the same cursed cause; yea, from it came all the miseries which I deserve to suffer with devils and condemned spirits in the fire that never is to be quenched, and shall I love and delight to serve such an enemy? Shall I give up the members of my body as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, and so work out mine own everlasting destruction? God forbid. As sin is the author of all the evil, which I do or can endure, I will therefore fight against it, and may the Lord God save me from the guilt, and deliver me from the dominion of it.

This is the language of every heart, which is made sensible of the poisonous qualities of sin. When the awakend sinner feels the malignant venom working in his constitution, he will be led to abhor and to detest it, and the more so, when the scripture discovers to him the execrable foe, who poisoned him with sin, and that was the old serpent What these serpents are said in the 17th verse to have done to the body in poisoning it, the same did he both to body and soul; and as he did it at first in the serpent, he has therefore been known and distinguished by this name from the time that he deceived our first parents in the subtle serpent. The apostle has given us a very alarming description of him, Rev. xii. 9. where he is treating of the war which was in heaven between Michael and his angels, and the dragon and his angels. "And the great dragon, he says, "was cast out, the old serpent, called the devil and satan, who deceiveth the whole world." Here he is called the serpent, alluding to his crafty wiliness, and the old serpent, to denote his having employed all the wiles to deceive and ruin man

kind. As soon as they were created he plotted their destruction, and he became satan, their sworn adversary, and the devil, their accuser, who sought to destroy their precious lives with the rage of a dragon; yea, with more rage than common dragons have, even with the burning fury of the great dragon. And alas! he was successful: for he deceiveth the whole world. He poisoned the whole human race. He corrupted all flesh, and we are now groaning under the dreadful effects of our total corruption. The cursed venom of sin, which he infused into our bodies, still works in them; but its more cursed venom still works, though less perceptibly, in our souls. The poison keeps working in the body, until it brings on sickness and death, and reduce us to the dust, from whence we were taken; and it keeps working in the soul in every hateful and unholy temper, which tends to stir up the wrath and indignation of God, and to separate the soul for ever and ever from him the fountain of life and glory.

This is the great and universal malady referred to in the text, the malady of sin, with which the old serpent, the devil, has poisoned the whole world. When he deceived our first parents, he then poisoned the fountain, and all the streams. which have been ever since flowing from it par take of the direful infection: for the word of truth declares, “That as by one man sin entered "into the world, and death by sin, so death pass "ed upon all men, in whom all have sinned." Here the entrance of sin is said to be the cause of the entrance of death, and we will all die in Adam, therefore we all sinned in him: for the wages of

sin is death. Now God being infinitely just and righteous would not pay the wages, unless there were some sin to deserve them, but infants receive the wages of sin, and consequently they are sinners; they die in Alam, because in him they sinned." For by the offence of one judgment came 66 upon all men to condemnation." Thus was our whole nature, both body and soul, corrupted by the fall, and there is not a sound part or faculty in either of them. They are corrupt and abominable altogether, and in nothing does this total corruption more evidently discover itself, than in their entire blindness and insensibility of their dangerous condition. They are poisoned, and yet they know it not; nay, they are so unwilling to know it, that when we inform them of it, they are highly offended. They cannot bear to be told of it, no, not by the ministers of the gospel, whose office and duty it is. We are sure to stir up their rage and hatred, if we discover to them the workings of this poison in their hearts, and if we appeal to the affects of it in their lives, and refer them to the plentiful streams of iniquity, which are continually flowing from the corrupt fountain of the heart, then they cannot bear us; they are like the deaf adder, that stoppeth her ear; which will not hearken to the voice of charmers, charming ever so wisely. They are resolved not to be disturbed about their sins, and therefore they will not hear of their sickness or of their danger.. They had rather die of their malady, than be made uneasy about it. Let sin do its worst in the next life, in the present they will enjoy it; and in sweet security too, if they can. Is not this an Ų 2

astonishing degree of infatuation? Is it not one of the strongest delusions of the devil, that he should make those very men insensible of their spiritual maladies, who are exquisitely sensible of the last bodily malady, whose fears are all alarmed at the thoughts of their dying to this world, but who have not the least concern about their dying from God and glory? Are any of you, my brethren in this case? Are you easy about the state of your souls, having never been in any distress about original and actual sin? Did you never feel yourselves so sick of both, that you were afraid you should perish everlastingly? If not, consider what it is, which keeps you in this fatal security. Are not you sinners? For all have sinned. And has not sin poisoned both body and soul? And is not this one of the sad, stupifying effects of its poison, that while there is not a step between you and death, yet you have no concern about your being healed? Are these things so? If they be, may the almighty God awaken you to a sense of your danger. Oh! that he may set home and fix such a conviction of sin upon your consciences, that, feeling your malady, you may earnestly seek the great physician's help, and may happily find that there is balm in Gilead; which is the

Second particular I was to consider; Glory be to God, who hath not left us without rememy. Our disease is dangerous, but there is balm in Gilead, which can heal perfectly and eternally. The country of Gilead was famous for a precious balm which grew there. "Go up to Gilead, and take balm," says the prophet Jeremiah, xlvi. 1

Its healing virtue is described by him, chap. li. 8. where speaking of the downfal of Babylon, he. says, "Take balm for her pain, if so she may be "healed." This sovereign medicine, which then grew in Gilead, could assuage the pain of wounds and heal them, and thereby was a type of the gracious remedy, which God had provided for the healing of the wounds of sin; namely, the most precious blood of the lamb of God, applied and made effectual by the holy Spirit: for as this cleanses away all the polutions, so it heals all the diseases of sin. The scripture has treated largely of its healing virtue, but it is no where more forcibly recommended than in the parable of the good Samaritan. Our Lord says, "A certain man

went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell "among thieves, who stripped hiin of his raiment, "and wounded him, and departed, leaving him "half dead." This certain man was Adam, whose possession was in a paradise of peace and rest, and there he was innocent, safe and happy : But he left this blissful state of his own accord, contrary to God's express commandment,' and he fell among thieves, satan and his angels, who drew him into sin, and stripped him of his raiment, rob. bed him of his righteousness, in which his soul had hitherto appeared in immaculate purity before God. This spotless robe they took away, and left poor fallen man naked and wounded. They wounded his body with those pains and diseases, which bring it down to the dust, from whence it was taken; and they wounded his soul in all its faculties, his understanding with darkness, his will with a vicious choice, and his affections with