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SERM. left at any time your hearts be overcharged with furfeiting, XLVII. and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and fo that day come

upon you unawares. Watch ye therefore, and pray, that ye may be counted worthy to escape—and to ftand before the Son of man.

V. I fhall adjoin but one ufe more, to which this confideration may be fubfervient, which is, that it may help to beget and maintain in us (that which is the very heart and foul of all goodness) fincerity: fincerity in all kinds, in our thoughts, words, and actions. To keep us from harbouring in our breafts fuch thoughts, as we would be afraid or afhamed to own; from speaking otherwife than we mean, than we intend to do, than we are ready any where openly to avow; from endeavouring to feem what we are not; from being one thing in our expreffions and converfations with men; another in our hearts, or in our closets: from acting with oblique refpects to private interefts or paffions, to human favour or cenfure; (in matters, I mean, where duty doth intervene, and where pure conscience ought to guide and govern us;) from making profeffions and oftentations, (void of fubftance, of truth, of knowledge, of good purpofe,) great femblances of peculiar fanctimony, integrity, fcrupulofity, fpirituality, refinednefs, like thofe Pharifees fo often therefore taxed in the Gospel; as also from palliating, as those men did, defigns of ambition, avarice, envy, animofity, revenge, perverfe humour, with pretences of zeal and confcience. We fhould indeed strive to be good (and that in all real strictnefs, aiming at utmost perfection) in outward act and appearance, as well as in heart and reality, for the glory of Rom. xii. God and example of men, (providing things honeft in the fight of all men ;) but we must not shine with a false luftre, nor care to feem better than we are, nor intend to ferve ourselves in feeming to ferve God; bartering spiritual commodities for our own glory or gain. For fince the Rom. ii. 16. day approaches when God will judge (rà xρUятà ȧνλgóпшV) Eccl. xii. the things men do fo ftudiously conceal; when God shall bring every work into judgment, with every fecret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil; fince we must all

17.

14.

2 Cor. v.

ἁπλῶς δεῖ,

2, 3.

appear (or rather be all made apparent, be manifefted and SERM. discovered) at the tribunal of Chrift: fince there is nothing XLVII. covered, which shall not be revealed, nor hid, that shall not be ŋi yàç xaknown; fo that whatever is spoken in the ear in clofets shall pass be proclaimed on the houfetops: fince at length, and that i within a very short time, (no man knows how foon,) the Pana Chryfoft. whispers of every mouth (the closest murmurs of detrac- Luke xii. tion, flander, and fycophantry) fhall become audible to every ear; the abftrufeft thoughts of all hearts (the closest malice and envy) fhall be disclosed in the most public theatre before innumerable spectators; the truth of all pretences fhall be thoroughly examined; the juft merit of every person and every caufe fhall with a moft exact fcrutiny be scanned openly in the face of all the world; to what purpose can it be to juggle and baffle for a time; for a few days (perhaps for a few minutes) to abuse or to amuse those about us with crafty diffimulation or deceit? Is it worth the pains to devise plaufible shifts, which shall instantly, we know, be detected and defeated; to bedaub foul designs with a fair varnish, which death will presently wipe off; to be dark and cloudy in our proceedings, whenas a clear day (that will certainly difpel all darkness and scatter all mifts) is breaking in upon us; to make vizors for our faces, and cloaks for our actions, whenas we must very shortly be expofed, perfectly naked and undisguised, in our true colours, to the general view of angels and men? Heaven fees at present what we think and do, and our confcience cannot be wholly ignorant or infenfible; nor can earth itself be long unacquainted therewith. it not much better, and more easy (fince it requires no pains or study) to act ourselves, than to accommodate ourselves to other unbefeeming and undue parts; to be upright in our intentions, confiftent in our discourses, plain in our dealings, following the fingle and uniform guidance of our reason and conscience, than to fhuffle and shift, wandering after the various, uncertain, and inconftant opinions or humours of men? What matter is it, what clothes we wear, what garb we appear in, during this posture of travel and fojourning here; what for the pre

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SERM. fent we go for; how men efteem us, what they think of XLVII. our actions? St. Paul at least did not much stand upon it; 1 Cor. iv. 3. for, with me, faid he, it is a very fmall thing (λáx150, the leaft thing that can come under confideration) to be judged of you, or of human day, (that is, of this present transitory, fallible, reversible judgment of men.) If we mean well and do righteously, our confcience will at present satisfy us, and the divine (unerring and impartial) fentence will hereafter acquit us; no unjuft or uncharitable censure shall prejudice us: if we entertain base defigns, and deal unrighteously, as our confcience will accuse and vex us here, fo God will fhortly condemn and punish us; neither shall the most favourable conceit of men ftand us in ftead.

13.

1 Cor. iii. Every man's work fhall become manifeft, for the day fhall declare it; because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire (that is, a fevere and ftrict inquiry) shall try every man's work, of what fort it is. I cannot infift more on this point; I fhall only fay, that, confidering the brevity and uncertainty of our prefent ftate, the greatest fimplicity may jufily be deemed the trueft wifdom; that who deceives others, doth cozen himself most; that the deepest policy, used to compass or to conceal bad defigns, will in the end appear the most downright folly.

Τῦτο ἔχει ἡ τελειότης το

σαν ἡμέραν ὡς τελευ

ib. vii.

I might add to the precedent difcourfes, that Philofophy itself hath commended this confideration as a proper and powerful inftrument of virtue, reckoning the pracTaia - tice thereof a main part of wisdom; the greatest proficient yu. Anton. therein in common esteem, Socrates, having defined philofophy, or the study of wisdom, to be nothing elfe but μeλéty Javáte, the study of death; intimating also, (in Plato's Phædon,) that this ftudy, the meditation of death, and preparation of his mind to leave this world, had been the conftant and chief employment of his life: that likewise, according to experience, nothing more avails to render the minds of men fober and well compofed, than fuch fpectacles of mortality, as do imprefs this confideration upon them. For whom doth not the fight of a coffin, or of a grave gaping to receive a friend, perhaps, or an ancient acquaintance; however a man in nature and state altoge

ther like ourselves; of the mournful looks and habits, of SERM. all the fad pomps and fole:nnities attending man unto his XLVII. long home, by minding him of his own frail condition, affect with fome ferious, fome honeft, fome wife thoughts? And if we be reasonable men, we may every day supply the need of fuch occafions, by representing to ourselves the neceffity of our foon returning to the duft; dreffing in thought our own hearfes, and celebrating our own funerals; by living under the continual apprehenfion and sense of our tranfitory and uncertain condition; dying daily, or becoming already dead unto this world. The doing which effectually being the gift of God, and an especial work of his grace, let us of him humbly implore it, faying after the holy Prophet, Lord, fo teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Amen.

SERMON XLVIII.

THE DANGER AND MISCHIEF OF DELAYING

REPENTANCE.

PSALM CXix. 60.

I made hafte, and delayed not to keep thy commandments. THIS Pfalm (no lefs excellent in virtue, than large in SERM. XLVIII. bulk) containeth manifold reflections upon the nature, the properties, the adjuncts and effects of God's law; many fprightly ejaculations about it, (conceived in different forms of speech; fome in way of petition, fome of thankfgiving, fome of refolution, fome of affertion or aphorism;) many useful directions, many zealous exhortations to the obfervance of it; the which are not ranged in any strict order, but (like a variety of fair flowers and wholesome herbs in a wide field) do with a grateful confufion lie difperfed, as they freely did spring up in the heart, or were suggested by the devout fpirit of him who indited the Pfalm; whence no coherence of fentences being defigned, we may confider any one of them abfolutely, or fingly by itself.

Among them, that which I have picked out for the fubject of my discourse implieth an excellent rule of practice, authorized by the Pfalmift's example: it is propounded in way of devotion or immediate address to God; unto whose infallible knowledge his confcience maketh an appeal concerning his practice; not as boasting thereof, but as praifing God for it, unto whofe gracious instruction and fuccour he frequently doth afcribe all his performances: but the manner of propounding I shall not infift

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