SERMON XI. ii. SAMUEL xix. 35. I am this day fourscore years old, and can I difcern between good and evil? Can thy Servant taste what I eat or what I drink? Can I hear any more the voice of finging men and finging women? Wherefore then Should thy fervant be yet a burden unto my Lord the King? A XI. LTHOUGH we are placed upon SERM. this globe to mortify our evil and corrupt affections, and become worthy of a more glorious habitation; although we are but strangers travelling to our home, the path XI. SERM. path we tread is fometimes fmooth and flowery; many a delight hath the hand of Infinite Goodness fcattered in the way, to comfort and refresh the wearied pilgrim. All the fenfes are inftruments of pleasure; the eye is charmed with objects of beauty, the ear is foothed with notes of melody, and the taste is gratified with inexhaustible variety from the animal and vegetable world. Still greater and more substantial fatisfaction refults from the affections of the mind. Man does not purfue his courfe in gloomy folitude; each individual fees numberless companions proceeding in the fame track, from whom he may felect fpirits congenial with his own; he may form many connections, which awaken all the finer feelings of the heart, and raise him to a state of temporary felicity. But as this earth is not our feat of reft, all earthly gra tifications muft, after a while, be refigned; if, by our unexpected removal to another fcene, they are not fuddenly oft to us, we become become at length loft to them; the powers SERM. of enjoyment fail, and old age, like the breath of winter, benumbs the fenfes and congeals the blood. The heart grows cold and torpid, and receives no longer the impreffions of gaiety. Such, at least, was the conviction of Barzillai, the Gileadite; a perfonage of confiderable rank and power, who had furnished David and his army with sustenance while they lay at Mahanaim. When Abfalom and his party were defeated, and the king returned in peace, Barzillai went down from the city where he dwelt, to conduct his fovereign over Jordan; and, as a reward for the loyalty and attention he had manifefted, this faithful subject was invited to accompany his royal master to Jerufalem, and partake the fplendour and luxuries of a court. But the Gileadite, fenfible of his infirmities and approaching diffolution, P XI. SERM. diffolution, replied, How long have I to live, that I should go up with the king unto Jerufalem? I am this day fourfcore years old, and can I difcern between good and evil? Can thy fervant tafte what I eat or what I drink? Can I hear any more the voice of finging men and finging women? Wherefore then Should thy fervant be yet a burden unto my lord the king? This paffage of facred history may fuggeft the following inquiries: Whether this incapacity of enjoyment was peculiar to Barzillai, or common to old age; and, whether he did wifely in declining the recompenfe which David offered him, and defiring to return to his own city, that he might be buried in the grave of his fathers? If it fhall be found that he anfwered well, and that all men who arrive at the fame date, muft expect the fame corporeal decay, we may then afk, with all XI. due humility, why hath the Father of SERM. mercies paffed this decree, So long shall thy gratifications continue and no longer? 2 We will firft, then, examine if Time be the enemy of pleasure, and if life, after we have numbered fourfcore years, be then, for its little remainder, but labour and forrow? Man may be confidered as a machine, and though of the most exquifite workmanship, liable, like any other machine, to a thousand irregularities and diforders, even while its fprings are yet strong, and many of its parts entire; but if it escape these accidents, which may damage or deftroy it long before the term of its ufual duration, it muft, at laft, wear away and perish. During the period to which our fpecies is generally confined, hope and fear, grief and joy, occafionally fill the bofom; but when we pafs the common boundary P 2 |