Laftly, Whatever men are now by grace they were even as others by nature. And this may be a fad meditation to them that have been at eafe from their youth, and have had no changes.

Now, these things being premised, I'fhall, in the first place, fhew what this ftate of wrath is next, confirm the doctrine; and then apply it.

1. I am to fhew what is this state of wrath. But who can. fully defcribe the wrath of an angry God? None can do it. Yet fo much of it must be difc vered, as may ferve to convince men of the abfolute ceffity of fleeing to Jefus Christ, out of that fate of wrath. Anger in men is a pation and commotion of the spirit for an injury received, with a defire to refent the f.me. When it comes to a height, and is fixed in one's fpiri it is called wrath. Now there are no phions in God, properly fpeaking; they are inconfiftent with his abfolute un changeablenels and independency: and therefore Paul and Barnabas (to remove the mistake of the Lycaonian, who thought they were gods) tell them, they were mer of like paffions with themselves," Acts xir. 15. Wrath then is attri buted to God, not in refpect of the affection of wrath, but the effects thereof. Wrath is a fire in the bowels of i nas, ter-. menting the man himself; but there is no pirtubaion in God.. His wrath does not in the leaft man that inline repole and happiness, which he hath in himff. It is a mock pure and un-disturbed act of his Will, producing dreadful ects against the finner. It is but little we know of an infinite God; but conde-fcending to our weakness, he is pleased to speak of him to us after the manner of men. Let us therefore mufice Lina's wratik,

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but remove every thing in our confideration of the wrath of God, that argues imperfection: and fo we may attain to fome view of it, however fcanty. By this means we are led to take the wrath of God against the natural man in these three.

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FIRST, There is wrath in the heart of God against him. The Lord approves him not, but is difpleafed with him. Every natural man lies under the difpleasure of God; and that is heavier than mountains of brafs. Altho' he be pleased with himfelf, and others be pleafed with him too; yet God looks/ down on him, as difpleafed. Firft, His perfon is under God's * difpleasure: "Thou hateft all workers of iniquity," Pfal. v. 5A godly man's fin is difpleafing to God, yet his perfon is ftill accepted in the Beloved," Eph. i. 6. But God is angry with the wicked every day," Pfal. vii. 1. There is a fire of wrath burns continually against him, in the heart of God. They are as dogs and fwine, most abominable creatures in the fight of God. Tho' their natural ftate be gilded over with a fhining profeffion, yet they are abhorred of God: they are to him as

fmoke in his nofe," Ifa. lxv. 5. and luke-warm water, to be "fpewed out of his mouth," Rev. iii 16." Whited fepulchres," Matth. xxiii. 27. " A generation of vipers," Matth. xii. 34. and a "people of his wrath," Ifa. x. 6.

SECONDLY, He is difpleafed with all they do: It is impoffible for them to pleafe him, being unbelievers, Heb. xi. 6. He hates their perfons; and fo hath no pleasure in, but is difpleafed with their best works, Ifa. lvi. 3. He that facrificeth a lamb,

is as if he cut off a dog's neck," &c. Their duty, as done by them, is" an abomination to the Lord," Prov. xv. 8. And as men turn their back upon them whom they are angry with; to the Lord's refufing communion with the natural man in his duties, is a plain indication of his wrath.

SECONDLY, There is wrath in the word of God against him. When wrath is in the heart, it feeks a vent by the lips: fo God fights against the natural man with "the fword of his mouth," Rev. ii. 1 The Lord's word never fpeaks good of him, but always cureth or condemneth him. Hence it is, that when he is awakened, the word read or preached, often increaseth his horror. Fi, It condemns all his actions, tegether with his corrupt nature. There is nothing he does, but the law declares it to be fin. It is a rule of perfect obedience, from which he always, in all things, declines; and fo it rejects every thing he doth as fin. Secondly, It pronounceth his doom, and denoun4th God's curse against him, Gal, iii. 10. "For as many as are

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of the Works of the Law, are under the curfe: for it is written, Curfed is every one that continueth not in all things, which are written in the Book of the Law, to do them." Be he never fo well in the world, it pronounceth a woe from heaven against him, lfa. iii. Ir. The Bible is a quiver filled with arrows of wrath against him, ready to be poured in on his foul. God's threatnings in his word, hang over his head as a black cloud, ready to thower down on him every moment. The word is indeed the faint's fecurity against wrath; but it binds the natu ral man's fin and wrath together, as a certain pledge of his ruin if he continue in that ftate. So the confcience being awakened and perceiving this tie made by the law, the man is filled with terrors in his foul.

THIRDLY, There is wrath in the hand of God against the natural man. He is under heavy ftrokes of wrath already, and is liable to more.

ift, There is wrath on his body. It is a piece of curfed clay, which wrath is finking into, by virtue of the threatning of the first Covenant, Gen. ii. 17. "In the day that thou eateft thereof, thou fhalt furely die." There is never a difeafe, gripe nor ftitch, that affects him, but it comes on him with the fling of God's indignation in it. They are all cords of death, fent before to bind the prifoner.

2dly, There is wrath upon his foul, (1.) He can have no communion with God; he is " foolish, and fhall not stand in God's fight," Pfal. v. 5. When Adam finned, God turned him out of Paradife : and natural men are, as Adam left them, banished from the gracious prefence of the Lord; and can have no access to him in that ftate. There is war betwixt heaven and them: and fo all commerce is cut off." They are without God in the world," Eph. ii. 12. The fun is gone down on them, and there is not the leaft glimpse of favour towards them from heaven. (2.) Hence the foul is left to pine away in its iniquity. The natural darkness of their minds, the averfenefs to good in their wills, the diforder of their affections, and dif temper of their confciences, and all their natural plagues, are left upon them in a penal way; and being fo left, increase daily. God calls a portion of worldly goods to them, more or lefs, as a bone is thrown to a dog: but alas! his wrath against them appears, in that they get no grace. The Phyfician of fouls comes by them, and goes by them, and cures others befide. them; while they are confuming away in their iniquity, and ripening daily for utter deftruction. (3) They ly open to

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fearful additional plagues on their fouls, even in this life. Firth, Sometimes they meet with deadaing ftrokes; filent blows from the hand of an angry God; arrows of wrath that enter into their fouls without noife, Ifa. xi. 10. " Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and hut their eyes, left the hey f fee with their eyes," &c. God fives with them for t while, and convictions enter their confciences; but they rehel against the light; and by a secret judgment, they are knocked on the head; fo that, from that time, they do, as it were, live and rot above ground. Their hearts are deadned; their affec-tions withered; their confciences ftupified: and their whole fouls blasted caft forth as a branch, and withred ” Jóhn xv. 16. They are plagued with judicial blindnefs. They fhut the'r eyes against the light, and they are given over to the devil, the god of this world to be blinded more, 2 Cor. iv. 4. Yea, "God fends them strong delufion, that they thould believe a lie," 2 Theff. 11. even confcience, like a falfe light on the thore, leads them upon rocks; by which they are broken in pieces. They harten themfelves against God; and he gives up with them, and leaves them to Satan and their own hearts, whereby they are hardened more and more. They are often given up unto vile affections. Rom. i. 26. The reins are laid on their ccs; and they are left to run into all excesses, as their furious luils draw them. Secondly, Sometimes they meet with quickning ftrokes, whereby their fouls become like mount Sinal, where nothing is feen, but fire a ad fmoak; nothing heard, but the thunder of God's wrath, and the voice of the trumpet of a broken Law, waxing louter and louder which makes them like Pabur, (Jer. xx. 4.)" A terror to themfelves." God' takes the fi thy garments of their fins, which they were want to fleep in fecurely; overlays them with brimftone, and fets them on fire about their ears: fo they have a hell within them.

3dly, There is wrath on the Batural man's enjoyments Whatever be wanting in his houf, there is one thing that is never wanting there, Prov. iii 33. "The curfe of the Lord is in the house of the wicked." Wrath is on all that he has ; ont the bread he eats the liquor be drinks, and clothes which he wears. His bafket and flore are curfed, Deut. xxviii. 17% Some things fall wrong with him; and that comes to pafs by virtue of his wrath; other things go according to his wish, and there is wrath in that too; for it is a fhare to his foul, Prov.

32. The profperity of fools hall deftroy them." This: weath turns his bieffings into cures, Mal. ii. a. “I will confe:

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