have much work, little time to do it in, little strength to do it with, and much opposition to wrestle against, had need to lose no time, John ix. 4. The shadows of the evening are stretched out; we have made but little way; let us therefore mend our pace.

(4.) Lastly, We must make a serious business of the considering of our days. The counting of them to purpose will not do otherwise. It deserves it, for eternity lies upon it; a mistake in that may be fatal; and we are very ready to miscount our days. And,

[1.] Make it a work by itself. If one have but a few threads to count, they will let other work alone till that be done; for it is of that nature that it will not mix with other pieces of work. Surely at any time, and much more at this time, God calls us to take some particular time for this work, Hag. i. 5.

[2.] Hold to it, till you have done it to purpose. Counting is not a work to be done by fits and starts. If it be broken off, readily all that is counted is lost, and one must just begin again, having lost his count. Fleeting thoughts of the shortness and uncertainty of time are to little purpose. The impression they make is soon worn off.

[3.] Dip into the business, and be not overly in it. One that is counting will be loath to hear or answer a word spc ken to him, lest he miss his count. Satan and our ill hearts are apt to cast in diversions to those employed in counting their days; and by that means many times mar the work. But ye must stop your ears, and mind your business.

II. I proceed to shew, that a time of mortality is a special call to this work.

1. It sets death and eternity in a particular manner before the eyes of mortals, as appears from this psalm wherein our text lies. It is a looking-glass wherein every one may see his own frailty; for the strength of the hale is no more the strength of stones, nor their bones brass, more than others whom death has cut down. What is the lot of one mortal to-day, may be the lot of another to-morrow; and that calls to consider it.

2. God, by laying his hand on some, speaks unto others, as appears from what our Lord says, Luke xiii. 1. and downwards, and warns them. And they that are wise will take

warning, Micah vi. 9. And it is a sad evidence when people will not hear it. They look like those marked for destruction, who, in the face of God's judgments going abroad in a place still do wickedly, Isa. xxvi. 11.

3. It is an evidence of the Lord's anger against a land or country-side where it prevails, Amos iii. 8. And not laying it to heart is a contempt of God, that he will surely avenge, Psal. xxviii. 5. It speaks God to be risen up from his place to punish; and who knows who may fall ere God's sword, once drawn, be returned into its sheath?

Use. Let old and young comply with the call of God by the present sickness and mortality: let every one be stirred up thereby so to count their days, as they may apply their hearts unto wisdom. For motives, consider,

1. We will be most inexcusable, if after all these warnings death find us unprovided. The dispensation of the day is such, that no body needs to pretend to be surprised with death's coming to their own door, since it is carrying off so many, both young and old.

2. It is a piece of that duty we owe to an angry God, as we would not inflame his anger more against us, Psal. xxviii. 5. Amos iii. 8. It is not true courage, but stupidity and obstinacy, not to be deeply affected with the hand of God gone out against us. Let creatures despise, if they will, the stroke of their fellow worms, but let them not despise the stroke of God, Heb xii. 5. It becomes saints of the highest pitch to fear God smiting, Luke xii. 4, 5.

1

3. This would be the way to get the stroke removed, or at least to get it sanctified, Hab. iii. 16. The design of Providence in the stroke is to stir us up to this duty, and the answering of the call of the rod bids fairest for the removal of it, Lev. xxvi. 41, 42. If not, the venom will be taken out of it; and if one be taken away being fitted for it, he will exchange this life for a better.

4. Lastly, If this be misimproved, it lays us open to a worse, Amos iv. 11, 12. In a land so full of sin, so often threatened with desolating strokes, and so often deliver, but nothing bettered by deliverances, this stroke looks rather like the beginning than the end of sorrows, rather like an earnest than the round sum, that might clear the accounts betwixt God and a sinful nation.

WE

THE SERMON IN THE AFTERNOON.

E are again met this day to humble ourselves under the hand of God, gone out against the congregation and country-side, in great sickness and mortality, and to deprecate the Lord's anger. I know no such expedient in our case, nor any thing that will bid so fair for the removal of the stroke, as our coming up to the standard of proficiency in the lesson in our text, which falls now to be spoken of, and which I shall cast into this doctrine.

DOCT. The right and necessary improvement of a time of bodily sickness and mortality, is to become wise for our souls.'

The Lord is putting particular persons and families among us yea, all of us, to the school of affliction, since the hand of God gone out against some concerns all; and it is necessary we learn our lesson aright, and become wise thereby.

In discoursing, from this doctrine, I shall,

1. Shew what is that wisdom we must learn thereby. II. Condescend on soine particular pieces of wisdom which such a time calls us to apply our hearts to.

İ. Í am to shew, what is that wisdom we are to learn by a time of bodily sickness and mortality. It is serious godliness, or true religion. When one becomes seriously godly leaving the way of sin, and entering on the way of faith and holiness, than he has learned the lesson that God is teaching us this day, Job xxviii. ult. Unto man he said, Behold the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil, is understanding.' This is the only true wisdom; and they continue arrant fools who do not arrive at it, whatever other wisdom they be masters of. This is the wisdom taught at God's school of affliction, Heb. xii. 10. The voice of the rod is, Be wise for your souls. That this is the true wisdom, appears in that,

1. It is practical wisdom, wisdom for regulating a man's life in the way to happiness, Hos. xiv. ult. How many are

there accounted wise, who betray their folly in quite shooting by the mark, in the way of life they chuse, Jer. xxii. 13,— 16. Surely that is wisdom which sets men in the true way to happiness, which is faith and holiness, Mark xvi. 16. Heb. xii. 14. What avail carnal worldly wit, the profound speculations of natural men in the learned sciences, and the dry and sapless notions of religion in formal professors? All these are but laborious trifling, and making of a noise, doing nothing, while they never make them better men, though more knowing.

"

2. It is wisdom for one's self, Prov. ix. 12. There is a set of men, whose wisdom is noted to be for others, but not for themselves, resembled by boatmen, who ferry others over, but, during the whole time of their rowing, have their eyes fixed on the place whence they came, and, immediately after landing their passengers, return to where they set out. Such is the wisdom of all ungodly men: their wisdom may profit other men's souls or bodies; but, alas! it profits not themselves, 1 Cor. ix. ult. Matth. vi. 19, 20. But this is the excellency of real godliness, that it giveth life to them that have it,' Eccl. vii. 12. It casts the soul into the mould of truth, sanctifies the heart and life in conformity to the divine nature and will; and so perfects human nature, raising up a glorious fabric out of the ruins in which it was laid by the fall.

3. It is wisdom for one's latter end, Deut. xxxii. 29. Thẹ fool in the gospel had wit enough to provide for many years life. But here lay his folly, he had nothing provided for his latter end, for a dying hour, Luke xii. 20. Many such fools are among us. It was one of the dying expressions of a learned man of the last age (Grotius), Ah! vitam perdidi, operose nihil agendo.

4. It is wisdom for the better part, Luke x. 41, 42, The wisdom of the world is but for the baser part of man, the body; it makes him useful in business and civil conversation. But this reaches only the outworks, while in the mean time the soul's concerns lie by neglected. But this wisdom advanceth the life and interests of the soul, insures one's title to heaven, and sets him on the way to eternal happiness, Prov. viii. 35.

5. Lastly, It is wisdom for the better world, Heb. xi. 14, 16. Our projects for this world, as to ourselves, must die

with ourselves, Psal. cxlvi. 4. but they who are wise for that better world, by being religious indeed, will find their measures wisely laid in time, to take and have their effect happily in eternity, Rev. xiv. 13. What they now sow, they shall then joyfully reap.

III. I proceed to condescend on some particular pieces of wisdom which such a time calls us to apply our hearts to. 1. To inquire seriously into the causes of the Lord's controversy with us, Job x. 2. When God's hand is stretched out, it will be our wisdom to search wherefore it is so, Lam. iii. 39. Surely there is a cause; he does not smite without good reason and unless our eyes see it, our hearts cannot rue it.

God has a controversy with the congregation and country-side; it were good we could lay it to heart. Two things seem to have the main hand in it.

(1). Abuse and misimprovement of spiritual mercies and privileges. Thus the Lord threatened the Old-Testament church, Deut. xxviii. 58, 59. If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law, that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, THE LORD THY GOD; then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance and sore sicknesses, and of long con. tinuance.' This brought a sore sickness upon the church of Corinth, 1 Cor. xi 30. The noted divisions, and deserting of ordinances, in the country, are the judgment and the sin of the corner, whereby contempt is poured on precious gospel-ordinances, the success of the gospel marred by so many hinderances laid in the way of souls getting good of it; and thus gnats are strained at, and camels swallowed down, in respect of the deep-died guilt in what it does to hinder the spiritual good of perishing souls. Men will not see it, but they shall see. And alas! how evident is our unfruitfulness under means of grace? How few are bettered now by a preached gospel? God's word is slighted, and ineffectual for our reformation, his holy name is profaned, his Sabbaths are violated, sacraments are neglected by some, and profaned by others with their unholy and untender lives. What wonder that for this cause many are weak and sickly among us, and many sleep?' I Cor. xi. 30. Warnings and reproofs