SERMON XXXV.

FROM SEED*.

PART I

PSALM CXiii. 5.

ACCORDING TO THE TRANSLATION IN THE BOOK OF COMMON

PRAYER.

Who is like unto the Lord our God, who hath his dwelling so high; and yet humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven and earth?

Ir is one great recommendation of the sacred writings, that they have expressed themselves with more justness of thought concerning the nature of God, than any other compositions whatever. What the vanity of science, falsely so called, has ascribed to nature, or to second causes, exclusive of the First, is by them resolved into the immediate will and providence of God.

We have no less reason to beg our daily brad of Almighty God, than the Israelites had to pray

Jeremiah Seed died 1747.

for their sustenance, when they were fed with manna from heaven. For, that a handful of seed. should multiply to so prodigious a degree, and that the fields should stand so thick with corn, that they should laugh and sing, must be ascribed to God; as well as that the food of angels was given from above to the Israelites: because a regular and uniform effect, in which there are evident traces of wisdom and benevolence, stands as much in need of the operation of a wise and benevolent Being, to produce it constantly at set times and seasons; as an occasional and extraordinary phenomenon does, to produce it Now and THEN, when an extraordinary occasion offers.

No beings, but what have life and sense, can properly be termed CAUSES. All other things, being dead and inactive, are only like tools in the hand of a workman. And whatever we ascribe to matter must be resolved into His will, who uses matter as an instrument. But, surely, I need not insist upon this point further: for, to deny a Providence in general, is, in effect, to deny a God. A particular Providence, however, is clogged with some difficulties. In order, therefore, to remove them, I shall state the doctrine of a particular Providence.

We must not expect, that God's particular Providence will ever interpose, where our own endeavours are sufficient. For that would be to encourage sloth and idleness, instead of countenancing and supporting virtue. Nor ought we to expect

to be relieved from difficulties and distresses, into which our own misconduct has plunged us. But when, without any fault of our own, our affairs are so perplexed and entangled, that human assistance can be of no avail; then we must have recourse to God, that he would give us wisdom to conduct us through all the labyrinths and intricacies of life, resolution to encounter difficulties, and strength to overcome them. And thus the prayer which Josephus puts into the mouth of Moses, before his passage through the Red Sea, is as just as it is beautiful. Impassable rocks barred his escape one way; the numerous host of the Egyptians blocked up others. Before him stood the Red Sea. In this situation, Moses, upon the brink of ruin, applies himself thus to God: "Lord, thou knowest that no strength or wisdom of ours can here be of any significance. It is in thy power alone to find out a way for the deliverance of this people, who, by thy command and under thy direction, have left Egypt. Despairing of all other help, we flee to thee alone for succour: Lord, let it come speedily. Give us a full proof of thy almighty power. We are surrounded with difficulties, great, and insurmountable by us; but to thee slight and inconsiderable. The sea is thine, and it obstructs out progress: the mountains that hem us round are thine also. Speak but the word-the one shall be levelled; the other turned into dry land.”

This was a difficulty too hard for any but the

Deity to remove but, in common cases, it is best to rely upon Providence, as if all human endeavours were useless; and yet to exert ourselves as vigorously, as if Providence never interposes. For God will not prostitute his power to supersede our endeavours as to what we can do; He will only supply what we cannot do.

Neither must we expect that Providence will so far consult our private interest, as to counteract those general laws which are calculated for the good of the whole. It is for the interest even of that very person who is uneasy because the order of nature is not changed in compliance with his wishes, that God has given things a law, which shall not be broken upon every frivolous occasion. For, if the Deity should depart from his uniform manner of acting upon his application in any material point; why should he not do so to gratify the importunity of others? The consequence of which would be, we should live in a world, where there would be no harmony, no order, no law: but all would be confusion and anarchy. God can and does govern the rational world, without subverting and unhinging the frame of the natural.

We are not to expect that Providence at our request will grant what we imagine a blessing: there being several things which we think to be blessings, that are not so upon the whole, or not so Nor must we hope, that Providence will prevent every calamity, that may befal even the

to us.

good. All that the assertors of a particular Providence contend for, is, that, if he does not think fit to prevent it, he will either support them under it, or rescue them from it, or make all things, at the last, work together for good, to them who love him. To annex worldly happiness constantly and universally to virtue, and worldly misery to vice, would lay too great a bias and restraint upon our inclinations it would over-rule the will, and necessitate it to be virtuous. This life would not be a state of probation and trial. There would be no temptation to vice, if all the advantages lay on the side of virtue.

And now, having stated the doctrine of a particular Providence, I proceed to prove the possibility of it.

The economy of nature may, in a great measure, be unalterable, as to the grand and fundamental laws, by which the universe is governed (such are those respecting the revolution of the heavenly bodies, the alternation of day and night, and the succession of the seasons) but there are subordinate and inferior laws, which God may change without any apparent alteration. And occasionally to recede from them, under proper limitations, at the instance of particular persons, may be no detriment to the universe, and yet of great importance to individuals. Such are the laws relating to the course of infectious and pestilential vapours, the state of the atmosphere, &c. Nay, however decisively men