him, and to pay him daily with obedience, adoration, and praise.

Our fins have been great, and our tranfgreffions never could have been obliterated, had not Christ done it for us; let us therefore no longer dwell upon the rock of Prefumption with Satan, who hath been a liar from the beginning; but let us rather defcend into the valley of Humility and Peace, and fettle accounts with the God of our lives, from whom I had strayed to that degree that my life became a burden to me, and I have wished that I had never been born; but Chrift, who was "a friend to the publicans and finners," is now become "the rock of my falvation !" he hath caused me to trust in him, and to seek the Lord my God. The debt I owe is infinite. I defire ever to acknowledge it with all poffible gratitude; and to do my utmost towards the discharge of it, while I have my being.

If there is a foul within the audience of my voice, which (upon this awful query) "How much owest thou unto my Lord?" is ready to apprehend, that it owes too much ever to hope for a discharge, or freedom from the heavy load of debt it has contracted; I have a little to fay to fuch, even from my own experience thy tranfgreffions do not exceed the bounds of his mercy; he still careth for thee, with an inexpreffible fatherly care and tenderness. Even when his afflictions are upon thee, they are intended for thy good. "The bruised reed he will not break, the smoaking

flax he will not quench." The more any of you fee your real state, the more you remember the favours you have received, and feel the burden of your injuffice and ingratitude, the more readily will he meet the penitent difpofition of your minds.

I have no manner of doubt but he, "whofe work is falvation," who "came into the world" purely and purposely" to fave finners" will carry on his own work, and, as you wholly refign yourselves to his forming hand, will purify your hearts, reconcile you to the Father, and make you everlasting inftances and monuments of his infinite mercy. Lift up therefore thy head in hope, whoever thou art, in this humbled penitent ftate; for "thy falvation draws nigh." Thou oweft abundance to thy LORD; and there is an abundance which thou canft never pay: but there is the good Samaritan, ever ready to do for thee, as for him, who going from Jerufalem to Jerico, "fell among robbers;" by whom he was wounded; "and" to say, "take care of him, and I will repay thee." There is a glorious found from the great and good « friend of publicans and finners;" he is ready to fay to thee who art in this penitent state before him, "Take thy bill and write down fifty." He will "blot out thy fins as a cloud, and thy tranfgreffions as a thick cloud. *

I cannot but remember with renewed feeling, and 'warm emotion of heart, the day that anxiety (in the

*Ifaiah xliv. 22.

view of my condition) seized me; and how his mercy relieved me from it. He made my foul to feel his compaffion, and in the depths of gratitude thankfully to adore him. And hence I often feel a tenderness of mind towards those who are weary of vanity, and heavy laden with a sense of their manifold tranfgreffions. I befeech fuch, by the mercy of GOD, that they would fly to him in their anguish of mind; for it is he, and he alone, that can speak peace to the finner; though your unrighteousness may be great, it is not in any degree of proportion to his infinite mercy! Again, fuch among you to whom I have spoken, who delight to dwell in the path of temptation, wherein you have too long continued; I warn you to consider, that you are in the road to deftruction.

I would not give up, like Efau, " my birth-right" to feek "a place of repentance with tears, and not find it." O my foul! forever acknowledge how much thou owest unto thy Lord! Let none say," he hath bleffed me varioufly, and in fome future time I will awake my foul to gratitude. I have now fomething elfe to do ;" like him who, when an apostle "reasoned of righteousness, temperance and judgment to come," replied, " Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient feafon I will call for thee." +

The like difpofition continues to prevail in too many; and this feems to be the language of their hearts, † A&s xxiv. 25.

*Heb. xii. 16, 17.

"Go thy way for this time; call upon me when I have lived to myself, and answered my own purposes a little longer: vifit me at fome distant time hence." Oh! rather "to-day, while it is called to-day.-Harden not thy heart:" do not defer thy repentance a moment; thou knowest not what "a moment may produce." Confider thy repeated tranfgreffions; thy multiplied offences against God: heap not up "wrath against the day of wrath :" fwell not the direful acThou haft hitherto trampled upon the goodnefs and the mercies of the God that made thee; venture not on prefumption and delay. Time is uncertain: Immortality is at hand.

count.

I beseech you, therefore, my friends, at the prefent time, that you will lay to heart the neceffity of your making up this great account; delay it not till the decline of life. Many are on the brink of the grave! reflect upon your extreme danger! think not of crowding the account of your repentance into your last hour of life! you will find it extremely difficult to labour under the infirmities of the body upon a death-bed without a reasonable ground of hope: all the offers of mercy having been long continued, and often repeated; yet by you as long and as often rejected; what then will discharge you from that dreadful account! I wish it may never be the cafe of any within the audience of my voice. Let us all immediately ponder, rightly confider, and seriously improve this confideration, "How much owest thou unto my Lord ?”

A Prayer after the foregoing Difcourse.

WITH unfpeakable reverence we presume to approach thy prefence, O Father! who art in heaven: and with the voice of thanksgiving and high praise, to offer the tribute, that is due to thee alone!

In commemoration of thy mercy, thy infinite mercy! we are awfully bowed before thee, as at thy facred foot-ftool; in the deepest reverence and thankfulness for the stretching forth" of the rod and the staff,"* which thou haft been pleased to bless, as the means of our furtherance in the way of life and falvation.

Though humbled in duft, in the sense of our unworthiness, we are, nevertheless, encouraged to breathe unto thee, and to make mention of thy name, with joy of heart: we adore that goodness, which hath put it into our hearts to feek, ferve and fear Thee; and to turn to the place where "prayer is wont to be made."+

Thou haft loved us before we loved Thee; thy love, O Lord! hath not been after the manner of men: Thou haft called us, when we were enemies; and hast reconciled tranfgreffors to thyfelf. Thou haft followed us in the day of our revolting; and, when we were ftraying in the wilderness, as a moft gracious and ten