the dead, they will repent. Then follows the text, which is the laft refolution of this cafe, If they hear not Mofes and the prophets, neither will they be perfuaded though one rofe from the dead. And indeed where infidelity is the effect of fuch profligate wickedness, it deferves not fo much regard from God, as that he should condefcend to make particular applications to it by new lights and evidences and fhould he do it, there is reafon to fufpect it would be ineffectual. We fee, in the ordinary course of providence, many judgments beftowed upon finners to reclaim and amend them; but they harden themselves against them; so that their last state is worfe than their firft. I will not answer for the courage of finners, how well they would bear the fight of one from the dead; nay, I am apt to imagine it would strangely terrify and amaze them. But to be frightened and to be perfuaded are two things: nature would recover the fright, and fin would recover ftrength, and the great fright might come to be matter of ridicule. How eafy would it be, when the fright was over, to compare this event with the many ridiculous ftories we have of apparitions, and to come at length to miftruft our own fenfes, and to conclude that we were mifled, like a man in a dark night who follows an ignis fatuus? And, what is worse, when the infidel had once conquered his own fears, and got loose again from the thoughts of religion, he would then conclude, that all religion is made up of that fear which he felt himself, which others cannot get rid of, though he fo manfully and happily fubdued it. You may think it perhaps impoffible, that a man should not be convinced by

fuch an appearance: the fame I believe you would think of the judgments which befel Pharaoh, that it is hardly poffible any man fhould withstand them; and yet you see he did: nay, did not the guards, who were eyewitneffes of our Saviour's refurrection; who faw the angel that rolled away the ftone from the mouth of the fepulchre; who fhook and trembled with fear, and became as dead men; did not they, after all this, receive money to deny all they faw, and to give false evidence against the person they beheld coming from the grave? So, you fee, it is in the nature of man to withstand fuch evidences, where the power of fin is prevalent.

Befides, there are many finners, who are not infidels they may believe Mofes and the prophets, though they will not hear them, that is, obey them. Now fhould one come from the dead to these men, the moft they could do would be to believe him : but that does not imply their obeying him; for they believe Mofes and the prophets, Chrift and his Apoftles, and yet obey not them; and why fhould obedience be the confequence of belief in one cafe more than another? There can be no greater arguments for obedience than the Gospel affords; and therefore he who believes the Gospel, and difobeys it, is out of hope to be reformed by any other evidence. So that, confidering this cafe with respect to all manner of infidels or finners, there is reason in our Saviour's judgment; If they will not hear Mofes and the prophets, neither will they be perfuaded though one rofe from the dead.

And hence perhaps we may learn the reason, why this fort of intercourfe between the other world and

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this is fo very rare and uncommon, because it could serve no good end and purpose; for God having already given a fufficient evidence of all things which we are concerned to know, there is no room to expect or hope for fuch kinds of admonition. He sent the greatest person of the other world to us, his own Son, and fent him too from the dead: he has come himself down to us in figns and wonders and mighty works: and why he should send a man from the dead to tell you, what is legible in the book of nature, what he, his Son, his Apoftles and Prophets have already told you, you that can give the reason, give it.

DISCOURSE XXXV.

PSALM xix. 12.

Who can understand his errors? Cleanfe thou me from Secret faults.

THE only method of coming to the diftinct

knowledge of our fins, and to a due fenfe of them, is felf-examination; and therefore it is, that you are fo frequently exhorted to enter into yourselves, to converse with your own hearts, and to fearch out the evil which is in them. But often it happens that this method, after the fincereft and moft laborious inquiry, leaves men under great diffatisfaction of mind, and fubject to the frequent returns of doubts and mifgivings of heart; left fomething very bad may have escaped their fearch, and, for want of being expiated by forrow and repentance, fhould remain a debt upon their fouls at the great day of account. As in temporal concerns, men often know, that by a long courfe of prodigality, and many expenfive vanities, they have contracted a great debt upon their eftates, and have brought themselves to the very brink of poverty and diftrefs, and yet, when they try to think and confider of their condition, find themselves utterly unable to ftate their