of mankind, he has seen a dog come into the room where he was among his merry companions, and has groaned inwardly, and said, "Oh! that I had been that dog!" And hast thou, O sinner, felt nothing like this? Has thy conscience been so stupified, so "seared with a hot iron," (1 Tim. iv. 2.) that it has never cried out, for any of the violences which have been done it? Has it never warned thee of the fatal consequences of what thou hast done in opposition to it? These warnings are, in effect, the voice of God; they are the admonitions which he gave thee by his vicegerent in thy breast. And when his sentence for thy evil works is executed upon thee in everlasting death, thou shalt hear that voice speaking to thee again, in a louder tone, and a severer accent, than before; and thou shalt be tormented with its upbraidings through eternity, because thou wouldst not, in time, hearken to its admonitions.

10. Let me add farther, if it be any aggravation that sin has been committed after God has been moving by his Spirit on the mind, surely your sin has been attended with that aggravation too. Under the Mosaic dispensation, dark and imperfect as it was, the Spirit strove with the Jews; else Stephen could not have charged it upon them, that through all their generations "they had always resisted him." Acts, vii. 51. Now, surely, we may much more reasonably apprehend that he strives with sinners under the Gospel. And have you never experienced any thing of this kind, even when there has been no external circumstance to awaken you, nor any pious teacher near you? Have you never perceived some secret impulse upon your mind, leading you to think of religion, urging you to an immediate consideration of it, sweetly inviting you to make trial of it, and warning you, that you would lament this stupid neglect? O sinner, why were not these happy motions attended to? Why did you not, as it were, spread out all the sails of your soul, to catch that heavenly, that fovorable breeze? But you have carelessly neglected it: you have overborne these kind influences. How reasonably then might the sentence have gone forth

in righteous displeasure, "My Spirit shall no more strive." Gen. vi. 3. And indeed, who can say that it is not already gone forth? If you feel no secret agitation of mind, no remorse, no awakening, while you read such a remonstrance as this, there will be room, great room to suspect it.

11. There is indeed one aggravation more, which may not attend your guilt: I mean, that of being committed against solemn covenant engagements: a circumstance which has laid heavy on the consciences of many, who perhaps in the main series of their lives have served God with great integrity. But let me call you to think, to what this is owing. Is it not, that you have never personally made any solemn profession of devoting yourself to God at all? have never done any thing, which has appeared to your own apprehension an act by which you have made a covenant with him, though you have heard so much of his covenant, though you have been so solemnly and so tenderly invited to it? And in this view, how monstrous must this circumstance appear, which at first was mentioned as some alleviation of guilt! Yet I must add, that you are not, perhaps, altogether so free from guilt on this head as you may at first imagine. Has your heart been, even from your youth, hardened to so uncommon a degree, that you have never cried to God in any season of danger and difficulty? And did you never mingle vows with those cries? Did you never promise, that, if God would hear and help you in that hour of extremity, you would forsake your sins, and serve him as long as you lived? He heard and helped you, or you had not been reading these lines; and, by such deliverance, did as it were bind down your vows upon you; and therefore your guilt, in the violation of them, remains before him, though you are stupid enough to forget them. Nothing is forgotten, nothing is overlooked by him; and the day will come, when the record shall be laid before you too.

12. And now, O sinner, think seriously with thyself, what defence thou wilt make to all this? Prepare thine apology; call thy witnesses; make thine appeal from him, whom thou hast thus offended, to some superior judge, if

such there be. Alas! those apologies are so weak and vain, that one of thy fellow-worms may easily detect and confound them; as I will endeavour presently to show thee. But thy foreboding conscience already knows the issue. Thou art convicted, convicted of the most aggravated offences. Thou "hast not humbled thine heart, but lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven;" (Dan. v. 22, 23.) and "thy sentence shall come forth from his presence." Psal. xvii. 2. Thou hast violated his known laws; thou hast despised and abused his numberless mercies; thou has affronted conscience, his vicegerent in thy soul; thou hast resisted and grieved his Spirit; thou hast trifled with him in all thy pretended submissions; and, in one word, and that his own, "thou hast done evil things as thou couldst." Jer. iii. 5. Thousands are, no doubt, already in hell, whose guilt never equalled thine; and it is astonishing, that God hath spared thee to read this representation of thy case, or to make any pause upon it. O waste not so precious a moment, but enter attentively, and as humbly as thou canst, into those reflections which suit a case so lamentable and so terrible as thine.

The Confession of a Sinner, convinced in general of his Guilt.

"O God! thou injured Sovereign, thou all-penetrating and Almighty Judge! what shall I say to this charge? Shall I pretend I am wronged by it, and stand on the defence in thy presence? I dare not do it; for thou knowest my foolishness, and none of my sins are hid from thee.' Psal. lxix. 5. My conscience tells me, that a denial of my crimes would only increase them, and add new fuel to the fire of thy deserved wrath. If I justify myself, mine own mouth will condemn me; if I say I am perfect, it will also prove me perverse ;' (Job, ix. 20.) 'for innumerable evils have compassed me about; mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; they are,' as I have been told in thy name, ' more than the hairs of my head; therefore my heart faileth me.' Psal. xl. 12. I am more guilty than it is possible for another to declare or represent. My heart speaks inore than any other ac

cuser. And thou, O Lord, art much greater than heart, and knowest all things. 1 John, iii. 20.

my

"What has my life been but a course of rebellion against thee? It is not this or that particular action alone I have to lament. Nothing has been right in its principles, and views, and ends. My whole soul has been disordered. All my thoughts, my affections, my desires, my pursuits, have been wretchedly alienated from thee. I have acted as if I had hated thee, who art infinitely the loveliest of all beings; as if I had been contriving how I might tempt thee to the uttermost, and weary out thy patience, marvellous as it is. My actions have been evil, my words yet more evil than they! and, O blessed God, my heart, how much more corrupt than either! What an inexhausted fountain of sin has there been in it! A fountain of original corruption, which mingled its bitter streams with the days of early childhood; and which, alas! flows on even to this day, beyond what actions or words could express. I see this to have been the case with regard to what I can particularly survey. But, oh! how many months and years have I forgotten, concerning which I only know this in the general, that they are much like those I can remember; except it be, that I have been growing worse and worse, and provoking thy patience more and more, though every new exercise of it was more and more wonderful.

"And how am I astonished that thy forbearance is still continued! It is because thou art God, and not man.' Hos. xi. 9. Had I, a sinful worm, been thus injured, I could not have endured it. Had I been a prince, I had long since done justice on any rebel whose crimes had borne but a distant resemblance to mine. Had I been a parent, I had long since cast off the ungrateful child who had made me such a return as I have all my life long been making to thee, O thou Father of my spirit! The flame of natural affection would have been extinguished, and his sight and his very name would have become hateful to me. Why, then, O Lord, am I not 'cast out from thy presence?' Jer. lii. 3. Why am I not sealed up under an irreversible

sentence of destruction? That I live, I owe to thine indulgence. But, oh! if there be yet any way of deliverance, if there be yet any hope for so guilty a creature, may it be opened upon me by thy Gospel and thy grace! And if any farther alarm, humiliation, or terror, be necessary to my security and salvation, may I meet them, and bear them all! Wound my heart, O Lord, so that thou wilt but afterwards 'heal it ;' and break it in pieces, if thou wilt but at length condescend to bind it up. Hos. vi. 1.

CHAPTER V.

THE SINNER STRIPPED OF HIS VAIN PLEAS.

1. 2. The vanity of those pleas which sinners may secretly confide in, is so apparent, that they will be ashamed at last to mention them before God.-3. Such as, that they descended from pious parents.-4. That they had attended to the speculative part of religion.-5. That they had entertained sound notions.-6. 7. That they had expressed a zealous regard to religion, and attended the outward forms of worship with those they apprehended the purest churches.-8. That they had been free from gross immoralities. 9. That they did not think the consequences of neglecting religion would have been so fatal.-10. That they could not do otherwise than they did.-11. Conclusion. With the meditation of a convinced sinner giving up his vain pleas before God.

1. My last discourse left the sinner in very alarming and very pitiable circumstances: a criminal convicted at the bar of God, disarmed of all pretences to perfect innocence and sinless obedience, and consequently obnoxious to the sentence of a holy law, which can make no allowance for any transgression, no not for the least; but pronounces death and a curse against every act of disobedience; how much more then against those numberless and aggravated acts of rebellion, of which, O sinner! thy conscience hath condemned thee before God? I would hope some of my readers will ingenuously fall under the conviction, and not think of making any apology; for sure I am, that, humbly to plead guilty at the divine bar, is the most decent, and, all things considered, the most prudent thing that can be done in such an unhappy state.