more time or pains, upon it, than you did once? I doubt this is not done to please God. Then it pleases the devil. If you laid aside your needless ornaments some years since,-ruffles, necklaces, spider-caps, ugly, unbecoming bonnets, costly linen, expensive laces,-have you not, in defiance of religion and reason, taken to them again?

12. Perhaps you say you can now afford the expense. This is the quintessence of nonsense. Who gave you this addition to your fortune; or (to speak properly) lent it to you? To speak more properly still, who lodged it for a time in your hands as his stewards; informing you at the same time for what purpose he intrusted you with it? And can you afford to waste your Lord's goods, for every part of which you are to give an account; or to expend them in any other way than that which he hath expressly appointed? Away with this vile, diabolical cant! Let it never more come out of your lips. This affording to rob God is the very cant of hell. Do not you know that God intrusted you with that money (all above what buys necessaries for your families) to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to help the stranger, the widow, the fatherless; and, indeed, as far as it will go, to relieve the wants of all mankind? How can you, how dare you, defraud your Lord, by applying it to any other purpose? When he intrusted you with a little, did he not intrust you with it that you might lay out all that little in doing good? And when he intrusted you with more, did he not intrust you with that additional money that you might do so much the more good, as you had more ability? Had you any more right to waste a pound, a shilling, or a penny, than you had before? You have, therefore, no more right to gratify the desire. of the flesh, or the desire of the eyes, now, than when you was a beggar. O no! do not make so poor a return to your beneficent Lord! Rather, the more he intrusts you with, be so much the more careful to employ every mite as he hath appointed.

13. Ye angels of God, ye servants of his, that con

tinually do his pleasure! our common Lord hath intrusted you also with talents far more precious than gold and silver, that you may minister in your various offices to the heirs of salvation. Do you not employ every mite of what you have received, to the end for which it was given you? And hath he not directed us to do his will on earth, as it is done by you in heaven? Brethren, what are we doing? Let us awake! Let us arise! Let us imitate those flaming ministers! Let us employ our whole soul, body, and substance, according to the will of our Lord! Let us render unto God the things that are God's; even all we are and all we have!

14. Most of those who when riches increase set their hearts upon them, do it indirectly in some of the preceding instances. But there are others who do this more directly; being, properly, "lovers of money;" who love it for its own sake; not only for the sake of what it procures. But this vice is very rarely found in children or young persons; but only, or chiefly, in the old,-in those that have the least need of money, and the least time to enjoy it. Might not this induce one to think, that in many cases it is a penal evil; that it is a sinpunishing evil; that when a man has, for many years, hid his precious talent in the earth, God delivers him up to Satan to punish him by the inordinate love of it? Then it is that he is more and more tormented by that auri sacra fames," that execrable hunger after gold," which can never be satisfied. No: it is most true, as the very heathen observes, Crescit amor nummi, quantum ipsa pecunia crescit," As money, so the love of money, grows; it increases in the same proportion." As in a dropsy, the more you drink, the more you thirst; till that unquenchable thirst plunge you into the fire which never shall be quenched!

15. "But is there no way," you may ask, "either to prevent or to cure this dire disease?" There is one preventive of it, which is also a remedy for it; and I believe there is no other under heaven. It is this; after you have gained (with the cautions above given) all you

can, and saved all you can, wanting for nothing; spend not one pound, one shilling, or one penny, to gratify either the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, or the pride of life; or, indeed, for any other end than to please and glorify God. Having avoided this rock on the right hand, beware of that on the left. Secondly, Hoard nothing. Lay up no treasure on earth, but give all you can; that is, all you have. I defy all the men upon earth, yea, all the angels in heaven, to find any other way of extracting the poison from riches.

16. Let me add one word more. After having served you between sixty and seventy years; with dim eyes, shaking hands, and tottering feet, I give you one more advice before I sink into the dust. Mark those words of St. Paul: "Those that desire" or endeavour "to be rich," that moment" fall into temptation:" yea, a deep gulf of temptation, out of which nothing less than almighty power can deliver them. "They fall into a snare;"-the word properly means a steel trap, which instantly crushes the animal, taken, to pieces;-" and into divers foolish and hurtful desires, which plunge men into destruction and perdition." You, above all men, who now prosper in the world, never forget these awful words! How unspeakably slippery is your path! How dangerous every step! The Lord God enable you to see your danger, and make you deeply sensible of it! O may you "awake up after his likeness, and be satisfied with it!"

I

17. Permit me to come a little closer still. Perhaps may not trouble you any more on this head. I am pained for you that are "rich in this world." Do you give all you can? You who receive five hundred pounds a year, and spend only two hundred, do you give three hundred back to God? If not, you certainly rob God of that three hundred. You that receive two hundred, and spend but one, do you give God the other hundred? If not, you rob him of just so much. "Nay, may I not do what I will with my own?" Here lies the ground of your mistake. It is not your own. It cannot be, unless

7

you are lord of heaven and earth. "However, I must provide for my children." Certainly but how? By making them rich? Then you will probably make them heathens, as some of you have done already. "What shall I do then?" Lord, speak to their hearts! else the preacher speaks in vain. Leave them enough to live on, not in idleness and luxury, but by honest industry. And if you have not children, upon what scriptural or rational. principle can you leave a groat behind you more than will bury you? I pray consider, what are you the better for what you leave behind you? What does it signify, whether you leave behind you ten thousand pounds, or ten thousand shoes and boots? O leave nothing behind you! Send all you have before you into a better world! Lend it, lend it all unto the Lord, and it shall be paid you again. Is there any danger that his truth should fail? It is fixed as the pillars of heaven. Haste, haste, my brethren, haste! lest you be called away before you have settled what you have on this security! When this is done, you may boldly say, "Now I have nothing to do but to die! Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit! Come, Lord Jesus; come quickly!"

BRISTOL, September 21, 1790.

12

SERMON CXXIV.

FREE GRACE.

PREACHED AT BRISTOL, IN THE YEAR 1740.

"Ile that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things ?"-ROM. viii. 32.

1. How freely does God love the world! While we were yet sinners, "Christ died for the ungodly." While we were "dead in sin," God "spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all." And how freely with him does he "give us all things!" Verily, FREE GRACE is all in all!

2. The grace or love of God, whence cometh our salvation, is FREE IN ALL, and FREE FOR ALL.

3. First. It is free IN ALL to whom it is given. It does not depend on any power or merit in man; no, not in any degree, neither in whole, nor in part. It does not in any wise depend either on the good works or righteousness of the receiver; not on any thing he has done, or any thing he is. It does not depend on his endeavours. It does not depend on his good tempers, or good desires, or good purposes and intentions; for all these flow from the free grace of God; they are the streams only, not the fountain. They are the fruits of free grace, and not the root. They are not the cause, but the effects of it. Whatsoever good is in man, or is done by man, God is the author and doer of it. Thus is his grace free in all; that is, no way depending on any power or merit-in man, but on God alone, who freely gave us his own Son, and "with him freely giveth us all things."

4. But is it free FOR ALL, as well as IN ALL? To this some have answered, "No: it is free only for those whom God hath ordained to life; and they are but a little flock. The greater part of mankind God hath ordained to death;

IV. -2 G