SERM. I. ; I fhall only add, that as it appears, from the example in the text, that bad men are fometimes ftruck with terror on account of their vices, and fully convinced of their unreasonable nature, and pernicious confequences, but foon wear off the impreffion, and continue their evil practices without being at all reformed we learn from hence, how ftrangely a course of habitual wickedness captivates and enflaves the mind: It is held in fuch ftrong fetters, that the finner has not refolution enough to return to the paths of virtue, tho' reafon and interest both demand it; nor to abandon his vices, notwithstanding he is perfuaded that they are a fource of reproach and dishonour, and have a direct tendency to mifery and ruin. Such a state of fervitude, in which our nobleft faculties, our intellectual and moral powers, are entirely fubjected to fense and appetite, is the lowest and most melancholy depravation of human nature; most ignominious in itself, and fatal in its effects. 2dly. We may obferve, from the text, what a miserable thing it is to have a con confcience burthened with guilt, in that SERM. a man dares not truft himself to think, for I. fear of being alarmed, and filled with terror and confufion. Felix does not feem to have been at all prone to fuperftition; or, in general, to have had any troublesome sense of his crimes. The flatteries of a court, and the amusements of grandeur and luxury, gave him no time to cool; and diverted all grave and ferious reflections. But when St. Paul began to difcourfe to him of the immutable obligations of juftice, against which he had been a moft heinous of fender, he immediately faw the vileness of his conduct, and trembled for the confequences of it. And the cafe is very much the fame with fuch as indulge to any other kind of vicious excefs. As long as they are amus'd with company, or engag'd in a hurry of business, or can keep their paffions inflam'd, and filence the voice of reafon and natural confcience by a courfe of intemperance, they may continue ftupid and infenfible. But when any thing happens that damps their gaiety, gives a fhock to the mind, and puts them upon B think SERM. thinking, they are foon rouz'd out of I. their lethargy, and entertain'd with none but dark and gloomy profpects. And nothing, furely, can be a more perverted state of mankind, than to derive all their relief, all their peace, from the fuppreffion or extinction of reafon; not to be able to ftand the deliberate judgment of their own minds, or bear those exercises of fedate and impartial reflection, which are their peculiar glory and happiness. Befides, as guilt is such an enemy to confideration, there is this dreadful circumftance attending it farther to aggravate and enhance its mifery, that it cuts off, in a great measure, the only poffible means of the finners recovery. 3dly, It is a very natural inference from the text, that inculcating the great duties of morality, and enforcing the practice of them from a regard to the future judgment, is true Gospel preaching; and answers, in the most effectual manner, the excellent defign of Chriftianity. Indeed the reason of the thing itself demonftrates, that to promote univerfal purity, and ftrengthen the obligations of virtue, which are eternal and immutable, a con formity formity to the moral perfections of God, SE RM. and the supreme rectitude and happiness I. of human nature, must be the ultimate view of every divine revelation. Without this, faith is no better than infidelity, nor orthodoxy than error; and external rites and folemnities of devotion, however dignified by a civil or ecclefiaftical authority, or even by a divine appointment, if they are confider'd as having an intrinfic goodness, and fubftituted in the room of the virtues of a holy life, are fo far from being parts of true religion, that they degenerate into acts of the most vile and impious fuperftition. And therefore if Christianity had, really, fubverted, in any instance, the religion of nature, or depretiated any effential branches of morality; nay, indeed if it had not represented them as of the first importance to mankind, infinitely preferable to speculations, myfteries, and alterable forms and modes of worship; notwithstanding the pomp of miracles, it would hardly have prov'd itself, to a wife and judicious enquirer, worthy of God, or useful to the world. SERM. I. To PREACH CHRIST is univerfally allowed to be the duty of every Chriftian minifter. But what doth it mean? Tis not to ufe his name as a charm, to work up our hearers to a warm pitch of enthusiasm, without any foundation of reafon to fupport it "Tis not to make his perfon and his of- That |