worse than beaftly filth, which was not too low for God himself. You cannot meet him, but with the fame fpirit in which he came. He became a man of forrows, and acquainted with grief, from that day, when he took on him the burthen of your flesh and sins. And are you, who committed those fins, to be a man of pleasure? He emptied himself of his majesty and glory for you; and are not you to be emptied of that pride which goeth before your own deftruction, and thofe filthy affections, which reprefent you in the eyes of God, as a piteous, if not an odious wretch? Are not you to feel the weight of your own fins, as well as Chrift? What ftable, what manger, is too vile for you, who have fo long lain in filth, and fed with fwine, and yet have been foolish enough to take it all for grandeur and pleasure? If you ftill perfift in this mind, you must be told, that, though Chrift had baptized you with his own hands, yet to you no promife is made, no performance due, no Saviour born.

Unto you only, who have put off the old man, and are born again by water and the Spirit; unto you, who feel in yourself, on the baptifmal call of Chrift, the answer of a good confcience; unto you, who walk not in your own ways, but in newness of life, not after the flesh, but the Spirit; unto you, who ftand faft in the faith, confeffing that Jefus is the fon of God, and that through him only you have falvation; unto you, who obferve all things, whatsoever Chrift bath commanded you, who being delivered out of the bands of your enemies, ferve God, without fear, in boliness and righteoufnefs before bim, all the days of your lives; unto you only, is born this day a Saviour, which is Chrift the Lord.

Lay faft hold therefore by a lively faith on this Saviour, and by taking good heed to the articles of your peace with God, endeavour to make your election

and

and adoption fure, left by departing from them, you be found among thofe, who have trodden under fost the Son of God, and have counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith they had been fanctified, an unboly thing, and have done defpight unto the Spirit of grace.

Here now, my brethren, are light and darkness, glory and infamy, life and death, fet before you. God give you understanding in all things, but more efpecially to make a right choice between these oppofites; and grant that your hearts may warmly fecond your reason, and your works, the warmth of your hearts, through Chrift Jefus our Saviour, to whom, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be all might, majesty, and dominion, now and for ever more. Amen.

DIS

DISCOURSE X.

PREACHED ON GOOD FRIDAY.

The Neceffity and Efficacy of the great

Sacrifice.

ACTS xvii. 3.

Chrift muft needs have fuffered, and rifen again from

T

the dead.

HE rifing again from the dead fhews, that the fuffering, here mentioned, was that of death. St. Paul, as we are told in this paffage, proved to the Jews, from the prophecies of the old teftament, that the Meffiah or Christ, must of neceffity have been put to death, and raised again to life. That he could not have fulfilled thofe prophecies, nor proved himself to be the Chrift, without thus fuffering, may be clearly feen in the 22d Pfalm, and the 53d Chapter of Ifaiah, as well as in a great variety of other places, Chrift himself, before his crucifixion, affured his difciples, that he Should fuffer many things of the elders, and the chief priefts, and fcribes, and should be killed. He foretold VOL. IV.

N

the

the fame thing to a mixed multitude, most of them as yet unconverted, in thefe words, Now is the judgment of this world, not shall the prince of this world be caft out; and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. This be faid, fignifying what death he bould die. After his refurrection, he reproved his difciples, who had doubted, whether the Meffiah fhould die or not; O fools, and flow of beart to believe all that the prophets have Spoken. Ought not Chrift to have fuffered thefe things? And beginning at Mofes, and all the prophets, be expounded unto them, in all the Scriptures, the things concerning bimfelf.

Although there is nothing, at first fight, more mysterious, than that he, who was without fin fhould, by the exprefs appointment of eternal juftice, fuffer the wages of fin; that the juft fould be put to death for the unjust, or that the son of God himself should die; yet, this most extraordinary, and indeed amazing, piece of hiftory, if duly weighed, and clofely confidered, will appear to be no lefs rational, than it is aftonishing. But there is no reconciling it to the reason of infidel oppofers, without pafling through a train of thinking, to the full, as furprising, as either the fact of our Saviour's death, or the end propofed by it.

In purfuit of this, we must take a little compass. It is evident from the fuperiority of his nature to that of any other animal, that man was intended by his Maker to be, and ftill is, the Lord of this world, which he inhabits. By the power derived to him from his reason, he makes the agility and ftrength of other animals, and the properties of the very elements, his own; he fends the dove and the dog on his errands; he fubdues the lion; he bestrides the horse, he makes the ocean his high-way, and is carried

carried round the world by the winds; the earth and the fun wait on him with his food, and even the thunder is put into his hand. He is made only a little lower than the Angels.

Surely then he must be endued with wifdom and goodness equal to the high ftation he is placed in; and the exercise of these two endowments, in fo large an empire, must make him happy in proportion to the full extent of his capacity. This is a moft natural conclufion from that knowledge which informs us, that man and this world, are the works of infinite wisdom and goodness.

Yet nothing can be more contrary to experience. Inftead of governing a world, this lord, fo highly ftationed, is utterly unable to govern himself He hath but a small fhare of that power, his natural abilities entitle him to, and what he hath, he abufes fo foolishly, and fuffers for it fo miferably, that his station and power are become his curfe; and yet an unbounded advancement of both is the moft violent of all his defires. Nay, instead of a fovereign, he is a flave. His body is enflaved to hunger, thirst, cold, heat, labour, pain, fickness, unhappy accidents; and to death, which he cannot think of without the utmoft terror, which he cannot poffibly efcape. His mind is ftill worfe enflaved. How is he torn with defires, which, if fuccefsful, he knows would undo him! How is he blown up with idle hopes! How thrown down by unexpected difappointments! How unmanned by vain fears! How terrified with fuch as are but too well founded, perhaps fore-boding miferies without end! How racked with pride! How diftracted with anger! How gnawn with envy! How every thing within him, and about him, tyranifes over him in its turn, and forces him to betray himself, to abuse his own nature, and to infult his God!