And how have some of you behaved yourselves in your family relations! How have you neglected your children's souls! And not only so, but have corrupted their minds by your bad examples; and instead of training them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, have rather brought them up in the devil's service!

How have some of you attended that sacred ordinance of the Lord's supper without any manner of serious preparation, and in a careless, slighty frame of spirit, and chiefly to comply with custom! Have you not ventured to put the sacred symbols of the body and blood of Christ into your mouth, while at the same time you lived in ways of known sins, and intended no other than still to go on in the same wicked practices? And, it may be, have sat at the Lord's table with rancor in your heart against some of your brethren that you have sat there with. You have come even to that holy feast of love among God's children, with the leaven of malice and envy in your heart; and so have eat and drank judgment to yourself.

What stupidity and sottishness has attended your course of wickedness; which has appeared in your obstinacy under awakening dispensations of God's word and providence. And how have some of you backslidden after you have setout in religion, and quenched God's Spirit after he had been striving with you! And what unsteadiness, and slothfulness, and great misimprovement of God's strivings with you, have you been chargeable with, that having long been subjects of them?

Now, can you think when you have thus behaved yourself, that God is obliged to shew you mercy? Are you not, after all this, ashamed to talk of its being hard with God to cast you off? Does it become one that has lived such a life, to open his mouth to excuse himself, or object against God's justice in his condemnation, or to complain of it as hard in God not to give him converting and pardoning grace, and make him his child, and bestow on him eternal life! Or to talk of his duties and great pains in religion, and such like things, as if such performances were worthy to be accepted, and to draw God's heart to such a creature! If this has been your manner, does it not

shew how little you have considered yourself, and how little a sense you have had of your own sinfulness?

Secondly, Be directed to consider, if God should eternally reject and destroy you what an agreeableness and exact mutu al answerableness there would be between God's so dealing with you, and your spirit and behavior. There would not on ly be an equality, but a similitude, God declares, that his dealings with men shall be suitable to their disposition and practice. Psalm xviii 25. 26. “With the merciful man, thou wilt shew thyself merciful; With an upright man, thou wilt shew thyself upright: With the pure, thou wilt shew thyself pure; and with the froward, thou wilt shew thyself froward." How much soever you dread damnation, and are affrighted and concerned at the thoughts of it; yet if God should indeed eternally damn you, you would but be met with in your own way; you would be dealt with exactly according to your own dealing: God would but measure to you in the same measure in which you mete, Surely it is but fair that you should be made to buy in the same measure in which you

sell.

Here I would particularly shew, 1. That if God should eternally destroy you, it would be agreeable to your treatment of God. 2. That it would be agreeable to your treatment of Jesus Christ. 3. That it would be agreeable to your behav ior towards your neighbors. 4. That it would be according to your own foolish behavior towards yourself.

I. If God should forever cast you off, it would be exactly agreeable to your treatment of him. That you may be sensible of this, consider,

1. You never have exercised the least degree of love to God; and therefore it would be agreeable to your treatment of him if he should never express any love to you. When God converts and saves a sinner, it is a wonderful and unspeakable manifestation of divine love. When a poor lost soul is brought home to Christ, and has all his sins forgiv en him, and is made a child of God, it will take up a whole eternity to express and declare the greatness of that love.

And why should God be obliged to express such wonderfel love to you, who never exercised the least degree of love to him in all your life? You never have loved God, who is infinitely glorious and lovely; and why then is God under obligation to love you who are all over deformed and loathsome as a filthy worm, or rather a hateful viper? You have no benevo lence in your heart towards God; you never rejoiced in God's happiness; if he had been miserable, and that had been possible, you would have liked it as well as if he were happy; you would not have cared how miserable he was, nor mourned for it, any more than you now do for the devil's being miserable: And why then should God be looked upon as obliged to take so much care for your happiness, as to do such great things for it, as he doth for those that are saved? Or why should God be called hard, in case he should not be careful to save you from misery? You care not what becomes of God's glory; you are not distressed how much soever his honor seems to suffer in the world: And why should God care any more for your welfare? Has it not been so, that if you could but promote your private interest, and gratify your own lusts, you cared not how much the glory of God suffered? And why may not God advance his own glory in the ruin of your welfare, not caring how much your interest suffers by it? You never so much as stirred one step, sincerely making the glory of God your end, or acting from real respect to him: And why then is it hard if God do not do such great things for you, as the changing your nature, raising you from spiritual death to life, conquering the powers of darkness for you, translating you out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear Son, delivering you from eternal misery, and bestowing eternal glory upon you? You do not use to be willing to deny yourself for God; you never cared to put yourself out of your way for Christ: Whenever any thing cross or difficult came in your way, that the glory of God was concerned in, it has been your manner to shun it, and excuse yourself from it: You did not care to hurt yourself for Christ, that you did not see worthy of it: And why then must it be looked upon as

such a hard and cruel thing, if Christ has not been pleased to spill his blood and be tormented to death for such a sinner.

2. You have slighted and made light of God; and why then may not God justly slight you? When sinners are sensible in some measure of their misery, they are ready to think it hard that God will not take more notice of them; that he will see them in such a lamentable distressed condition, beholding their burdens and tears, and seem to slight it, and manifest no pity to them. Their souls they think are precious: It would be a dreadful thing if they should perish, and burn in hell for ever. They do not see through it, that God should make so light of their salvation. But then, ought they not to consider, that as their souls are precious, so is God's honor precious? The honor of the infinite God, the great King of heaven and earth, is a thing of as great importance, (and surely may justly be so esteemed by God) as the happiness of you, a poor little worm. But yet you have slighted that honor of God, and valued it no more than the dirt under your feet. You have been told that such and such things were contrary to the will of an holy God, and against his honor; but you cared not for that. God called upon you, and exhorted you to be more tender of his honor; but you went on without regarding him. Thus have you slighted God! And yet, is it hard that God should slight you? Are you more honorable than God, that he must be obliged to make much of you, how light soever you make of him and his glory?

And you have not only slighted God in time past, but you slight him still. You indeed now make a pretence and shew of honoring him in your prayers, and attendance on other external duties, and by a sober countenance, and seeming devoutness in your words and behavior; but it is all mere dissembling. That downcast look and seeming reverence, is not from any honor you have to God in your heart, though you would have it go so, and would have God take it so. You that have not believed in Christ, have not the least jot of honor to God; that shew of it is merely forced and what you are driven to by fear, like those mentioned in Psalm lxvi. 3. "Through VOL. VII. 2 U

the greatness of thy power shall thine enemies submit themselves to thee." In the original it is, " shall lie unto thee;" that is, yield feigned submission, and dissemble respect and honor to thee. There is a rod held over you that makes you seem to pay such respect to God. This religion and devotion, even the very appearance of it, would soon be gone, and

all vanish away, if that were removed. Sometimes it may be you weep in your prayers, and in your hearing sermons, and hope God will take notice of it, and take it for some honor; but he sees it to be all hypocrisy. You weep for yourself; you are afraid of hell; and do you think that that is worthy that God should take much notice of you, because you can cry when you are in danger of being damned; when at the same time you indeed care nothing for God's honor?

Seeing you thus disregard so great a God, is it a heinous thing for God to slight you, a little wretched, despicable creature; a worm, a mere nothing, and less than nothing; a vile insect, that has risen up in contempt against the Majesty of heaven and earth?

3. Why should God be looked upon as obliged to bestow salvation upon you, when you have been so ungrateful for the mercies he has bestowed upon you already? God has tried you with a great deal of kindness, and he never has sincerely been thanked by you for any of it. God has watched over you and preserved you, and provided for you, and followed you with mercy all your days; and yet you have continued sinning against him. He has given you food and raiment, but you have improved both in the service of sin. He has preserved you while you slept'; but when you arose, it was to return to the old trade of sinning. God, notwithstanding this ingratitude, has still continued his mercy; but his kindness has never won your heart, or brought you to a more grateful behavior towards him. It may be you have received many remarkable mercies, recoveries from sickness, or preservations of your life, when at one time and another exposed by accidents, when, if you had died, you would have gone directly to hell: But you never had any true thankfulness for any of these mercies. God has kept you out of hell, and con