Haven of Reft and Peace: If the Wicked profper, we know there is a Day of Account; if the Righteous fuffer, we know his Reward is not far off: If all Things about us seem difturbed, we know whose Word can bring Order out of Confufion: Whatever our State and Condition are, we poffefs our Souls in Patience, and in full Affurance that all Things are fubject to him, who is our God, and our Redeemer.

I fhall detain you no longer than to lay two Confequences before you, arifing from what has been faid. Firft, Since the Evils of Life do so neceffarily force us to have refort to the Comforts of Religion, being capable of no other Cure or Remedy, it may fhew us fome Marks of God's Goodness and Care of us, even in his permitting these many Evils in the World: They are fo many Calls to us, to fearch out and fecure to ourselves that real Happiness to which we are ordained. Had we been made for this World only, it would be impoffible to imagine a Reason, why a Being of infinite Goodness should place us in the midst of so many Fears and Sorrows: But as we are formed for a more lafting State than this, and are placed here for our Trial only, it was neceffary and agreeable to the wife Ends of Providence

Providence to furround us on all Sides, with Warnings not to set up our Reft here, but to remember, and with all our Might to labour for the Life that fhall never perish. To this End the Evils of the World are very fubfervient; they are diffufed through all Conditions of Life, and are Calls to Per fons of all Conditions to remember God in all their Ways, and to keep a ftedfaft Eye upon the Things which God has prepared for those who love him.

Secondly, Since the Evils of Life cannot be avoided, nor yet be cured without the Helps and Affiftances which Religion alone can afford; let us confider, what a fad Choice we make for ourselves, when we throw from us the Hopes and Comforts which flow from a due Acknowledgment of God. If we have Hope in this Life only, we must be miferable. We are born to Mifery, and we muft die to be happy. But if we add to the Terrors of Death, by renouncing or forfeiting all Hopes of Futurity; if we corrupt the few Pleafures of Life by the Fears of Guilt, and give Weight and Sharpnefs to all our other Afflictions, by a fearful looking for of Judgment to come; our Condition, even in this World, will be deplorable, and our Life but one continued VOL. II. U Scene

Scene of hopeless Mifery. As we value therefore even the Pleafures of this Life, and our Share in the good Things of the World, which the Providence of God has placed before us, let us keep ourselves in a Capacity of enjoying them, by holding faft the Comforts of Religion. These only can give us a true Relish of our Pleasures; these only can enable us to bear like Men our Share of Evil and Affliction: Our Hearts will often be difquieted within us, and we hall, in the Multitude of our Thoughts, find a Multitude of Sorrows: Let us therefore keep God our Friend, whofe Comforts will refresh our Souls.

DISCOURSE

PSALM 1xxxviii. 15.

While I fuffer thy Terrors, I am diftracted.

A

***

eS the Comforts which true Re

ligion affords are the only fure Support against the Evils and Calamities of the World, to which every Condition of Life is more or less expofed; fo the Terrors of Religion, being very grievous in themselves, exclufive of thefe Comforts, add Weight to all our Miseries, and are a Burden too heavy for the Spirit of a Man to fuftain. But furely there is fomething monftrous in fuch Terrors! They come not from Religion by U 2

natural

natural Birth: For it is much easier to believe, that all we fee is Chance and Fortune, and Religion itself a vain Thing, than to believe that an all-wise all-powerful Being has formed us to be miferable, and given us a Senfe and Knowledge of himfelf, that we may live in perpetual Terror and Distraction. And yet, in fact, this is often the Cafe; we fee many rendered unhappy by fuch Fears and Jealoufies And of all the Fears incident to Man, these are the most fearful, and give us the quickest Senfe of Mifery; they are, what the Pfalmift has defcribed them to be, Diftraction A Man in this fad State employs all his Reason to his own Destruction; he is fagacious in finding out new Torment for himself, and can give a thousand Reasons to juftify his unreasonable Fears: If you offer a thousand more for his Comfort and Confolation, he rejects them all; his Mindis under fo thick a Cloud, that no Ray of Light can find Admittance. This Evil is the more to be lamented, because Virtue and Innocence are not always a Security against it; nay, fometimes the very Defire to be better than we are, and to render ourfelves more acceptable to God, makes us think ourselves to be worse than we are, and quite out of his Favour. What a wretched

State