lefs a greater Good demands it of us, there is no Occafion for Self-Denial? 'Tis the whole Bufinefs of our Lives to endure Hardships and encounter Difficulties for future Profpects; and we have nothing to do, but to examine carefully the whole Scene of Futurity, to find proper Motives for a right Behaviour in all Cafes. The feveral Burdens which are necessary to try and improve our Patience, the feveral Exercises of our feveral Capacities as they are the neceffary Means of our Virtue and Perfection, must be alfo the Means of our Happiness; and to call these things Evils, is as abfurd, as to call Hunger an Evil, which is the Inftrument of our Preservation and Health. We fee then that we cannot come after Chrift, we cannot follow him in the Regeneration here, nor partake in his Glory hereafter, his Inheritance eternal in the Heavens, unless we deny our our felves all thofe deceitful and treacherous Pleasures, which are continually obtruding themseves; and how agreeable foever they may seem for a time, do either impair the Health of our Bodies, or the Attention of our Minds; or our Neighbour's Welfare; or offend our own Consciences. We see also, that we are prefs'd by all kinds and Degrees of Motives, which regard either our Happiness both prefent and future, or our Neighbour's Happiness, by all and every Relation we stand in to God our Neighbour and our selves, to be continually engaged in this Self-Denial. Let us therefore exert our Reafon, and weigh our Actions for the future with more Exactnefs: How ftrong and inveterate soever the Habits may be we have enflaved our felves to, how great foever their Pleafures, if we can but prevail with our felves to confider them in their Consequences, in their eternal and everlasting Confequences, they will be but as Wax before the Fire; and we fhall rejoice as a Giant to run our Courfe. To close with every Pleasure that offers it felf, without any regard to its Confequences, either in this Life or the next, is no other than a State of Madness. And where our own perfonal Happiness or Mifery are treated, a clear Representation of them is the best Argument and strongest Persuasive. Pleasure and Pain carry with them their own Motives, fuch as need not, cannot be affifted or enforced. I call Heaven and Earth to record against you this Day, that I have fet before you Life and Death, Bleffing and Curfing; therefore chufe Life, that your Soul may live. DISCOURSE VI. The Duty and Delight of fhewing Mercy, especially to the Stranger. EXOD. xxiii. 9. Also thou shalt not opprefs a Stranger, for ye know the Heart of a Stranger, Seeing ye were Strangers in the Land of Egypt. HAT God is represented throughout the Scriptures, as a Being Rich in Mercy, full of Compaffion, and plenteous in Goodness; That he seems to delight in the Character of Love above all others; that Judgment is his ftrange work; work; that his Compaffions fail not, and his Mercy is everlasting and endureth for ever ---- That this Difpofition of Mind is alfo recommended to us as the chief Perfection of our Nature, as what will make us like unto God; his Sons or Children; as what will render us the Brethren of Chrift, who went about doing good; as what will fecure and enlarge to us a Portion in his Inheritance: Thefe, I fay, are Particulars, which, whether or no they mayhave influenced our Practice, cannot however have escaped any of our Obfervations. On the other hand, it is equally obvious that Ill-nature and Malice are the Characters of the Devil; the Properties of those fallen and apoftate Angels, who are at the greatest Enmity with God, the greatest distance from his Nature and Happiness; and that the further we are advanced in these evil Dispositions of Mind, so much the more |