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were that dog!" Such was then his happiness; and such perhaps is that of hundreds more, who bear themselves highest in the contempt of religion, and glory in that infamous fervitude which they call liberty.

If the confcience of the wicked be eafy, it must be in one or more of these ways, either by a long course of iniquity, or by adopting false principles, or by a comparison with others who are thought worfe; or by refolving to amend in future; or by performing part of the duties of Religion. Wo to those who are able to quiet it by any of them. It will fome time or other awake to their forrow. Like a frozen viper laid to the fire, it will recover ftrength, and fting them to the heart. Take them in their most compofed frame, how far are they from that ferenity of foul which Religion gives. This is a peace which paf-Seth all understanding. The minds of the wicked are reftlefs, and hurried by their lufts and paffions. In the verfe preceding the text, it is faid, The wicked are like the troubled fea, when it cannot reft, whofe waters caft up mire and dirt: But in the godly foul there is a calm. The contemplation of heavenly things affords complacency; and in God the foul can hope and rest for time and eternity. Peace, faid Chrift to his disciples, I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. With this peace, what earthly bleffing can be compared? Could we command every thing our hearts would wish, where is the enjoyment, if the mind be difquieted? This, like an aching tooth, or a bone out of joint, will disturb us, will break our fleep, and render us unhappy.

Perhaps fome may think, that only atrocious finners are fubject to fuch fevere lafhes. Generally it is fo; but every person estranged from God is deftitute of folid and lafting peace. It is owing to ignorance and mistake that

he

he has

any at all. There are no fins fmall, confidered with refpect to God. It is found fo in a thorough conviction; and their being committed against the light and grace of the Gospel, highly aggravates them, and is a bitter ingredient to all true penitents. Our hearts condemn us for fecret as well as for open fins; for omiffions as well as tranfgreffions. Unless then confcience is unduly hushed, it cannot otherwife than moleft all who are not reconciled to God.

Again: There is no peace to the wicked in a dying hour. By this is not meant that they shall undergo more pain of body than others. The pangs of diffolution are the fame to all. Thofe, indeed, of whom the world was not worthy, have often fuffered the moft cruel and violent deaths. Nor is it meant that the wicked have never any compofure in death, or hope of well-being hereafter :For though the fcripture tells us, The wicked is driven away in his wickedness; but the righteous bath hope in his death; yet we are not to understand, that none of them ever entertain in that folemn hour expectations of mercy, or that they all anticipate their mifery. Some of them die as they had lived, ftupid and thoughtless as beafts. Befides, I know not that death fhakes every falfe hope. It is thought that some good men may have fears and perplexities to the very last; and that fome bad men may remain unshaken, and die with more apparent confidence than the others. There are instances of infidels maintaining cheerfulness and refolution in their last moments. With fome it has been otherwise, and they have betrayed dreadful forebodings of a wrath to come. Now and then they have retracted their principles, and fought relief in a profeffion of Christianity. It is faid, that the poet Dryden, not being able to fortify himself in infidelity, embraced the Popish religion. Some years ago it was confidently

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fidently afferted, that Voltaire, at the age of eighty, and being, as he thought, about to die, had felt some strange qualms of confcience, in confequence of which, he had made a long and goodly confeffion of the truths of revelation. His followers deem this a flander, and cannot believe that their mighty champion would ever retreat. Having fo long edified them by his writings, perhaps there is no fufficient authority to deprive them of their comfort in his death.

The fears of the good man cannot render his state less safe, nor the confidence of the bad render his less dangerous. Whatever their own fentiments are, it shall be well with the righteous, and ill with the wicked. We are, however, compaffed about with a cloud of witneffes, who bear teftimony that the end of the perfect and upright man is peace; who have died, not only with calmness and refignation, but have been filled with a joy unspeakable and full of glory; who have met death, not only on a bed furrounded by friends, but in its most horrid form, on a gibbet, or at a stake; not only thofe of ftrong and fearless make, but those of a timorous nature, and from among the weaker fex; not only thofe who had no attachment on earth why to wish for life, but those who had eftates, families and friends. It is an obfervation made to show the efficacy of grace, that, in fuffering times, none went more cheerfully to martyrdom than thofe who had numerous families dependent on them. Let the decriers of Religion produce us any principle so powerful to bear one up, under the diftreffes of life, and fupport through the valley of the fhadow of death, any thing that will fo revive and embolden the foul, as a view of God reconciled in Chrift, and the hopes of a bleffed immortality. No; it is only this will difarm death of his fting. It is this will make death not only tolerable, but defirable; will

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give not only compofure, but triumph; not only free us from pain, but make heaven beam all around us.

Dr Young, in his tract on original compofition, has given us a precious anecdote of the amiable Mr Addifon. "After he had difmiffed his phyficians, and all hopes of life, he fent for a youth nearly related to him, and finely accomplished, yet not above being the better for good inItructions from a dying friend. He came, but life now glimmering in the focket, the dying friend was filent. After a decent and proper paufe, the youth faid, "Dear Sir, you fent for me; I believe and I hope that you have fome commands; I shall hold them most facred." May distant ages not only hear, but feel the reply! Forcibly grafping the young gentleman's hand, he loftly faid, “See in what peace a Chriftian can die!"He fpoke with dif ficulty, and foon expired." I the rather adduce this instance, because he was a man of genius, of great literary fame, and in high ftation, with which empty fmatterers and conceited fools are ready to think Religion inconfistent. Indeed, the men of greatest talents who ever adorned our world, were not ashamed of the Gofpel of Chrift; among whom we may rank a Locke, a Boyle, a Newton, and a Bacon. Perhaps it might be afferted, without extravagance, that thefe, for ftrength of mind and deep refearch, as far exceeded many of the retailers of infidelity as an angel did them; or, as an untutored favage exceeds the beasts below him. They were the glory of Britain,

and one half her fame.

What awful spectacles have fome of the wicked exhibited on a deathbed! How contrary to the example just now adduced! Hell seemed already to have been kindled in their fouls. Under the fcourges of a guilty confcience, and a fearful fenfe of impending wrath, they could not contain, but vented their difmal outcry enough to rend

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the ftouteft heart. One, of whom mention is made in a practical writer, " a monument of justice, worn to skin and bone, blafphemed the God of heaven, cursed himself, and continually cried, O torture! torture! torture! O torture, torture!" Another is faid to have cried out, "I have had a little pleasure, but now I must have hell for ever more." To whatever was spoken to afford him comfort, he replied, "I must to hell; I must to the furnaces of hell for millions of millions of ages." The repetition of thefe expreffions is frightful; how much more to have feen the fad objects! Suffer me to fay, with the greatest seriousness and affection, that no finner who goes on against his conscience can expect to die in another manner. Let not the fright of these examples freeze the blood and make the hair stand on end only, but so impress our minds as to deter us from all the paths of known fin. Should we fall blindfold into destruction, it will not be less terrible in the iffue. It must be grievous and distracting to think of appearing before God without fome fure and firm hope. To have our peace to make when the body is racked with fore pain, when refreshing fleep has departed, and we know not when the pulfe may cease, and we stiffen into cold clay,-how affecting, and alas, what prospect that the mighty work fhall be done, when years of health and strength have been finned away! I leave this mournful theme, but for one more mournful still. There is,

In the last place, No peace to the wicked after death. Then their forrows begin, which admit of no alleviation. In this world they had their good things: They enjoyed with others the common bounties of Providence, and were fenfible of pleasure. In these they placed their only happinefs; but now all is gone, and they are tormented. Confcience can be quieted no more, It is the worm that

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