requires fuch a principle of union. Do we dread hunger, and thirft and pain? we have bodies capable of fuffering under these fenfations. But where fhall we find an object for the finner's horror, under a fenfe of crimes, hid under an impenetrable veil of darkness? It plainly points to futurity, and warns him to guard against the punishment awaiting him there. It is not the effect of superftition, or the prejudice of education from the tales of priests and nurses. It is a natural impreffion, which every man, Jew or Gentile, Chriftian or Heathen, must feel in every age and place, where he acts deliberately against what he knows to be his duty. * And happy THE doctrine of Epicurus was fo far efpoufed at Rome in Catiline's time, that Cæfar very roundly and gravely avows one of his worst tenets in open fenate. It may well be fuppofed, that Catiline was as well acquainted with thefe comfortable principles; and yet fee the power of natural conScience, as defcribed by an hiftorian almost as profligate as himself! Animus impurus, diis hominibufque infeftus, neque vigiliis neque quietibus fedari poterat ; ita consci they, who will now, in this their day, listen to this Divine Remembrancer, that they may direct its reproaches to their proper purpose, and fave themselves from the wrath to come! A MINISTER of religion is confidered as a favage unfeeling bigot, who ventures to treat of these harsh things with proper feverity. For my own part, my heart's defire, and prayer to God is that all men may be faved; and, if concealing and palliating of dangers were a proper method of removing them, I should entia mentem excitam vexabat! Igitur color ei exfanguis, fædi oculi citus modò, modò tardus inceffus: prorfus in facie vultuque vecordia inerat. SALL. : WE have a fimilar inftance in the monster Tiberius Circa deos ac religiones negligentior, tonitrua tamen præter modum expavefcebat: et turbatiore cælo nunquam non coronam lauream capite geftavit, quod fulmine affari negetur id genus frondis. Suet. in Tib. c. 69. His letter to the Senate is well known: Quid fcribam vobis, P. C. aut quomodo fcribam, aut quid omninò non fcribam, hoc tempore, dii me deæque pejus perdant, quam quotidiè perire fentio, fi fcio. id. 67. Tacitus Ann. 6. 6. See the latter's excellent reflexions upon it. very readily indulge the weakness of a flumbering world, fpeak fmooth things and prophecy deceits: but knowing that GOD Almighty has thought the fear of hell a neceffary reftraint on human corruption, Seeing in fact, that it is scarce fufficient to confine our enormities within tolerable bounds, believing too, that it is inconfiftent with Divine Perfection to threaten what he cannot execute, to ufe artifice and illufion (the mere effect of human impotence) in his government; knowing, I say, thefe terrors of the Lord, we perfuade men, and are performing the trueft act of tenderness towards them. When your neighbour's houfe is kindling about his ears, the cruelty is to let him fleep on and take his reft, to his deftruction-to rouze him from the fweets of flumber and lend a friendly hand to rescue him from the flames, is the true act of humanity. ON the lowest fuppofition, it is as probable at least, that there is a hell, as that that the wicked fhall efcape unpunished. For heaven's fake, what difficulties can we meet with, in a virtuous life, to counterbalance the mere probability of an infinite evil? And to brave and defy it, upon the fuppofition of its reality-I was going to call it the extravagance of madness: but language has no words to exprefs the degrees of fuch an infatuation. You meet with men, who think it fomething great and heroic, to appear infenfible of danger; and under this falfe idea of courage, they affect to set the threats of omnipotence at defiance, as a flavish ignoble confideration. But it happens unfortunately for these false fpirits, that there is nothing mean in fear : every creature muft have his fears. DIFFERENT men, according to the difference of their views, may place their fear on different objects: but every one, as having fomething before him, which he confiders as his evil, muft have the correfpondent paffion. The religious man makes the fear of Gop the rule of his actions, the wicked confider worldly fhame, labour, or poverty, as more dreadful evils. With regard to the common paffion, they are both upon an equality; but the religious man acts the rational part in dreading the greater evil, and bearing inferior ones with magnanimity. You meet with others, who fay that fear is a fervile fpirit unworthy of the generous fervices of virtue. But there is certainly a merit in being influenced by any motive it pleafed GoD to appoint. Where a man begins to fear properly, he is in a happy way: the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wif dom. Fear reftrains from fin: this brings on a habit of virtue; this habit becomes a pleasure, and to take a pleafure in virtuous actions as the will of GOD, |