SER M. Good-will, from One Person to another, do III. very strongly draw men; The Beauty and Excellency, the Goodness and usefulness of Things, draws or perfwades them: We are drawn, by Arguments and Reasons, by Promifes and Threatnings, by Hopes and Fears; Yet 'tis not that these things are Agents, but that we ourselves act, when we are faid to be drawn by them. Much after the fame manner of fpeaking, Men are faid to be moved (or drawn) with compaffion, Matt. ix. 36. moved with indignation, Matt. XX. 24. moved with Envy, Acts vii. 9. moved with Fear, Heb. xi. 7. And when St Paul had reckoned up the things which are generally apt to af fect Men moft ftrongly, yet None of thefe things (fays he) move Me, Acts xx. 24. After the fame manner, in the Ill fenfe of the word, Men are described to be drawn away with their own Luft, and enticed, Jam. i. 14. and David is reprefented as having been moved by Satan to number the people, 2 Sam. xxiv. 1, And yet neither the one nor the other expreffion were at all intended to fignify, that the things done were not the perfons Own Acts. Directly on the contrary, the Scripture plainly

plainly means, feverely to blame the One, SER M. acting upon the incitement of Luft; and the III. Other, for acting upon the Suggestions of the Devil. Thus therefore in the Text likewife, when our Lord fays, No man can come to Me, except the Father, which has fent me, draw him; 'tis reasonable and neceffary to understand him as speaking, not concerning any Act of God upon men, but concerning the Affection which Some men bear towards God. For as 'tis not a misfortune, but a Vice, for a Man to be drawn away by his own Luft, and enticed; and St Peter's expoftulation with Ananias, Why hath Satan filled thine heart, is not by way of Excufe, but by way of aggravating his crime: So neither on the other fide, is it any declaration of Fate, but a high commendation of Men's Virtue, to fay that they were drawn to their Duty, or prevailed with to perform it, by confideration of God. Indeed, without confideration of God, without a continual View and Regard towards Him as Governing the World, there can be no fuch thing as True Virtue: No man can become a true and good Chriflian, without first having a Senfe of the original natural obligation he lies under, of Love and

Duty

SER M. Duty towards God: No man can come to III. Me, except the Father, who has fent me, draw him. And This fenfe of the phrafe, our Saviour himself confirms by the words immediately following: For fo he exprefly adds in the very next verfe, Every man that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto Me; Every one that has a juft fenfe, and fuitable Practice, of natural Religion towards God; will be difpofed readily to embrace the Doctrine of Christ.

THERE is another expreffion very frequent in Scripture, which may help much to illuftrate the manner of speaking in the Text. The fame Difciples of Chrift, who are here faid to be drawn to him by the Father, are elsewhere frequently defcribed as being given to him of God. Heb. ii. 13. I, and the children whom God has given me. And And again, Job. xvii. 2. Thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. Now that even This phrafe does not denote any Action of God upon men, but merely the character or qualifications of the perfons defcribed ; is apparent from

the

III.

the parallel places of Scripture. All that SER M. the Father giveth me, Joh. vi. 37. are, in the 40th verfe, every one which feeth the Son, and believeth on him: And they to whom it is not given of the Father to come to Chrift, ver. 65; are they whom, in the verfe before, our Lord reproves for their unreasonable obftinacy in not believing. And when in his Prayer to the Father, ch. xvii. 12. he fays, those that thou gavest me, I have kept, and none of them is loft, but the Son of perdition; 'tis plain by That exception, that Judas was originally one of thofe, whom God had given to Chrift, in the fame fense as he gave him the reft of his Disciples; and yet afterwards, by his own Fault, by becoming a Son of Treachery, i. e. a wicked and traiterous perfon, he ceased to be of that number. Juft as, in Acts xxvii. 24. God had given to St Paul all those that failed with him; and yet he declares, ver. 31. Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be faved.

By a not much unlike figure of Speech, fuch perfons as voluntarily undertake extraordinary Difficulties for the Kingdom of Heaven's fake, Matt. xix. 12. are, in

the

SERM.the verfe before, ftiled thofe to whom it is III. given. And, 'Tis given unto you, fays our

Lord to his Difciples, ch. xiii. 11. to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven; because feeing, ye fee, (that is, ye fee without Prejudice ;) and bearing, ye bear and understand, ver. 13. And concerning thofe of a contrary Difpofition, the Scripture fays that they are binded; that God hath given them eyes that they should not fee, and ears that they should not hear nay, that God fends them ftrong Delufion: And Mofes, in a most affectionate manner of expoftulation, complains of the Ifraelites, Deut. xxix. 4. that after all the Great things that their eyes had feen, the Signs of thofe Great Miracles, yet the Lord had not given them an heart to perceive, and eyes to fee, even unto That day. evident, than that the Complaints is, not that God was wanting in his affiftance, much less that he actu ally operated upon men to make them stu fidly and ungratefully wicked; but that, through their own Obftinacy and Perverfenefs, the Means which God had been pleafed to make ufe of to reclaim them,

and ears to hear, Nothing is more

meaning of these

had