ftiled often the Saviour of finners; but you "know "neither the Father nor the Son." You know not God as Creator, nor, by confequence, your obligations and duty to him, or your apostacy and departure from both. You know not what fin is, and, therefore, you cannot know a Sayiour. If ever you come to true religion at all, light will break in upon you in your darkness, you will no more be able to forget God, he will follow you into your fecret. chambers, he will come home upon you, and affault you, as it were, with the reality of his prefence, with the fanctity and purity of his nature, and the terrible majefty of his power. O how great is the effect of a real discovery of the divine glory, whether in the word, or by the providence of God; to a faint or to a finner. Hear how Job expreffes himself. "I have heard of thee by the hearing "of the ear, but now mine eye feeth thee, "wherefore I abhor myfelf, and repent in duft "and afhes *." We have the fame thing well defcribed by the prophet Ifaiah, as the effect of divine power in defolating judgments. "Enter "into the rock, and hide thee in the duft, for "the fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his σε majefty. The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men fhall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be ex "alted in that day. And they fhall go into the - "holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the "earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory "of his majefty, when he arifeth to shake ter"ribly the earth. In that day a man shall caft "his idols of filver, and his idols of gold, which "they made each one for himself to worship, to "the moles and to the bats, to go into the clefts. "of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged "rocks, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory "of his majesty, when he arifeth to shake ter"ribly the earth +." So foon as it pleases God to open your eyes upon himself, with whom you have to do, it will humble you in the duft, it will discover your danger, it will make redemption precious to you, and the name of a Saviour unfpeakably dear. 2. The fame thing fhews the danger of error, as well as ignorance. Among many loofe and pernicious principles, which are zealously spread, and blindly embraced in this age, one of the most prevailing and dangerous is, the innocence of, error. "O, fay fome, every man is to enquire. freely, and each will embrace what appears to It is no matter what a "him to be the truth. "man believes, if his life be good. Even he who mistakes, may be as acceptable to God as his oppofite, if he is equally fincere." Now there ! It Ifaiah ii, 10, 11, 19, 20, 21. is no doubt, that liberty to enquire freely is an ineftimable bleffing, and impartiality in religious enquiries an indifpenfible duty. But the above maxim becomes falfe and dangerous by being carried an exceffive length; and it is carried to this excess by the favour of two fuppofitions, which are false and groundless. The maxim is applied frequently to justify an open and virulent oppofition to the most important truths of the gofpel; nay, fometimes, even a denial of all religion, natural and revealed. To be able to apply it thus, it is neceffary to fuppofe that false opinions will have as good an influence upon the heart as true. If this is the case, the boafted privilege of free enquiry is not worth having, and all the labour bestowed on the fearch of truth is entirely thrown away. Another supposition contained in the above maxim is, That a person may be as fincere in embracing grofs falshoods, as in adhering to the truth. If this be true, our Creator hath not given us the means to distinguish the one from the other, which is the highest impeachment both of his wifdom and goodness. Such perfons do not confider, that a corrupt inclination in the heart brings a biafs on the judgment, and that when men do not " like to retain God in their knowledge," he frequently, in his righteous judgment, gives them up to a reprobate mind. Nay, when they reject his truth truth from an inward hatred of its purity, he is faid to fend them "ftrong delufions," as in the following paffage : "Because they received "not the love of the truth, that they might be "faved, for this caufe God shall fend them ftrong "delufion, that they fhould believe a lie, that 66 they all might be damned who believed not "the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteouf"nefs *." But the nature of regeneration will ferve, in a peculiar manner, to fhew the danger of error. If men form wrong notions of God, if they love and worship, and refemble a falfe God, they cannot be renewed, they are not like, and therefore are unfit for the prefence of, the true. Be not deceived, he cannot deny himfelf, and therefore "there is no fellowship of righteousness with unrighteousness, no communion of light with darkness, no concord of "Chrift with Belial +." I must here, to prevent mistakes, obferve that this ought, by no means, to be extended to differences of fmaller moment, under which I rank all those which regard only the externals of religion. I am fully convinced, that many of very different parties and denominations are building upon the one "foundation laid in Zion" for a finner's hope, and that their diftance and alienation from one another in affection, is very much † 2 Cor. vi. 14, 15. 2 Theff, ii, 10, 11, 12. to to be regretted. Many will not meet together on earth for the worship of God, who fhall have but one temple, where all the faithful," from "the eaft, and from the weft, from the north, "and from the fouth, fhall fit down with Abra ham, and Ifaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom "of their" eternal "Father." But, after all, I must needs alfo believe, that it is poffible to make fhipwreck of the faith. This appears plainly from the following, as well as many other paffages of fcripture: "But there were false pro"phets alfo among the people, even as there fhall be falfe teachers among you, who privily "fhall bring in damnable herefies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring 66 upon themselves swift destruction *." If any take up falfe notions of God, or expect fanctification and eternal life in any other way than he hath pointed out in his word, though they may now build their hope on a fond imagination that he is fuch an one as themselves, they fhall at laft meet with a dreadful difappointment in this awful fentence, "Depart from me, I know "ye not, ye workers of iniquity." |