SERMON XVII.

LA M. iii. 40.

Let us fearch and try our Ways, and turn again

TH

to the Lord.

HE gracious and wife Creator of all Things, as he hath made known to every Creature, by a fecret Instinct, the Way of Life which belongs to its Frame and Condition: fo to Man he hath shewn, both by his Affections and his Understanding, what is good, and what he requires of him. Yet having placed him in a State of Trial, in which thefe inward Principles might be perverted and mislead him, he hath graciously fuperadded external Manifeftations of his Will for our furer and completer Guidance: thus making our Rule of Duty evident and obligatory in the highest Degree. No Course of Action is more plainly fuited to the Nature of any Agent, than Religion and Virtue is to ours. For what can be more evidently natural, than for a reasonable Being to make Reason his

govern

governing Principle; for a focial Being to do justly, and love Mercy; and for a created one to walk humbly with his God? Agreeably therefore to this peculiar Destination, which allots to us Employments worthy to fill up an eternal Exiftence, whereas inferior Animals arrive very foon, without contributing almoft any Thing to it themselves, at the finall Perfection of which they are capable, and there ftop: Man is qualified, and, as Revelation fully affures us, defigned, for endlefs Improvement in Goodnefs and Happiness, but fuch as fhall depend on his own Care and Induftry, excited and affifted by the Grace of God.

For this Purpofe, together with an inward Perception of what is right and fit for us to do, and what is otherwife, we have alfo a Faculty of Self-Reflexion, which, prefenting us to our own View, fhews us, what we have been and are. The Exercife of this Faculty is expreffed in the Text by fearching and trying our Ways; and elsewhere by examining and proving ourfelves, and knowing the Thoughts of our Hearts'; which Phrafes have their peculiar Import and Ufe. For as the Temper and State of our Hearts is the great Thing that we have to be b I Cor. xi. 28. 2 Cor. xiii. 5.

a Mic. vi. 8.

c Dan. ii. 30.

concerned

concerned about in Religion: fo the Confideration of our Ways, or the Actions in which our Temper is exerted and fhewn, muft difcover to us the Motives that influence it: juft as, in the material Objects that furround us, we learn, from particular Facts and Appearances, the general Laws by which the Frame of Things is governed.

This Faculy of moral Reflexion, and the Self-Approbation or Diflike arifing from it, which we commonly call by the Name of Confcience, is the Character that diftinguishes Man from the Beings below him: it is the Principle that God hath endued with an evident Right to direct our Lives: and, according as we employ or difregard it, we fhall advance back in real Religion.

or go

The Seeds of every Virtue were planted in the Soul of Man originally, each in its due Order and Proportion, without any Mixture of Evil. Yet even then, for Want of due Cultivation by our first Parents, they were fatally blasted, instead of growing up to the Perfection for which they were defigned. But now, when our inward Frame is fo unhappily disordered and weakened by their Fall, Watchfulness over it is become unspeakably more neceffary than it was

at

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at first. And fince, with a Nature thus prone to err, we are a confiderable Time from our Birth before we reflect on our Actions at all j and, after that, do it very imperfectly; it cannot fail, but our own bad Inclinations, and the Cuftoms of a bad World, must have led us all afide, more or lefs, from the right Path, before we knew distinctly which it was. Nor have we, many of us, of us, it may be feared, made fo early

or so effectual an Ufe, as we might, of the Faculty of Self-Government, in that Season of warm and hafty Paffions which quickly follows the firft confiderable Ufe of Reafon. And, if not, we may be ftill furer of finding many Things within us that want Correction.

A great Part of thofe around us, we fee, are quite wicked. And in the few that are feriously good, the most fuperficial Obferver and most charitable Interpreter will difcerna great Number of Faults and Imperfections unreformed. Since therefore Failures in Point of Duty are, from the Nature of the Thing, to be apprehended, and have in Fact happened to all the reft of the World: if we were not ufually, by a most preposterous Kind of Negligence, less attentive to ourselves than to others, we should be likely to perceive the most Disorders in that

Breaft,

Breaft, with which we have the most Opportunities of being intimately acquainted. But, at least, there is Ground enough for us to examine, what our State really is: to fearch and try our Ways; that, if we have erred in any Thing, we may turn again to the Lord.

And though it is very apparent, that such a Resolution may have many good Confequences, and can have no bad ones, if executed in the Manner, which every Man's Reason, and the Word of God, will fuggeft to him: yet, for your further Encouragement and Direction, I thall lay before you particularly,

I. The Advantages that may arife from this Inquiry.

II. The chief Things requifite for performing it aright.

I. The Advantages that may arife from it. A confiderable Part of the wrong Conduct of Mankind proceeds, not fo much from any strong Inclination to do amifs, as from being fo unhappily thoughtless, that the flighteft Motive is enough to determine their Choice any Way. We engage at firft in this or that Sort of Behaviour, we scarce know why or how: then go on of Course in the Way we have set out in, without ever thinking whither it leads us; and