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"did never reflect on their minds; did never compare their practice with their duty; had no confcience at all, or a very blind and stupid one. Who can Jay, I have made my "heart clean, I am pure from fin, was a quef"tion of Solomon, to which he thought no man could answer affirmatively of himself. If I justify myself, my own mouth shall con"demn me; if I fay, I am perfect, it shall prove me perverfe, was the affeveration of

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that person, whose virtue had undergone the "fevereft trials. In many things we offend all; "was the confeffion of an Apostle, in the "name of the wifeft and beft men'."

It will be elucidating by a beautiful example the fcriptural notions of affurance and perfection; of perfection, to which the Chriftian is daily drawing more near, and of affurance not vouchsafed unto him until the close of his mortal life; if I call to your recollection the laft moments of a " most learned, most humble " and holy man," a man of saintlike and apoftolical fimplicity. "I have lived,” said he, "to "fee this world is made up of perturbations, " and I have been long preparing to leave it, and gathering comfort for the dreadful " hour of making my account with God, which I now apprehend to be near. And though

I have by his grace loved him in my youth, " and feared him in mine age, and laboured to

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have a confcience void of offence to him and "to all men; yet, if thou, O Lord, be extreme "to mark what I have done amifs, who can "abide it? And therefore where I have failed, Lord, fhow mercy to me: for I plead not my righteousness, but the forgiveness of my unrighteousness, for his merits who died to purchase a pardon for penitent finners. And fince I owe thee a death, Lord, let it not be terrible, and then take thine own time: I fubmit to it! Let not mine, O Lord, but let thy will be done! With which expreffion," adds his biographer, "he fell into a dangerous

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flumber, dangerous as to his recovery; yet "recover he did, but it was only to fpeak "these few words: God hath heard my daily

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petitions; for I am at peace with all men, "and he is at peace with me: from which "bleffed affurance I feel that inward joy, "which this world can neither give nor take "from me. More he would have spcken; but "his fpirits failed him; and after a short con"flict between nature and death, a quiet figh put a period to his last breath, and fo he fell afleep."

Such were the dying fentiments of a man, whom his biographer characterises by great learning, remarkable meeknefs, godly fimpli

#

city, and Chriftian moderation: whom his contemporaries esteemed as most capable of "teach

ing learning by instruction, and virtue by ex"ample;" whom not this University alone, but our Church and Nation, have uniformly esteemed, as one of their brightest luminaries"; and to whofe merits the teftimony of two fucceffive monarchs has been fanctioned by the approbation of the good, the wife, and the great; who have concurred in adopting the appellation, that his fovereigns had bestowed, and in transmitting his honour to posterity as "the learned, or judicious, or reverend, or ve"nerable Hooker *."

Virtually disclaiming the modern doctrine of affurance, by declaring that "the strongest "in faith that liveth on the earth, has always

need to labour, strive, and pray, that his af"furance concerning heavenly and fpiritual

things may grow, increase, and be augmented:" and disclaiming the modern doctrine of perfection by an humble acknowledgment of his own unrighteousness, he bore his testimony to the truths, which I have been endeavouring to establish, even before the opposite herefies had taken root amongst us. With fingular gratification I close the prefent discourse by

k Ifaac Walton's Life of Hooker. Works, Oxford ed.

fuch an atteftation to the foundness of the tenets, which I have been deducing from the Oracles of God: for I cannot confider it as a matter of trifling moment, that they are thus incidentally supported by one, whose heart was the living picture of that poorness of spirit, to which is promised the bleffing of the kingdom of heaven; and whofe mind was of a capacity to trace the operations of law, emanating from the bofom of the Creator, and diffufing harmony throughout his works'.

Now unto "the high and lofty One that in"habiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; who "dwelleth in the high and holy place, with "him alfo that is of a contrite and humble fpirit:" unto Him be glory and dominion for ever!

1 See Eccl. Polity. Conclufion of the first book.

DISCOURSE IX.

I COR. ix. 16.

Though I preach the Gospel, I have nothing to glory of; for neceffity is laid upon me: yea, wo is unto me, if I preach not the Gospel.

AT the commencement of these Lectures, to the conclufion of which we are now rapidly advancing, the words, that have been just recited, were selected for your attention; because I was defirous that our minds might be impreffed, at the outset of the proposed inquiry, with a due fenfe of the folemnity of the charge, into the grounds of which it was my defign, with God's bleffing, to examine: a charge, as was then remarked, which, if it were fubftantiated, muft involve us in the guilt of corrupting, or renouncing," the truth " as it is in Jefus ;" and which muft in confequence expofe us to the "wo," (as it is expreffed in the text,) to the "curfe," (as St. Paul elsewhere expreffes it,) denounced on