that I am as certainly using the proper means, which, by God's blessing, may be effectual for your eternal salvation; as your kind and humane physicians are using the proper means of restoring your health, and prolonging your lives. Let me then propose to your most serious attention the following short Hints on a subject of infinite importance.

1. You should consider that affliction is not a thing which comes of course, or by chance; but it springs from the holy and righteous abhorrence with which God beholds iniquity; and is under his immediate direction and appointment.

When God had created man in his own image, and pronounced him very good; in addition to the law written in his heart, he laid on him one single restraint, amidst those blessings with which he was surrounded; adding this threatening; "In "the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt "surely die." When, through Satan's temptation, he had eaten the forbidden fruit, the sentence in part was pronounced in these words, "Dust thou

art, and to dust shalt thou return." The consequence evidently proves our concern in this transaction.' "By one man sin entered into the "world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, in that all have sinned." At that awful season man became a distempered, dying

VOL. IV.

'Read Gen. iij. and Rom. v.

Ff

creature: his sentence is executed in a gradual manner; and every pain and disease which we feel forms a part of that execution, is the beginning of death, and the forerunner of the last fatal stroke. We should therefore, under afflictions, consider, submit to, and adore, the justice of God in them; reflect upon his holy hatred of sin displayed in these dispensations, and endeavour to affect our hearts with a sense of its malignity, that we may deeply repent, and abhor our own iniquities. And, as in Christ the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, we are dealt with as under a dispensation of mercy; we ought also to consider the goodness of God in our sufferings; his patience in bearing so long with us; his kindness in warning us by merciful chastisements, instead of cutting us off in our sins; and his tenderness in chastising us so gently, in comparison of our deservings, and the sufferings which many others endure.

2. You should from your present affliction take occasion to consider, that if these first fruits of sin are so bitter, what the misery in another world will be of those who die in their sins? The pains which you feel, the death which you fear, and the scenes of misery and mortality around you, loudly proclaim the displeasure of God: but the body, the seat of sickness and the prey of death, is merely the instrument of unrighteousness;

the soul is the contriver and the agent in sin. The curse upon the serpent, by which the devil tempted our first parents, was only the outward token of God's vengeance upon Satan himself: nor is the pain and death of the body more than a visible token of the invisible effects of "God's "wrath against every soul of man that doeth " evil." "It is appointed for men once to die, "and after death the judgment." It is the wrath to come, which we are warned to flee from, and from which Jesus delivers us: we are exhorted "not to fear them who kill the body, and after "that have no more that they can do; but to fear

him, who is able to destroy both body and soul "in hell." Oh then, under the pains which you feel, consider, that if "these light afflictions, and "but for a moment," are so burdensome and tedious, how could you endure everlasting punishment, where "the fire is not quenched, and the 66 worm dieth not??

3. This will induce you to consider, whether you are prepared to meet God in judgment, should this sickness end in death. Life, at the best, is short and uncertain; and notwithstanding the favourable judgment of the most skilful physicians, and the use of the most excellent medicines, you may possibly be taken away: nor will you be the less likely to recover for making the

Read Rom. vi. 1 Thess. i.

enquiry, 'Am I ready for death and judgment? Am I entitled to, and fit for the kingdom of heaven?' Oh, do not put the issue of that awful decision, on which the happiness or misery of eternity depends, upon a comparative freedom from gross wickedness. You may, or you may not, have been moral and decent in your outward conduct: but surely you have not feared, loved, served, and worshipped God in all his ordinances and commandments, so much, and so well as you ought to have done; as his precepts, and your relations and obligations to him require: you have frequently no doubt indulged evil thoughts, harboured sinful desires and covetings, spoken idle and evil words, committed many secret sins, loved worldly objects inordinately, pursued them immoderately; and either neglected religious duties, or performed them in a very careless and heartless manner. You have either been much better than the best of mere men mentioned in scripture; or else you have been very inattentive to divine law and your own thoughts, words, and works, if you be not sensible that this is true respecting you; for they all confessed that they were thus guilty.' And all this being sin, must either be pardoned or punished; it is transgression of the law; and it is written, "Cursed is every one, who

1 Read Job xl. 3—5. xlii. 1-6. Psalms xxxii, xxxviii, xl. Nehemiah ix. Isaiah vi. Daniel ix.

"continueth not in all things written in the book "of the law to do them."

And do not imagine that some transient sorrow, partial amendment, external performances, or imperfect obedience in future, can so make amends for former crimes, or so merit God's favour, as to deliver you from future punishment, and entitle you to eternal life. This notion, however common, is totally unreasonable: no man expects to escape the punishment of robbery or murder, as the reward of not committing more robberies or murders; or pretends to pay old debts by going with ready money for what he now buys. Nay indeed if righteousness come by the law, and by any of our imperfect obedience to it for a part of our lives, then verily "Christ died in vain." And if your sufferings in this world could atone your sins, his sufferings would have been needless, and the denunciation of the wrath to come, mere words without a meaning.'

for

No, my brethren, these indeed are mere human devices, which will be found as ineffectual at the day of judgment, as every other expedient for safety proved in Noah's deluge, to those who refused to enter the Ark.

God hath himself contrived, effected, and revealed in his holy word, salvation for sinners; springing from his compassionate love, and accomplished in a way, which is suited to impress 'Read Rom. iii, and iv. Gal. ii, and iii.