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SECT.V.

SECTION V.

Confiderations on the appearance, doctrine, and baptifm of St. John.

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HE days of St. John's retirement were now ended, and he was to exchange the pleasures of contemplation for the far different fcenes of an active life; to behold, with grief and indignation, the fins and follies of mankind, the fight of which muft needs be more grating and afflicting to his righteous foul, than a garment of camel's hair could be to his body; to encounter the oppofition of a world that would be fure to take arms against him, from the moment in which he ftood forth a preacher of repentance and reformation. But no good could be done to others in folitude, no converts could be made in the defarts; and he must therefore quit even the moft refined and exalted of intellectual enjoyments, as every minister of Christ should be ready to do,

when

when charity dictates an attendance on SECT.V. the neceffities of his fellow creatures.

YET let it be obferved, that St. John was thirty years of age, when" the

"word of God came to him in the wil"derness," and commiffioned him to enter upon his ministry; and the holy Jefus likewife was of the fame age, when inaugurated to his office, by the visible descent of the Spirit upon him at his baptism; to intimate, perhaps, that neither the exigences of mankind, nor a consciousness of abilities for the work, can be pleaded as a fufficient warrant for a man to run before he is fent, and take the facred office upon himself, without a regular and lawful call. The inftitutions of God are not without a reafon, and he will not be ferved by the breach of his commandments.

THE place to which the Baptist first repaired is styled "the wilderness of Judea," a country not like the vast and uninhabited defarts in which he was educated, but one thinly peopled, a

a Luke iii. 2.

b Matt. iii. 1. Luke iii. 3.

K 2

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SECT.V. comparative wilderness, chofen by him

on account of it's bordering on the river.
Hither the inhabitants of the neigh-
bouring cities and villages prefently
flocked in great numbers, attracted by
the uncommon fanctity of the new
preacher, who thus came forth, on a
fudden, from the defarts, like one from
another world, without any connections
in this, that no attachment might take
him off from the duties of his high
calling, or any way impede him in the
exercise of it; fince a man's worst foes:
have often been thofe of his own houf-
hold, and the ties of flesh and blood
have been known to prevail, where ty-
rants have threatened and inflicted tor-
tures, without effect. And as there is
nothing fo directly oppofite to the pro-
feflion of a prophet, nothing which fo
foon or fo effectually fullies his reputa-
tion, as a tendency to indulgence and
fenfuality; in him, who was "more
"than a prophet "," we must expect to
find a perfect crucifixion of the flesh,
with it's affections and lufts. What
"went ye out into the wilderness to
a Matt. xi. 9.

a

"fee?

"fee? A man clothed in foft raiment"?" SECT.V. No, the very reverfe; a man, like his predeceffor Elijah, coarfly attired; "his "raiment of camel's hair, with a lea"thern girdle about his loins ;" and content with the plaineft food that nature could provide for him; "his meat, "locufts, and wild honey," a man, whose person, habit, and manner of life, were themselves a fermon, and the best illuftration of the doctrine he was about to teach; a proper perfon to prepare the way for Chrift, and introduce the law to the gofpel; to fhew men what effect the one ought to have upon them, in order to dispose them for the bleffings of the other; that mercy might fave from the wrath which juftice had denounced, and Jefus comfort those whom Mofes had caufed to mourn.

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THE actions of a prophet, who appears, like the Baptift, with an extraordinary miffion, though they are not to be imitated by us according to the letter, may yet convey a moral of general use. There is no obligation upon

a Matt. xi. 8.

b Ibid. iii. 4.

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SECT.V. us to be clothed with camel's hair, and to eat locufts and wild honey, nor are we commanded to abftain wholly from wine, ás St. John did, according to the prediction of the angel concerning him, delivered at the annuntiation of his birth, "He fhall drink neither wine nor ftrong drink, and fhall be filled with "the Holy Ghost even from his mo"ther's womb a." But who doth not here perceive, evidently marked out, the oppofition between fenfuality and the fpirit of holiness, and the impoffibility of their dwelling together under the fame roof? "Into a malicious foul "wisdom fhall not enter, nor dwell "in a body that is fubject to fin. For "the holy spirit of discipline will flee

deceit, and remove from thoughts "that are without understanding, and "will not abide when unrighteousness "cometh in ". b " As, therefore, "no "man can say that Jefus is the Lord, "but by the Holy Ghoft," who speaks in the fcriptures, who enlightens our

a Luke i. 15.
b Wifd. i. 4.
C 1 Cor. xii. 3.

under

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