IX.

particular, operates to our high advan- SERM. tage, both by the immediate affiftance which we may hope it will procure from Him who is the author and infpirer of virtue, and by its native influence in softening, purifying, and exalting the heart. In vain would he attempt to behave himfelf wifely in a perfect way, who looks not frequently up to God for grace and aid; and who would prefumptuously attempt to feparate moral virtue from devotion, its natural and original ally. Besides the exercises of religious worship both public and private, seasonable returns of retirement from the world, of calm recollection and ferious thought, are most important auxiliaries to virtue. He who is without intermiffion engaged in the buftle of fociety and worldly occupation, becomes incapable of exercising that difcipline over himself, and giving that attention to his temper and character which virtue requirès. Commune with your own hearts on your bed, and be ftill. Offer the facrifices of righteoufnefs, and put your truft in the Lord*.

*Pfalm iv. 4, 5.

Br

SERM.

IX.

By the obfervance of fuch rules and maxims as have been now pointed out, it may be hoped that, through divine grace,, we may be enabled to behave ourfelves wifely in a perfect way, until, in the end, we receive the reward of fuch behaviour. The wifdom here fpoken of as conjoined with virtue, is that wisdom from above, which is appointed by God to enlighten and guide the courfe of integrity. It opens to us that path of the just, which is now as the fhining light, and which will fhine more and more until the perfect day.

On the Immortality of the Soul, and a future State.

1

2 CORINTHIANS, V. I.

For we know, that if our earthly houfe of this tabernacle were diffolved, we have

a building of God, an houfe not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

THIS

X.

HIS paffage prefe nts to us in one SERM. view the nature of our prefent earthly ftate, and the future object of the Christian's hope. The ftyle is figurative; but the figures employed are both obvious and expreffive. The body is represented as a houfe inhabited by the foul, or the thinking part of man. But

it

X.

SERM. it is an earthly house, a tabernacle erected only for paffing accommodation, and to be diffolved; to which is to fucceed the future dwelling of the just in a building of God, an houfe not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. Here then are three great objects prefented to our confideration. First, the nature of our prefent condition, Secondly, that fucceeding ftate which is the object of good men's hope. Thirdly, the certain foundation of their hope; we know, that if our earthly houfe be diffolved, we have a building of God.

I. THE text gives a full defcription of our prefent embodied state; as an earthly houfe, an earthly houfe of this tabernacle, and a tabernacle which is to be diffolved.

We dwell in an earthly houfe. Within this cottage of earth is lodged that fpiritual, immortal fubftance into which God breathed the breath of life. So we are elfewhere faid in Scripture, to have our foundation in the duft, and to dwell in houfes of clay. During its continuance in this

humble

humble abode, the foul may be justly SERM. confidered as confined and imprisoned.

It is reftrained from the full exertion of its powers by many obftructions. It can perceive and act only by very imperfect organs. It looks abroad as through the windows of the fenfes; and beholds truth as through a glafs darkly. It is befet with a numerous train of temptations to evils which arifes from bodily appetites. It is obliged to fympathize with the body in its wants; and is depreffed with infirmities not its own. For it fuffers from the frailty of those materials of which its earthly houfe is compacted. It languishes and droops, along with the body; is wounded by its pains; and the slightest difcomposure of bodily organs is fufficient to derange fome of the highest operations of the foul.

All these circumftances bear the marks of a fallen and degraded ftate of human nature. The manfion in which the foul is lodged, correfponds fo little with the

powers and capacities of a rational im

mortal

X.