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When therefore we read that our Lord requires of us to confess him before men, the true way to know what we are to confefs, is to reflect what he confeffed himself; for it cannot be fuppofed that he thought it reasonable for himself to make one confeffion, and for his difciples and fervants to make another. Look then into the Gospel, and fee his own confeffion: he confeffed himself to be the only Son of God; to come from the bofom of the Father to die for the fins of the world; to have all power given to him in heaven and earth; to be the judge of the world. When you have weighed these things, read his words, and judge what your duty is: Whofoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and finful generation, of him alfo fhall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father, with the holy angels.

DISCOURSE XLIX.

2 CORINTHIANS V. IO, II.

We must all appear before the judgment-feat of Chrift, that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. Knowing therefore the terrors of the Lord, we perfuade

men.

It is the privilege and distinguishing character of

a rational being to be able to look forward into futurity, and to confider his actions, not only with respect to the prefent advantage or disadvantage arifing from them, but to view them in their confequences through all the parts of time in which himfelf may poffibly exift. If therefore we value the privilege of being reasonable creatures, the only way to preserve it is to make use of it; and, by extending our views into all the scenes of futurity, in which we ourselves muft bear a part, to lay the foundation of folid and durable happiness.

By the exercise of this power of reason, the wifeft among the heathens difcovered, that there was ground for men to have expectations beyond this life. They faw plainly that themfelves, and all things that fell under their obfervation, were de

pendent beings on the will and power of him who formed them; and when they fought to find him, they were led by a neceffary chain of reasoning to the acknowledgment of a fupreme, independent, intelligent Being. They faw in every part of the creation evident marks of his power, wifdom, and goodnefs they difcerned that all the inanimate parts of the world acted perpetually in fubmiffion to the law of their creation; the fun and all the host of heaven were conftant to their courses; and, in every other part, the powers of nature were duly and regularly exerted for the prefervation of the prefent fyftem: among men only they found diforder and confufion. That they had reafon, was plain; that they were intended to live according to reason, could not be doubted; and yet they faw virtue often diftreffed and abandoned to all the evils of life, vice triumphant, and the world every where fubject to the violence of pride and ambition. How to account for this they knew not: this only they could obferve, that man was endowed with a freedom in acting, which the other beings of the lower world wanted; and to this they rightly afcribed the diforders to be found in this part of the creation. But though this accounted for the growth of evil, yet it rendered no account of the juftice or goodness of God in permitting vice oftentimes to reign here in glory, whilst virtue fuffered in diftrefs. Upon these confiderations they concluded, that there muft be another state after this, in which all the prefent inequalities in the administration of providence should be fet right, and every man receive according to his works.

This was, this is the ground of our natural expectation of a life after this. But upon this ground of truth many fables and ftories were raised, by fear and fuperftition, and by the power of imagination: so that the general belief, though right in its foundation, yet in almoft all the particulars of it was rendered ridiculous and abfurd. Hence it is, that among the writers of antiquity, we fometimes find wife men ridiculing the follies and fuperftitions of the people, and bad men always arguing from these follies against the very notion itself, and calling in queftion the reality of any future ftate.

Under thefe circumftances of the world, our bleffed Lord appeared to bring to light life and immortality through the Gofpel. Let us then confider how this fundamental article of religion now stands upon the foot of the Gospel revelation.

As to the principal point, there is no difference between the hopes conveyed to us in the Gospel, and the expectation built upon natural reafon : for, as the wifeft men thought there must be, fo the Gospel affures us there will be, a day in which God will judge the world in righteoufness, and render to every man according to his works. Thus far then the doctrine of the Gospel and the dictates of natural reason must stand or fall together. If this doctrine has had a larger and more extenfive influence through the authority of the Gofpel, than it could have had by the mere force of fpeculative reasoning, the world has received an advantage by the encouragement given to virtue, and the restraint laid upon vice by these means, which ought ever to be acknowledged with thankfulness.

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But the Gospel has added to this doctrine, and communicated to us the knowledge of some circumstances, which were not discoverable but by the means of revelation; and they are principally these : that there fhall be a refurrection of the body; that Chrift fhall be judge of the world; that the rewards and punishments in another life fhall be in proportion to our behaviour in this.

I shall speak briefly to these particulars, and fhew for what purpose they were revealed.

First, the refurrection of the body was revealed to give all men a plain and a sensible notion of their being fubject to a future judgment. Death is the deftruction of the man; and fure we are that the lifeless body is no man; and whatever notions fome may have of the foul in its state of separate exiftence, yet a mere fpirit is not a man; for man is made of foul and body: and therefore to bring the man into judgment to answer for his deeds, the foul and the body must be brought together again. This doctrine, established upon the authority of the Gofpel, does not remove all prejudices of the cafe, when examined by the short and fcanty notions we have of the powers of nature; but it effectually removes all difficulties that affect this belief, confidered with respect to religion and morality. For the fingle point in which religion is concerned, is to know whether men fhall be accountable hereafter for their actions here. Reafon tells us they ought to be fo: but a great difficulty arises from the diffolution of the man by death; a difficulty followed by endless speculations upon the nature of the foul, of its separate existence, of its guilt in this separate

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