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better? Do you find your heart more free from corruption then it was when you first set out? You will not, you cannot assert it: because reason and matter of fact are against you; they demonstrate, that our worldly tempers must be fed and encouraged by these worldly pursuits and attainments; for it is a glaring contradiction to suppose that we can increase our spirituals, by laying out all our time and pains upon temporals. Be therefore assured that the more you try these worldly things, the worse you will be: and the longer you try them, the more difficult you will find it to be set right. They have no virtue to take one single vice out of the heart, but as they fall in with our corrupt inclinations, they must encourage and strengthen every vice, which is in the heart. If you try all the powers upon earth, you will find by experience, that the heart is out of their reach, and at last, if ever you see the face of God with joy, you must conclude, that there is nothing but the blood of Jesus Christ, and the operation of his good Spirit, which is able to cleanse your polluted hearts, and to renew a right spirit within you.

Thus it is abundantly evident from experience, that nothing can purify and take away the natural pollutions of the heart, but the blood of Jesus Christ sprinkled upon it by the holy Spirit. This is the only gospel method. And it is able to purify by faith and take away all these pollutions which nothing else can: for its power is also abundantly evident from experience. It has been found effectual, after all other methods have failed. It has been tried ever since sin first entered into the world, and has ever succeeded. And this single circumstance seems sufficient to recommend it to the minds of all serious persons, and to determine them to receive it as the sovereign remedy of their natural corruptions. We have in the first ages after Christ a particular account of the great change made in men's hearts upon their embracing the gospel. And these accounts are so well attested, that if the strongest his

torical evidence can gain your assent, they will appear to you full and decisive. I remember to have seen a passage in Lactantius, where in his apology for the Christians of his time, he has these words, Give me "a man (says he to the heathens) who is passionate, "malicious, headstrong, with a few gospel precepts, I "will render him as meek as a lamb. Give me one "who is covetous, I will soon persuade him to be "liberal and charitable. Give me one who dreads "afflictions and death, I will make him run and court "martyrdom. Give me an unclean, intemperate, un

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just, cruel, sinful wretch, I will, by the knowledge "of Christ, and by the influence of his laws render him "chaste, sober, merciful, innocent, and holy." Lactantius had good reason for what he here asserts : he had seen the gospel of Christ take these vices out of men's hearts, and we have seen the same happy effects of it in our days; not indeed in so great a number, but, God be praised for it, we have enew to demonstrate to any unbeliever, that the same gospel has still the same power. You do not see so much of its power, because you do not hear so much of the gospel. But wherever the pure gospel of Jesus Christ is preached, and men receive it with faith, their experience daily confirms what Lactantius long ago observed. You still see it work the same real change in men's tempers, which cannot arise from any heat of fancy, or flight of enthusiasm, or sudden rapture of devotion, because it is a sober, regular, thorough change, that reforms the heart, and all its affections, and influences the whole behaviour, rendering a man confident and uniform throughout the whole course of his future life. That such changes are wrought at this day is an undoubted matter of fact. Sinners, and great sinners too, are brought to see the error of their ways, to forsake their wicked courses, to lead a new life, to follow the commandments of God, and to walk from henceforth in his holy ways. This is an entire, a total change. When a sinner becomes a Christian, he

is absolutely a new creature and a new man, insomuch that you may truly say of him, "old things are passed "away, behold, all things are become new;" for he neither thinks, speaks, nor acts, as he used to do. He has a new set of senses and faculties. He neither sees things in the same light he did before, nor hears after the same manner. What formerly pleased him, now displeases. The very end of all his pursuits is changed, and his happiness is placed on a different object. We see this perfect change produced every day, when the gospel enters into any man's heart. As it takes possession, the corrupt passions retire. The holy Spirit purifies the fountain and then all the streams run pure. It is evident, that he has given the heart a new nature, because what proceeds from it is not influenced by the natural man. All is renewed. The murderer is humane and loving, the fornicator and adulterer are chaste, the thief is honest, the false-witness true, the blasphemer, a Christian. Such is the glorious change, which the holy Spirit makes when he sprinkles the heart with the all-purifying blood of the Lamb of God.

And now we have discovered the cause of the evil, and its remedy. The heart of every man we find to be by nature corrupt, destitute entirely of divine grace, and disposed as temptation shall offer to commit any wickedness: for from this fruitful fountain, from the heart of the natural man, proceed murders, adulteries, fornication, thefts, perjuries, and blasphemies. And nothing but the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus can dry up this fountain of sin, and nothing can carry the virtue of it to the heart but an almighty Spirit. Human laws, which are the only expedient lately attempted, cannot come to the head and source of this corrupt fountain. It lies too deep.

Their

power cannot reach it, and much less purify it. An act of parliament can only regulate the outward behaviour. It can take no cognizance of a crime, until it break out into some overt act, and therefore it can

have no influence over the heart. If murder, adultery, robbery, &c. be in the heart, there all statute laws leave them; and the inclination only waits for a fair opportunity, which it will always embrace, whenever there is a prospect of escaping the lash of the law. Thus no sin is hereby prevented. Only the commission of it is rendered more private, and the heart is put upon inventing schemes, how it may gratify itself in its pleasures, without incurring the pains and penalties, which the law threatens to inflict. By this means the corruption that seems to be diminished in the channels, gathers and increases at the fountain-head, where the more it is stopt, the more it ferments and pollutes itself. Since this is the case, what reformation

we expect from the interposition of human authority? Supposing the legislature should follow his majesty's gracious instructions from the throne, and try to find out some new laws for putting a stop to robberies and murders, yet experience would soon prove them to be ineffectual. All the human laws which ever were made, or ever will be made, cannot reform one single person, because they cannot reach the heart. Gospel and not law should be here employed. The gospel can take sin out of the heart, but the law can only make the commission of it more private. The clergy therefore should be called upon, and not the magistrate. This is under God, the peculiar business of the ministers of the gospel, and it is, I fear, owing to their great neglect of their duty, that robberies and murders are become so common. Our people grow more corrupt in their morals, not for want of good statute laws, but for want of good gospel ministers. For it is certain, that the gospel, and nothing else, can take murder, adultery, fornication, robbery, &c. out of the heart, and `it is as certain, that the gospel has taken them out of the heart, wherever it has been properly received: and therefore either in the manner of applying the gospel, or in not applying it at all, there is a great failing somewhere or other among us. God Almighty grant, that

they who are guilty may see their error, and may have grace to repent and amend.

And now let me intreat you, my brethren, to pray that these truths may make a proper impression upon your minds. You have heard me labour this point much of late. It appears to me to be the most important in Christianity, and therefore in several discourses I have been endeavouring to give you a just sense of your state and condition by nature. What success they may have met with depends upon God, whose blessing upon them I do most sincerely implore. All our preaching can do nothing to your hearts without his grace, and I beseech him that, out of the riches of his infinite love to sinners, through Jesus Christ, he would be pleased to let you see your own hearts: for until you behold that defilement and corruption, in which the heart of every man lies by nature, you will see but little necessity for a Saviour. And this divine grace I hope he will now send into all our hearts, that you may be disposed to receive favourably, and to profit by, two short remarks, with which I shall apply the doctrine, first to them who do not believe it, then to them who have given their free assent.

If any of you do not believe the doctrine, you are in a very dangerous situation, because you are on the very brink of destruction, and yet do not see your danger. Can you think your heart is not corrupt? This very thought demonstrates its corruption: for sinners you certainly are: and all sin comes from the heart, and can the heart send forth a whole life of sin, and not be sinful itself? This is impossible. To believe such an impossibility argues a most dangerous state of mind. A man does not cheat himself more, who fancies himself to be in good health, when he has been long ill, and is just dying, than he who fancies his heart to be pure, although every thing that flows from it is impure. This is one of the greatest delusions of sin. It lulls the sinner into a state of security, and tempts him to believe, that his heart is pure and without spot,

VOL. IV.

M.

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