XVIII.

SERMON afford you. Take it for granted, that what is naturally mutable, will one day change; that what was designed to be transient, will pass away. Look forward to futurity without impatience. Be not desirous to know it. It belongs to God. Let him bring forward the events of the world, in his own way. Imagine that you continually hear those words, which our Lord once addressed to Peter, when he was inquiring about what was to happen to a fellow-disciple, What is that to thee? Follow thou me. Amidst all the uncertainty of future events, this road of clear and plain duty lies before you; follow Christ, and enquire no farther. Seek no crooked path, in order to avoid impending dangers. Turn not to the right hand, nor to the left; but commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in bim, and he shall bring to pass the desires of thy heart.

V. BUILD your hopes of happiness on somewhat more solid and lasting than what either to-day or to-morrow are likely to produce. From what has been said, you may clearly perceive, that he who

rests

XVIIL

rests wholly upon this world, builds his SERMON house upon the sand. This life, by means of wisdom and virtue, may be rendered to a good man, a tolerable, nay a comfortable state. But he who expects complete happiness from it, will be greatly deceived. Man in his most flourishing condition, were much to be pitied, if he was destitute of any higher hope. Rolling from change to change, throughout all the days of his life, with a dark and unknown prospect always before him in futurity, what would avail a few short interrupted glimpses of happiness, which, from time to time, he was permitted to enjoy? Can we believe, that only for such a state as this, man was designed by his great and good Creator? -No: Let us bless the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten us again into a lively hope, by the resurrection of Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away. Here is the Rock on which the mind, however tossed by the storms of life, can securely rest. Here is the object to which a wise man will bend his chief attention, that,

XVIII.

SERMON after having acted his part on earth with fidelity and honour, he may be enabled, through the merits of his Saviour, to look for a place in the mansions of eternal and untroubled peace. This prospect is the great corrective of the present vanity of human life. It gives significancy and importance to its most transitory scenes; and, in the midst of its mutability, discovers one fixed point of rest. He who is habitually influenced by the hope of immortality, will be able to look without dismay on the changes of the world. He will neither boast of to-morrow, nor be afraid of it; but will pass through the varieties of life with a manly and unbroken mind; with a noble superiority to those fears and expectations, those cares and sorrows, which agitate the multitude.-- Such are the native effects of Christian faith and hope. To them alone it belongs, to surmount all the discouragements to which we are now exposed; to render our life comfortable, and our death blessed; nay, to make the day of our death, better than the day of our birth.

SERMON

XIX.

On following the MULTITUDE to do
EVIL

EXODUS, xxiii. 2.

Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil.—

IN

to

XIX.

N this world, we are placed as com- SERMON panions and assistants to one another. Depending, for most of the comforts of life, on mutual intercourse and aid, it was necessary, that we should be formed desire the company, and to take pleasure in the good-will, of our fellows. But this sociability of man, though essential to his present condition, has, like many other good principles, been unhappily warped from its original purpose; and in the pre

the assis

SERMON sent state of the world, has proved the XIX. cause of much evil. For, as vice has abounded in every age, it hath propagated itself much more easily by ance of this social disposition. We naturally mould ourselves on the pattern of prevailing manners; and corruption is communicated from one to another. By mutually giving, and taking, the example of sinful liberties, licentiousness spreads and grows; each justifies himself by his neighbour; and the multitude of sinners strengthens one another's hands to commit iniquity. In all the ages of the world, custom has had more power than reason. Few take the trouble of inquiring what is the right path; the greater part content themselves with following that in which the multitude have gone before them. No exhortation, therefore, is more necessary to be frequently given, and to be seriously enforced, than that which we receive from the text; Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil.

To acquire a full view of any danger to which we are exposed, is the first mea

sure