the more folemn completion of that which we practised daily in our health. And most of us have fo much to rectify, and all have so much need to do it well, be it more or less, that we should not fail to take the earliest and surest time for it; when it will be most acceptable to God, and most advantageous to our own fouls; when there will be least ground for doubt and scruple afterwards, whether we left our fins, or they left us; whether we acted on ingenuous, or servile motives. But whatever we have unhappily omitted till fickness calls, let us then at least set about it instantly; not be ashamed of repenting, or being known to repent, for it is in finning that the only shame lies; not be satisfied with feeling, and owning to men a sense of our guilt, as far as it relates to them; but tonfefs to God our disobedience and ingratitude to him, with the deeper contrition, the longer we have neglected it. Hezekiah's prayer indeed hath no confeffion of fin, but his thanksgiving afterwards hath a very strong one: Thou hast cast all my fins behind thy back*. And therefore, when he pleaded at first, Remember, O Lord, I beseech thee, how I have walked before thee with a perfect heart, and done that which is good in thy fight †, we should understand him to mean, that as a king he had been zealous for God's true religion, to which consequently his life was of importance; not that as a man he had not deferved death, which all men have. And if we are convinced in any due degree what our deferts have been, we shall entreat the divine mercy, not for the merits, I said it before, and I say it again, not for the merits of our good actions, for the best of them are faulty; not for the sake of our repentance, which in strictness undoes nothing that we have done amiss, and therefore (though our natural power extends no further) cannot intitle us even to exemption from punishment, much less to eternal rewards; but folely through his fatisfaction and interceffion, who died to obtain both for us.

A just sense of this invaluable blessing will effectually incline us to join with our thankful humiliations, a zealous performance of whatever duties are oppofite to our past fins, and whatever mortifications are proper to correct our prefent evil tendencies. But no useless and fanciful observances, nor any austerities, calculated only to give uneafiness for the fake of giving it, VOL. I. should

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should ever enter into a christian's penitence. For such things take off the attention from real obligations, and fix it on them, selves, as matters of the greatest moment: whence the punctual performers of them are tempted to spiritual pride; and others, who fee this great stress laid on them, are induced either to esteem them without cause, or to disesteem religion, falfely supposing it to enjoin them. Therefore the scripture directs returning offenders neither to empty forms, nor to the rigours of corporal discipline, any farther than to such occasional use of fafting, as may be found beneficial, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with their God*. And least of all should the fick be harrassed with needless burdens. For they have one already, of no small weight, laid on them by God himself; I mean the disease which he hath inflicted, and bearing that as they ought, will feldom fail to be labour sufficient.

Merely feeling the pressure of it indeed will do us no fervice, without attending properly to him from whom it comes. On the contrary, when God faith, In vain have I Smitten your children, they received no correction †, it implies that they were hardened in wickedness; whereas, when the voice of the Lord crieth, the man of wisdom will bear the rod, and who hath appointed it ‡. Yet still worse would it be, if, perceiving whence our fufferings proceed, we should be wrongly affected towards the author of them; either with their blafphemous vehemence, of whom the scripture foretels, They shall fret themselves, and curse their God, and look upwards §; or with his profane def pondency, who faid, This evil is from the Lord, why should I wait for the Lord any longer ? But if we apply to him with humble confeffion, and fincere amendment, like Ephraim in Feremiah, thou baft chastised me, and I was chastised; after I was instructed, I fmote upon my thigh, I was ashamed, yea, even confounded ** : we shall have cause to say with the Pfalmist, It is good for me that I have been in trouble, that I might learnthy statutest. We should learn our duty from God's mercies, but if these make us forget him, chastisement is fitly employed to make us recollect him. I will cause you to pass under the rod, and bring you into the bond of the covenant ; and ye shall remember your ways, and all your doings, wherein ye have been defiled:-and ye shall loathe your

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Selves in your own fight, and know that I am the Lord*. By this shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged; and this is all the fruit to take away his fins t. When therefore God hideth his face from us, and we are troubled with uneasiness of body or mind, though it may be only to make us, like the captain of our falvation, perfect through fufferings §; yet we shall do well to inquire with humility, though not with causeless terror, whether his purpose is not what the prophet declares in his name: I will go, and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence; in their affliction they will feek me early. If on self-examination we find little or nothing but common frailties to charge upon ourselves, we shall have abundant reason to rejoice in all our tribulations, and be thankful to his preventing grace. If we discover grosser failings, our concern is, to anfwer the divine expectation, as the next verse directs: Come, and let us return unto the Lord, for he hath torn, and he will healus; be bath Smitten, and be will bind us up **. Such behaviour will procure us the removal, or mitigation of our fufferings at present, if infinite wisdom sees it best for us. But however this be, it will certainly obtain for us that future recompence of everlasting felicity, which the words, that follow there naturally express, perhaps with an allusion to the time of our Lord's refurrection, the foundation and first-fruits of the general one: After two days will be revive us, in the third day be will raise us up, and we shall live in his fight ††.

SERMON XXIV.

THE DUTIES OF THE SICK.

ISAIAH Xxxviii. 1, 2.

In those days was Hezekiah fick unto death: and Ifaiah the prophet, the Son of Amos, came unto him, and faid unto him, Thus faith the Lord, fet thine house in order: for thou Shalt die, and not live. Then Hezekiah turned his face towards the wall, and prayed unto the Lord.

FROM these words I have proposed to shew you the duties of fick perfons.

I. Respecting their fellow-creatures; expressed by the direction, fet thine house in order :

II. Respecting more immediately God and their own fouls; intimated in the good king's behaviour, Then Hezekiah prayed unto the Lord.

The former of these I have finished, and made some progress in the latter: under which, after setting before you, in general, the neceffity of having regard to God in our fickness; I proceeded to the particular obligations, first of faith in his word (giving at the fame time directions to those who are disquieted by doubts and fcruples); then of self-examination in his prefence; then of fuch repentance as our case requires. And here I infisted largely on the danger of trusting to a death-bed forrow; and yet the usefulness of feeling and expressing then, rather than never, a due concern for our past fins: which, I cbserved to you, must always be accompanied with earnest petitions for pardon, offered up in the name of our bleffed Redeemer; and for assistance from the grace of the Holy Spirit; with rational and scriptural, not fuperftitious, proofs of our humiliation; humiliation; and a hearty defire to amend and improve under the difcipline of heaven.

I now go on to remind you farther, that together with thefe, the fick ought to be very constant in every other exercise of private piety. For as they are cut off from active life, they have more leifure for religious contemplation. And as they want all the improvement and comfort which they can have, so they will receive the most of both, by frequent lifting up of their hearts to the God of patience and confolation*, the giver of all good, in addresses carefully suited to their present condition. But ufually, if not always, the right manner of doing this will be, not to fet yourselves tasks of reading, or meditating, or praying, just so often, or so long; but to observe with impartiality and difcretion, what really edifies, and what only flattens you; as also what your strength and spirits will permit, without suffering by it. And if there be need, you should allow other perfons of skill and seriousness to judge for you in this matter; following their decifions with fome degree of implicit obedience. And should it prove, that with your best management you can neither pray to God, nor think of him, with any thing near the affection and fervency, which you find expressed in many good books, and shewn by many good Chriftians, when fick; but in a poor, imperfect, broken, languid manner: bear with yourselves for what you cannot help; and be afsured, that your heavenly Father will bear with you, and will accept the service of which your weakness is capable, be it ever so small.

Nay further, should your condition be such as to require a confiderable share of your hours to be spent in a thoughtless trifling way; fubmit to it, as part of your duty; and do it without fcruple. Were you indeed to make amusements your choice, as the means of banishing serious thought, that would be a great and dangerous fin. To throw away the time of fickhess after throwing away that of health; and imagine it too foon for you to think of religion while you are well; and too much for you when you are ill; is a method which must end unhappily. But in the necessary intervals of attention to better things; when, if you were not to spend your hours thus, you would fpend them worfe; when your spirits would fink,

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