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thing but Ignorance or Affectation could make a Man fo impertinent, as to talk of any thing that were pious and good. 1 befeech you to confider whether this be not a very near approach to the being afham'd of Chrift; and if it be, how fhall we efcape that dreadful Sentence which is denounced against it, Mark 8. 38. Whosoever shall be ashamed of me, and of my words, in this wicked and adulterous Geneof him alfo fhall the Son of Man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy Angels. This Minds me of the

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3d, And laft Direction, which is, That we must be thoroughly perSwaded that the right conduct of our felves, in the point of Society, is a Matter of the highest moment and importance. Does not the Scripture plainly fuggeft this, when our Saviour tells us, Math. 12. That by our Words we shall be justified, and by our Words we shall be condemned. And St. James tells us, James 3. 2.

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If any Man offend not in Word, the fame is a perfect Man. And 'tis no wonder the Scripture lays fo great a ftrefs, or fets fo great a value on the due government of the Tongue, fince nothing tends more to the pleafing of God, to the honour and intereft of Religion, and to the forming the Morals of Men. As to this latter, the forming every Man's particular Manners, have faid enough: One thing here I will only remark; never was there a more illuftrious Proof of the Efficacy of Religious Converfation than in the Primitive Times. Next to that of the Spirit of God it felf the Chriftians found no greater Support under all their Trials, than what they derived from their mu-tuaf Incouragements and Exhortations of one another. And I do not question, but that Religious Friendship would be as ufeful now to preserve us against the Snares and Pleasures of Sin, as it was then to uphold them under their fiery Trials and Afflictions, were

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our Difcourfes now actuated by the fame Spirit theirs were then. As to the pleafing God; must not God, think you, be as well pleas'd with our talking of, and magnifying his wondrous Works in our familiar Converfations with one another, as with our praifing or extolling him in our Clofets? and must not the regard and reverence which we teftifie for him in Company, be as acceptable to him as our private Adorations? fpring they not from the fame Principle, and is not the one as fubfervient (to fay no more) to his Glory, as the other? As to the Honour and Intereft of Religion, nothing can more effectually promote it than the giving a frequent and publick Testimony of our Value for it. Which way can we more clearly convince the World of the Excellence and Vertue of it? Which way can we more effectually propagate in one another the Love of it, than by making it appear that it has moulded and form'd our Souls

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Souls into the Image of God; that it has possessed our Thoughts, and refin'd our Converfation? But on the other Hand, if we have no regard to our Talk, if we think this a Matter which Confcience is not concern'd in, we fhall foon fee Religion daily lofe ground; for we fhall foon learn to think and act with the fame liberty we talk; and this will introduce a strange face of things in a little time.

Now to close all, If our care or unconcernment in this point, be of this vaft Confequence, we cannot but think we shall be called to a ftrict account about it in another World; the Day is coming when the Lord will fulfil his promife, Mal. 3. And the Lord har kened and heard, and a Book of remembrance was written and they fhall be mine, faith the Lord, that Day when I make up my Fewels. The Day is coming when God will execute the Threat denounc in the Apostle Jude, Behold the

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Lord cometh with ten Thousand of. his Saints, to execute judgment upon all, to convince them that are ungodly among us, of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodlily committed; and of all their hard Speeches which ungodly finners have spoken against

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