will be evinced in the final refult, and even in the general courfe of our lives. We fhall enjoy peace, and a good confcience. Hope of God's favour will brighten every prospect; and there is every reason to believe, that while the children of this world, who in their generation are wifer than the children of light, fhall be excluded from the prefence of God, we shall be admitted (our good intentions and endeavours being accepted as a compensation for our defects) to the right hand of him, in whose gift are pleasures, riches, and honours, far beyond what we can defire or deserve.

Then may the worldly-wife say, “We fools "accounted their lives madness, and their end "to be without honour. How are they num"bered among the children of God, and their " lot is among the faints *!"

* Wifdom, v. 4.

On the SNARES of the DEVIL, and MEANS of escaping them.

AN

MATT. vi. 13.

But deliver us from evil.

NY attempt to elucidate a paffage in a prayer which every Chriftian ufes privately in his clofet, and which the wisdom of our church has directed to be used in every separate office, will justly claim your serious

attention.

I mean not, however, to arrogate the merit of making a new difcovery, when I inform you, that the words, deliver us from evil, have been commonly misunderstood. They have been supposed to convey a petition for a deliverance from evil in general, moral, and natural; and indeed, in this sense, the meaning is comprehensive, and fuch as must receive the fincere affent of every mortal.

But it is juftly observed, that the original fignifies a petition for deliverance from the power of the evil one, and ought to be tranflated-deliver us from THE EVIL ONE;—from Satan, the adversary of mankind, from whom all the fin and mifery of man derive their origin.

In this age, in which many make pretenfions both to wit and philosophy, without any juft claim to common fenfe or common honesty, attempts have been made to ridicule or reason away the belief of an evil fpirit; and there feems to be caufe for furmifing, that they who believe not in the existence of Satan, are equally incredulous on the subject of all revealed religion. It is indeed certain, and beyond poffibility of difpute, that the Holy Scriptures declare the reality of evil fpirits and fallen Angels, and of ONE, who is eminent among them, as their chief or tyrant. So that he who ventures to reject the belief of Satan, the adverfary of God and man, muft at the same time reject the Gospel of Jesus Christ,

There are, however, many who cannot induce themselves to avow a total difbelief of the Gospel, who yet would explain away the doctrine of devils as merely allegorical and figurative. They chufe to be Chriftians; they

are

are shocked at the idea of profeffing infidelity, yet they would fashion the Gospel according to their own ideas of propriety, and accept fuch doctrines only as quadrate with their own prepoffeffions.

Before I proceed any farther on the interefting subject which I have chosen for your prefent meditation, I will defire you to recollect those plain texts of Scripture, which no ingenuity of interpretation can fo far diftort, as to prevent them from declaring plainly, the actual existence and great power of the evil one.

You cannot require a repetition of the hiftory of Adam's fall, and of the part which Satan acted in effecting it. You cannot require to be informed, that Chrift was to bruise the head of the ferpent; that is, the Devil: and you must be credulous indeed, if you will believe that the Devil, fo often mentioned in the New Teftament, is only an allegorical perfonage.

It is the doctrine of the Scriptures, however it may be derided by minute philofophers, that the Devil and his angels, or evil fpirits, have their present habitation in the circumambient air; from which convenient fituation they furvey mankind, and take every opportunity of feducing, corrupting, and leading them to deftruction. Satan himself is called by

Dd 2

by St. Paul, the prince of the power of the air. This fituation conftitutes their place of exile from heaven. This is the prison in which God hath reserved them unto the judgment of the great day. And the angels which kept not their first estate, faith St. Jude, but left their own babitation, he hath referved in everlafting chains under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day. For God spared not the angels, as we read in St. Peter, which finned, but caft them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be referved unto judgment; or, as it is interpreted by Joseph Mede, having adjudged the angels that finned to hell torments, "he delivered them to be "kept, or reserved, (in the airy region, as in

a prison,) for chains of darkness at the day "of judgment."

But to discover the local refidence of these evil beings, is not of the greatest consequence to us. Our firft object with respect to them is, to be convinced of their real existence, and the greatnefs of their power. I could produce many other paffages, which tend to prove, that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against Spiritual wickedness in high places; but you

need