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SERMONS

BY

LAURENCE STERNE.

SERMON XXIII.

THE PARABLE OF THE RICH MAN AND

LAZARUS CONSIDERED.

LUKE XVI. 31.

And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one should rise from the dead.

THESE words are the conclusion of the parable of the rich man and Lazarus; the design of which was, to shew us the necessity of conducting ourselves, by such lights as God had been pleased to give us the sense and meaning of the patriarch's final determination in the text being this, That they who will not be persuaded to answer the great purposes of their being, upon such arguments as are offered to them in scripture, will never be persuaded to it by any other means, how extraordinary soever;" If they hear not Moses and the prophets, "neither will they be persuaded though one should "rise from the dead."

-Rise from the dead! To what purpose ? What could such a messenger propose or urge, which had not been proposed and urged already? The novelty or surprise of such a visit, might awaken the attention of a curious unthinking people, who spent their time in nothing else but to hear and tell some new thing; but ere the wonder was well over, some new wonder would start up in its room,

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