judge parents might inform their children in. But we must tell fuch, that the defign of preaching is not to gratify itching ears with new difcoveries, but to reform hearts by the old, yet new truths of God, which will never wear old to them who are acquainted with the power of them; that children have fouls as well as they; that their fouls are no leis precious than thofe of adult perfons; that we have the charge of the one as well as the other; that the Lord has fometimes been pleased to reach the heart of children by fuch familiar applications; that we are obliged to be all things to all men, that fo we may win fome to Chrift. In fine, we must tell fuch, that we are particularly obliged, by our Lord's command formerly quoted, to encourage children to come to him, and therfeore we' could not but endeavour to deal with them, and that in a way fuitable in fome measure to their capacities: what is old to you, may be new to them; and a new drop of the influences of God's Spirit would even make these very truths, which formerly you have known, have a new and better relish than formerly they had.

I fhall now proceed, in the second place, to you who have stepped out of childhood into youth, or into middle age, and fhall endeavour to fix guilt upon you. Hitherto we have made it appear, that you are guilty now we come to tell you, and to condefcend on fome particulars whereof you are guilty. We told you, nay proved, that you were defiled: now, we fall, as it were, point to the very fpot. We have made it appear that ye have finned: now we shall take you to the places, as it were where ye have finned, that ye may get no way of fhifting the challenge. And because now we find you in the house of God, we thall,

1. Examine you a little in reference to your conduc there. You have frequently come here; you have frequently prefented yourfelves before God as his people; but I fear, if your carriage in this matter be narrowly fcanned, you fhall be found finners before the Lord in reference to this. I fhall, in the name of that God in whole courts ye tread, put three questions to your confciences. (1.) What brings you ordinarily here? Come ye to facrifice to the world's idol, cuftom, because they are il-looked upon who stay away? or come ye to stop.

the

the mouth of a natural confcience, that would give you no reft if ye ftaid away? or come ye to fee and be feen? or to gratify curiofity merely? I fear these be the designs on which not a few of you come; and if fo, then you are found guilty before God, who requires you to come upon other defigns, even to wait on him, that ye may fee his power and glory in the fanctuary, as his people have feen him heretofore. (2.) What do ye here, when ye are come! Do ye hear the word of God merely as an idle tale? Do ye put truths by yourselves, and apply them to others? Do ye fuffer your minds to roam up and down upon the mountains of vanity, looking at this or the other thing or perfon? Do you observe more the way of the truths being spoken, than the truth of God itself! Are you more intent in obferving the inftrument than in listening to the voice of God? Let your confciences speak, and I am fure a great many of thefe evils ye will find yourfelves guilty of. (3.) I would pose you, as to the fruit of these approaches. What good get ye for your coming? Do ye get convictions, and shift them? Do ye get calls, and fit them? Do ye hear reproofs, and hate them? Do ye hear inftructions, and forget them? Who of you can clear yourselves of these fius? fins done in the very prefence of God, fins wherein his honour and glory is in a more than ordinary manner concerned, because they do extremely reflect upon it.

2. We fhall next follow you to your employments, and inquire a little what your carriage is there. I take it for granted, that all of you have fome honeft occupation or other. If there be any who have not, these persons, as they fin in wanting, because thereby they idle away God's talents; fo they lie open to all fins. Now, fuch of you as have employments, I fhall defire you to answer me a few questions in reference to your deportment in them. And, (1.) I would know if ye did confult God in the choice of them? Did ye make it your endeavour to understand what God was calling you to? God, either by giving a man fpecial endowments, a peculiar genius, with other congruous circumftances, or by hedging up the way to all other employments, or fome one fuch providential way or other, calls every one to a particular employment; and therefore, when we engage in any, we fhould endeavour

to

to understand God's mind in it, what it is our duty to do; for we are commanded, in all our ways to acknowledge God, Prov. iii. 6. "In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he fhalt direct thy paths." Now, did ye in this step of your way acknowledge God, I mean in the choice of your employments? I fear, few dare say that they bowed their knee to God to crave his direction. Well, then, here your iniquities have found you out. (2.) Do ye fet God before you in following your employments? Do ye make it your business to know how ye may glorify God in them? Whatever we do, we are obliged to do it to the glory of God. Let confcience now fpeak, and it will tell many of you, that to this very day, ye never had a thought of promoting the glory of God by your employ. ments. So that here you are found guilty, not of some one fin only, but of a tract of fin, and that even from the morning of your day continued till now. (3.) Do ye depend upon God for a blessing upon the work of your hands? Who of you dare fay, that however ye do ufe means dili gently, yet it is to God ye look for the bleffing? And are ye earnest in dealing with God, that he may fucceed the works of your hands, and make you profper in them? (4.) To whom do ye attribute the fuccefs of them? When the Lord fucceeds the work of your hands, do ye heartily blefs God for it? Dare ye fay, that this leads you to praise the God of your mercies, and to walk humbly before him, who deals kindly even with the unthankful and finners, and has given a proof of this, in giving you fuccefs in these employments? (5.) When ye are fuccessful in them, what ufe make ye of your fuccefs? Does it engage you to the ways of God, and make you walk more humbly or are you lifted up, and forget yourselves, and forget the Lord? And do ye spend upon the service of fin what the Lord has gracioufly given to you? Sure, if ye confcientiofly put these questions home to your own hearts, they will discover very much fin.

But,

take a view of you in there fee whether we And with refpect to

3. We fhall, in the next place, your converse in the world, and can find you guilty of fin or not. your converse in the world, I would pofe you upon a few things.

And,

(1) I put the question to you, What company do ye

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make

make choice of? Do ye chufe the company of them that fear God, or the company of irreligious perfous? I am fure, if many of you deal impartially with your own hearts in this matter, ye will find guilt. Your confciences can tell, that you have the greatest intimacy with perTons who have no religion, perfons who have no fear of God before their eyes; nor regarding what the wife man long ago obferved, that he that walks with the wife hall be wife, but a companion of fools fhall be destroyed,” Prov. xiii. 20. And fuch are all irreligious men in God's account. I would not be understood to extend this too far, as fome, through a mistake dangerous enough, do, as if thereby we were forbid civil or neighbourly converse with perfons that are not religious; for this is not only Jawful, but a duty; we have not only fcripture-commands to this purpose, but the very law of nature obli ges us to it; and we are fure, God did never by any pofitive precept enjoin us any thing contrary to this. Nay, upon the contrary, we fee plainly, that a walk according to the law of nature in this matter is highly congruous to religion. If fuch perfons do vifit us, we may vifit them again, and carry it friendly. This is one part of that courteoufnefs that the apostle Peter enjoins us, 1 Pet. iii. 8. Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compaffion one of another; love as brethren, be pitiful, be courte ous." And whereas the refufal of civil converse, in inquiring after one another's health, vifiting at fome times, and the like ads of kindness, is looked upon by fome as a piece of strictnefs, it is quite other wife; for the very contrary is determined to be a piece of perfection, by our great Lord and Master, who is the best judge, Matth. v. 47, 48. "And if ye falute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans fo? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in hea ven is perfect." The plain meaning of which is this, A Christian fhould be a man every way beyond others, and fhould have fomething peculiar in the whole of his conduct; but if ye deal only civilly and neighbourly with those of your own perfuafion, with those who in every thing do jump with you, wherein do ye go beyond the publicans and finners, the moft fignally impious wretches that the world can fhew? Again, even thieves and rob

bers

hers will keep fome correfpondence and civility towards those of their own fort; but Christian perfection calls for more enlargement of foul, and requires that we carry obligingly to all, and perform, as occafion calls, all the duties of love, which comprehend certainly these of civil converfe and nhbourliness, as the apoftle puts beyond all question, 1 Cor. x. 27. " If any of them that believe not, bid you to a feast, and ye be difpofed to go; whatsoever is fet before you, eat, afking no question for confcience fake." Thus we fee Chriftians are allowed to converfe civilly with those who are unbelievers. And indeed not to do so, has a tendency to bring the way of God into contempt, and to make religion to be evil spoken of, and is contrary to the very spirit of the gospel, and to thefe many exprefs commands which we have, of adorning the gospel, and of converfing, fo as thereby we may leave a teftimony upon the confciences of men. Nay, it is to bear witness against God's goodness, and to rub flame upon our religion, as if it did narrow our fouls, and make us defective in those duties which it obliges us to abound in. But though what we have faid doth condemn the unchriftian rigidity of fome, yet it will not justify the un warrantable choice of perfons who have no religion, för our intimates, or for our ordinary and daily companions. No; we are obliged to guard against this. If we do this, we are out of our duty, and therefore have no reason to promise to ourselves God's protection. A perfon that walks, that ordinarily converses with fuch men, has reafon to fear that the Lord may leave him to become like to them; and this intimacy, I fear, is what most of you are guilty of,

(2.) I would ask you, What company do ye delight moft in? This is a great indication of the frame of the heart. A man that takes moft pleasure in the company of irreligious perfons, furely fins in it. Some, when they are in the company of the godly, carry it as if they thought themselves in fetters; and whenever they get out of it, to their own companions again, their minds are at cafe, and they find fatisfaction; as a man doth that is loofed out of the stocks. Are there none here whofe confciences can tell them that they are of this number? Let fuch look

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