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and the ftars be darkened, and all the comforts and joys of life be fled and gone.

Be not deceived, O man, whofoever thou art; for God is not mocked. He will not be put off by us with the days in which we ourselves have no pleasure. Offer up thyfelf a living facrifice, and not a carcafe, if thou wouldft be accepted. Do not provoke and affront the living God, by offering up to him faint fpirits, and feeble hands, and dim eyes, and a dead heart. He hath been bountiful to us, in giving us the beft bleflings of life, and all things richly to enjoy; and do we grudge him the most valuable part of our lives, and the years which we ourfelves have pleasure in? Do we thus requite the Lord? foolish people and unwife! Is the giver of all good things unworthy to receive from us any thing that is good? If we offer up the lame in facrifice, is it not evil? and if we offer up the blind, is it not evil? Offer it now to thy governor, and try if he will be pleafed with thee, and accept thy perfon. Hath God deserved fo ill at our hands, that we fhould forget and neglect him? and hath the devil deferved fo well of us, that we fhould be contented to spend the best part of our lives in his fervice, which is perfect flavery? Was he our creator, or can he make us happy? nay, does he not carry on a most malicious defign, to make us for ever miserable?

2. Let me urge those who have neglected this first and best opportunity of their lives, to repent quickly, and return to a better mind, left all opportunity of doing it be loft for ever, and their cafe become desperate and past remedy. Refolve to redeem, if it be poffible, the time which you should have improved. You have fquandered away too much already, wafte no more of this precious opportunity of life. You have deferred a neceffary work too long, delay it no longer. Do not delude yourfelves with vain hopes, that this work may be done at any time, and in an inftant; and that if you can but fashion your last breath into, Lord, have mercy upon me, this will prevail with God, and make atonement for the long courfe of a wicked and finful life. What ftrange thoughts have men of God and heaven, what extravagant conceits of the little evil of fin, and the great casiness of repentance, that can impofe upon themfelves at this rate?

Bethink

Bethink yourselves better in time; confider, and fhew yourfelves men. What will you do in the day of your diftrefs, who have neglected God in your most flourishing and profperous condition? what will you fay to him in a dying hour, who fcarce ever had one serious thought of him all your life? Can you have the face at that time to befpeak him in this manner: "Lord, 66 now the world and my lufts have left me, and I feel "myself ready to fink into eternal perdition, I lay hold 66 upon thy mercy, to deliver my foul from going down "into the pit. I have heard ftrange things of thy good"nefs, and that thou art merciful even to a miracle. "This is that which I always trufted to, that, af ter a long life of fin and vanity, thou wouldst at laft "be pacified with a few penitent words and fighs at "the hour of death. Let me not, I pray thee, de difappointed of this hope, and put to confufion?"

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Is this an addrefs fit to be made to a wife man, much lefs to the all-wife and juft judge of the world? And yet this feems to be the plain interpretation of the late and forced application of a great and habitual finner to almighty God in his laft extremity, and when he is just giving up the ghoft, and going to appear before his dreadful tribunal.

I fay again, let no man deceive you with vain words, or with vain hopes, or with false notions of a flight and fudden repentance; as if heaven were an hospital, founded on purpose to receive all fick and maimed perfons; that when they can live no longer to the lufts of the flesh, and the finful pleasures of this world, can but put up a cold and formal petition, to be admitted there.

No, no as fure as God is true, they shall never fee the kingdom of God, who, instead of feeking it in the first place, make it their laft refuge and retreat; and, when they find themfelves under the fentence of death and damnation, only to avoid prefent execution, and fince there is no other remedy, do at laft bethink themfelves of getting to heaven, and fall upon their knees to petition the great judge of the world, that they may be transported thither.

Can any man in reafon expect that fuch a petition will be granted? I tell you nay; but except you repent soon

er, and at a fitter time, and after a better fashion, you fhall certainly perish. As much as God defires the falvation of men, he will not prostitute heaven, and set the gates of it wide open to those who only fly to it in extremity, but never fought it in good earnest, nor indeed do now care for it or defire it for any other reason, but to excuse them from going to hell. They have no va→ lue for heaven, because they are in no ways fit for it; but yet they think hell to be the worse place of the two. The ever bleffed God is himself abundantly fufficient for his own happiness, and does not need our company to make any addition to it: nor yet is heaven fo defolate a place, or fo utterly void of inhabitants, that, like some newly discovered plantation, it should be glad to receive the most vile and profligate perfons, the fcum and refufe of mankind. There are an innumerable company of glorious angels, much nobler creatures than the best of men, to people thofe bleffed regions: Thousands of thousands continually stand before God, and ten thousand times ten thousand minifter unto him.

We do abfolutely ftand in need of God to make us happy; but he hath no need of us to help him to be fo. God indeed is fo good, as to defire our happiness as earneftly as if it were ncceffary to his own: but he is happy in and from himself; and without him it is impoffible we should be happy; nay, we must of ncceffity be for ever miferable.

To conclude: If we would have God to accept us in a dying hour, and our bleffed Saviour to remember us, now he is in his kingdom, let us think of him betimes, and acquaint ourselves with him; that we may be at peace, now, before the evil days come, and the years draw nigh when we shall fay, we have no pleasure in them.

O that men were wife, that they understood this, that they would confider their latter end! Which God of his infinite goodness grant that we may all feriously lay to heart, in this our day; and may learn betimes fo to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom; for his mercies fake in Jefus Chrift. To whom, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, be all honour and glory, now and for ever. Amen.

The

O R,

An ANSWER to the treatife of Mr. I. S. intitled, Sure footing, &c.

To my honoured and learned friend Dr. S T I L

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LINGFLEET.

SIR,

Have, with a great deal of pleasure and fatisfaction, read over your book, which I find in every part anfwerable to its title, viz. A rational account of the grounds of the Proteftant religion. And now I thank you for it, not only as a private favour, but a publick benefit. No fooner had I perufed it, but I met with a difcourfe, intitled, Sure footing in Chriftianity. And although I have no fmall prejudice againft books with conceited titles, yet I was tempted to look into this, because it pretended to contain animadverfions on fome passages in your book which I had fo lately read over. Upon perufal of which animadverfions, I found, that the author of them had attacked (and in his own opinion confuted) a page or two in your book. This drew me on to take a view of his main difcourfes; which, because they are in great vogue among fome of his own party, and do, with an unafual kind of confidence and oftentation, pretend to the newest and most exact fashion of writing controverfy, as being all along demonftrative, and built upon felf-evident principles; therefore I refolved thoroughly to examine them, that I might difcover, if I could, upon what fo firm and folid foundations this high and mighty confidence was built.

But, before I had entered upon this undertaking, I met with a letter from the author of Sure footing to his anfwerer, directing him how he ought to demean himself in his anfwer. In which letter, though there be many things liable to great exception; yet, because I am unwilling to be

diverted

diverted from the main question, I shall not argue with him about any of thofe matters; only take leave to ufe the fame liberty in managing my answer, which he hath affumed to himfelf in prefcribing laws to me about it: therefore, without taking any further notice of his letter, I addrefs myself to his book.

PART I.

The explication and state of the queftion.

SECT. I. The explication of the terms of the question.

"T

§1. THE queftion he propounds to himself to debate, is, "What is the rule of faith?" In order to the refolution whereof, he endeavours,

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First, To fix the true notion of these two terms, rule, and faith which way of proceeding I cannot but allow to be very proper and reasonable; but I can by no means think his explication of thofe terms to be fufficient. He tells us, that "a rule is that which is able to regulate or guide him that ufeth it." In which defcription, as in many other paffages of his book, he is plainly guilty of that which he taxeth in Mr. Whitby, p. 180.; that is, the confounding of a rule and a guide, by making regulating and guiding to be equivalent words. But for this I am no further concerned, than to take notice of it by the way. The fault which I find in this definition, is, that it doth not make the thing plainer than it was before; fo that no man is the wifer for it, nor one jot nearer knowing what a rule is. He pretends to tell Englishmen what a rule is; and, for their clearer underftanding of this word, he explains it by a word lefs removed from the Latin, "A rule is that which is able to "regulate him that useth it :" just as if a man should go about to explain what a lawgiver is, by faying, " He "is one that hath the power of legiflation." Of the two he had much better have faid, that " a rule is a

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