no good thing." On these accounts he loathes himself in his own sight, not partially or occasionally only, for having acted a wrong part, which he supposes that by prudence he might have avoided, but universally as a degenerate and corrupted being. He can find nothing to be proud of, nothing that he can call his own, but guilt, disorder, and weakness. And under this conviction, he falls down before God, saying with Job, "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee, wherefore I abhor myself in dust and ashes." This is that self-loathing which I now call upon you to exercise. And the necessity of it is apparent; for until you are brought thus low in your own estimation, you will never esteem the Lord Jesus Christ, who alone can save you from the wrath to come. Who is it that values a physician while he feels no disease, and hath no fears of death? Will any fly to Christ for refuge, who is not sensible that he stands in need of such a Saviour? No; they only who are perishing in their own apprehensions will welcome the tidings of a Redeemer, and look to him, as the stung Israelites looked to the brazen serpent, lying prostrate at his feet, and resigning themselves wholly to his disposal and gov ernment. LET me then conclude with exhorting you to repair to that fountain which is opened for sin and for uncleanness, to that blood which can cleanse you from all sin. This is the proper use and improvement of all that hath been said. Here is a remedy for all your diseases, a full supply for all your wants. Here you will find gold tried in the fire, that you may be rich; and white raiment, that you may be clothed, and the shame of your nakedness do not appear. The Lord Jesus is a complete Saviour. Be your burden what it will, he is able to support it. His merit surpasseth your guilt by infinite degrees; and his victorious Spirit can subdue and mortify your most imperious lusts. Let what hath been said, then, lead you to him. Dwell on the consideration of your own vileness, till your self-confidence is entirely destroyed, and your hearts disposed to receive him as the unspeakable gift of God to man. In this your Christianity doth consist, and on this your justification depends. This is the sum of your conversion, and the very soul of the new creature. Other things are only preparatives to this, or fruits that grow out of it. Christ is the end and fulfilling of the law, the substance of the gospel, the way to the Father, the help, the hope, the life of the believer. If you know not HIM, you know nothing; if you possess not HIM, you have nothing; and if you be out of HIM, you can do nothing that hath a promise of salvation. O then fly to him as your refuge and sanctuary, and commit your souls into his hands, that he may purify and form them for himself. Plead in the language of David, (Psal. li. 2.) "Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. Purge me with hysop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." And look by faith for the accomplishment of that promise, (Ezekiel xxxvi. 25.) "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean; from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse yon." Amen. SERMON LXVI. CHOICE BETWEEN INIQUITY AND AFFLICTION, Job xxxvi. 21.—"Take heed; regard not iniquity; for this hast thou chosen rather than afflic tion." It THESE words were addressed to Job, who from the height of prosperity was suddenly plunged into the deepest and most complicated distress. They are the words of Elihu, the youngest, but by far the wisest and most candid of all Job's friends. The other three were indeed, as himself had styled them, miserable comforters. was their belief, that adversity was in all cases a certain token of God's displeasure; and, upon this principle, they endeavored to persuade this excellent servant of God, that his whole religion was false and counterfeit, that divine justice had now laid hold of him, and that he was suffering the punishment of his hypocrisy and iniquity. as to render sin more odious, or affliction less formidable, I shall gain one of the noblest ends of my office, and we shall have reason to acknowledge, that our meeting together has been for the better and not for the worse. In proof, then, of the general proposition, That there can be no greater folly than to choose sin rather than affliction, let it be observed, At length Elihu interposes; and moved with zeal for the honor of God, and with compassion to his friend, he, unfolds the mysteries of Divine Providence, asserts and proves that affliction is designed for the trial of the good, as well as for the punishment of the bad, directs Job to the right improvement of his present distress, and comforts him with the prospect of a happy deliverance from it, as soon as his heart should be thoroughly moulded into I. THAT sin separates us from God, the a meek and patient submission to the will only source of real felicity. That man is of his God. At the same time, he re- not sufficient to his own happiness, is a bukes him with a becoming dignity for truth confirmed by the experience of all some rash and unadvised speeches which who have candidly attended to their own the severity of his other friends, and the feelings. It is the consciousness of this sharpness of his own anguish, had drawn insufficiency of the human mind for its from him; and particularly cautions him own happiness, which makes men seek rein the passage before us, "Take heed; resources from abroad; which makes them gard not iniquity; for this hast thou cho- | fly to pleasures and amusements of various sen rather than affliction." kinds, whose chief value consists in filling The want remains; and we have found out only the means of putting away the sense of it for a time. God alone can be the source of real happiness to an immortal soul, an adequate supply to all its faculties, an inexhaustible subject to its understanding, an everlasting object to its affections. The latter part of the text contains an up the blanks of time, and diverting their heavy censure, for which some of Job's uneasy reflections from their own internal impatient wishes for relief had no doubt poverty. But these are vain and deceit given too just occasion. But these ex-ful refuges of lies. pressions, uttered in his haste, he afterwards retracted, and finally came out from the furnace of affliction, like gold tried and refined by the fire.-What I propose, in discoursing on this subject, is to illustrate and prove the general proposition, that there can be no greater folly than to seek to escape from affliction by complying with the temptations of sin; or, in other words, that the smallest act of deliberate transgression is infinitely worse than the greatest calamity we can suffer in this life. Sin bereaves the soul of man of this its only portion. "Behold," saith the Prophet, "God's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither is his ear heavy that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, That the greater part of mankind are and your sins have hid his face from you, under the influence of the contrary opin- that he will not hear." Affliction, on the ion, may be too justly inferred from their other hand, instead of separating the soul practice. How many have recourse to from God, is often the means of bringing sinful pleasures to relieve their inward it nearer to him. Let a man be ever so distress? What unlawful methods do poor, diseased, reproached, persecuted, others use for acquiring the perishing still if he hold fast his integrity, if he be riches or honors of this world? while, in a real saint, he is near and dear to God. order to evade suffering for righteousness The eyes of the Lord are upon him, and sake, thousands make shipwreck of faith his ears are open to his cry. The angel and a good conscience, through sinful of the Lord encampeth round about him, compliances with the manners of the world, and a guard of angels wait to carry his against the clear and deliberate conviction departing spirit into Abraham's bosom. of their own minds. These things plainly Whereas sin renders us loathsome in the show, that the subject I have chosen is of eyes of God. He is angry with the wicked the highest importance; and if what may every day; and even their prayers and sabe said on it shall be so far blessed to any, crifices are an abomination to him. He hath bent his bow, and made it ready; he spect, is the greatest curse we can possihath also prepared for him the instruments | bly bring on ourselves; and the most desof death. God looks on them with abhor-perate condition in which a human crearence, and, when conscience is awake, they ture can be placed before his everlasting think of him with horror, and dare not doom be pronounced, is when God saith come into his presence, knowing that he of him, as he did of Ephraim of old, "He is a consuming fire to the workers of ini- is joined to his idols, let him alone." quity. Affliction, on the other hand, though a bitter, is yet a salutary medicine; and though no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous, nevertheless afterwards it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them who are exercised thereby. Affliction is the discipline by which we are trained to glory, and honor, and virtue. If this world, indeed, were our only portion, there would be some reason, or at least some excuse, for choosing the pleasures of iniquity, rather than those sufferings which would embitter the short period of our existence in it. But the greatest error we can possibly fall into, is that of taking it for the place of our rest. To cure this fatal mistake, God visits us with afflictions. They are his messengers sent to teach us our true condition, what this world is, a fleeting scene of vanity and illusions; and what we ourselves are in it, pilgrims and strangers, hastening to another land of perpetual abode. II. AFFLICTION may not only consist with the love of a father, but may even be the fruit of it. "Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.-By this," saith the prophet Isaiah, speaking of affliction, "shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged, and this is all the fruit to take away sin." David could say, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes. Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I have kept thy word." A good man may even glory in tribulation, knowing that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost which is given unto him. But sin is always both evil in its own nature and pernicious in its effects. This contrast is very strikingly displayed by the apostle Paul. Of the one he speaks as a privilege, and a token for good to those who are exercised thereby. "Unto you," saith | he, (writing to the Philippians, i. 29.) "it is left to our choice; the other is not. is given in the behalf of Christ, not only When we suffer in the cause of virtue, we to believe on him, but also to suffer for are in the hand of our most faithful and his sake. But what doth he say concern- everlasting friend; but when we sin in or ing the other, (Rom. vii. 24.) "O wretch-der to avoid suffering, we commit ourselves ed man that I am, who shall deliver me into the hands of that malicious, cunfrom the body of this death?” If any had ever reason to complain of the burden of affliction, Paul had more—“in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft." But in the midst of these sufferings, we never hear him crying out, Who shall deliver me from this unremitting distress? His inward corruption gave him greater THAT the evil of affliction is of short pain than the evils of his outward condi- duration, but that of sin perpetual. tion; and his captivity to the law of sin | Weeping may endure for a time, but joy was worse to him than prisons, and tor-cometh in the morning; and these light tures, and death. III. SIN is evil whether we feel it or not, and worst when we are most insensible of it. To be past feeling, in this re IV. IN affliction we are commonly passive, but always active in sin. The one ning, and eternal enemy, who goeth about seeking whom he may destroy. Affliction only hurts the body, but sin affects the health and well-being of that immortal principle, which is destined to survive the ruins of this earthly tabernacle, and to inherit happiness or misery for ever. Which leads me to observe, in the last place, afflictions, which are but for a moment, work out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. Should they continue throughout our whole lives, yet even that is but a moment compared with Let us then be warned, ere it be too eternity. The evil of sin, on the con- late, against the fatal error referred to in trary, goes beyond the grave, and lasts as the text; the preference of the momenlong as the soul itself, which it has pol-tary pleasures of sin, to the salutary disciluted. The delight of it is soon gone, but the sting remains; the guilt and punishment of it pass with us into the other world, and there constitute the worm that never dieth, and the fire which is not quenched. THESE observations may suffice to illustrate the general proposition, that there can be no greater folly than to seek to escape from affliction, by complying with the temptations to sin; or, in other words, that the smallest act of deliberate transgression is infinitely worse than the greatest calamity we can suffer in this life. pline of affliction. Let us never allow 2dly. Let us examine ourselves carefully, whether our judgment and choice. have been rectified on this important. What hath been said, ought, in the 1st point. What is it that affects us with the place, to serve for reproof to those who, deepest concern and sorrow; the adverse so far from considering iniquity as more to events in providence, or the sins by which be dreaded as a greater evil than afflic- we have incurred the loss of the divine tion, will not refrain from their ungodly favor? When the hand of God lies heavy and vicious practices even when their sin on us, what do we desire with the greatproves their affliction. To many, alas! it est earnestness? whether is it to have the seems to be as their meat and drink to trial sanctified, or to have it removed? obey the commands of sin, by fulfilling What is the chief object of your ambithe lusts thereof. In vain hath the word tion? Is it to grow in grace, and in conof God and providence admonished them, formity with the image of God? or is it that naught but bitterness is to be found to become great, and prosperous, and in the path of folly. They still pursue powerful in the world? Were God now that path, in defiance of their own experi- to put wisdom or riches in our choice, as ence, and weary themselves with commit- he once did to Solomon, would we deterting iniquity. They break through all mine as he did? or would we grasp at the restraints, not only when an angel stands riches, leaving it to age and experience to in the way, but where ruin, misery, and bring wisdom along with them in the ordestruction, stare them broad in the face. dinary supposed course of things? In How many are to be seen bound with what character does Christ appear most the cords of their own sins, from which amiable to us, as a Saviour from punishthey have neither the inclination nor ment, or as a Saviour from sin? Finally, power to free themselves? How many in what view does heaven appear most wasted and maimed by criminal indul-worthy of our desires and wishes; as a gence? How many brought to poverty place of deliverance from suffering, or as and rags, by riot and intemperance? a state of perfect freedom from sin and "Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who infirmity of every kind, where we shall hath contentions? who hath wounds with-be enabled to serve God with the entire out cause? who hath redness of eyes? they that tarry long at the wine, they that go to seek mixed wine." Sin has had its martyrs as well as godliness, who, in premature old age, have been made to possess the transgressions of their youth, in all the bitter fruits of a body tortured with diseases, and a spirit wounded with re morse. affections and powers of our whole nature ? By these marks let us try the real state of our characters, that so we may not pass through life with a lie in our right hands; but knowing that we are of the truth, may assure our hearts before God, looking for his mercy unto eternal life. Amen. Christian hope, which he calls a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. And, III. He expresses the firm persuasion which he had, in common with all true believers, of being admitted into that glorious and permanent dwelling-place, as soon as the earthly tabernacle should be dissolved. Each of these particulars I shall briefly illustrate, and then direct you to the practical improvement of the whole. THE prospect of a blessed immortality is one of the most powerful supports to the people of God, amidst all the trials of the I BEGIN With the first of these heads, present state; and therefore hope is com- which respects our state and condition on pared to an anchor, which being cast with-earth. And in the description here given. in the veil, keeps the soul firm and un- us, there are several things that deserve moved, so that nothing from without can our notice. disturb its inward peace and tranquillity. 1st. The body is called a house; and it This was the true foundation of that cour- may well get this name, on account of its age and constancy with which the apostles curious frame and structure, all the parts. and primitive Christians endured and over- of it being adjusted with the greatest exactcame the most grievous sufferings. Faithness, insomuch that there is not one meinpresented to their view a far more exceed- ber redundant nor superfluous, nor any ing and eternal weight of glory; in com- thing wanting that is necessary, either for parison of which their present afflictions ornament or use. appeared so light and momentary, that they were incapable of giving them much pain or uneasiness, as the apostle more fully declares in the close of the preceding chapter. And being unwilling to leave such an agreeable subject, he further enlarges upon it in the words of my text: "For we know, that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." Death itself can do us no real prejudice; on the contrary, we have reason to wel come it as a friend, because, when it beats down these tenements of clay in which we are lodged, or rather imprisoned upon earth, it only opens a passage for us into a far more commodious and lasting habitation, where we shall possess the greatest riches, the highest honors, and the most transporting pleasures, without intermission, and without end. I. He compares the body to an earthly house, yea to a tabernacle or tent, which is still less durable, and more easily taken down; and therefore the dissolution of such a frail thing ought not to be reckoned a very great calamity. To this he opposes, in the II. place, The glorious object of the But it is principally with relation to the inward inhabitant that the body gets the It is a name of a house in the text. lodging fitted up for the soul to dwell in. It is the residence of an immortal spirit, and from thence it derives its chief honor and dignity. As God created this earth, before he made any of the creatures which were to inhabit it, and as the world was completely furnished with every thing necessary and desirable, before man, its intended sovereign, was introduced; so likewise, in the formation of man, God began with the body, and first completed the outward fabric, before he breathed into it a living soul. How foolish then are they who spend all their thoughts and cares upon the bodies, and overlook those immortal spirits within, for whose use and accommodation they were solely intended; especially when it is considered, in the 2d place, That the body was not only made for the service of the soul, but that it is likewise composed of the meanest materials, even that of the dust which we trample under foot. Upon this account the apostle calls it in the text, not merely a house, but an earthly house. Thus we are told, (Genesis ii. 7.) "that the Lord God formed man of the dust of the |