(Hosea iv. 2.) What a scene of blackness and guilt appears to the observant eye? The lying Prophets indeed "see visions of peace;" boast of man's moral rectitude; palliate the flagrant evils they cannot deny; and seek to hide themselves and others from the light, speaking peace, peace, when it is so evident, as Jehu said, "What peace, when our iniquities and our whoredoms are so many" (2 Kings, ix. 22.)

Where can you look, without beholding the broken tables of the covenant trod under foot? whilst one part of mankind are plunged in the grosser crimes of perjury, drunkenness, all manner of lewdness, sabbath-breaking, profaneness and disobedience; the other more decently corrupt themselves and forget God; in Mammon's idol service; in Honour's empty pageantry; in Pleasure's thoughtless throng. The world, the world is the universal cry, where envy, malice, disappointment, covetousness, ambition, successively torment the fortunate and the unsuccessful. The learned and the unlearned, the high and low, the rich and poor, have their separate walk, concurring all in this, "to worship and serve the creature more than the Creator." (Rom. i. 25.) But these things men hate to see or hear of, though truths so flagrant; and, fixed on their own deceivings, will neither attend to their danger, nor be restrained. Hence so ineffectual have been all the means which God or man hath used. Doth God raise up servants to remonstrate against iniquity? They hate and persecute them. Like their fathers that "killed the Prophets, and stoned them which were sent unto them." (Matt. xxiii. 37.) They smite them "with the words of the tongue," and would with the edge of the sword, "All the day long therefore have we

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stretched forth our hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people. (Rom. x. 21.) They hate to be reformed, and cast God's word behind their back." (Psal. 1. 17.) Nor do they regard men much more than God. In general how ineffectual are all the restraints of human laws? How evaded or broken through? What would men say, if only the laws against sabbath-breaking, drunkenness and lewdness, were actually put in execu+ tion? But if these things are so, a sad demonstration arises of man's deep corruption.

Facts like these prove that his neck is an iron sinew, that he determines to go on in the frowardness of his heart, "an evil heart of unbelief, departing from the living God." (Heb. iii. 12.)

2. Another confirmation of this truth may be drawn from observation on the tempers of children, even before they have reached any years of reflection. It will be found universally true, that "folly (that is sin) is bound up in the heart of a child." (Prov. xxii. 15.) And those who would be convinced of the corruption of our nature, need only observe the babe in the nurse's arms. Those perverse passions which afterwards in life break forth and fill our houses with violence, appear then in embrio. What anger may you remark in their little breasts when crossed or contradicted? What self-will and obstinacy do they shew under correction? What envy at favours done to others? And scarce have they begun to speak, but they begin to lie, and disingenuously and artfully, like Adam, seek to conceal their transgressions. So true it is, that "ungodly man is froward, even from his mother's womb; as soon as he is born he goes astray, and speaks lies." (Psal. lviii. 3.) (Psal. lviii. 3.) Nor can this be ascribed to the influence of education, or laid to the fault of bad examples before them, It is the

case with those who are the most carefully edu cated; and the most pious parent with grief beholds the seeds of corruption springing up continually in this their native soil, notwithstanding his pains by the rod of correction and by instruction to root them up.

And though some shew stronger dispositions to sin than others, and a milder constitution appears from the cradle in a few; yet none are excepted from the above symptoms of corruption, though, like different animals of the same savage species, some exceed others in ferocity. Nor can this be accounted for on any other principles than those the scriptures open to us: For what could be more impious, nay blasphemous, than to suppose that we came such out of our Maker's hands as we now evidently are?

3. I add, as a corroborative proof to the foregoing remarks, the miseries which appear in the world. That man is now born to sorrow and trouble, as the sparks fly upward," (Job v. 7.) cannot be denied. We hear on every side the complainings of the afflicted, the murmurings of the discontented, the repinings of the poor, the vexations of the disappointed, the cries of the sick, and the groans of the dying. What is the world but a Bochim, a place of weeping? Whilst sorrow cometh upon sorrow faster then Job's messengers of evil. And who are exempted from the general lot? Doth not every living soul feel within the forebodings of approaching dissolution, the decays of age, the wastes of time, and know that he is, even in the midst of life, hastening to the dust, to the grave, the heritage of the sinner? Now can it be thought, that the God "whose mercy is over all his works, (Psal. cxlv. 9.) who never willingly afflicts the children of men," (Lam. iii, 33.) can it be imagined that

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the God" whose name and nature is love," (1John iv. 8.) would thus unprovoked lift up the Scourge, and with scorpions chastise us? That be far from him: "He is righteous in all his ways, and just in all his judgments." (Psal. cxlv. 17.) He giveth us less, but never more than our iniquities deserve. If it be said, true; but we have actually sinned, and are plagued for our own offences. I say, that will not account for the scene we have been describing; for we see all the like evils, and death the greatest of them, pass upon those who have not sinned after the similitude of Adam's trangression." (Rom. v. 14.) Stand by the cradle, and see that child of man scarce started from the womb; hear its doleful moans, see it convulsed and agonizing with pain; covered with loathsome ulcers, and pining, laid in its coffin; what can this mean? Is there no preceding cause, no meritorious ground for this heavy chastisement? To suppose it, would be making the most High, like the idol Moloch, pleased with dying infants' cries. But here the mystery is solved: that babe, scarce a span long, is a corrupted creature: it hath a nature which is enmity against God: it possesseth every abomination, not indeed in their maturity, but which have already taken root "to bring forth fruit unto death." And thus we shall no longer question God's righteousness in punishing, death being universally "the wages of sin." (Rom. vi. 23.)

4. The acknowledgments of the best of men have borne a strong testimony to this great truth, that man is a corrupted creature. Whoever reads the scripture with an attentive eye, will necessarily observe the ancient worthies full of their confessions of guilt and corruption. David, Job, St. Paul, high as their advancements were, "groan

ed under this evil, being burdened. A body of death" hung about them; a nature departed from God, and ready continually to hurry them down its stream into the dead sea of perdition. It was only by wrestling, striving, labouring, and by the grace of God beating down this body of sin, that they were enabled to stand: so true it is that "the righteous scarcely are saved;" arising from the difficulty of subduing this strong bent of our fallen nature. And the experience of God's servants hath and doth continue to confirm it. For who of them doth not feel "a law in his mem bers warring against the law of his mind?" (Rom. vii. 23.) Who is not often forced to say, "when I would do good, evil is present with me ?" . (Rom. vii. 21.) Yea, do they not all go mourning to their graves under this burden, and long especially to "be absent from the body," that they may be delivered wholly from the bondage of corruption which now presseth down the soul? From what hath been said, who can any longer doubt of the universal corruption of our nature? Who will have the hardiness to say, "I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?" (Prov. xx. 9.)

It remains therefore only to improve what hath been spoken.

First, For our deeper humiliation before God. Though we are never so deeply convinced of this or that sin, if we see the fact only, the impression of guilt will be but partial, and though terrifying, not truly humbling and emptying us of our self-sufficiency. If we would see sin in its true malignity, we must ascend from the act to the temper; from the temper to the nature.

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what can so entirely confound our pride as this view we have taken of ourselves? Not merely corrupt in practice but in principle; not sinners