only, of the whole number infected with it escaped, it is no great encouragement that you shall make the second. O think, and think again, how many thoufands, now on earth, have been labouring, and ftriving, forty or fifty years together, to make their calling and election fure; and yet, to this day, it is not fo fure as they would have it: they are afraid, after all, time will fail them for finishing, and you think it is too early for beginning fo great a work. 3. Others have begun fooner than you, and finifhed the great, and main work, before you have done any thing. Abijah was very young, scarce got out of his childhood, "when the grace of "God was found in him," 1 Kings xiv. 13. The fear of God was in Obadiah, when but a youth, i Kings xviii. 12. Timothy was not only a Chriftian, but a preacher of the gospel," in the mor"ning of his life," 2 Tim. iii. 15. What have you to plead for yourtelves, which they had not? Or what arguments, and motives to Godliness had they which you have not? You shall be judged per pares, by thofe of your own age, and fize; their fe. rioufnels fhall condemn your vanity, 4 The morning of your life is the flower of your time, the fresheft, and fitteft of all your life for your great work; now your hearts are tender, and impreffive, your affections flowing, and tractable, your heads clear of distracting cares, and hurries of bufinets, which come on, afterwards, in thick fucceffions: "Remember, now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, whilst "the evil days come not," Ecclet. xii. 1. 2. If a man has an im portant business to do, he will take the morning for it, knowing if that be flipped, a crowd, and hurry of business will come on afterwards, to distract, and hinder him. I prefume, if all the converts in the world were examined in this point, it would be found, that at least ten to one were wrought upon in their youth; that is the moulding age. 5. And if this proper hopeful feafon be elapfed, it is very unlikely that ever you be wrought upon afterwards: how thin, and rare in the world, are the inftances, and examples of conversion, in old age! long-continued cuftoms in fin, harden the heart, fix the will, and root the habits of vice fo deep in the foul, that there is no altering of them; your ears then are so accustomed to the lounds of the word, that Chrift and fin, heaven and hell, foul and eternity, have loft their awful found, and efficacy with you. But it is a queftion only to be decided by the event, Whe ther ever you shall attain to the years of your fathers. It is not the iprightiy vigour of your youth that can fecure you from death. What a madness, then, is it, to put your fouls, and e ternal happiness, upon fuch a blind adventure? What if your prefumption of fo many fair, and proper opportunities hereafter, fail you, as it hath failed millions, who had as rational, and hopeful a prospect of them as you can have; where are you then? And if you fhould have more time, and means, than you do prefume upon, are you fure you hearts will be as flexible, and impreffive, as now they are? O beware of this fin of vain prefumption, to which the generality of the damned owe their everlasting ruin ! The eighth way of lofing the foul, opened. VIII. The eighth way of ruining the precious foul, is, by drinking in the principles of Atheiim, and living without God in the world. Atheism flabs the foul to death at one ftroke, and puts it quite out of the way of falvation; other finners are worse than beafts, but Atheists are worfe than devils, for they believe, and tremble; these banish God out of their thoughts, and, what they can, out of the world, living as without God in the world, Eph. ii. 12. It is a fin that quencheth all religion in the foul. He that affents not to the being of a God, destroys the foundation of all religious' worship; he cannot fear, love, or obey him, whose being he believes not: this fin ftrikes at the life of God, and deftroys the life of the foul. Some are Atheists in opinion, but multitudes are fo in practice: "The fool hath faid in his heart, there is no God," Pfal. xiv. 1. though he hath engraven his name upon every creature, and written it upon the table of their own hearts; yet they will not read it or if they have a flight, fluctuating notion, or a fecret fufpicion of a Deity, yet they neither acknowledge his prefence, nor his providence. Fingunt Deum talem qui nec videt, nec punit, i. e. They make fuch a God who neither fees nor punishes. They fay, "How doth God know? Can he judge "through the dark clouds? Thick clouds are a covering to "him, that he feeth not," Job xxii. 14. Others profefs to believe his being, but their lives daily give their lips the lie; for they give no evidence in practice, of his fear, love or dependance on him: if they believe his being, they plainly fhew they value not his favour, delight not in his prefence, love not his ways, or people; but lie down and rife, eat and drink, live and die without the worship, or acknowledgment of him, except fo much as the law of the country, or custom of the place extorts from them. Thefe dregs of time produce abundance of Atheists, of both forts; many ridicule, and hifs religion out of all companies into which they come, and others live down all fenfe of religion; they cuftomarily ȧttend, indeed, on the external duties of it, hear the word; but when the greateft, and most important duties are urged upon them, their inward thought is, This is the preacher's calling, and the man muft fay fomething to fill up his hour, and get his living. If they dare not put their thoughts into words, and call the gospel Fabula Chrifti, the fable of Chrift, as a wicked Pope once did; or fay of hell, and the dreadful sufferings of the damned, as Galderinus the Jefuit did, Tunc credam cum illuc venero; I will believe it when I fee it: yet their hearts, and lives, are of the fame complexion with these men's words: they do not heartily affent to the truth of the gospel which they hear, add though bare affent would not fave them, yet their affent, or non-affent, will certainly damn them, except the Lord heal their understandings, and hearts, by the light and life of religion. To this last fort I fhall offer a few things. The eight way to hell fbut up by fix weighty confiderations. 1. You that attend upon the ordinances; but believe them no more than fo many devised fables, nor heartily affent to the truth of what you hear; know affuredly, that the word fhall never do your fouls good, it can never come to your hearts and affections in its regenerating and fanctifying efficacy, whilft it is stopt and obftructed in your understandings in the acts of af fent. And thus you may fit down under the best ordinances all. your lives, and be no more the better for them, than the rocks are for the showers of rain that fall upon them; Heb. iv. 2. "The word preached did not profit them, not being mixed "with faith in them that heard it." This is Satan's chief ftrength and fastness, wherein he trusteth; he fears no argument, whilst he can maintain his post: the devil hath no furer prifoner than the Atheist; there's no efcaping out of his poffeffion and power, whilst this bolt of unbelief is fhut home in the mind or understanding. An unbelieved truth never converted or faved one foul from the beginning of the world, nor never fhall to the end of it. Thofe bodies that have the Boulema, or dog-appetite, whatever they eat, it affords them no nourish ment or fatisfaction, they thrive not with the best fare: just so it is with your fouls, no duties, no ordinances can possibly do them good; as in argumentation, no conclufion, be it never fo regularly drawn, and ftrongly inferred, is of any force to him that denies principles. 2. If you affent not to the truth of the gospel, you not only make God speak to your fouls in vain, which is fatal to them ; but you also make God a liar, which is the greatest affront a creature can put upon his Maker; 1 John v. 10. "He that be"lieveth not God, hath made him a liar." Vile duft, darest thou rife up against the God that made thee, and give him the lie? An affront which thy fellow creature cannot put up, or bear at thy hands. Dareft thou at once stab his honour, and thy own foul? Are not the things that thou lookest on as romances and golden dreams, a mere artifice, neatly contrived to cheat and awe the world? Are they not all built upon the veracity of God, which is the firmest foundation and greateft fecurity in the world? Hath he not intermingled, for our fatisfaction, not only frequent affertions, but his affeverations and oath to put all beyond doubt? and yet dare any of you lift up your ignorant blind understandings against all this, and give him the lie? Surely the wrath of God fhall fmoke against every foul of man that doth fo, and his own bitter, lamentable, doleful experience shall be his conviction fhortly, except he repent. 3. Dare any of you give the thoughts of your hearts as certain conclufions under your hands, and stand by them to the laft, and venture all upon them. Wretched Atheist! bethink thy felf, pause a while, examine thine own breast; whatever thy vile atheistical thoughts fometimes are, is there not at other times a fear of the contrary? A jealousy that all these things which thou deridest and sportest thy wicked fancy with, may, and will prove true at laft? When thou readeft, or hearest that text, John iii. 18. "He that be"lieveth not is condemned already;" his mittimus is already made for hell: doth not thy confcience give thee a fecret gird, like a ftitch in thy fide? Dare you venture all upon this iffue, that if those things you find in the word be true, you will stand to the hazard of them? If that be a truth, Mark xvi. 16. “He that "believeth not fhall be damned," you will be content to be damned? Or if, Rom. viii. 13. be a truth, That "they who "live after the flesh fhall die," you will run the hazard, and bear the penalty of eternal death? If Heb. xii. 14. prove true, That "withet holiness no man thall fee God," you will be content to be banished from his presence for evermore? Speak your hearts in this matter, and tell us, don't you live betwixt atheistical furmises, that all these are bnt cunning artifices, and fears that at last they will prove the greatest verities? 4. Hath not God given you all the fatisfaction you can reafonably defire, of the undoubted truth and certainty of this world? What would you have, which you have not already? Would you have a voice from heaven? the fcriptures you read, or hear are a more fure word than fuch a voice would be, 1 Pet. i. 19. Or would you have a meffenger from hell? He that be lieveth not the written word, neither would believe" if one "fhould rife from the dead," Luke xvi. 31. View the innate characters of the fcripture, is it not altogether pure and holy, full of divine wifdom and awful majefty, and in every refpect, fuch as evidenceth its author to be the wife, holy, and just God, who fearcheth the hearts and reins? Look upon the feals and confirmations of it; hath not God confirmed it by divers miracles from heaven, a feal which neither men or devils could counterfeit? And do not you fee the bleffing and power of God accompanying it in the converfion and wonderful change of men's hearts and lives, which can be done by no other hand than God's? Say not, the miracles, which confirm the gospel, are but uncertain traditions, and except you yourfelyes fee them wrought, you cannot believe them. There are a thousand things. which you do believe, though you never faw them; and what you require for your fatisfaction, every man may require the fame for his; and fo Chrift mult live again in all parts of this world, and repeat his miracles over and over, in all ages, to fatisfy the unreasonable incredulity of those that question their truth, after the fulleft confirmation and feal hath been given, that is capable to be given, or the heart of man can defire should be given; and if all this fhould be done, you might be as far from believing, as now you are; for many of thofe that saw and heard the things wrought by Chrift, contradicted and blafphemed, and fo might you. 5. Satan, who undermines your affent to these things, is forced to give his own: he that tempts you to look on them as fables, himself knows, and is convinced that they are realities; "The "devils alfo believe and tremble," James ii. 19. they know and feel the truth of thefe things, though it be their great defign, and intereft, to shake your affent to them: they know Chrift is the Son of God, and that there will be a day in which he will judge the world in righteoufnefs, and that there are torments prepared for themfelves, and all whom they feduce from God, Matth. viii. 29. If you ungod God, you must unman yourselves; yea, not only make yourselves lefs than men, but worse than devils. 6. In a word, let thy own heart, O Atheist, be judge, whether these be real doubts ftill fticking in your minds, after you have done all that becomes men to do for fatisfaction in fuch importtant cafes? Or whether they be not fuch principles as you wil lingly foment and nourish in your hearts, as a protection to your fenfual lufts, whofe pleasures you would fain have, without in |