we fecretly exult at it, and use it only to form new plans of life, new projects of ambition, new fchemes of pleasure? Alas! from the horrors and the ashes of the tomb fhall thofe fparks come forth that rekindle our lufls with new ardor !* On its mouldering ruins fhall we attempt to build our own flability and glory!

Finally, let the uncertainty of life urge upon every hearer, and especially on the young who are most prone to prefume upon time, a fpeedy and earnest concern for the things that belong to their peace. Interests of infinite moment demand your attention-the time prelles-and will you, like Felix poftpone them to a period that may, probably, never arrive?" Behold, now is the accepted time, behold, now is the day of falvation." God affords you the prefent inftant to feek his mercy, the next is with him.-One moment of grace only is certainly yours, and do you need entreaties and remonitrances to urge you to put it to profit? Alas! almoft all men have loft that pre

* Maffillon.

cious moment by delay. They promised
themselves hereafter to repent; but death
cut fhort their hopes and refolutions in the
midft. And will you, ingenuous youth!
in the fpring of life, in the morning of an
eternal being, with this fearful and inftruct-
ive example before your eyes, be guilty of
the fame fatal error, and blaft all the prof-
pects of immortality? Watch, therefore, for

ye
know neither the day nor the hour wherein
the Son of Man cometh. Haften to the door
of mercy while it is open; for, if your Lord
fhall come and find you, like the foolish
virgins, fleeping and unready, it fhall be
forever and inexorably clofed. Similar
warnings, I know, have been a thousand
times given you from the word of God, and
perhaps a thousand times forgotten. Shall
this at laft prove equally fruitlefs? It is in
vain, O God! that mortals fpeak. Do
thou thyself arreft the fugitive and giddy
thoughts that escape from every impreffion
we would fix upon them. Penetrate! Oh!
penetrate with deep and effectual convic-
tion the fecure and infenfible heart! Thine
is the work Almighty God! Pluck these
precious pledges of their parent's love from

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everlasting burnings. To thine infinite mercies we commit them! Gather the lambs in thine arms, and bring them to thy heavenly fold!

AMEN!

DISCOURSE XV.

ON THE LAST JUDGMENT.*

ACTS XVII. 31.

He hath appointed a day wherein he will judge the world in rightcoufnefs by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given affurance unto all men, in that he hath raijed him from the dead.

HE final judgment is an event the most

THE

fublime, the moft awful, and interefting that fhall take place from the commencement till the confummation of time. The everlafting deflinies of angels and of men fhall be decided by the fupreme Judge arrayed in all the fplendors of omnipotence, and feated amidit the flaming ruins of the

* The plan of this difcourfe was fuggefted at a very early period of life, by one of Mr. Durand's on the fame fubject. It being long, however, fince I have read his fermons, a great part of which I have unfortunately loft, I am not able to make any references to particular paffages which on my general principle, I would otherwife probally have done.

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univerfe. If one ray of the divine glory overwhelmed Mofes, almoft confumed Ifaiah, deranged, for a moment, the faculties of the difciples on the mount of trans guration, robbed Paul of the powers of vifion, and ftruck him, and his companions to the earth like dead men, what will be the full display of that dreadful magnificence with which the Eternal will appear to deftroy the prefent fyftem, and to announce to finners and to faints the irreverfible d crees of his juflice!But, it is not merely the fplendor of the tribunal, the grandeur of the fcene that furrounds it, nor the glories of the judge which, on this fubject, ought to arreft our attention. We have a ftill more important intereft in the irrevocable decifions that fhall then be pronounced upon mankind-decifions that fall take their colour from our conduct in the prefent lifedecifions founded in eternal truth and juftice-decifions that fhall place our defliny, beyond the power of change, in hopeless mifery, or in everlasting felicity.

One of the most inftructive and affecting truths in the whole compass of revelation is, that God hath appointed a day in which he