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ing they had received, but which they did not believe. The prophet hath been telling us of desolating judgments just at hand, and with the same breath he calls us to weeping, and mourning, and girding with sack-cloth. How absurd, how unreasonably cruel is the demand! Will not the evil day come soon enough, though we should not anticipate the sorrows of it, by afflicting ourselves unnecessarily before its arrival? Nay, rather, if life is to be cut short, let us make the most of it while it lasts. If we must die to-morrow, let us eat and drink, and be merry to-day, and crowd into the few scanty hours that remain as much festivity and pleasure as we can.

Surely it is not needful that I should lengthen out this picture of deformity in all its dimensions. Its most distinguishing features are abundantly obvious; and I am confident, that the few sketches I have given you, will suffice to render the generation it represents the objects of contempt and abhorrence to all; those very persons not excepted, who, in the portrait drawn for them, may perhaps discover their own true likeness. For it is common enough to condemn with just, though partial severity, the same faults in others which we we easily forgive, nay cherish in ourselves. At any rate, I suppose none of us will be surprised to hear the alarming denunciation of wrath against those perverse and obstinate transgressors; which is the

III. Particular contained in my text, ver. 14. "It was revealed in mine ears by the Lord of Hosts, surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye die, saith the Lord God of Hosts."

We meet with another threatening of the same import, Ezek. xxiv. 13. "Because I have purged thee, and thou wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more, till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee. I the Lord have spoken it, and it shall come to pass, and I will do it. I will not go back, neither will I spare, neither will I repent, saith the Lord God.".

These wicked men had not only resisted the means of conviction, but they had perverted those means and extracted poison from the medicine intended for their cure. They drew iniquity with cords of vanity, and sinned as it were with a cart rope. By their scoffing reply to the call that was given them, in the name of the Lord God of Hosts, they said in effect, with insolent contempt and proud defiance, "Let him make speed, and hasten his work, that we may see it; and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know it." The prophet therefore proclaims, as on the house top, what God had revealed in his ears, that from that time forward, vengeance should pursue those impious men, till, like their rebellious forefathers, whose carcases fell in the wilderness, they should be utterly consumed from off the face of the earth.

Thus have I endeavoured briefly to illustrate the several parts of the passage before us.

But what concern have we in these things? and what improvement shall we make of them? For an answer to these questions, I need only refer you to 1 Corinthians, chap. x. where, after reciting some of those awful judgments which God had inflicted upon his ancient church, the apostle subjoins those memorable words, verse 11. "Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples, and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come."

"The Lord is known by the judgments which he executes." God is always the same: with him there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. And therefore, in his past acts of government, as they are explained by his word, we behold a plan of righteous administration; from whence we may learn, with some degree of certainty, what kind of treatment, in similar circumstances, we ourselves have reason to expect.

They must know little of what passes in the world, who do not observe a very striking resemblance between the present state of our own nation and that of the Jews, in the day to which my text refers.

Ingratitude to God, for the great things he hath done in our behalf, and for the distinguishing privileges we have long enjoyed, is too apparent to require any proof. Our deliverance from

popery at the Reformation, and the full establishment of our civil and religious liberties at the Revolution; these marvellous doings of the Lord are either forgotten by many, as a dead man out of mind, or at least remembered with cold indifference; nay, treated with marks of disaffection by some, while the characters of those illustrious men, whom God honoured to be the instruments in bringing about these glorious events, have been canvassed with the utmost severity of criticism, and under the specious pretext of candour and impartiality, set forth to public view in the most unfavourable light.

Have not vice and immorality grown up among us to an amazing height? Do not multitudes proclaim their sins as Sodom; and, instead of hiding them, do they not rather glory in their shame, as if they accounted it an honour to excel in one species of wickedness or another? I do not aggravate the charge: every one's observation may convince him of the truth of it. Is there not a visible and growing contempt of the blessed gospel ? Are not its ordinances despised by some, and profaned by others; nay, is it not by many deemed a mark of superior genius, to reject the whole of divine revelation as a cunningly devised fable, and to employ all their influence in proselyting others to their opinion?

What small success attends the preaching of the gospel even among those who profess to be

lieve? Into how many sects and parties are they divided? With what zeal do they build up their walls of partition? With what animosity do they contend for their own peculiarities, as points of new and important discovery, though in fact most of them might lay claim to a very ancient date, have been often republished, and as often refuted? Now, union is the strength of the religious, as well as of the civil community; and there is reason to fear that God will suffer that candlestick to be removed from among us, about which we quarrel and fight with one another, instead of walking by the light it affords, and performing the work which was given us to do.

I shall not waste any part of your time upon the mere triflers of either sex, who literally walk in a vain shew, and ought rather to be regarded as the scenery or decorations of the theatre, than as actors sustaining any character upon the stage. Yet even they, light as they may seem, make some addition to the load of national guilt, as we learn from the passage respecting the daughters of Zion, in the third chapter of this prophecy, which I formerly quoted. Enough has been said to prove, that we are a sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, and that the call to repentance is proper and seasonable, and belongs to the very day in which our lot is cast.

Indeed our very meeting together in this place is a public acknowledgment of it. For what pur

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